The new strategic depth for Pakistan

[kit]

The currently evolving scenario is likely to establish a Taliban controlled government in Afghanistan. This scenario gives the Pakistan military their much sought after "strategic depth" vs India. Establishing military bases., parking their AEW&C aircraft out of harm's way as well as even basing strategic missiles in Afghan soil. How is this going to impact India's security?

The S400 impact was for its system radars to cover the whole of Pakistani airspace., how does Paki fighter jets based in say Kabul impact Indian military operations?

As regards militancy., they could move their jihadi camps to Afghanistan and say "we don't have any in our soil"

[bharathp]

I still want to confirm that this taliban 2.0 is fully pro-pak. the way they are going, they may think they dont need Pakistan. in fact its pakistan that needs them at the moment.

[Raveen]

I still want to confirm that this taliban 2.0 is fully pro-pak. the way they are going, they may think they dont need Pakistan. in fact its pakistan that needs them at the moment.

The fact that the Talibunny negotiators were flying to and fro from Doha to Pakistan during negotiations with the US isn't clear enough for you?

[ramana]

No. This Taliban 2.0 is different from Taliban 1.0
The T 1.0 was controlled by ISI like Hamid Ghoul via Mulllah Omar.

The peaceful transition to power had suddenly removed the ISI yoke on the mules err mullahs.
And see the interim head is being parachuted from Washington DC.
So am not ready to think all these are under Pak control.
Some factions are under Pak control funded by China.
I will post a few tweets soon.

[ramana]

Please read about the China Taliban faction nexus by Andrew Small

https://twitter.com/ajwsmall/status/142 ... 74211?s=19

[yensoy]

Yet Pakis will have an enormous amount of clout over the Taliban given that almost any logistics chain into/out of Afghanistan goes thru Pakistan. Rent-seeking, as usual, that the deep state excels in.

Two things could distort this calculus (i) if Talib 2.0 are enough of a threat and menace to the very peace and existence of the Pak state causing a trade of non-nuisance for logistics or (ii) if China pressures Paki deep state to go easy on the Talib so as to give the Chinese access.

[srin]

Why is Talibanized Afghanistan a strategic depth for the Bakis ? So far, it has been the other way around.

To me, the strategic depth is what happened in 2nd world war on Eastern Front. The Soviets took blow after blow and yielded space for the time (Russian winter and to get reinforcements). How is Afghanistan (that is surrounded by mountains) going to be strategic depth for the Baki army if they are chased by Indian army ?

[kit]

From the horses mouth

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opense ... gic-depth/

We want a strategic depth in Afghanistan but do not want to control it,” the general said while speaking to a group of journalists at the Army General Headquarters in Rawalpendi, Pakistan. “A peaceful and friendly Afghanistan can provide Pakistan a strategic depth,” he said, while warning that it was essential to address Pakistan’s long-term strategic concerns for stability in the region.

The Military “Strategic Depth”

What though, do Pakistani official mean by gaining strategic depth in Afghanistan?

Militarily speaking, strategic depth describes the insulation of a fighting unit’s core capacity (cities, industry etc) and its distance from the front line. But varied and at times contradicting concepts of “Pakistan’s Strategic Depth in Afghanistan” have emerged from Pakistani and Afghan soldiers and analysts.

Some Pakistani military strategists retain a military understanding of the term and appear to believe that Afghan’s territory could provide a strategic rallying point in the case of an Indian attack. They are concerned about the fact that Pakistan geographically is a narrow country and an indian attack can cut through the country and divide it into two halves. In such a case, they believe, Afghan territory could provide a suitable “Strategic Depth” to which the Pakistan army can retreat and regroup in order to launch a counter attack.

This same idea helps explain Pakistan’s interest in a “friendly” government in Afghanistan, one that would be willing to violate its impartiality in a possible Indo-Pak conflict, and allow the Pakistani army to retreat to Afghan territory to gain strategic depth.

[srin]

Thank you very much, kit'ji !

There are no industries in Afghanistan to speak of. If you look at the terrain relief map (https://maps-for-free.com/), it's obvious that they have to go through only a few mountain passes (Khyber pass, Bolan Pass in Balochistan, and what else ?). There isn't much space to maneuver. If they regroup in Afghanistan, they can't launch a mass attack into the plains due to the mountains.

If this is their idea of strategic depth, I think they are welcome to it. They must be smoking crack ... finest Afghan variety !

[nits]

2 Things to note

There is no base in Afgan which is in very close proximity to India compared to Pak's own bases and neither of them can plan a route which can be surprise for India as they have to cross POK and thats something we always monitor...

there can be a situation where they can park some of there vital assets or even sme spare N Bombs in Afgan for safe keep or as second / third strike capability which India need to factor into. There was some talk about we having a base in Tajakistan and if its true it can be used for such times

[Cyrano]

----X posting from Afghanistan thread ---

Taliban 2.0 seem to be much smarter than they made the world think they are until now. The future looks like this to me:

Stage 1: "Emirate" : Afghanistan will initially go along the Iranian model. Lamp posts will be used once they consolidate grip on the entire country, the foreigners leave, all entry and exit points & airports are fully in Taliban control and the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) is established and outsiders can no longer intervene. Then the real power struggles will happen and darwinian victors will emerge. As long as non-muslim nations don't interfere in IEA or Islamic matters they will not stir too much trouble outside their borders.

Stage 2: "Chidiya Chor" : Their focus now will be on raiding eastwards like the generations have done before them to capture the "Aag ki Chidiya" or Pak's crown jewels. Pakistan is anyway seen by the Taliban as a failed islamic state and in the long established tradition of sons killing their fathers, they will go after Pakistan's scotch swigging, dog loving Pepperoni Genernails and expand their new emirate erasing the Durand line. Pepperoni Genernails will quickly realise their Frankenstien creation has islamised their own Army at every level, so they will cut a deal to become the (acting) heads of the expanded IEA's army and bringing their Crown Jewels ie dirty bums with them, which the Taliban will find impossible to resist. The PA surely know how to spin the resulting IEA++ into a victory, while secretly hoping to do a military coup at some point in the future. They won't care much about separatist movements in Baluchistan or Sindh - they will simply let Taliban to run over those regions striking terror in those peoples who will eventually, being muslims, submit to the new Emirate's islamic rule.
IEA++ which now encompasses AF+Pak will then have 2 choices:

Stage 3: "Caliphate" : To supplant Saudi Arabia as the global authority on sunni islam itself, declare itself as the new Caliphate and lord over the Ummah, and start a war with Iran & KSA which will lead to MAD scenarios in the ME. The Chinese invested lot of money meanwhile in exchange for not interfering with Uyghurs, thats great because the call of the new Caliphate can actually activate the dormant Uyghurs when needed. Islamic ideology exerts a pull that Communism can never match. Who cares about a taquiyya promise made to greedy, goodless yellow idiot Chinese anyway?

--- OR directly go to ---
Stage 4: "Gajwa e Hind' : To conquer the "soney ki chidiya" and realise the dream their forefathers tried countless times but never succeeded. They will most likely go to stage 3 then Stage 4 because the promised Hind has now become very powerful and is a "soney ka giddh (meaning golden eagle or gartuhmantha)" and can't be attacked too soon. Meanwhile they can create and foster maximum internal rot, because the ummah loyal to the caliphate is everywhere and is multiplying like horseweed (Eichhornia) on stagnant water, slowly suffocating all other life forms of light and oxygen.

So the priority for India (preferably with or even without the US) now must be to swoop down on Pak's dirty bums and confiscate them to prevent them from falling into IEA's hands. Even if that means war now because it will be a far more dangerous war the later we fight it. Don't worry about the Tofu Chinese, they will never fight a war they cant win, and have never won any. They'll be happy just to keep their shandongs and ding dongs intact for beauty parades of the proletariat. If India acts clearly and decisively NO ONE can or will stop us because no one wants an islamic bum.
---x---

If India acts, it can make it "strategic death" for Pakistan.

[ramana]

The Paki interlocutors are being disingenuous about the concept of strategic depth in Paki mind.
It's to store their nukes away from Indian strikes.
And Mushy was foolish enough to do that in 2001.
On 9/12/2001 they had multiple flights to bring back these clown jewels when they realized the US would attack Afghanistan due to 9/11.

I don't think the strategic depth need holds anymore.

[Anujan]

^^^
Agree 400%

What is the current idea of "Strategic depth"? That India will rout the TFTAs, who will then gather in the Kave Kamplex of tora bora and then regroup and run down the mountains yelling "Jeeeehaaaarrrrrddddddd!!!!!"

Anyone with any decent level of strategic thought* will know that they need supplies. Food, arms, artillery. Without that, they are machine gun fodder.

"Strategic depth" only means one of a few things

1) It is a poorly though out idea, like "Strategic defiance"
2) They want plausible deniability, locating terror training camps in Afghanistan, exporting raw materials as recruits, importing finished maal as hardened jihadis and re-exporting them to India and the rest of the world
3) They want to store the bum
4) They want a "forward policy", like Ranjit Singh. Unless the Pashtun dominated areas of Afghanistan is fully under their control, Pakjab is not.

The whole idea that "Strategic depth" means that Jernails and Kernails will sit in caves in mountains is pure bunkum. Ask the Jernails to sit outside the DHA, where they are all swilling whiskey and setting up Pizza franchises in Massa.

*Well in one sense you can tell me that some Pakis think of this tactic: Remember that they did a cavalry charge with tanks, all in a straight line like horse riders in the eighth century, yelling Jeeeehaaarrrrddd!!!!. Indian infantry picked them off one by one with recoilless rifles.

[Rudradev]

5) They want to profit from the opium poppy & heroin trade because it's the one viable export Afghanistan has to offer.

To the Paki way of thinking, this qualifies as "strategic depth" because, once again, there is deniability. If called upon to crack down on opium cultivation, ISI/TSPA can simply shrug their shoulders because it's not technically happening on Paki soil. Yet it's an open secret that the transport, processing, monetization & re-export of the raw material would be 400% in Paki hands.

This trade is going to go through the roof if Pakistan winds up on the FATF blacklist.

A corollary: there will be no mining of any of Afghanistan's much vaunted mineral wealth as long as the narcotics trade reigns supreme (which it will... the infrastructure of criminal institutions to support Afeem farming in Afghanistan is very well established, whereas the institutions to support a national mining industry don't exist at all. No way the Bunnies are going to deprioritize the quick & ready money of the poppy for the long-term, delayed-return, highly speculative project of mineral extraction.)

The socio-economic landscape of Afghanistan is going to start looking very much like Pablo Escobar's Colombia of the 1980s. Warlords on steroids running everything with an eye to cornering the market on narcotics production. And to boot, with a heady dose of full-two Malsi stirred into the mix.

If the Chinese try to establish a mining industry in the middle of all this, they will find themselves "living in interesting times". CPEC itself has foundered... and CPEC transited the relatively tame areas of KPK & Baluchistan where Pak army could maintain some degree of sway through brute force. They won't be able to do that in Afghanistan (although I hope they try).

[Manish_P]

^
Good posts.

I was wondering about the point about Narcotics providing the economic fuel for the Jihad, when i saw that Rudradev ji has put it ever so concisely.

Just would like to add that in addition to the traditional Poppy/Opium combo, in the recent few years the Afghans have diversified into the much more profitable Meth production, including a game changer natural source for the component. Please refer to recent posts from Deans on the same..

The Pakis will be very aggressive to push it into India and we will need to be even more careful (especially vulnerable border areas like Punjab)

[Rudradev]

----X posting from Afghanistan thread ---

Taliban 2.0 seem to be much smarter than they made the world think they are until now. The future looks like this to me:

Stage 1:

...


So the priority for India (preferably with or even without the US) now must be to swoop down on Pak's dirty bums and confiscate them to prevent them from falling into IEA's hands. Even if that means war now because it will be a far more dangerous war the later we fight it. Don't worry about the Tofu Chinese, they will never fight a war they cant win, and have never won any. They'll be happy just to keep their shandongs and ding dongs intact for beauty parades of the proletariat. If India acts clearly and decisively NO ONE can or will stop us because no one wants an islamic bum.
---x---

If India acts, it can make it "strategic death" for Pakistan.

Interesting set of scenarios. The question is: if Taliban are really smarter this time around, would they
1) Allow the Pakis to store nukes on IEA soil, thereby opening themselves up to a first-strike (while once again, the Pakis might just get away with it)?
2) Endeavour to seize control of the Pakistani state, and all of Pakistan's nukes and other military assets along with that?

I strongly suspect it will be the latter (and in fact you mention this possibility in your Stage 2 as well). It is at this stage that the entire international community, including the US, will be alarmed and goaded into action. Indeed, even the Ummah countries will recognize that this is a cancer on the verge of uncontrolled metastasis.

So perhaps the thing for India to do is to encourage this to happen. The nukes will suddenly become everybody's problem, even China's, and the international consensus will converge on countering them by any means necessary.

Conversely, what if India attempts to grab control of Pak nukes in Stage 1 itself, but does not succeed in securing all of them? Such an act might make the Taliban more amenable to going with option 1-- letting the Pakis store nukes in IEA territory just as a security measure (dispersing the arsenal)-- because otherwise all the crown jewels might be lost before they can gain control of the Pakistani state.

[RKumar]

^ what is the assurance that TB will not use noclear on the napaki population once relationship is sour and it is easy to do given how napaki handed over some of the top TB including OBL on the plate. There is a mistrust and for now TB relationship with Napaki is mutual benefits. As the time will pass, as per my personal opinion they will divorce within 5 years if TB remain united and could rule without an all open infighting.

Get the popcorn and cola .... show just started. We will not do any major investment, be it weapons, money or resources to build. We will let the Napaki and China do the Afg building with their money. I guess USA and EU will also only give token aid money like us.

Let the drugs pass through Napak Land as India-Napak border is completely closed till 2024. So to whom they are going to fool ... Sri Lanka, Nepal, BD, Male or China? As Napaki fights and cargo is throughly checked and scanned by Eu and USA.

Interesting and hard times ahead for napaki janta... so tune your TV