As US withdrawal opens Pandora’s Box in Afghanistan, Pakistan and China are in the firing line
- As the Taliban captures swathes of territory, fears are growing that the government and its demoralised military are heading for a swift collapse
- Amid the chaos, previously defeated insurgent groups with bones to pick against both Pakistan and China are once more on the rise
The Taliban’s successes on the battlefield have seen it seize swathes of the ring road that connects Afghanistan’s urban centres and surround many provincial capitals, effectively cutting off the government in Kabul from much of the country.
This has prevented the government from reinforcing isolated military units guarding towns. They have also lost the support of Nato warplanes which previously prevented the Taliban from holding any urban centres.
In many cases, demoralised government forces have surrendered to the Taliban, handed over stockpiles of US-supplied arms and equipment - including dozens of Humvee personnel carriers - and disbanded after negotiations conducted by tribal elders desperate to avert bloody, destructive clashes in populated areas.
The battlefield debacle amid the Nato pullout has fuelled predictions by security analysts that the Afghan military could collapse by the end of the year.