The National Interest, 29 June 2016
Article questioning whether American military operations overseas reduces the threat of domestic terrorism quotes from a recent dispatch by AAN’s Borhan Osman:
One of the most recent examples of fighting “over there” backfiring, was in the recent killing of Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansour by a U.S. drone on Pakistan’s soil. In the aftermath of the strike, Secretary of State John Kerry said, “Peace is what we want. Mansour was a threat to that effort.” Yet the man who took Mansour’s place as the Taliban’s new leader, Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada, is viewed by on-the-ground Afghan experts as more militant than Mansour.
“There is no reason to believe the fighting will de-escalate with the new leadership, Borhan Osman of the Afghan Analysts Network [sic] said, “Haibatullah can thus be expected to show a determination to fight and not be intimidated by Mansur’s killing. His first priority will be internal unity, as Mansour’s was when he officially took over in 2015, and fighting is better than peacemaking at maintaining the coherence of the movement.”
Revisions:
This article was last updated on 9 Mar 2020
