The terror of the Taliban is back

Jason Burke of the Observer reports on the re-emergence of a stronger, better coordinated Taliban in Afghanistan.

"The Taliban are expanding fast," he writes. "The deputy governor of Zabul admits most of his province is now controlled by the militia. Most of Oruzgan province and around half of Kandahar province is now beyond government authority."

Not only is the group mobilizing quickly, its political leadership has developed a coherent strategy for dealing with the Karzai government and US presence, according to Burke:

In June, Mullah Omar set up a 10-man leadership council to co-ordinate a new strategy aimed at cutting south-eastern Afghanistan off from the rest of the country. Their aim, according to Western diplomats in Kabul, is to make the region too insecure for development work.

'If the Taliban can prevent the benefits of postwar reconstruction reaching local people, the disillusionment and alienation created will boost support,' one said.

So far, the strategy is working. International aid organisations are restricting their operations in the south-east. 'It's just too damned dangerous these days,' said one NGO security officer.

This strategy seems to resonate with what's happening in Iraq, too.

Update: "Two years after the Taliban regime fled Kabul in the face of U.S.-led coalition forces," the Washington Post's Walter Pincus reported on Saturday, "Gen. John Abizaid, the head of the U.S. Central Command, has described daily combat operations in Afghanistan as 'every bit as much and every bit as difficult as those that go on in Iraq.'"