At a large conference those who call themselves “us, The International Community” have announced that they want to end the Afghan War by talking to the Moderate Taliban.
But the Afghan war began by talking to the Moderate (in the true sense of that word) Taliban.
Yes, there was a dialogue between the then US Government and the Taliban before the US invaded Afghanistan. And the essence of this dialogues was as follows:
US GOVERMENT (to the Taliban): “Hand over to us Osama bin Laden”.
TALIBAN: “We shall hand over Osama bin Laden to a neutral country where he would be given a fair trial”.
US GOVERNMENT: “Hand over to us Osama bin Laden without any conditions”.
TALIBAN: “We shall hand over Osama bin Laden to a neutral country where he would be given a fair trial”.
At this point the US begins bombings of the Afghan Cities, and then invades Afghanistan.
So, who is the truly “moderate” in this dialogue, and who is the truly “violent extremist”?
And was that not the time for real meaningful “talks”?
And was putting a condition of a fair trial, as a condition for extraditing a suspected criminal, a valid reason for a war? And, if it was not a valid reason, then was not that war a crime of aggression?
But now, after almost a decade of aggressive criminal war, the aggressors and their accomplices want to talk to the “moderate Taliban”, so that they would accept some kind of settlement, so that the aggressors could present it as a “victory” to the public of their own countries.
But what can such talks be about?
The Taliban are already saying that the aggressors should withdraw from Afghanistan and let the Afghans govern their own country the way they see fit.
Is such statement “extremist”, or is this a moderate legitimate request to the lawless, violent and truly “extremist” aggressors?
But then is there any need to talk to the Taliban?
Would it be not more useful for world peace and stability to pass a UN resolution that (1) the lawless criminal war be terminated, (2) all the troops of the aggressor countries withdrawn, (3) the criminals who started this lawless war be put on trial for starting a war of aggression without a valid reason, and then … to implement that UN resolution?
And once this criminal war is stopped and the aggressor troops are withdrawn, the Taliban will have no need to continue with their resistance and would resume governing Afghanistan as they did before the lawless invasion.
And the same lawful, reasonable, peaceful, moderate approach can be used in all the other “conflicts” which are the result of violent extremist wars by those who call themselves “us, The International Community”.