How India targets Afghanistan | Essay Materials for CSS

By: Adeela Naureen and Umar Waqar

As intra-Afghan peace negotiations have moved ahead, spoilers of peace have started their nefarious game to delay or scuttle the process. With regional countries, especially Afghanistan neighbours desiring peace, there is growing support for the process. The only country in the world who wants to derail the peace process is India.

Afghanistan neighbours and the international community have reached a consensus that the peaceful settlement of the Afghan issue is the only solution to get rid of terrorism and instability in the region.

In the past, India armed the Afghan forces as well as terrorist entities like IS and TTP with a view to target Taliban freedom fighters. Taliban casualties in the conflict are heavily attributed to Indian military aid to the National Directorate of Security (NDS) and the Afghan National Army (ANA).

Details of Indian military aid to ANA, NDS and the Afghan government indicates how India was consciously arming the factions and Afghan government to fuel the war and target freedom fighters of Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. India pumped in approximately 3 billion dollars into Afghanistan in the last fifteen years in the form of so-called aid for social development, almost one-third of it was for fuelling the war machine.

In terms of training 7200 Afghan personnel including interpreters have been trained from 2006-20; focus remained on intelligence, logistics and operations, three groups of sixty ANA lady officers were trained at the Officer Training School since 2017. During 2020, the training cooperation has further enhanced. NDS and ANA cadres trained against the Taliban in 2020 include 345 officers and soldiers in Indian military institutions.

After 9/11, India found an expanding space in Pakistan’s neighbourhood to apply all strands of Chankaya’s Mandala theory through a sophisticated hybrid war. The south bloc head-honchos thought that a nuclear Pakistan could be finally eroded by their proxies in Afghanistan and the game started in earnest through expanding operations of RAW in collaboration with hostile intelligence The objectives were; befriend anti Pakistan terrorist organisations and support selective but ruthless terrorist organisations like TTP, Lashkar e Jhangvi and Daish etc; penetrate the area east of River Indus including Balochistan to support proxy war against Pakistan; support dissident leadership of BLA etc, and supply them arms and ammunitions to sabotage the lifeline of Balochistan, especially the communication networks; provide diplomatic support to dissident leaders and organise seminars and conferences in major capitals of the western world to highlight the so called ‘cause of liberation of Balochistan’.

RAW’s big game against Pakistan and Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan got a fillip after the fall of the Taliban regime, as Afghanistan became the centre of the power game led by the US with a plethora of approximately 40 intelligence agencies actively pursuing their agenda. RAW exploited the swaths of ungovernable areas of Afghanistan for setting the bases across the Durand Line and even within some of Indian Consulates in Iran. Balochistan became a prime target because of three major reasons; the deep sea port of Gwadar would propel Pakistan into the maritime game of the Indian Ocean and allow it to grow faster than India.

The extent of RAW’s involvement in Karachi, Balochistan, KPK and even urban centres of Punjab and Sindh may not be fully known; however, the intelligence gathered from Commander Kulbhushan has uncovered some of the strategic directives given to him by South block and Mr. Ajit Kumar Doval.

The façade of Indian investment and development in Afghanistan has started crumbling as more stories about how Indian military and RAW directly took part in military operations against Taliban fighters are emerging. No wonder Indian Chief of defence Staff (CDS) General Bipin Rawat pointed out the need for talking to the Taliban during the Raisina Dialogue held in New Delhi.

The reality, of course, is different: the Indian Militablishment and RAW, after playing a long and dirty game in Afghanistan, feels its investment in drowning in Kabul River.

Pakistan and Afghanistan are intertwined twins and neighbours who have remained inseparable throughout history. They have to live and coexist together; any outside power trying to create cleavages between these two brothers will fail and India is no exception. From now on, all roads to Kabul will pass through Islamabad.

Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan must realise that the RAW and Indian government has blood of many of the Taliban martyrs on their hands.

Article Source: The Nation