Over the last two weeks, we have looked at the War in Afghanistan, including the Soviet’s strong feelings that Afghanistan needed to be part of them, and their disappointment when turned down in a brutal war. (Terrorism, A Remnant of The Cold War: Part 1 )
The second part looked at Pakistan’s heavy influence in trying to determine who ruled Afghanistan after the fall of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), which included abandoning one of the groups they were supporting to supporting the Taliban.
While Pakistan, the United States of America, Saudi Arabia, Iran and the USSR were interested in Afghanistan in the 1980s, they might have been unaware that they were starting a war that would involve almost half of the world two decades later. The war would also expand the scene from battlefields and war hit countries into streets in major cities, the now familiar terrorists.
Wars would no longer just be on the TV, but in metal detectors in the streets. How did terrorism travel from the streets of Kabul to those of Nairobi, New York and Khartoum?
The Al Qaeda was founded in the late 1980s to fight off the USSR in Afghanistan. It was closely associated with Hezb-e Islami, one of the many Mujahideen who were fighting to flush out the invasion of the USSR army into Afghanistan. The other Mujahideen however swear that Hezb-e Islam spent most of their time fighting them after the USSR left than they ever spend fighting the invaders. The group also received about $ 600 million from the US to fight the soviets (and later funding and tens of thousands of rockets from Pakistan).
Al Qaeda had strong Sunni religious fundamentals, with its roots in Saudi Arabia where Osama Bin Laden was born. Al Qaeda specialises in protecting the invasion of Muslim countries by non-muslim forces. The sect has also been quite ruthless on the minority Shia Muslims, especially in Iraq.
Sunnis constitute 75 percent to 90 percent of muslims while Shias make up 10 percent to 20 percent of global muslims. Shias have been at the receiving end of violence from extremist Sunnis for centuries.
Al Qaeda was one of the firms with strong Sunni religious fundamentals, with its roots in Saudi Arabia where Osama Bin Laden was born. Al Qaeda specialises in protecting the invasion of Muslim countries by non-muslim forces. The sect has also been quite ruthless on the minority Shia Muslims, especially in Iraq.
Al Qaeda’s war with Iraq dates back to 1990 when Iraq invaded Jordan and almost overran Saudi Arabia who were outnumbered by the Iraqis, despite being better armed. Osama offered to help Saudi Arabia, but the Saudis turned him down and opted for the US. Osama got very bitter at the presence of foreign troops in the holy land of the Muslims, Saudi Arabia. Being very critical, he was expelled out of Saudi, stripped of his citizenship and his accounts frozen.
In Sudan, Bin Laden’s organisation ended up killing an Egyptian school girl instead of the Egyptian PM, turning Egyptian public anger towards suicide bombers. Sudan also decided he was no longer welcome. and invited the US to arrest him, but the US rejected the invitation. Osama was expelled and he sought refuge with his old pals in Afghanistan.
The Taliban and Al Qaeda were very ruthless. They often massacred communities especially the Shia Hazara minority, denied food aid to areas they were attacking. In regions where they ruled, women were barred from accessing health care, education and houses were supposed to have covered windows that prevented women from “being seen from outside”. Women were also not supposed to laugh in a “manner that could be heard by others”.
The Taliban once killed a commander whose mistake was allowing the leader of an opposing faction to walk free from peace negotiations, after he came unarmed as a sign of goodwill. Despite basing their fundamentals on religion, the Taliban abducted women and sold them as sex slaves.
The Taliban and Al Qaeda are said to have fallen out at some point, with the Taliban now being said to receive funding and weapons from Iran, one of Al Qaeda’s enemies.
From Afghanistan, Al Qaeda was able to organise and carry out attacks including taking over failing Muslim Jihad cells in Bosnia, bombings in Saudi Arabia in 1996 against the US and the world famous hijackings and bringing down of the World Trade Center in 11th September 2001. It’s the last attack that saw the US go back to Afghanistan after almost 10 years of being away.
There’s also the United States embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 223 and injured more than 4,000.
Bin Laden’s turning back on his former masters probably goes back to his jealous on Saudi Arabia’s opting of US support instead of his. He might also consider the US an enemy for supporting Israel, one of Al Qaeda’s enemies.
Al Qaeda have also opened up base in Yemen and Somalia, seemingly opening up operation in countries with a majority muslim base and incapacitated central governments.
They US later drove the radical Taliban from power, the same radicals who had been relied on to bring the Soviets down a decade earlier.
The Taliban, meanwhile, have been running an insurgency in Afghanistan after their removal, and have also gone into hiding in Pakistan. In Pakistan, the Taliban and Pakistani troops have been engaged in a war since 2004. However, the Pakistani government has beens aid to be secretly supporting the Taliban while waging the war as a “public show” to please the west.
The US, probably not wanting to make another grave mistake of supporting a future Osama, has been using drones – remote controlled planes- to make attacks against Taliban hideouts in Pakistan. Again, it is claimed that Pakistan has been supporting the attacks in secret while criticising them in public.
Pakistan provides drone bases and provides a supply route to Afghanistan.
Pakistan and the US additionally remain interested in Afghanistan as an independent route to oil rich countries of the former USSR. Russia currently controls energy access to these countries at its own advantage.
Meanwhile, the US and its allies investing resources in bringing down Al Qaeda in Somalia and Yemen, in addition to Iraq and Afghanistan. There has also been talk of Al Qaeda emerging in Mali.
The Cold War was said to end with the fall of the USSR in 1992, but it came with repercussions felt to date.
The war on terror, focused on the Al Qaeda and Taliban currently involves 72 of about 180 countries on earth. The US is estimated to have spend about $ 1.2 trillion to $ 2.7 trillion (between 85 to 210 times Kenya’s total budget) on the war in 2011.
Kenya’s spending on the war in Somalia remains as secretive a sit’s military budget, though the government acknowledges a KES12 billion direct addition to the budget from the war.
Article sourced largely from Wikipedia entries. Other resources are Yahoo Answers, Quora