India backed wrong horse in race for Kabul

Dostum caved in without a fight after some more of his generals, attracted by the colour of money the Taliban were offering, defected to the militia. He has fled to Ankara, Turkey. Rabbani is already believed to be in Iran.

Official reaction to the Afghan crisis came late in the evening: 8220;Government of India has closely followed recent developments in Afghanistan which have led to the extension of Taliban8217;s authority to the northern areas of the country8230;.This new situation is entirely within the domestic sphere of Afghanistan. Government would like to reaffirm that it is for the Afghan people to decide on their future, free from outside influence and interference8230;8221;

By refusing to outright recognise the Taliban, New Delhi appeared to be preparing the ground for doing so in the near future. One analyst pointed out that in UN parlance 8220;extension of authority8221; is code for 8220;recognition and acceptance8221; of authority.

South Block, meanwhile, seemed in a suspended state of disbelief: 8220;What could India have done in the last few years, what can it possibly do today?8221; At a lesser level, the feeling wasn8217;t much different from the time when hardliners in Moscow attempted a putsch against Gorbachev in 1991 and everyone knew that the days of the Soviet Union were numbered.

In contrast, Pakistan8217;s Foreign Minister Gohar Ayub Khan landed on his feet running, when he arrived back home from a visit to Washington on Sunday: He promptly recognised the Taliban as the new rulers of Afghanistan and crowed about his nation8217;s support to a group that has never been inhibited about imposing the strictest Islamic code on women.

New Delhi8217;s other overwhelming reaction to the Afghan crisis is that India8217;s neighbourhood has suddenly become much more unsafe: intelligence agencies are believed to have found evidence of Pakistan8217;s ISI-trained Taliban fighters fighting side-by-side with the Harkat-ul-Ansar terrorists in the Kashmir valley.

Right now in South Block, hope alternates with despair: sources point out that the comfort level between the Taliban and Nawaz Sharif is not particularly high, and that a few months ago a Talib spokesman had warned Islamabad about not messing around with it, otherwise they might open channels with India.

On the other hand, the sources admit that Nawaz Sharif8217;s uneasiness with his northern neighbour is precisely because he has little control over the ISI8217;s direct line with the Taliban.

Analysts say that the Pentagon8217;s own linkages with the ISI, never discreet, meant that Washington provided significant moral, and perhaps, financial support to the Taliban over the last three years when it launched its jehad8217; from southern Kandahar.

The analysts add that, since, the Taliban8217;s stunning successes have in all probability been bankrolled with Saudi money: Herat fell without a fight and the Shia governor Ismael Khan slunk away across the border to Iran; Kabul fell last September after a few battles, none of them breathtaking. And now in the last week, Dostum8217;s generals, one by one, have fallen like ninepins without a single blow being traded.

New Delhi admits too that the US pressure on India to build bridges with the Taliban has been persistent. Former assistant secretary of state Robin Raphel openly lobbied for the militia both in Islamabad and here, especially because the US wanted the oil major Unocal to succeed in the laying of its pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Karachi, Pakistan.

As long as Dostum8217;s alliance held in northern Afghanistan that wasn8217;t possible. Today, the pipeline8217;s politics are seen as a vindication of US foreign policy.

The ministry, nevertheless, thinks it can see a silver lining in the election of Mohammed Khatami, a 8220;moderate8221; to the Iranian presidency, also over the weekend. A letter of congratulations is being prepared to be sent to the new head, who is believed to be close to the former president Rafsanjani and therefore, is expected to carry on his policies.

Sources said that Khatami8217;s election is likely to spell greater moderation in domestic politics as well as overtures to the West. That the time may be ripe for Iranian society to end its isolation in the region.

If that happens, US oil companies may press their own establishment to lift sanctions against Iran and allow them to tap the huge reserves that exist there.

It was because of Iran8217;s isolation that the Central Asian-Afghanistan pipelines were thought about in the first place. If the Iranian alternative proves more viable, the dependence on the Afghan-Pakistan line could become greatly reduced: in that lies New Delhi8217;s only hope to still play a role in the region.