“The Taliban are different from their predecessors, and if” less repressive “elements of the Taliban work at the top of the country,” General Nick Carter, the British military commander, said before his last appearance in the House of Commons Defense Committee, according to the Financial Times. The Afghan government can be more inclusive.
It is too early to judge the defeat of the NATO alliance in Afghanistan following the Taliban’s rapid takeover of Kabul in August and the withdrawal of US troops, the British military chief of staff said.
“I think it ‘s too early to say that there has been a defeat,” Carter, who is stepping down as Britain’ s top military official at the end of November, told lawmakers in the House of Commons’ defense committee. Victory here must be measured by results, not by great military achievements.
He added that the second version of the Taliban is different. There are a lot of people in the current Taliban who want to govern in a more modern way. If the less repressive elements finally gain control, I think there is no reason not to believe that Afghanistan will become a more inclusive country in the next five years than previously thought. ،
He defended Western intelligence agencies that had underestimated the power of the Taliban, blaming the sudden fall of the Afghan government and the rise of the Taliban on a sudden shift in loyalty to local warlords. Millions of dollars were exchanged. What happened there was that loyalty changed within a week.
The top British military official defended his earlier claims that the Afghan government would retain power after the withdrawal of Western forces, saying that a more pessimistic assessment at the time would weaken then-President Ashraf Ghani. “The plan was to force the Afghan government to stand together and maintain it,” he said. I’m one of the voices they listened to, probably more than any other foreigner other than the Strange Americans.
In response to why he had warned of calling the Taliban an “enemy” at the time of the evacuation, Carter said it was to protect British troops still there.
