2RHPZ
05-22-2004, 08:33 AM
The last battle
Part 1: Exit Osama, enter Hekmatyar
By Pepe Escobar
ASADABAD, eastern Afghanistan - It's 7am in dirt-poor, semi-devastated Martyr's
Square in this town in the heart of Kunar province. The sun is already shining
high and the big, brash American anti-terrorist show is in town.
And what a show it is. Nine vehicles, ranging from Humvees to Toyota HiLux
vehicles customized with machine guns, carrying as many as six soldiers each,
all engineered to raise serious hell, take possession of the square. The whole
town is watching. A commando group climbs up the rickety stairs to the balcony
of the Istiqlal - the only hotel in town and whose unbelievably filthy washrooms
are crammed with graffiti of the new jihad against America - and engages in a
search-and-destroy operation against two "culprits", as the local Pashtuns put
it: this Asia Times Online correspondent and his companion, Pashto-speaking,
Peshawar-based journalist Majeed Baber.
The Special Forces are relatively polite - but firm. Identity documents are
checked and then digital still photos and video footage is erased - under severe
vigilance. Next time, the cameras will be confiscated. Although the whole
process is totally illegal, all is justified in the name of the "tense" security
situation. Scott, one of the soldiers, is a little more affable than the others,
who share a uniform blank, psychopath-style gaze. Scott confirms on the record -
and he will be the only one to do so - that the real mission is "to get
Hekmatyar", the former Afghan premier and famed mujahideen warlord, Gulbuddin
Hekmatyar, leader of the Hezb-i-Islami Afghanistan (Islamic Party).
Scott argues the footage and photos might fall into the wrong hands. "They might
see how many we are, what we are doing." As if "they" didn't know already. Some
intelligence information is exchanged and the show departs with a bang to look
for the bad guys. Later, the whole town will keep coming back to ask in utter
perplexity, "What were the Americans telling you? Have you done anything wrong?"
Make no mistake. This is it. One year after September 11, this is the ultimate
frontline, the last, crucial battle in the new Afghan war - as the best
Pakistan-Afghanistan insiders have been predicting for months. Or maybe the
battle is just beginning. The fact is that now between 300 and 400 American
Special Forces - according to different estimations of local Pashtun commanders
- are now based in Kunar in hot pursuit of the newly-promoted number one "dead
or dead" enemy in the war against terrorism in Afghanistan: Hekmatyar, the
Pashtun leader and the only premier in history with the dubious distinction of
shelling his own capital, Kabul, in mid-1992, causing the death of as many as
25,000 people, until his bases were destroyed by the Taliban in early 1995.
Even though the war against terrorism costs roughly US$1 billion a day, Osama
bin Laden has not been found. Ayman "The Surgeon" Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda's
number two, has not been found. Taliban supremo Mullah Omar - who escaped from
B-52 bombing last November on the back of a Honda 50cc motorcycle - has not been
found. So the new bogeyman is Hekmatyar, who is gathering forces for his new
jihad to drive foreign troops out of Afghanistan.
Scores of international journalists are gathering at the Tora Bora to
"commemorate" September 11 - perhaps hoping to shoot a bin Laden video in one of
the myriad caves in which he was reputed to have hidden before escaping well
before the advancing US troops arrived. Asia Times Online, instead, is trying to
confirm privileged information according to which Hekmatyar is hiding somewhere
in Kunar; former mujahideen leader "Professor" Abdul Rassoul Sayyaf - renamed by
his Arab patrons Abd al-Rabb al-Rasul Sayyaf - has been to Kunar; and bin Laden
and al-Zawahiri may or may not have recently been in Kunar.
The American Special Forces - housed in a huge compound that used to be the
local jail on the outskirts of Asadabad - have been camped since the end of
June; in the beginning they were less than a dozen, now they're hundreds, but
still they haven't found what they are looking for. The search - for Hekmatyar,
for al-Qaeda, for supporters, for clues in the middle of ever-shifting
alliances, for escape routes - is a complex puzzle. There's only one way to go -
and it is to criss-cross information volunteered by all the major players. What
we find is a dizzying web of political, military, tribal and religious friction.
In Hekmatyar America has a formidable foe, as the Soviets found out to their
cost in their Afghanistan adventure in the 1980s. He issued an anti-American
fatwa in June, and last week he reconfirmed a jihad against "American invaders"
and the "persecution of Pashtuns". His Hezb-i-Islami Afghanistan now runs the
show and Hekmatyar can count on hundreds of loyal and very experienced
commanders - such as Maulana Jalaluddin Haqqani, the former number one military
commander of the Taliban. Al-Qaeda is collaborating with Hezb-i-Islami, but only
in a supporting role.
The Hezb-i-Islami - 75 percent of it made up of Pashtuns - is the most
revolutionary and disciplined of all the Afghan Islamist parties. It's nothing
remotely similar to a bunch of turbans roaming around in pick-up trucks, as
often the Taliban were. The Hezb is a modern organization. Recruitment and
promotion is based on skill and merit - and not on social roles or how well one
can recite the Koran. Hezb leaders have all been educated in Afghanistan - not
in Pakistani madrassas (religious schools). Hekmatyar is a radical Islamist.
During the anti-Soviet jihad his party was the absolute favorite of the Afghan
refugees in Pakistan, where Islamabad helped the Hezb control 250 schools - from
which 43,500 students graduated. These students are the core of the party's new
generation, and they make up most of the soldiers of Hekmatyar's conventional
military force, the Lashkar-i-Isar (Army of Sacrifice).
During the anti-Soviet jihad, Hekmatyar received tens of millions of dollars
from Libya and Iraq. And prior to Saddam Hussein invading Kuwait in 1990, the
Saudi and Kuwaiti governments and private donors had provided as much as a
billion dollars to Hekmatyar. The Hezb was also the darling of Pakistan's Inter-
Services
Intelligence (ISI) and the Islamic conservative wahhabis from Saudi Arabia. It
was also the favorite of moderate Pakistani generals and - the icing on the cake
- the operations wing of the US's Central Intelligence Agency.
This went on until late 1989, when Bush senior's administration realized that
the USSR was collapsing - and Afghanistan lost its strategic importance. When
the priority was to "kill Russians" - according to the crude lingo of the times
- the US gave free reign to the ISI to distribute cash and weapons in
Afghanistan, with no American supervision. The lion's share always went straight
to Hekmatyar and Sayyaf.
It is fair to say that practically every Pashtun tribe or clan had or has a
branch or faction with a link to Hekmatyar. So it is no wonder that the man is
now skillfully playing the ethnic card. In his most recent audiotaped address to
people all over the Pashtun belt to the east of the country he asks rhetorically
why only Pashtuns are being bombed, arrested or killed by the Americans.
Hekmatyar touches the right chord in any tribal Pashtun heart when he says that
Pashtuns have been humiliated by Americans searching their houses without any
warning, confiscating their weapons and - an unpardonable sin in Pashtunwali,
the tribal code of honor - physically searching their women.
Pashtuns in Kunar and Nangarhar are convinced the Tajik-dominated Northern
Alliance was behind the killing of Haji Abdul Qadir - the only Pashtun vice-
president
in President Hamid Karzai's government in Kabul. Portraits of Qadir are
ubiquitous in Nangarhar while not a single Karzai portrait is to be seen.
Karzai, although a Pashtun, is widely despised as an American puppet and a
hostage of the powerful Northern Alliance ministers, such as commander Mohammed
Fahim, the Afghan Defense Minister. Karzai's own security service is totally
infiltrated by experienced Hezb-i-Islami operatives, possibly why he now relies
on US bodyguards for his personal protection.
Haji Matheullah Khan Safi is the core commander of Kunar. In theory, he is
working with the Americans. He says that he used to speak English - but adds,
emphatically, that "with this war I forgot everything". According to him, the
Americans have been in Kunar for at least two months. "When they got here, we
had problems with local commanders in different checkposts. Now this is
finished. The province is under a single administration."
Haji Matheullah is the first to tell what will be a recurrent story of how a
group of high-ranking Arabs escaped from Jalalabad after the city fell to the
Northern Alliance on November 12. "There was a huge compound full of Arabs. The
most important escaped to Kunar." The Arabs were helped by Hezb-i-Islami people,
by Haji Roohullah (a Kunar wahhabi rising star, recently arrested and now in
American custody at Bagram air base on the outskirts of Kabul) and Kashmir Khan
(a high commander close to Hekmatyar whom some define as a gangster). "There
were only nine Arabs at the time. But one of them was severely injured, died,
and was buried near Asadabad. The eight that remained arrived in Daish and then
the valleys of Shigal. There were at least four important people among them -
maybe Abu Zubaida." Zubaida, an al-Qaeda strategist, was later arrested in
Faisalabad, Pakistan, in late March.
Haji Matheullah cannot or is not willing to confirm a now famous meeting in the
beginning of August between Hekmatyar, Sayyaf and other key people that took
place in Kunar. "It is not easy for Sayyaf to get into this area. But everyone
knows their thinking is the same." He comments with a Pashtun proverb. "If you
don't eat the onion, you don't smell." And then he adds, "Some activities in
this area might confirm that Hekmatyar could be in the remote mountains
northeast of Asadabad." A few minutes later, though, comes a new twist: "If all
the people are thinking that Hekmatyar is in Kunar, he may well be in Kunar. And
if Hekmatyar is in Kunar, Osama and al-Zawahiri may be as well, because they are
all in contact."
We talk about how Hekmatyar - by satellite telephone, on the BBC Pashto service
- announced that he supported a new jihad against the Americans, launched in
Gardez and Khost, in Paktia province. "Are you sure it was a sat-phone, or
tape?" He then switches to attack mode. "We did the jihad 20 years ago against
the Russians, for the stability of the country and for the sake of Islam, and
then we gave Kabul to these people - Hekmatyar, [Rashid] Dostum, [Burhanuddin]
Rabbani, Sayyaf. What did they do to Kabul and the country? They destroyed
Kabul, they destroyed the country and now they want it again."
The situation in Kunar is increasingly tense. Two weeks ago, two missiles hit
the American compound in Asadabad. Haji Matheullah finally fires on all
cylinders and admits fighters, numbering about 500, are probably hiding in the
mountains. "It takes 48 hours to get there, by walking. We heard they bought a
lot of new weapons, RPGs, rocket launchers." The route they most likely took is
from Nawaqui, a village on the Pakistani border. On the Pakistan side lies the
region dominated by the fierce black-turbaned Sufi Muhammad, who sent thousands
of madrassa students in a jihad against the Americans last October. Most were
killed or captured and Sufi Muhammad is now languishing in a Pakistani jail.
Haji Matheullah notes that the Americans in Kunar don't have helicopters.
Anyway, that would not help: "These people could stay in the mountains during
the whole winter. They collected food. They have a lot of money. They have
support from Pakistan, across the border. The only way for the Americans is to
go there on foot, through the mountains and jungle."
Kunar still holds a lot of sympathy to Wahhabism. "Twenty years ago, the Arabs
got here and started their aid to widows, orphans, kids. There was a lot of
money. When people saw what we call 'load, coat and boot', they converted to
Wahhabism. The sheikhs, they wanted to spread Wahhabism all over Afghanistan,
starting from Kunar. For this reason, the region still has a lot of relations
with the Arabs."
What Haji Matheullah is actually saying is that in the community there's still a
lot of support for al-Qaeda. That's why people in Kunar are so incensed by the
arrest of Haji Roohullah. But at the same time he is also saying that "the
common people support Americans, they think they are helpful". The
characteristically Pashtun twists and turns of the conversation are spiced up:
"Afghans never liked foreign invaders." And then comes the punchline.
"Afghanistan has problems with Pakistan and China. The Americans want to finish
the influence of neighbors on Afghanistan. They [Americans] created a nightmare
for us. When they create light, they can go."
Haji Amanullah is the man responsible for Asadabad's security. But,
significantly, he is still a military Hezb-i-Islami commander. This flagrant
contradiction requires extreme diplomacy. His basic judgment of the American
presence is "if they want to stay long, for security reasons, and if they do not
disturb the people, they are welcome. But if they continue to search houses,
scare people - the people's temperament won't stand them for any more than three
months."
The security commander confirms that at the beginning of July Hekmatyar visited
Kunar, and then went north into Nuristan. He was in touch with local commanders,
"But people in Kunar told him they could not guarantee his safety. He might be
in Xinjiang [western China]." But this is extremely unlikely as Beijing - ultra-
sensitive
towards the Muslim Uighur region in western China - would know it right away. In
once again a characteristically indirect Pashtun manner, Haji Amanullah finally
implies that Hekmatyar is alive - and in the region.
In his view the Kunar Wahhabis "got a lot of aid from the Arabs and Osama. They
still have a lot of money. But they are not more than 10,000 followers." Haji
Roohullah, according to him, was and still is receiving money from Pakistan's
ISI.
The story of the Arab escape from Jalalabad receives a new, savoury twist in
Haji Amanullah's version. "I saw nine Arabs at the time. Commander Saburlal
arrested them - and then he helped them to escape. They left all their own
vehicles and money." Saburlal was also arrested a few days ago, and is now under
American custody at Bagram air base.
Raiz Khan Mushwani is only 18. With his boyish good looks and disarming smile he
could be a heartthrob in a boy band or a Hollywood television series. But he is
the son of Malik Zarin - the number-one core commander of Kunar (so one assumes
that Haji Matheullah is in fact number two). Malik Zarin spends most of his time
in crucial meetings in Kabul. His son stays in Asadabad . Raiz says that "more
than 20 people" are working closely with the Americans. And he, at only 18, is
their commander.
Raiz is happy as "the Americans are bringing peace". Americans, he says, "choose
their own informers", "have one American Pashto-speaker, an air force soldier
named Kay" and are not paying directly for information, "only for expenses". The
American morale, according to Raiz, is "fresh, there is no tension". Their
commander is one "Captain Ryan, who came from Bagram". Raiz thinks that the
Americans will stay for long. They have "no helicopters or tanks, but there is a
helipad in the compound". In fact, every night the activity is feverish, for as
long as three hours - with surveillance by drones.
Raiz confirms that the mission is to get Hekmatyar. Not surprisingly, he does
not know where bin Laden could be. "Sometimes, as a joke, the Americans ask me
if I know something." Everybody in Asadabad talks about how in a patrolling
mission in ultra-sensitive Pech Dara a month and a half ago, four men were shot
and killed by the Americans just because they were carrying a Kalashnikov.
Another lethal case of cultural misunderstanding. Raiz insists that "the
Americans recognized the mistake".
Gradually, in the Kunar puzzle, emerges the crucial figure of another commander,
Khan Jan. Khan Jan is a distinguished Hezb-i-Islami commander, as well as being
the mayor of Asadabad. The Americans tried to arrest him and they raided and,
according to some, even fired on his house. They think that he meets regularly
with Hekmatyar, Raiz admits. "Khan Jan has popular support in the area." As we
talk to Raiz, we finally learn that none other than Khan Jan himself is in the
same compound. He came to meet Malik Zarin - or Raiz - to complain about heavy-
handed
American tactics. But Raiz does not want to meet him. He belongs to the Mushwani
tribe, while Khan Jan is from the Salarzai tribe. Tribal enmity is deadly -
especially now that one of the tribes has been selected to work closely with the
Americans. Raiz admits, "It is clear there is a movement among people to fight
the Americans." But the "jihad is over", says the son of the most powerful
military commander in Kunar - at least for the moment.
The plot thickens. Ahmadullah is a cousin of the crucial character, the Wahhabi
superstar Haji Roohullah. He recognizes that Haji Matheullah and Malik Zarin are
"well-relationed with the Americans". But he quickly adds, "Zarin is creating
problems because he targeted Haji Roohullah and his tribe." He stresses that
"people from all over Kunar demand the release of Haji Roohullah because he
fought against the Taliban and took over the area. Americans have to tell us
what charges they have against him."
Last November, Ahmadullah was fighting against the Taliban alongside Hazrat Ali
- the American's favorite commander in Nangarhar province. After he came to the
area, Haji Roohullah called him: he needed people to take over Asadabad.
Ahmadullah confirms that commanders Sabarlal and Najinuddin Khan, among others,
took over Asadabad "under the supervision of Haji Roohullah" and had been ruling
the area ever since. But now both Haji Roohullah and Sabarlal are under arrest
by the Americans.
Ahmadullah was an eyewitness to the massive Taliban escape last November. "The
Taliban crossed to Pakistan in Marawara" - the direction of Bajaur agency in the
Pakistani tribal areas. Hazrat Rahman was another commander at the time in
Marawara who supported the Taliban. Ahmadullah saw 48 trucks coming, carrying at
least 12 men each, a mix of Arabs and Taliban: "Hazrat Rahman took all their
weapons and helped them escape." Then came another convoy of Pakistani Taliban,
who also profited from the services of Rahman.
Ahmadullah fiercely criticizes "those people who are collaborating with the
Americans" - meaning Haji Matheullah and, most of all, Malik Zarin: he is
implying that the arrest of Roohullah is a power game between commanders of
different tribes. Ahmadullah also stresses that "we are ideological enemies of
the Arabs because they killed our leader in '92, Maulvi Jamil Rahman Salafi."
The portrait of Salafi is displayed at most of Asadabad's businesses. One
Abdullah, an Egyptian, went to Bajaur agency and shot Salafi in a mosque in 1992
because he was against Arab proselytizing in the region.
Ahmadullah adds an extremely ironic twist to the American presence in Kunar. He
says that five British, not American, special forces were the first to arrive in
Kunar a little more than two months ago. They came escorted by none other than
Roohullah, and his first cousin Haji Wali Ullah, the president of the World
Relief Committee, an Arab NGO very much active in the region.
Personally, Ahmadullah claims "not to know if Hekmatyar is here". But he assumes
that Hekmatyar and Kashmir Khan are working together. Kashmir Khan "disappeared"
a month ago and remains one of Hekmatyar's top commanders.
Presiding over the Kunar puzzle is the governor of the province, Sayed Muhamad
Yusuf. But he is not from Kunar: he is from neighboring Laghman province. He was
appointed by Hamid Karzai's central government and spends most of his time
asking villagers to support Kabul - an unenviable task, as Pashtun houses are
being permanently raided by bullish American soldiers. He insists that "all the
nation is behind the Karzai government". The recent assassinations in Kabul and
the attempt against Karzai in Kandahar are dismissed as "the usual". "President
[John F.] Kennedy was assassinated, General Zia [ul-Haq of Pakistan] was
killed."
A long white beard disguises the steely character of Yusuf, a former jihad
commander in the 1980s. The governor is playing a tremendously skillful
diplomatic game, trying to accommodate the anger of local populations against
American methods, the demands of the Americans themselves, and the conflicting
interests of powerful and sidelined commanders. He insists that "all the people
here are fed up with war. There is no chance of a battle in Kunar."
The governor thinks that the Americans came "under the flag of the UN to create
peace in the land of the Afghans. Kunar is too sensitive, a border province, the
geographic situation is too important". He does not think that Hekmatyar, bin
Laden or al-Qaeda are in Kunar. He says "there's only a 5 percent chance" of
Hekmatyar and some Arabs being in the province. He hasn't heard of any
eyewitnesses: "The ideal place for them would be Nuristan." This is a huge
mountainous enclave between Laghman and Kunar, northwest of Asadabad.
The governor recognizes the mesmerizing cultural shock between America gung-ho
culture and Pashtun culture. "I asked, why are you doing like this. They said
because we receive information in a hurry, we don't want to waste time. But they
are not checking anything. I was in a jirga [meeting] and I told the people the
Americans are coming to your villages because of your informers. And they are
giving bad information." So how do the Americans gather intelligence? "They ask
us sometimes. But most of the time they do it on their own. Some teenagers, they
told them they had seen Hekmatyar in Dangan. The Americans went there, stayed
the whole night. They got into a house, they only saw women and kids." He denies
that the Americans armed eastern Afghanistan commanders, although "they did arm
commanders in Kandahar".
And then, in a slip, the crucial word "invasion" comes up. "The Taliban, they
were Afghans, but they always made mistakes. Due to the Taliban we are now
facing invasion of these forces." If even the ultra-diplomatic governor commits
a Freudian slip of this nature, in the dusty streets and tea houses of Asadabad
there is widespread talk about "invasion".
Ghulam Ullah, the head of education in the province, warns in a soft voice, "We
all think Americans came here with the support of the UN. We don't look at them
as invaders. But we do not accept Americans as rulers of this country."
This sums up half of the popular perception in Kunar. The other half is already
involved - surreptitiously for now - in an anti-American jihad.
Part 2: Special Forces, ordinary people
SHIGAL, ASMAR and DANGAN, Kunar province - "Hekmatyar is not here," the smiling
young men answer in chorus when questioned about the whereabouts of Gulbuddin
Hekmatyar, the famed mujahideen warlord busy gathering forces to kick foreign
troops out of Afghanistan, a man desperately wanted by the US.
It's 7am in the tiny village of Aman Koot, in Shigal district, and the convoy of
the governor of Kunar, Sayed Muhamad Yusuf - packed with dozens of uniformed
Kunaris armed with Kalashnikovs - is parked by the side of the dusty, rocky
road.
The governor is inside a mud-walled compound, addressing a shura (meeting),
trying to calm down the locals, all furious with the heavy-handed tactics used
by American soldiers in searching houses for "terrorist suspects". The landscape
is breathtaking - like in most of Kunar: green maize fields, the Kunar river and
the backdrop of stunning forested mountains. The mountains are part of the
Kashmund Range - but the locals know them by at least five different names.
The American Special Forces are also on the spot - this time in four customized
Toyota Hi-Lux vehicles equipped with machine guns - patrolling the road and
combing the surrounding fields, although they are not with the governor. "We're
not with anybody. We're Americans," says one of the soldiers. They don't confirm
or deny that they are protecting the governor this morning - but they certainly
prevent us from getting into the compound to follow the shura, although we have
been invited by the governor's people. All in the name of the "tense" security
situation. There's an eerie feeling that a missile could zoom in from behind the
mountains at any moment. We are less than three hours trekking from the porous
Pakistani border.
The young men crowded around us are eager to talk because with the Americans
there's no dialogue. "It's not possible for us to support Hekmatyar in front of
the Americans, now that jihad is finished." The smiling crowd is "very hopeful"
for the future: they list as their only problem the absence of a cricket pitch -
with all those maize fields and mountains. And they insist that they don't have
"any concern" about the Americans: "We welcome them."
They are not exactly welcomed back by the Americans, though, even if it is their
own country. Kids swarm the dusty road. Some soldiers pick up a stick and start
shooing them off. No chance for anybody to get even close to one of the Mad Max
Toyotas. Two soldiers combing the fields with their precision rifles held high
are surrounded by a mini-mob. Kids ask for pens. A few minutes later a local
comes with a tin plate full of mutton slices - a characteristic sign of Pashtun
hospitality. The soldiers recoil in utter disgust. Some start shouting "Back
up!" to no avail. "Zai" - the Pashtun equivalent, would produce a better effect.
We depart following the governor's convoy and soon stop at another dismal
village where the four American vehicles are parked in a semi-circle,
practically in combat-ready mode. They see us, they radio messages to each other
- "Your Asia Times connection is here again." It's all part of a cat-and-mouse
game developed over a few days. They know that we are here - and they don't like
it. We know where they are and where they're going - and they don't like it.
Every night, when they patrol Asadabad, Kunar's capital, they point their night
vision goggles to the roof of the Istiqlal hotel where we are staying to check
whether we're filming them. On a visit to the American compound, in a former
prison on the outskirts of Asadabad, we are met at the gate by two soldiers, one
of them carrying a pistol in one hand and X-ray goggles in another. The armed
soldier is very polite, but absolutely "no quotes", not even a "How's the
weather?", unless we are cleared by Bagram air base on the outskirts of the
capital Kabul.
After a quick stop in the village of Asmar, the crucial part of the governor's
day is spent at a jirga (council) meeting in the village of Dangan - reached by
an absolutely hair-raising, back-breaking rocky mountain trail. It's the first
time ever that a Kunar governor has visited this village - which is not even on
the map: that is a measure of the reigning tense situation. The convoy is
greeted by a long circuitous line of very young madrassa (religious school)
students immaculately dressed in blue. An armed sentry in a watchtower, next to
the black-green-red Afghan flag, commands a spectacular view of the lush valley
and the surrounding mountains - a landscape that evokes the most pristine
mountain valleys in the Panjshir or in Kashmir. Before the jirga, some of the
students engage in a heart-warming rendition of an Afghan national poem, whose
lyrics say, "We know how to grow flowers in this land, we don't need guns, we
need pens." Some elders weep. Then, in a fairytale courtyard naturally protected
by trees from the scorching sun, the governor resumes his complex diplomatic
ballet, forcefully telling the locals not to spread false information on
Hekmatyar's whereabouts. The Hezb-i-Islami supremo is extremely popular in the
region.
On a more environmental mode, the governor insists, "You have to protect your
forests from Pakistani loggers." At the capital, Asadabad, the only business is
the timber business - all of it controlled by six or seven powerful commanders,
all of them with privileged connections with Pakistani companies. In Dangan
itself, people diversify, and practically everybody is now back into cultivating
poppy. The governor pleads with them not to.
After the governor's speech, the village elder, the green-turbaned Sayed
Mehbwob, takes the stage and delivers a blistering performance. Fiery eyes,
booming voice and an expressive face straight out of tribal theater, he details
to the governor how the Americans are disturbing the peace of his tribe.
Later, he spells out to us some of the grievances. According to Mehbwob, two
months ago, when the Americans got to Dangan, someone fired an RPG at them. The
Americans didn't say who they were looking for. Three days later they came back
and "struck the house of Zhulam Khan with mortars for four hours. There were
people inside, but mercifully no one was injured." Then, a few days ago, says
Mehbwob, the Americans broke into another house at night: "They broke a lot of
boxes [Pashtuns keep a lot of their possessions in tin containers]. They checked
the clothes of the women. There were only women and children inside the house.
Now everybody in the area is afraid. This is against Pashtun tradition."
Mehbwob confirms that the Shinkai home of the very popular Hezb-i-Islami
commander and mayor of Asadabad, Khan Jan, was also raided by the Americans
"because they thought he had information that would lead to Hekmatyar". Mehbwob
is stinging: "We don't know who they are looking for. Sometimes they say it's
Osama [bin Laden], sometimes al-Qaeda, sometimes Hekmatyar, and now they say
they are looking for terrorists." Another village elder cuts to the chase. "I
think the Americans are foolish. There is tension everywhere in Afghanistan.
What are they doing in this area."
The head of education in Kunar, the affable Ghulam Ullah, offers a more nuanced
perspective. "Kunar is part of a body that has 32 parts. We support the central
government. Kabul is recognized by all the world." He sees the war on terrorism
being waged "by civilized nations. America is part of a coalition. We see the
peacekeepers in Kabul and the American presence in this area in the same way. We
do not see them as invaders. The Russians were invaders. We kicked them out. And
we are here to help Afghans."
But the Americans may be making serious mistakes, such as arresting the popular
Wahhabi leader Haji Roohullah. "Roohullah is a national religious leader." The
motto at the office of Haji Roohullah is "Unity is the best policy". The
educator, on the arrest of Roohullah, says that "all the tribes have long
enmities. One of them is creating problems [he means the Mushwani tribe].
Roohullah was the first to start loya jirga negotiations in Kunar." Ghulam Ullah
is absolutely right when he recalls that the Afghan jihad against the Russians
in the 1980s "started in Kunar, through the family of Roohullah".
Ghulam Ullah is among the few in the region who reject Hekmatyar's ruthless
methods: "We have a lot of differences with Hezb-i-Islami. In 1990, we had a
parliament in Kunar, a democratic election for the chief of this area ...
Roohullah won. The Hezb-i-Islami started fighting because they lost. They killed
12 of Roohullah's supporters. So we have no relationship with Hekmatyar, Hezb-i-
Islami
or al-Qaeda. Hekmatyar got Osama to north Kabul and then they sent an Egyptian
to kill our religious leader, Maulvi Jamil Rahman Salafi. Hekmatyar and Osama
were our first enemies. So how can we give them help."
The real sensitive relationship, for Ghulam Ullah, is between Americans and
local collaborators: "I'm not blaming Americans, because they don't know our
traditions. I'm blaming those working with them. They are kids [a reference to
Raiz, the son of pro-American Asadabad commander Malik Zarin, and his army of
teenagers]. They want to fill their pockets. And they want to obliterate Pashtun
tradition." Last week, Ghulam Ullah met with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and
Defense Minister Mohammed Fahim in Kabul. He is hopeful. "I'm sure Haji
Roohullah will come back soon. But these people who created problems for him
must get behind bars." It's unlikely that the Americans will incarcerate their
few local partners in Kunar.
Back to Asmar, at what the locals call the Capitol building, the governor is
reclined in his cushion, surrounded by what amounts to an informal cabinet
meeting, with everyone seated on carpets sipping green tea. Someone asks the
governor point blank, "Are you going to search these disinformers and put them
in jail?" There's no clear answer. At 3pm the charismatic Khan Jan shows up -
received with all-around reverence. The governor and Khan Jan launch into an
elaborate conversation revolving around the relationship between the commander
and Hekmatyar.
The governor says, "We have two types of mujahideen in Afghanistan. One of them
was boiling tea for the mujahideen who were in the front against the Russians.
The other was in fact in the frontline. The Taliban were boiling tea, and then
they started creating problems. [Former president Burhanuddin] Rabbani is now
creating all kinds of problems for the government. He had support in 1996, not
anymore." Khan Jan tells the governor that two days ago he went to talk to the
Americans, and they told him that they had intelligence in the area proving that
he (Khan Jan) was the problem.
The background for the terse exchange, inevitably, is once again tribal enmity.
The Americans are working with the Mushwani tribe - to which Malik Zarin, the
core commander of Asadabad and his son Raiz, belong. Khan Jan is a member of the
Alizai - a sub-clan of the Salarzai tribe. Mushwanis and Salarzais are
"brothers" only in name: the atmosphere is more like fraternal hatred. The
Salarzai are accusing the Mushwanis of spreading false information to the
Americans. Malik Zarin fought against the Taliban. But the Taliban at one time
were supported by Malik Zarin's cousin. It soon became a battle of cousin
against cousin. Now Salarzais believe that Malik Zarin is exacting his revenge.
The future of Kunar - the last battle of the new Afghan war, and the first
frontline of the new anti-American jihad - will be decided by this cast of
characters. Haji Matheullah - the number-two core commander - and Malik Zarin -
the number-one core commander - plus his 18-year-old son Raiz and his army of
teenagers, will keep working with the Americans. The governor will keep his
skillful diplomatic balancing act. The local populations remain split between
feelings of silent anger or joining Hekmatyar's appeal for a jihad against the
American invaders. Khan Jan, mayor of Asadabad, may be working secretly with
Hekmatyar. There are no prospects of Haji Roohullah being released from Bagram
air base. Hekmatyar may be hidden and plotting in the mountains, 48 hours on
foot to the northeast of Asadabad. And the Americans are bound to keep treating
the local populations with a total lack of sensitivity.
The crucial fact is that the post-Taliban Pashtun counterrevolution is already
in full swing. And it's once again Pashtuns against Tajiks: the Pashtun belt
against a central government in Kabul dominated by the Northern Alliance, where
the Pashtun President Hamid Karzai is derided as a mere American puppet.
Bacha Khan Zadran is a powerful warlord with a strong military presence in three
key Pashtun belt provinces: Paktia, Paktika and Khost. He is openly confronting
Kabul, which nominated what the Pashtuns call "a kid", Abdul Taniwal, as the
governor of Khost. Kabul is after Zadran. But Zadran's tribe has forcefully
asked Karzai to fulfill an earlier pledge and appoint him as head of the three
provinces. A few days ago in Gardez, the simple presence of Zadran inside the
American compound for four hours started a riot, because the locals thought that
he had been arrested.
In Kunar, Haji Roohullah's arrest is not reaping any benefits for the Americans.
On the contrary. In Nangarhar the Americans have relied since the Tora Bora
campaign on the wily Hazrat Ali, a Pachai: the Pachais are derided by the
Pashtuns. Americans are only working with commanders recommended by the Northern
Alliance. They are being fed bad intelligence, no intelligence, and in the
process are being drawn into the tangled web of warlord tribal rivalry. Under
these circumstances, "peace" is impossible: US National Security Advisor
Condoleezza Rice's recent claims that the security situation in Afghanistan had
improved in the past year is nothing short of ridiculous.
Hamid Karzai's security services are totally infiltrated by ultra-disciplined
Hezb-i-Islami operatives. The 4,800 international peacekeeping soldiers in Kabul
are seemingly ineffective. Under their watch, two Afghan ministers have been
assassinated in broad daylight and a car bomb exploded last week in Kabul,
killing 30 people and wounding 167. An assassination attempt on Karzai was only
narrowly averted in Kandahar.
The US - as did the former USSR - has underestimated the indomitable Pashtuns,
at its peril. Many empires have already paid the price for this carelessness.
The American strategy in the Pashtun belt has been the catalyst for re-starting
the civil war in Afghanistan. On the night of September 10, eyewitnesses claim
to have spotted Gulbuddin Hekmatyar himself not in Kunar, but in the Teraha
valley, in Khyber agency (in Pakistan) - on the other side of the Tora Bora.
Hekmatyar was deep in a conference with a group of influential mullahs.
What the US is up against now is a formidable coalition involved in a jihad to
kick out what it sees as foreign invaders. The coalition groups Hekmatyar and
the Hezb-i-Islami's "Professor" Sayyaf, with his wealth of Arab connections and
sponsorship; Ishmail Khan, the "Emir of southwest Afghanistan", who is very
close to Iran; Mullah Omar (still hiding in safety somewhere in Kandahar
province) and his formidable former Taliban military commander, Jalaluddin
Haqqani; plus vast middle-level support from Pakistan's Inter-Services
Intelligence.
At the end of a gruelling day, on the dusty Asmar-Asadabad road, Azad (his name
means "free"), a Pashtun villager, definitely not a fundamentalist, stops the
car to show us his house perched on a hill. The landscape around is
breathtaking, as usual. The American Special Forces are only minutes away - we
cross their convoy on our way back. Azad gazes at the classic Afghan panorama
and murmurs, almost to himself, "The Americans are here because the world
community has made a promise to the Afghan nation. But if they have their own
agenda, I'll have to take care of this. Because I am the owner of this land."
©2002 Asia Times Online Co Ltd.
Sep 12, 2002
Part 1: Exit Osama, enter Hekmatyar
By Pepe Escobar
ASADABAD, eastern Afghanistan - It's 7am in dirt-poor, semi-devastated Martyr's
Square in this town in the heart of Kunar province. The sun is already shining
high and the big, brash American anti-terrorist show is in town.
And what a show it is. Nine vehicles, ranging from Humvees to Toyota HiLux
vehicles customized with machine guns, carrying as many as six soldiers each,
all engineered to raise serious hell, take possession of the square. The whole
town is watching. A commando group climbs up the rickety stairs to the balcony
of the Istiqlal - the only hotel in town and whose unbelievably filthy washrooms
are crammed with graffiti of the new jihad against America - and engages in a
search-and-destroy operation against two "culprits", as the local Pashtuns put
it: this Asia Times Online correspondent and his companion, Pashto-speaking,
Peshawar-based journalist Majeed Baber.
The Special Forces are relatively polite - but firm. Identity documents are
checked and then digital still photos and video footage is erased - under severe
vigilance. Next time, the cameras will be confiscated. Although the whole
process is totally illegal, all is justified in the name of the "tense" security
situation. Scott, one of the soldiers, is a little more affable than the others,
who share a uniform blank, psychopath-style gaze. Scott confirms on the record -
and he will be the only one to do so - that the real mission is "to get
Hekmatyar", the former Afghan premier and famed mujahideen warlord, Gulbuddin
Hekmatyar, leader of the Hezb-i-Islami Afghanistan (Islamic Party).
Scott argues the footage and photos might fall into the wrong hands. "They might
see how many we are, what we are doing." As if "they" didn't know already. Some
intelligence information is exchanged and the show departs with a bang to look
for the bad guys. Later, the whole town will keep coming back to ask in utter
perplexity, "What were the Americans telling you? Have you done anything wrong?"
Make no mistake. This is it. One year after September 11, this is the ultimate
frontline, the last, crucial battle in the new Afghan war - as the best
Pakistan-Afghanistan insiders have been predicting for months. Or maybe the
battle is just beginning. The fact is that now between 300 and 400 American
Special Forces - according to different estimations of local Pashtun commanders
- are now based in Kunar in hot pursuit of the newly-promoted number one "dead
or dead" enemy in the war against terrorism in Afghanistan: Hekmatyar, the
Pashtun leader and the only premier in history with the dubious distinction of
shelling his own capital, Kabul, in mid-1992, causing the death of as many as
25,000 people, until his bases were destroyed by the Taliban in early 1995.
Even though the war against terrorism costs roughly US$1 billion a day, Osama
bin Laden has not been found. Ayman "The Surgeon" Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda's
number two, has not been found. Taliban supremo Mullah Omar - who escaped from
B-52 bombing last November on the back of a Honda 50cc motorcycle - has not been
found. So the new bogeyman is Hekmatyar, who is gathering forces for his new
jihad to drive foreign troops out of Afghanistan.
Scores of international journalists are gathering at the Tora Bora to
"commemorate" September 11 - perhaps hoping to shoot a bin Laden video in one of
the myriad caves in which he was reputed to have hidden before escaping well
before the advancing US troops arrived. Asia Times Online, instead, is trying to
confirm privileged information according to which Hekmatyar is hiding somewhere
in Kunar; former mujahideen leader "Professor" Abdul Rassoul Sayyaf - renamed by
his Arab patrons Abd al-Rabb al-Rasul Sayyaf - has been to Kunar; and bin Laden
and al-Zawahiri may or may not have recently been in Kunar.
The American Special Forces - housed in a huge compound that used to be the
local jail on the outskirts of Asadabad - have been camped since the end of
June; in the beginning they were less than a dozen, now they're hundreds, but
still they haven't found what they are looking for. The search - for Hekmatyar,
for al-Qaeda, for supporters, for clues in the middle of ever-shifting
alliances, for escape routes - is a complex puzzle. There's only one way to go -
and it is to criss-cross information volunteered by all the major players. What
we find is a dizzying web of political, military, tribal and religious friction.
In Hekmatyar America has a formidable foe, as the Soviets found out to their
cost in their Afghanistan adventure in the 1980s. He issued an anti-American
fatwa in June, and last week he reconfirmed a jihad against "American invaders"
and the "persecution of Pashtuns". His Hezb-i-Islami Afghanistan now runs the
show and Hekmatyar can count on hundreds of loyal and very experienced
commanders - such as Maulana Jalaluddin Haqqani, the former number one military
commander of the Taliban. Al-Qaeda is collaborating with Hezb-i-Islami, but only
in a supporting role.
The Hezb-i-Islami - 75 percent of it made up of Pashtuns - is the most
revolutionary and disciplined of all the Afghan Islamist parties. It's nothing
remotely similar to a bunch of turbans roaming around in pick-up trucks, as
often the Taliban were. The Hezb is a modern organization. Recruitment and
promotion is based on skill and merit - and not on social roles or how well one
can recite the Koran. Hezb leaders have all been educated in Afghanistan - not
in Pakistani madrassas (religious schools). Hekmatyar is a radical Islamist.
During the anti-Soviet jihad his party was the absolute favorite of the Afghan
refugees in Pakistan, where Islamabad helped the Hezb control 250 schools - from
which 43,500 students graduated. These students are the core of the party's new
generation, and they make up most of the soldiers of Hekmatyar's conventional
military force, the Lashkar-i-Isar (Army of Sacrifice).
During the anti-Soviet jihad, Hekmatyar received tens of millions of dollars
from Libya and Iraq. And prior to Saddam Hussein invading Kuwait in 1990, the
Saudi and Kuwaiti governments and private donors had provided as much as a
billion dollars to Hekmatyar. The Hezb was also the darling of Pakistan's Inter-
Services
Intelligence (ISI) and the Islamic conservative wahhabis from Saudi Arabia. It
was also the favorite of moderate Pakistani generals and - the icing on the cake
- the operations wing of the US's Central Intelligence Agency.
This went on until late 1989, when Bush senior's administration realized that
the USSR was collapsing - and Afghanistan lost its strategic importance. When
the priority was to "kill Russians" - according to the crude lingo of the times
- the US gave free reign to the ISI to distribute cash and weapons in
Afghanistan, with no American supervision. The lion's share always went straight
to Hekmatyar and Sayyaf.
It is fair to say that practically every Pashtun tribe or clan had or has a
branch or faction with a link to Hekmatyar. So it is no wonder that the man is
now skillfully playing the ethnic card. In his most recent audiotaped address to
people all over the Pashtun belt to the east of the country he asks rhetorically
why only Pashtuns are being bombed, arrested or killed by the Americans.
Hekmatyar touches the right chord in any tribal Pashtun heart when he says that
Pashtuns have been humiliated by Americans searching their houses without any
warning, confiscating their weapons and - an unpardonable sin in Pashtunwali,
the tribal code of honor - physically searching their women.
Pashtuns in Kunar and Nangarhar are convinced the Tajik-dominated Northern
Alliance was behind the killing of Haji Abdul Qadir - the only Pashtun vice-
president
in President Hamid Karzai's government in Kabul. Portraits of Qadir are
ubiquitous in Nangarhar while not a single Karzai portrait is to be seen.
Karzai, although a Pashtun, is widely despised as an American puppet and a
hostage of the powerful Northern Alliance ministers, such as commander Mohammed
Fahim, the Afghan Defense Minister. Karzai's own security service is totally
infiltrated by experienced Hezb-i-Islami operatives, possibly why he now relies
on US bodyguards for his personal protection.
Haji Matheullah Khan Safi is the core commander of Kunar. In theory, he is
working with the Americans. He says that he used to speak English - but adds,
emphatically, that "with this war I forgot everything". According to him, the
Americans have been in Kunar for at least two months. "When they got here, we
had problems with local commanders in different checkposts. Now this is
finished. The province is under a single administration."
Haji Matheullah is the first to tell what will be a recurrent story of how a
group of high-ranking Arabs escaped from Jalalabad after the city fell to the
Northern Alliance on November 12. "There was a huge compound full of Arabs. The
most important escaped to Kunar." The Arabs were helped by Hezb-i-Islami people,
by Haji Roohullah (a Kunar wahhabi rising star, recently arrested and now in
American custody at Bagram air base on the outskirts of Kabul) and Kashmir Khan
(a high commander close to Hekmatyar whom some define as a gangster). "There
were only nine Arabs at the time. But one of them was severely injured, died,
and was buried near Asadabad. The eight that remained arrived in Daish and then
the valleys of Shigal. There were at least four important people among them -
maybe Abu Zubaida." Zubaida, an al-Qaeda strategist, was later arrested in
Faisalabad, Pakistan, in late March.
Haji Matheullah cannot or is not willing to confirm a now famous meeting in the
beginning of August between Hekmatyar, Sayyaf and other key people that took
place in Kunar. "It is not easy for Sayyaf to get into this area. But everyone
knows their thinking is the same." He comments with a Pashtun proverb. "If you
don't eat the onion, you don't smell." And then he adds, "Some activities in
this area might confirm that Hekmatyar could be in the remote mountains
northeast of Asadabad." A few minutes later, though, comes a new twist: "If all
the people are thinking that Hekmatyar is in Kunar, he may well be in Kunar. And
if Hekmatyar is in Kunar, Osama and al-Zawahiri may be as well, because they are
all in contact."
We talk about how Hekmatyar - by satellite telephone, on the BBC Pashto service
- announced that he supported a new jihad against the Americans, launched in
Gardez and Khost, in Paktia province. "Are you sure it was a sat-phone, or
tape?" He then switches to attack mode. "We did the jihad 20 years ago against
the Russians, for the stability of the country and for the sake of Islam, and
then we gave Kabul to these people - Hekmatyar, [Rashid] Dostum, [Burhanuddin]
Rabbani, Sayyaf. What did they do to Kabul and the country? They destroyed
Kabul, they destroyed the country and now they want it again."
The situation in Kunar is increasingly tense. Two weeks ago, two missiles hit
the American compound in Asadabad. Haji Matheullah finally fires on all
cylinders and admits fighters, numbering about 500, are probably hiding in the
mountains. "It takes 48 hours to get there, by walking. We heard they bought a
lot of new weapons, RPGs, rocket launchers." The route they most likely took is
from Nawaqui, a village on the Pakistani border. On the Pakistan side lies the
region dominated by the fierce black-turbaned Sufi Muhammad, who sent thousands
of madrassa students in a jihad against the Americans last October. Most were
killed or captured and Sufi Muhammad is now languishing in a Pakistani jail.
Haji Matheullah notes that the Americans in Kunar don't have helicopters.
Anyway, that would not help: "These people could stay in the mountains during
the whole winter. They collected food. They have a lot of money. They have
support from Pakistan, across the border. The only way for the Americans is to
go there on foot, through the mountains and jungle."
Kunar still holds a lot of sympathy to Wahhabism. "Twenty years ago, the Arabs
got here and started their aid to widows, orphans, kids. There was a lot of
money. When people saw what we call 'load, coat and boot', they converted to
Wahhabism. The sheikhs, they wanted to spread Wahhabism all over Afghanistan,
starting from Kunar. For this reason, the region still has a lot of relations
with the Arabs."
What Haji Matheullah is actually saying is that in the community there's still a
lot of support for al-Qaeda. That's why people in Kunar are so incensed by the
arrest of Haji Roohullah. But at the same time he is also saying that "the
common people support Americans, they think they are helpful". The
characteristically Pashtun twists and turns of the conversation are spiced up:
"Afghans never liked foreign invaders." And then comes the punchline.
"Afghanistan has problems with Pakistan and China. The Americans want to finish
the influence of neighbors on Afghanistan. They [Americans] created a nightmare
for us. When they create light, they can go."
Haji Amanullah is the man responsible for Asadabad's security. But,
significantly, he is still a military Hezb-i-Islami commander. This flagrant
contradiction requires extreme diplomacy. His basic judgment of the American
presence is "if they want to stay long, for security reasons, and if they do not
disturb the people, they are welcome. But if they continue to search houses,
scare people - the people's temperament won't stand them for any more than three
months."
The security commander confirms that at the beginning of July Hekmatyar visited
Kunar, and then went north into Nuristan. He was in touch with local commanders,
"But people in Kunar told him they could not guarantee his safety. He might be
in Xinjiang [western China]." But this is extremely unlikely as Beijing - ultra-
sensitive
towards the Muslim Uighur region in western China - would know it right away. In
once again a characteristically indirect Pashtun manner, Haji Amanullah finally
implies that Hekmatyar is alive - and in the region.
In his view the Kunar Wahhabis "got a lot of aid from the Arabs and Osama. They
still have a lot of money. But they are not more than 10,000 followers." Haji
Roohullah, according to him, was and still is receiving money from Pakistan's
ISI.
The story of the Arab escape from Jalalabad receives a new, savoury twist in
Haji Amanullah's version. "I saw nine Arabs at the time. Commander Saburlal
arrested them - and then he helped them to escape. They left all their own
vehicles and money." Saburlal was also arrested a few days ago, and is now under
American custody at Bagram air base.
Raiz Khan Mushwani is only 18. With his boyish good looks and disarming smile he
could be a heartthrob in a boy band or a Hollywood television series. But he is
the son of Malik Zarin - the number-one core commander of Kunar (so one assumes
that Haji Matheullah is in fact number two). Malik Zarin spends most of his time
in crucial meetings in Kabul. His son stays in Asadabad . Raiz says that "more
than 20 people" are working closely with the Americans. And he, at only 18, is
their commander.
Raiz is happy as "the Americans are bringing peace". Americans, he says, "choose
their own informers", "have one American Pashto-speaker, an air force soldier
named Kay" and are not paying directly for information, "only for expenses". The
American morale, according to Raiz, is "fresh, there is no tension". Their
commander is one "Captain Ryan, who came from Bagram". Raiz thinks that the
Americans will stay for long. They have "no helicopters or tanks, but there is a
helipad in the compound". In fact, every night the activity is feverish, for as
long as three hours - with surveillance by drones.
Raiz confirms that the mission is to get Hekmatyar. Not surprisingly, he does
not know where bin Laden could be. "Sometimes, as a joke, the Americans ask me
if I know something." Everybody in Asadabad talks about how in a patrolling
mission in ultra-sensitive Pech Dara a month and a half ago, four men were shot
and killed by the Americans just because they were carrying a Kalashnikov.
Another lethal case of cultural misunderstanding. Raiz insists that "the
Americans recognized the mistake".
Gradually, in the Kunar puzzle, emerges the crucial figure of another commander,
Khan Jan. Khan Jan is a distinguished Hezb-i-Islami commander, as well as being
the mayor of Asadabad. The Americans tried to arrest him and they raided and,
according to some, even fired on his house. They think that he meets regularly
with Hekmatyar, Raiz admits. "Khan Jan has popular support in the area." As we
talk to Raiz, we finally learn that none other than Khan Jan himself is in the
same compound. He came to meet Malik Zarin - or Raiz - to complain about heavy-
handed
American tactics. But Raiz does not want to meet him. He belongs to the Mushwani
tribe, while Khan Jan is from the Salarzai tribe. Tribal enmity is deadly -
especially now that one of the tribes has been selected to work closely with the
Americans. Raiz admits, "It is clear there is a movement among people to fight
the Americans." But the "jihad is over", says the son of the most powerful
military commander in Kunar - at least for the moment.
The plot thickens. Ahmadullah is a cousin of the crucial character, the Wahhabi
superstar Haji Roohullah. He recognizes that Haji Matheullah and Malik Zarin are
"well-relationed with the Americans". But he quickly adds, "Zarin is creating
problems because he targeted Haji Roohullah and his tribe." He stresses that
"people from all over Kunar demand the release of Haji Roohullah because he
fought against the Taliban and took over the area. Americans have to tell us
what charges they have against him."
Last November, Ahmadullah was fighting against the Taliban alongside Hazrat Ali
- the American's favorite commander in Nangarhar province. After he came to the
area, Haji Roohullah called him: he needed people to take over Asadabad.
Ahmadullah confirms that commanders Sabarlal and Najinuddin Khan, among others,
took over Asadabad "under the supervision of Haji Roohullah" and had been ruling
the area ever since. But now both Haji Roohullah and Sabarlal are under arrest
by the Americans.
Ahmadullah was an eyewitness to the massive Taliban escape last November. "The
Taliban crossed to Pakistan in Marawara" - the direction of Bajaur agency in the
Pakistani tribal areas. Hazrat Rahman was another commander at the time in
Marawara who supported the Taliban. Ahmadullah saw 48 trucks coming, carrying at
least 12 men each, a mix of Arabs and Taliban: "Hazrat Rahman took all their
weapons and helped them escape." Then came another convoy of Pakistani Taliban,
who also profited from the services of Rahman.
Ahmadullah fiercely criticizes "those people who are collaborating with the
Americans" - meaning Haji Matheullah and, most of all, Malik Zarin: he is
implying that the arrest of Roohullah is a power game between commanders of
different tribes. Ahmadullah also stresses that "we are ideological enemies of
the Arabs because they killed our leader in '92, Maulvi Jamil Rahman Salafi."
The portrait of Salafi is displayed at most of Asadabad's businesses. One
Abdullah, an Egyptian, went to Bajaur agency and shot Salafi in a mosque in 1992
because he was against Arab proselytizing in the region.
Ahmadullah adds an extremely ironic twist to the American presence in Kunar. He
says that five British, not American, special forces were the first to arrive in
Kunar a little more than two months ago. They came escorted by none other than
Roohullah, and his first cousin Haji Wali Ullah, the president of the World
Relief Committee, an Arab NGO very much active in the region.
Personally, Ahmadullah claims "not to know if Hekmatyar is here". But he assumes
that Hekmatyar and Kashmir Khan are working together. Kashmir Khan "disappeared"
a month ago and remains one of Hekmatyar's top commanders.
Presiding over the Kunar puzzle is the governor of the province, Sayed Muhamad
Yusuf. But he is not from Kunar: he is from neighboring Laghman province. He was
appointed by Hamid Karzai's central government and spends most of his time
asking villagers to support Kabul - an unenviable task, as Pashtun houses are
being permanently raided by bullish American soldiers. He insists that "all the
nation is behind the Karzai government". The recent assassinations in Kabul and
the attempt against Karzai in Kandahar are dismissed as "the usual". "President
[John F.] Kennedy was assassinated, General Zia [ul-Haq of Pakistan] was
killed."
A long white beard disguises the steely character of Yusuf, a former jihad
commander in the 1980s. The governor is playing a tremendously skillful
diplomatic game, trying to accommodate the anger of local populations against
American methods, the demands of the Americans themselves, and the conflicting
interests of powerful and sidelined commanders. He insists that "all the people
here are fed up with war. There is no chance of a battle in Kunar."
The governor thinks that the Americans came "under the flag of the UN to create
peace in the land of the Afghans. Kunar is too sensitive, a border province, the
geographic situation is too important". He does not think that Hekmatyar, bin
Laden or al-Qaeda are in Kunar. He says "there's only a 5 percent chance" of
Hekmatyar and some Arabs being in the province. He hasn't heard of any
eyewitnesses: "The ideal place for them would be Nuristan." This is a huge
mountainous enclave between Laghman and Kunar, northwest of Asadabad.
The governor recognizes the mesmerizing cultural shock between America gung-ho
culture and Pashtun culture. "I asked, why are you doing like this. They said
because we receive information in a hurry, we don't want to waste time. But they
are not checking anything. I was in a jirga [meeting] and I told the people the
Americans are coming to your villages because of your informers. And they are
giving bad information." So how do the Americans gather intelligence? "They ask
us sometimes. But most of the time they do it on their own. Some teenagers, they
told them they had seen Hekmatyar in Dangan. The Americans went there, stayed
the whole night. They got into a house, they only saw women and kids." He denies
that the Americans armed eastern Afghanistan commanders, although "they did arm
commanders in Kandahar".
And then, in a slip, the crucial word "invasion" comes up. "The Taliban, they
were Afghans, but they always made mistakes. Due to the Taliban we are now
facing invasion of these forces." If even the ultra-diplomatic governor commits
a Freudian slip of this nature, in the dusty streets and tea houses of Asadabad
there is widespread talk about "invasion".
Ghulam Ullah, the head of education in the province, warns in a soft voice, "We
all think Americans came here with the support of the UN. We don't look at them
as invaders. But we do not accept Americans as rulers of this country."
This sums up half of the popular perception in Kunar. The other half is already
involved - surreptitiously for now - in an anti-American jihad.
Part 2: Special Forces, ordinary people
SHIGAL, ASMAR and DANGAN, Kunar province - "Hekmatyar is not here," the smiling
young men answer in chorus when questioned about the whereabouts of Gulbuddin
Hekmatyar, the famed mujahideen warlord busy gathering forces to kick foreign
troops out of Afghanistan, a man desperately wanted by the US.
It's 7am in the tiny village of Aman Koot, in Shigal district, and the convoy of
the governor of Kunar, Sayed Muhamad Yusuf - packed with dozens of uniformed
Kunaris armed with Kalashnikovs - is parked by the side of the dusty, rocky
road.
The governor is inside a mud-walled compound, addressing a shura (meeting),
trying to calm down the locals, all furious with the heavy-handed tactics used
by American soldiers in searching houses for "terrorist suspects". The landscape
is breathtaking - like in most of Kunar: green maize fields, the Kunar river and
the backdrop of stunning forested mountains. The mountains are part of the
Kashmund Range - but the locals know them by at least five different names.
The American Special Forces are also on the spot - this time in four customized
Toyota Hi-Lux vehicles equipped with machine guns - patrolling the road and
combing the surrounding fields, although they are not with the governor. "We're
not with anybody. We're Americans," says one of the soldiers. They don't confirm
or deny that they are protecting the governor this morning - but they certainly
prevent us from getting into the compound to follow the shura, although we have
been invited by the governor's people. All in the name of the "tense" security
situation. There's an eerie feeling that a missile could zoom in from behind the
mountains at any moment. We are less than three hours trekking from the porous
Pakistani border.
The young men crowded around us are eager to talk because with the Americans
there's no dialogue. "It's not possible for us to support Hekmatyar in front of
the Americans, now that jihad is finished." The smiling crowd is "very hopeful"
for the future: they list as their only problem the absence of a cricket pitch -
with all those maize fields and mountains. And they insist that they don't have
"any concern" about the Americans: "We welcome them."
They are not exactly welcomed back by the Americans, though, even if it is their
own country. Kids swarm the dusty road. Some soldiers pick up a stick and start
shooing them off. No chance for anybody to get even close to one of the Mad Max
Toyotas. Two soldiers combing the fields with their precision rifles held high
are surrounded by a mini-mob. Kids ask for pens. A few minutes later a local
comes with a tin plate full of mutton slices - a characteristic sign of Pashtun
hospitality. The soldiers recoil in utter disgust. Some start shouting "Back
up!" to no avail. "Zai" - the Pashtun equivalent, would produce a better effect.
We depart following the governor's convoy and soon stop at another dismal
village where the four American vehicles are parked in a semi-circle,
practically in combat-ready mode. They see us, they radio messages to each other
- "Your Asia Times connection is here again." It's all part of a cat-and-mouse
game developed over a few days. They know that we are here - and they don't like
it. We know where they are and where they're going - and they don't like it.
Every night, when they patrol Asadabad, Kunar's capital, they point their night
vision goggles to the roof of the Istiqlal hotel where we are staying to check
whether we're filming them. On a visit to the American compound, in a former
prison on the outskirts of Asadabad, we are met at the gate by two soldiers, one
of them carrying a pistol in one hand and X-ray goggles in another. The armed
soldier is very polite, but absolutely "no quotes", not even a "How's the
weather?", unless we are cleared by Bagram air base on the outskirts of the
capital Kabul.
After a quick stop in the village of Asmar, the crucial part of the governor's
day is spent at a jirga (council) meeting in the village of Dangan - reached by
an absolutely hair-raising, back-breaking rocky mountain trail. It's the first
time ever that a Kunar governor has visited this village - which is not even on
the map: that is a measure of the reigning tense situation. The convoy is
greeted by a long circuitous line of very young madrassa (religious school)
students immaculately dressed in blue. An armed sentry in a watchtower, next to
the black-green-red Afghan flag, commands a spectacular view of the lush valley
and the surrounding mountains - a landscape that evokes the most pristine
mountain valleys in the Panjshir or in Kashmir. Before the jirga, some of the
students engage in a heart-warming rendition of an Afghan national poem, whose
lyrics say, "We know how to grow flowers in this land, we don't need guns, we
need pens." Some elders weep. Then, in a fairytale courtyard naturally protected
by trees from the scorching sun, the governor resumes his complex diplomatic
ballet, forcefully telling the locals not to spread false information on
Hekmatyar's whereabouts. The Hezb-i-Islami supremo is extremely popular in the
region.
On a more environmental mode, the governor insists, "You have to protect your
forests from Pakistani loggers." At the capital, Asadabad, the only business is
the timber business - all of it controlled by six or seven powerful commanders,
all of them with privileged connections with Pakistani companies. In Dangan
itself, people diversify, and practically everybody is now back into cultivating
poppy. The governor pleads with them not to.
After the governor's speech, the village elder, the green-turbaned Sayed
Mehbwob, takes the stage and delivers a blistering performance. Fiery eyes,
booming voice and an expressive face straight out of tribal theater, he details
to the governor how the Americans are disturbing the peace of his tribe.
Later, he spells out to us some of the grievances. According to Mehbwob, two
months ago, when the Americans got to Dangan, someone fired an RPG at them. The
Americans didn't say who they were looking for. Three days later they came back
and "struck the house of Zhulam Khan with mortars for four hours. There were
people inside, but mercifully no one was injured." Then, a few days ago, says
Mehbwob, the Americans broke into another house at night: "They broke a lot of
boxes [Pashtuns keep a lot of their possessions in tin containers]. They checked
the clothes of the women. There were only women and children inside the house.
Now everybody in the area is afraid. This is against Pashtun tradition."
Mehbwob confirms that the Shinkai home of the very popular Hezb-i-Islami
commander and mayor of Asadabad, Khan Jan, was also raided by the Americans
"because they thought he had information that would lead to Hekmatyar". Mehbwob
is stinging: "We don't know who they are looking for. Sometimes they say it's
Osama [bin Laden], sometimes al-Qaeda, sometimes Hekmatyar, and now they say
they are looking for terrorists." Another village elder cuts to the chase. "I
think the Americans are foolish. There is tension everywhere in Afghanistan.
What are they doing in this area."
The head of education in Kunar, the affable Ghulam Ullah, offers a more nuanced
perspective. "Kunar is part of a body that has 32 parts. We support the central
government. Kabul is recognized by all the world." He sees the war on terrorism
being waged "by civilized nations. America is part of a coalition. We see the
peacekeepers in Kabul and the American presence in this area in the same way. We
do not see them as invaders. The Russians were invaders. We kicked them out. And
we are here to help Afghans."
But the Americans may be making serious mistakes, such as arresting the popular
Wahhabi leader Haji Roohullah. "Roohullah is a national religious leader." The
motto at the office of Haji Roohullah is "Unity is the best policy". The
educator, on the arrest of Roohullah, says that "all the tribes have long
enmities. One of them is creating problems [he means the Mushwani tribe].
Roohullah was the first to start loya jirga negotiations in Kunar." Ghulam Ullah
is absolutely right when he recalls that the Afghan jihad against the Russians
in the 1980s "started in Kunar, through the family of Roohullah".
Ghulam Ullah is among the few in the region who reject Hekmatyar's ruthless
methods: "We have a lot of differences with Hezb-i-Islami. In 1990, we had a
parliament in Kunar, a democratic election for the chief of this area ...
Roohullah won. The Hezb-i-Islami started fighting because they lost. They killed
12 of Roohullah's supporters. So we have no relationship with Hekmatyar, Hezb-i-
Islami
or al-Qaeda. Hekmatyar got Osama to north Kabul and then they sent an Egyptian
to kill our religious leader, Maulvi Jamil Rahman Salafi. Hekmatyar and Osama
were our first enemies. So how can we give them help."
The real sensitive relationship, for Ghulam Ullah, is between Americans and
local collaborators: "I'm not blaming Americans, because they don't know our
traditions. I'm blaming those working with them. They are kids [a reference to
Raiz, the son of pro-American Asadabad commander Malik Zarin, and his army of
teenagers]. They want to fill their pockets. And they want to obliterate Pashtun
tradition." Last week, Ghulam Ullah met with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and
Defense Minister Mohammed Fahim in Kabul. He is hopeful. "I'm sure Haji
Roohullah will come back soon. But these people who created problems for him
must get behind bars." It's unlikely that the Americans will incarcerate their
few local partners in Kunar.
Back to Asmar, at what the locals call the Capitol building, the governor is
reclined in his cushion, surrounded by what amounts to an informal cabinet
meeting, with everyone seated on carpets sipping green tea. Someone asks the
governor point blank, "Are you going to search these disinformers and put them
in jail?" There's no clear answer. At 3pm the charismatic Khan Jan shows up -
received with all-around reverence. The governor and Khan Jan launch into an
elaborate conversation revolving around the relationship between the commander
and Hekmatyar.
The governor says, "We have two types of mujahideen in Afghanistan. One of them
was boiling tea for the mujahideen who were in the front against the Russians.
The other was in fact in the frontline. The Taliban were boiling tea, and then
they started creating problems. [Former president Burhanuddin] Rabbani is now
creating all kinds of problems for the government. He had support in 1996, not
anymore." Khan Jan tells the governor that two days ago he went to talk to the
Americans, and they told him that they had intelligence in the area proving that
he (Khan Jan) was the problem.
The background for the terse exchange, inevitably, is once again tribal enmity.
The Americans are working with the Mushwani tribe - to which Malik Zarin, the
core commander of Asadabad and his son Raiz, belong. Khan Jan is a member of the
Alizai - a sub-clan of the Salarzai tribe. Mushwanis and Salarzais are
"brothers" only in name: the atmosphere is more like fraternal hatred. The
Salarzai are accusing the Mushwanis of spreading false information to the
Americans. Malik Zarin fought against the Taliban. But the Taliban at one time
were supported by Malik Zarin's cousin. It soon became a battle of cousin
against cousin. Now Salarzais believe that Malik Zarin is exacting his revenge.
The future of Kunar - the last battle of the new Afghan war, and the first
frontline of the new anti-American jihad - will be decided by this cast of
characters. Haji Matheullah - the number-two core commander - and Malik Zarin -
the number-one core commander - plus his 18-year-old son Raiz and his army of
teenagers, will keep working with the Americans. The governor will keep his
skillful diplomatic balancing act. The local populations remain split between
feelings of silent anger or joining Hekmatyar's appeal for a jihad against the
American invaders. Khan Jan, mayor of Asadabad, may be working secretly with
Hekmatyar. There are no prospects of Haji Roohullah being released from Bagram
air base. Hekmatyar may be hidden and plotting in the mountains, 48 hours on
foot to the northeast of Asadabad. And the Americans are bound to keep treating
the local populations with a total lack of sensitivity.
The crucial fact is that the post-Taliban Pashtun counterrevolution is already
in full swing. And it's once again Pashtuns against Tajiks: the Pashtun belt
against a central government in Kabul dominated by the Northern Alliance, where
the Pashtun President Hamid Karzai is derided as a mere American puppet.
Bacha Khan Zadran is a powerful warlord with a strong military presence in three
key Pashtun belt provinces: Paktia, Paktika and Khost. He is openly confronting
Kabul, which nominated what the Pashtuns call "a kid", Abdul Taniwal, as the
governor of Khost. Kabul is after Zadran. But Zadran's tribe has forcefully
asked Karzai to fulfill an earlier pledge and appoint him as head of the three
provinces. A few days ago in Gardez, the simple presence of Zadran inside the
American compound for four hours started a riot, because the locals thought that
he had been arrested.
In Kunar, Haji Roohullah's arrest is not reaping any benefits for the Americans.
On the contrary. In Nangarhar the Americans have relied since the Tora Bora
campaign on the wily Hazrat Ali, a Pachai: the Pachais are derided by the
Pashtuns. Americans are only working with commanders recommended by the Northern
Alliance. They are being fed bad intelligence, no intelligence, and in the
process are being drawn into the tangled web of warlord tribal rivalry. Under
these circumstances, "peace" is impossible: US National Security Advisor
Condoleezza Rice's recent claims that the security situation in Afghanistan had
improved in the past year is nothing short of ridiculous.
Hamid Karzai's security services are totally infiltrated by ultra-disciplined
Hezb-i-Islami operatives. The 4,800 international peacekeeping soldiers in Kabul
are seemingly ineffective. Under their watch, two Afghan ministers have been
assassinated in broad daylight and a car bomb exploded last week in Kabul,
killing 30 people and wounding 167. An assassination attempt on Karzai was only
narrowly averted in Kandahar.
The US - as did the former USSR - has underestimated the indomitable Pashtuns,
at its peril. Many empires have already paid the price for this carelessness.
The American strategy in the Pashtun belt has been the catalyst for re-starting
the civil war in Afghanistan. On the night of September 10, eyewitnesses claim
to have spotted Gulbuddin Hekmatyar himself not in Kunar, but in the Teraha
valley, in Khyber agency (in Pakistan) - on the other side of the Tora Bora.
Hekmatyar was deep in a conference with a group of influential mullahs.
What the US is up against now is a formidable coalition involved in a jihad to
kick out what it sees as foreign invaders. The coalition groups Hekmatyar and
the Hezb-i-Islami's "Professor" Sayyaf, with his wealth of Arab connections and
sponsorship; Ishmail Khan, the "Emir of southwest Afghanistan", who is very
close to Iran; Mullah Omar (still hiding in safety somewhere in Kandahar
province) and his formidable former Taliban military commander, Jalaluddin
Haqqani; plus vast middle-level support from Pakistan's Inter-Services
Intelligence.
At the end of a gruelling day, on the dusty Asmar-Asadabad road, Azad (his name
means "free"), a Pashtun villager, definitely not a fundamentalist, stops the
car to show us his house perched on a hill. The landscape around is
breathtaking, as usual. The American Special Forces are only minutes away - we
cross their convoy on our way back. Azad gazes at the classic Afghan panorama
and murmurs, almost to himself, "The Americans are here because the world
community has made a promise to the Afghan nation. But if they have their own
agenda, I'll have to take care of this. Because I am the owner of this land."
©2002 Asia Times Online Co Ltd.
Sep 12, 2002