To understand the Taliban and their current strategy, it helps to begin with the basics. The Taliban are insurgents, and their first order of business is simply survival. A domestic guerrilla group almost always has more staying power than an occupier, which is projecting force over a greater distance and has the added burden of a domestic population less directly committed to a war in a foreign — and often far-off — land. If the Taliban can only survive as a cohesive and coherent entity until the United States and its allies leave Afghanistan, they will have a far less militarily capable opponent (Kabul) with whom to compete for dominance.
Currently facing an opponent (the United States) that has already stipulated a timetable for withdrawal, the Taliban are in an enviable position. The United States has given itself an extremely aggressive and ambitious set of goals to be achieved in a very short period of time. If the Taliban can both survive and disrupt American efforts to lay the foundations for a U.S./NATO withdrawal, their prospects for ultimately achieving their aims increase dramatically.
And here the strategy to achieve their imperfectly defined objective begins to take shape. The Taliban have no intention of completely evaporating into the countryside, and they have every intention of continuing to harass International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) troops, inflicting casualties and raising the cost of continued occupation. In so doing, the Taliban not only retain their relevance but may also be able to hasten the withdrawal of foreign forces.
Judging from the initial phase of Operation Moshtarak in Marjah and what can likely be expected in similar offensives in other areas, the Taliban strategy toward the surge is: 1) largely decline combat but leave behind a force significant enough to render the securing phase as difficult as is possible for U.S.-led coalition forces by using hit-and-run tactics and planting improvised explosive devices; 2) once the coalition force becomes overwhelming, fall back and allow the coalition to set up shop and wage guerrilla and suicide attacks (though Mullah Omar has issued guidance that these attacks should be initiated only after approval at the highest levels in order to minimize civilian casualties). In all likelihood, this phase of the Taliban campaign would include attempts at intimidation and subversion against Afghan security forces.
Being a diffuse guerrilla movement, the Taliban will likely attempt to replicate this strategy as broadly as possible, forcing ISAF forces to expend more energy than they would prefer on holding ground while impeding the building and reconstruction phase, which will become increasingly difficult as coalition forces target more and more areas. The idea is that the locals who are already wary about relying on Kabul and its Western allies will then become even more disenchanted with the ability of the coalition to weaken the Taliban. However, the ISAF attempting to take control of key bases of support on which the Taliban have long relied, and the impact of these efforts on the Taliban will warrant considerable scrutiny.
For now, the Taliban appear to have lost interest in larger-scale attacks involving several hundred fighters being committed to a single objective. Though such attacks certainly garnered headlines, they were extremely costly in terms of manpower and materiel with little practical gain. And with old strongholds like Helmand province feeling the squeeze, there are certainly some indications that ISAF offensives are taking an appreciable bite out of the operational capabilities of at least the local Taliban commanders.
Conserving forces and minimizing risk to their core operational capability are parallel and interrelated considerations for the Taliban in terms of survival. If the recent assault on Marjah is any indication, the Taliban are adhering to these principles. While some fighters did dig in and fight and while resistance has stiffened — especially within the last week — the Taliban declined to make it a bloody compound-to-compound fight despite the favorable defensive terrain.
Similarly, the U.S. surge intends to make it hard for the Taliban to sustain — much less replace — manpower and materiel. Taliban tactics must be tailored to maximize damage to the enemy while minimizing costs, which drives the Taliban directly to hit-and-run tactics and the widespread use of improvised explosive devices.
There is little doubt that the Taliban will continue to inflict casualties in the coming year. But there is also considerable resolve behind the surge, which will not even be up to full strength until the summer and will be maintained until at least July 2011. Indeed, it is not clear if the Taliban can inflict enough casualties to alter the American timetable in its favor any further.
There is also the underlying issue of sustaining the resistance. Manpower and logistics are inescapable parts of warfare. Though the United States and its allies bear the heavier burden, the Taliban cannot ignore that it is losing key population centers and opium-growing areas central to recruitment, financing and sanctuary. The parallel crackdowns by the ISAF on the Afghan side of the border and the Pakistani crackdowns on the opposite side, where the Taliban has long enjoyed sanctuary, represent a significant challenge to the Taliban if the efforts can be sustained. Signs of a potential increase in cooperation and coordination between Washington and Islamabad could also be significant.
In other words, despite all its flaws, there is a coherency to what the United States is attempting to achieve. Success is anything but certain, but the United States does seek to make very real inroads against the core strength of the Taliban. One of those methods is to reduce the Taliban’s operational capability to the point where it will no longer have the capability to overwhelm Afghan security forces after the United States begins to draw down. There is no shortage of issues surrounding the U.S. objectives to train up the Afghan National Army and National Police, and it is not at all clear that even if those objectives are met that indigenous forces will be able to manage the Taliban.