Maria Laura Avignolo
08/12/2021 17:01
Clarín.com
World
Updated 08/12/2021 17:01
Afghanistan in chaos, after the departure of NATO coalition forces at night.
The provincial capitals fall one after another
, in a Taliban offensive that has a speed unimagined by Westerners in its retreat.
US military commanders believe that Afghanistan could fall into the hands of the Taliban in weeks and
within a month reach Kabu
l, its capital and headquarters of its universities and embassies.
But first it will be besieged.
Pul e Khumri, 220 kilometers north of Kabul, fell on Wednesday and was one of three cities that was left in a single day in the hands of Islamic fundamentalists.
The others were Farah and Faisabad.
This Thursday afternoon Harat fell, the city on the border with Iran, defended by the former Mujahideen leader Ismail Khan
.
Ten provincial capitals,
in the north and west of the country, have been captured by the Taliban in less than a week.
The Taliban offensive is unstoppable.
Photo EFE
The population flees
and crosses overcrowded routes to Taliban checkpoints, who check them and tell them: "Don't be afraid if you are not collaborators."
The provincial capital Gazhni has also fallen and they control the city.
"They entered the prison and
released 400 prisoners. They
began the assault at noon and at 2 in the morning they had finished," said a resident by phone.
"The governor and the police commander
made an agreement and will join the ranks of the Taliban
.
The security chief and the intelligence chief continue to fight in favor of the government forces, ”he said.
Humayyoon DShahidzada, Afghan MP for Farah province, confirmed that in the capture of Farah, the Taliban fighters dragged the body of an official soldier through the streets of the city,
shouting "God is great."
The Taliban carried M16 rifles and Humves vehicles,
abandoned by the Americans at their bases.
The fall
The fall of Pul e Khumri Ke gives the Taliban
strategic control of the route between the north and south of the country
.
The Afghan military and security forces have been defeated, or are isolated, without ammunition or air support at the bases or the combat field to defend against the offensive.
The strategy is simple: the Taliban surround the bases abandoned by the Westerners, which have been occupied by government troops.
But with the fall of more than 70 percent of the country,
they cannot be supplied with food or ammunition.
Elements of the security force monitor drugs on fire in Jalalabad, Nangarhar province, Afghanistan.
Photo Xinhua
The officers ask for help and it doesn't come
.
Soldiers debate and know the choice is simple: surrender or be beheaded.
They surrender their weapons and join the Taliban forces.
Now the insurgents
are less than 150 kilometers from the Bagram air base
, the great heritage of Westerners, where a failing air force is installed, with pilots who have deserted due to lack of support and without mechanics.
The entire US occupation effort was installed there for 20 years.
There was a prison for 5000 insurgents, which was abandoned in the middle of the night by NATO.
They did not even notify government forces
, who arrived the next morning to find abandoned Humvees, weapons, ammunition, armored cars and private cars, without keys.
The departure of Western forces from Afghanistan
was the biggest strategic mistake
of US Democratic President Joe Biden.
He is not sorry for the abandonment and says that it is the Afghans who must fight for their own country.
"Look.
We spend a trillion dollars in 20 years.
We train and equip, with modern equipment,
a force of 30,000 men.
Afghan leaders must unite, ”said the American president.
“We are watching security conditions deteriorate.
But in our view, nothing is inevitable, ”said Jen Psaki, a spokesperson for President Biden.
Thousands of Afghans flee to neighboring Pakistan.
Photo EFE
A Pentagon spokesman reported that they will give him "
air support
but we cannot substitute for leadership on the ground."
They have an Air Force.
Not the Taliban, ”he said.
"They have modern weapons and organization, the Taliban do not.
They are superior to the Taliban in numbers.
That is your country.
They have their military forces.
These are their provincial capitals, their people to defend them ”, he assured.
The past returns
The past returns.
Afghanistan in utter chaos, with Al Qaeda unbeaten, ISIS inside the country, the Haqani clan network intact,
opium overflowing
and on the brink of civil war.
The Taliban are advancing on the cities and are at the gates of Kabul.
Liquidate,
with lists in hand, those who worked with Westerners.
The British government agreed to host translators and journalists working for the Western media.
The United States bombards with its B52s and promises to continue bombing but from on high.
There will be no local ground or air support, or helicopters to take out the wounded in combat.
.
Chaos, death and
thousands of refugees fleeing
but the borders are closed in Afghanistan.
A sense of abandonment and terror for civilians.
The Taliban are advancing on each of the main Afghan cities.
In Kandahar, a military checkpoint.
Photo EFE
Fierce fighting in Helmand to control the capital, the former stronghold of British forces.
The target is Kabul
, where they assassinated the presidential spokesman and thwarted a suicide attack, which left 20 dead, against the defense minister.
But it is the Afghans themselves who feel abandoned by Westerners.
From the rooftops of Kabul, civilians seized the Taliban's religious slogans.
They are the ones who now sing "Ala es grande
" to reject them, when they tried to assassinate the defense minister with a suicide attack.
The Taliban are retaking Afghanistan
at an unthinkable speed
.
It reaches the cities, not only with its artillery, but with the ammunition and vehicles stolen from the bases abandoned by the Westerners.
They also arrive with lists of "collaborators."
They are the Afghans who worked for NATO as translators, who were the fixers for Western journalists and officials who worked for the Kabul government.
If they find them, they behead them and occupy their home.
They fight in Khandahar, their spiritual capital, which is on the verge of falling into the hands of the Taliban.
Zarrank and Herat, the third largest city in the country, fell this afternoon.
The warlords, who fought alongside the Moujadin Taliban at the time in the Soviet invasion, such as Ismail Khan, defended Herat,
with his 3,000 men from his militia so that the Taliban did not enter.
They fought for 15 days and today they fell.
It was they and their militias who carried out the defense and not the demoralized and inexperienced Afghan government forces.
"" The government forces and their officers
withdrew
to their bases outside the city to prevent further destruction, "said an official from Herat.
The border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
AP Photo
A Taliban spokesman tweeted from Herat that
"soldiers surrender their weapons and join the Mujahideen"
this afternoon.
The Taliban flag flies over the Herat police department, 150 kilometers from the border with Iran.
No air force
The Afghan planes are not working. Its Air Force has been dismantled after the departure of NATO.
The mechanics who nourish and repair its 160 planes are hired, leaving on August 31, when the retirement is formalized.
They are running out of pilots and without air cover.
The planes they have are too sophisticated for a chaotic country like Afghanistan.
No one can fix them
.
No one knows how they can defend themselves against a Taliban arrival in Kabul without air support.
There is no electricity or internet, which is essential to grant it.
The pilots desert en masse
because the Taliban killed one of them and they want protection for their families to continue fighting.
The Americans
have tried to provide air support
with planes from the Gulf countries, but they are ineffective because the Taliban move within the cities and use the homes of civilians as bases.
President Ghani has no alternative but to
resort to the militias of warlords
, the protagonists of the post-Soviet invasion civil war, a reality that can implode Afghanistan through the distribution of power.
He traveled to the besieged Mazar e Sharif, in an effort to encourage his demoralized troops.
His attempt was erased because hundreds of Afghan troops surrendered near Kunduz, the city that had fallen over the weekend.
A symbol for the Taliban.
Government troops have withdrawn to the Mazar e Sharif airport, to a military base.
Soldiers who ditched their uniforms say that the Taliban have surrounded the base and bombarded it with artillery.
They have captured three military aircraft.
The Taliban offer letters of forgiveness to the soldiers.
The officers have fled.
"Why am I going to keep fighting?"
Asked a soldier who surrendered.
"We must surrender everything to end the war.
I am happy that I gave up without a fight.
The Taliban will give me the letter and I can walk safely. No one is going to attack me, "he said.
Faced with the atrocities they commit in the advance, people flee.
He tries to cross into Iran or Pakistan
but the borders are closed. Thousands of trucks with rotting goods cannot cross from one side to the other.
Criticism of NATO
Everyone criticizes the agreement that the United States signed in Doha and legitimized the Taliban,
who today feel they have violated it
, because of the bombings.
They advance and release their prisoners on the way to the prisons.
With the Taliban at the gates of Kabul, the presidential spokesman executed and a broad and swift offensive, Britain
will offer refuge
to Afghan journalists working with UK media.
It was announced by the British Chancellor, Dominic Raab.
It was the response to the request of the main British media to save them.
But they were joined by the former chiefs of the British army, who
demanded humanity
and urgency to save the translators, who run the risk of being executed by the Taliban.
and many have already been.
The translators who have arrived in Great Britain ask their family to flee, that there is no more time.
It is believed that in a week it will be impossible to leave through the Kabul airport,
where refugees are crowding before the closing of borders.
Refugees are staying in tents in the capital, where foreigners have withdrawn like NGOs, at the request of their governments,
because no one can guarantee their safety.
The British military denounced that the Boris Johnson government was not doing enough to save them.
Afghan media director and presidential spokesman Dawa Khan Menapal
was executed last Friday
.
The other European countries have plans to evacuate the translators and civilians who helped them in Afghanistan in the face of imminent danger.
It is probably too late.
PB
Look also
Afghanistan: they propose to the Taliban a distribution of power to stop the violence
Kidnappings, beheadings and corpses in the street: the hell of the Taliban offensive in Afghanistan