- Khalilzad may get talks started again
The visit to Islamabad by US Special Envoy on Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad was cause for optimism. It showed that the USA wanted to resume talks with the Taliban, which had been broken off by the USA itself, by no one less than President Donald Trump himself, over perceived Taliban perfidy in carrying out attacks in which US soldiers were being killed, while at the same time negotiating to end the fighting that has now lasted almost two decades. However, while there was ire at the Taliban’s apparent attempts at an improvement of their negotiation position through last-minute violence, it cannot have escaped notice in Washington that negotiations had advanced so far that a signing ceremony at Camp David was scheduled, which was what President Trump cancelled.
Therefore, the USA would hardly be beginning talks afresh with a tabula rasa. However, it would also have to recognise that it has lost credibility because of President Trump’s shenanigans, and that the Taliban would not be as willing to trust in the word of the negotiating team. At the same time, it needs to recognise that the Taliban cannot be absolved of all responsibility for the breakdown, and the most charitable explanation of the situation would be that the negotiating team has no control over the field commanders; which would mean that the USA could not rely on their commitments.
The most compelling force for a settlement is that President Trump wants a withdrawal to boost his re-election bid next year. At the same time, Pakistan needs to ensure that the withdrawal does not leave it as did the end of the Afghan jihad: carrying the baby, with none of the advantages and all of the disadvantages of an end to the fighting. Afghanistan and its people need peace the most after almost half a century of war after the Soviet invasion in 1979, but so do its neighbours. That makes Pakistan more interested than the USA in a settlement. It does not have merely an election strategy depending on peace, but its own future as well. True, relations with the USA do depend on the situation there, but Pakistan should realise that its long-term interests depend more on a stabilisation of Afghanistan more than any short-term goodies it might be able to extract from anybody else.
