FROM THE ENCOUNTER IN BEIRUT. An American drone hits an ISIS vehicle, with kamikaze ready to hit US troops again at the Kabul airport, and thwarts a massacre perhaps even worse than that on Friday. The car was loaded with explosives and the terrorist wanted to break through one of the entrances, now manned by the Taliban, and massacre the soldiersyou engage in folding. The US Intelligence, in all probability primed by the Taliban themselves, identified them in a neighborhood adjacent to the airport. The unmanned aircraft destroyed the machine and triggered secondary explosions. There could also be civilian casualties because at the same time eyewitnesses told Ariana TV of another explosion, “due to a rocket,” which nearly demolished a house in the same area. This hypothesis was later denied. An Afghan official to the “AP” said that the raid and the rocket are “the same event”: Nine people died, including six children, four others were injured.
These are the umpteenth “collateral victims” of a twenty-year war that does not want to end, even now that there are less than three thousand NATO soldiers left, ready to leave by tomorrow night. But the “Islamic State of Khorasan Province” is trying to seize the last few opportunities to shed American blood, despite two of its leaders being beheaded by another drone on Saturday afternoon.
At this stage, the CIA has the bulk of the work on its shoulders. Three hundred US citizens have yet to be “extracted” by helicopters from the capital. As many, perhaps more, have decided to stay. They are mostly people with double passports, invaluable informants to control the moves of the Taliban and even more of ISIS. To protect their lives, US forces are destroying the “safe houses” where they were staying, in order to prevent documents and names from ending up in the hands of the jihadists. A raid on Friday demolished a building. Yesterday there may have been other operations of this type, yet to be confirmed. However, Washington breathes a sigh of relief as it has avoided further losses after 1pm on Friday.
Centcom Captain Bill Urban confirmed that the hit vehicle “posed an imminent threat.” National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan reiterated that “the raids will continue” to thwart terrorist attacks and “degrade”, that is, to weaken ISIS. The drones depart from a base near Abu Dhabi, in the Emirates, and massive use is to be expected, even if “President Joe Biden does not intend to start a new war”.
The problem is to stop it. Lord Curzon, former viceroy of India, said that Afghanistan “is easy to invade, impossible to govern, dangerous to leave”. In addition to the 300 Americans, the Air Force is currently busy evacuating 1,000 Afghans, which will bring the total close to 120,000. The giant C-17s can carry up to 500 soldiers, and up to 800 civilians, at a time. The six hundred British soldiers left the capital on Saturday, the other NATO troops on Friday. Tomorrow is the deadline indicated by Joe Biden. France and Great Britain also withdrew all diplomatic personnel. They still dream of a “safe zone” at the airport, perhaps to be entrusted to the Turkish military. All very vague. Al-Jazeera reporter Charlotte Bellis confirms that there are no more civilians queuing around the airport. The last are brought “by bus escorted by the Taliban”.
The guerrillas take over the whole country. The rebellious Panjshir is isolated, in the provinces the testimonies of “executions of government soldiers” and even “musicians” multiply. The risk of terrorism is also high on the border with Pakistan, where a commando of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan group attacked a border post in the district of Bajaur and killed two Pakistani soldiers. But, to the surprise of all Western analysts, the bulk of the refugee flow occurs in reverse. Two thousand Afghans return to their country every day. About three million have found refuge in Pakistan first during the Soviet occupation and then to escape the twenty-year warfare of the Taliban against NATO. Now they hope that Emir Haibatullah, who arrived in Kandahar yesterday and expected in Kabul mid-week, will keep his promise: “Enough wars”. At the Friday sermon it is possible that he will give the first answera.