Security in Afghanistan has hit the lowest point since the ouster of the Taliban in 2001. This year has seen pitched battles between the anti-government insurgents and the newly deployed NATO forces. As the country approaches the first anniversary of its first democratically elected Parliament based on full adult franchise, it seems as if the hopes of the international community and the Afghan citizens could be belied.
Suicide bombings are now a regular feature in the country, with nearly 80 thus far this year alone. Kabul increasingly resembles a city under siege, with more bunkers, roadblocks and barbed-wire fences than at any time since 2001. Both the development arm of the international community and the military forces are now agreed that Afghanistan has entered a 'critical' year.
This is a far cry from the end of 2001, when the US-led Coalition Forces claimed they were mopping up the remnants of the Taliban, and the US Defence Secretary said there were not enough good targets for the US to bomb. The turnaround in the security situation seems to have taken most of the international community by surprise, and the determination and desperation of the Taliban are often being cited equally as 'new' factors in the equation. During her visit to Afghanistan this year, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice repeatedly exclaimed that the international forces were facing a 'thinking enemy', and needed to change strategy – as if that had been an unexpected factor, and the entire military strategy of the last five years had simply been based on the assumption that the enemy could not or would not 'think'.
Yet even with the changes in strategy now being employed to combat the Taliban, there is little evidence that the international community and its military strategists have really learned from the experience of the last five years. The slow but steady deterioration of the security situation has not been in spite of the military strategies implemented, but largely because of them – strategies that have been short-sighted, and focused on piecemeal solutions. This is an approach that continues to inform military operations even now, with compartmentalised policies, exhibiting little understanding of the interlinkages of reasons causing the instability.