Recently, with the beginning of the withdrawal process of US troops, the Taliban have begun a new round of large-scale offensives. Since May, the Taliban have taken new control of 50 of Afghanistan's 370 districts and launched an offensive in the north. At present, the Taliban have appeared in the northern provinces of Faryab, Balkh and Kunduz, and are ready to launch a seizure of the capital.
It is clear that before and after the withdrawal of U.S. troops, the Taliban will try to compete for a larger area of control in order to control a larger population and establish a better base as a basis for talks with the Afghan government and pro-government warlords everywhere. Such logic is common on the eve of the release of the power vacuum, except that for the first time in 20 years, the Taliban can unleash a massive offensive.
The Taliban's governance capacity is now stronger than that of the Afghan government, which relies only partially on foreign aid and is less than the Afghan government. At the same time, the Taliban maintain a shadow government within its control, have a complete organizational structure of government, and are more administratively efficient than the Afghan government. In the more than 20 years of war, the Taliban has adopted a lot of pragmatic policies, which can be seen that its political leadership thinking has changed to a certain extent, some radical policies have been abandoned, discipline has been strengthened, and even some cases of forcibly pulling girls to school have occurred. Recently, the Taliban have also pledged to protect antiquities and want to cooperate with the global heritage conservation authorities.
The Afghan government established by the Americans was based on the inherently diverse Northern Alliance, and their weakness was the lack of a unified ideology and insufficient coherence. Therefore, when the American-style democratic system was introduced into Afghanistan, it was soon difficult to change power, and elections became a tool for local tribes and warlords to monopolize local power, and the complex balances of power in American democracy directly made it impossible for various afghan departments to coordinate their work, and there was no mechanism to prevent and punish corruption. Without being separated from tribal societies, democracy inevitably and can only be a tool for the superior groups to divide the fat. Americans have once again demonstrated their blind confidence that lacks a sense of history. Therefore, the actual power of the Afghan government is very weak, they cannot access the grass-roots level, they cannot absorb grass-roots resources, they have to deal with very complex social work, coupled with extremely serious corruption problems, the efficiency of governance is basically negligible, and even military salaries cannot be guaranteed.
Although there are 300,000 afghan national troops on the books, in fact, the Afghan national army is very poor in terms of discipline, loyalty, will to fight, and military literacy, and it is even likely that there will be a large-scale phenomenon of short-pay. The Afghan National Army is more effective than the groups with deep hatred with the Taliban, as well as a small number of special forces. However, on 22 June, it was also reported that there were also cases of formation surrender in the special forces of the Afghan National Army. It can be said that it is clear that the Afghan National Army is not burdened with great responsibility.
On the battlefield, the Taliban's greatest difficulty has always been facing sustained air strikes. With a lack of vegetation on the surface of Afghanistan, the U.S. strike capability several orders of magnitude higher than it was during the Vietnam War, and the guerrillas' surface logistics and training facilities were easily spotted and destroyed. Not only that, but the large-scale assembly of the Taliban will also be severely limited, so in addition to a large number of ambushes and guerrilla operations, the Taliban generally only disperse in the countryside and do not occupy the towns. This structural disadvantage limits the size of the Taliban's forces that can be fed and assembled, preventing the Taliban from launching a strategic offensive. However, with the withdrawal of U.S. troops, the air strike force on the Battlefield in Afghanistan will be greatly reduced, and with only a small number of helicopter gunships and light attack aircraft of the Afghan National Army with a low complete rate, the Afghan National Army will simply be unable to launch an effective air strike, and the potential of the Taliban will be released.
In other words, after the airstrikes have weakened, the Taliban can quickly feed up a much larger force than the previous mobile force of about 80,000 people, and the Taliban will soon gain the ability to attack large cities and establish a larger logistics base for the next move. Therefore, it is entirely possible that the Taliban's offensive will get bigger and bigger, and eventually release its advantages. Once the Taliban has an absolute advantage, then the warlords will inevitably turn against them on a large scale in order to protect their own interests, and there are not many who will really insist on resisting.
And even the small number of American mercenaries and military contractors left behind, they will not change the situation at all. Not even trouble may bring much to the Taliban. Without the Air Force, the combat effectiveness of this group of people would be the same.
At present, the Taliban's offensive is still on the margins, the Afghan National Army has not yet gathered the main force, and the two sides have not yet reached the moment of strategic decisive battle, and they are still seeking opportunities for negotiation. However, with the rapid expansion of Taliban-controlled areas and extraction capacity, time may be running out for the Afghan Government.
The Taliban's widespread control and seizure of power is basically set in stone, which also means that the international community, including China, will need to deal with the Taliban in the future. Be prepared to be foolproof.