The word talib literally means faith-seeking. Taliban - is interwoven network of teachers and students of private, overwhelmingly rural, madrasas in Afghanistan and the surrounding Pashtun lands of the Pakistani territory, which existed here for a long time. However, the policy of the Taliban never interfered, remaining purely religious social stratum.
Push to the political activities of the Taliban movement gave the Soviet war in Afghanistan. In the historical and mass consciousness of Islamic nations there is the concept of jihad - war against the invading crusaders on Islamic territory. Participation in it is the bounden duty of every true Muslim. From the outset, such crusaders for Muslims became the Soviet troops.
Protagonists on the Afghan scene in those years were former graduates of foreign universities and prestigious religious schools. However, two decades of civil war, where these intellectuals massacred each other, led to a complete collapse of the power and the moral authority of the entire social layer of society. At the same time, several million of Afghan refugees, mostly Pashtuns, went to Pakistan, where they created a whole new network of high schools (madrassas), which trains clergy, teachers and public servants. Refugee children lived fully provided for and studied Islam. A course in Afghan madrassa was shortened, and the quality is not high, but these schools turned into a real machine, preparing new ideologically resistant people for devouring jihad on Afghan territory. All top leaders of the Taliban, including Mullah Omar, too, passed through one of the most famous such schools - Haqqania near Peshawar.
Today this school is managed by Samiul Haq, former senator and one of the leaders of the fundamentalist Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Party of Pakistan with pronounced anti-American views. Haqqania is considered the birthplace of the ideological movement Taliban, and Samiul Haq dreams of talibanizing the native Pakistan.
Thus, the movement Taliban was born on Pakistani soil, and then supported by the Pakistani authorities. Pakistan was for most of its half-century history in the glow armed conflict with India over Kashmir, was always afraid of war on two fronts, i.e., involvement in the war in Afghanistan. Such a development could take place if there began to be implemented the idea of creating a single Pashtunistan. Pashtunians were the ones who in the 18th century proclaimed in Kandahar Afghan monarchy. Today they would like to create a single Pashtunistan, including the land of Pakistan. Perhaps this is why Afghanistan was the only country to vote against the admission of Pakistan to the UN.
The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, given the close, almost allied relations between Moscow and New Delhi during the war years of 1971-1972, caused in the Pakistani General Staff extreme anxiety (Tanner 208). Therefore, it chose the only option that was possible in these circumstances - support of the Afghan resistance. However, at the same time, Islamabad did not trust Pashtun nationalists and its support was focused on Islamic fundamentalists.
Hence, the victory of the Taliban movement in Afghanistan for Pakistan is a major political victory in the region. However, Pakistan's support of the Taliban movement pursued not only political and regional, but also political and religious purposes, i.e. the purpose of spreading Islam in the world and secure domination due to the political situation in its Islamic states.
In the mythology of the twentieth century, there were the most popular stories about a mad inventor or a gang of anarchists, who with the help of high-powered weapons blackmail humanity. When dystopia came true, the old cliche entered the case. The role of the maniac was perfect for bin Laden with a fantastic shine in his eyes - real and artificial. Anarchists place was taken by mysterious radical Islamists (Parenti 126). Who are the Islamists? Is it everyone who is Muslim? But they are more than a billion, and it is unlikely that percentage of murderers and killers among them is significantly higher than that of the followers of other religions.
Islamic terrorism originated only in the 1970s as a purely political phenomenon, concentrated in the military conflict points – Pakistan, Kashmir, Afghanistan. In this case, the terrorists carefully nurtured and supplied weapons of infidels of the Soviet and American intelligence agencies. With the cessation of Cold War, Soviet troops left the Afghan mountains, and there dawned peace in the Middle East (Magnus, Naby and Rather 59). A critical time formed - a large army of people, who could only shoot and lay mines, could be out of work.
There could spray the former Fedayeen (the people who sacrifice themselves for the sake of ideas) and mercenaries from other hot spots, but intervened unforeseen factors - Islam. More precisely, the militant anti-Western Islam revived after the victory of the revolution in Iran (Griffin 17). Ayatollah Khomeini threw all the resources of the country to finance the Islamists abroad. Before the terrorists referred to the religion without enthusiasm, but now became very dedicated to it and conflicts broke out in their original locations and with renewed vigor.
Played a role here the constant willingness of Muslims to violence against infidels. Even in the Quran, there is stated that when you meet those who disbelieve, then blow to the neck with a sword; and when great beating is done, strengthen their ties. However, in the same Quran, you can find quite friendly words about "people of the book" - Jews and Christians. In addition, the focus should be not on the books, even the most sacred, but on the facts. The facts say that, until recently, terrorism was not inherent in Islamic society. Moreover, later, terrorists were acting selectively on a small scale.
The same goals pursued the terrorist №1 Osama bin Laden. The secret of his power is unknown to anyone. Of course, the Saudi Osama rich relatives have a lot of money, but hardly all family has enough capital to pay thousands of militants in Chechnya, Kashmir, Tajikistan and Afghanistan. Closer to the truth of the rumors that Osama when he fought against the shuravi (Islamic association of Students idealists), funded by the American CIA, but this does not explain the prosperity of the unsinkable Saudi.
It is possible that the whole matter is in thin geopolitical calculations of Arab monarchs. They cannot know that oil reserves - their only wealth – will be depleted in some hundred years. It is even more likely that before it happens, the scientists of "infidels" will find some substitute for the "black gold" (Afsar 85). Toga, monarchs, and their subjects at once will become beggars. This can be avoided only by one way, bequeathed by the first caliph, - with a sword in the hands grab the land of infidels, their property and wives. You can call it medieval morality, but everyone who has visited the East, knows the Middle Ages are not over there yet.
At the crossroads of the interests of the oil sheiks, dictators and guerrilla leaders offended by the West arose totalitarian ideology, which many called Wahhabism, although historical Wahhabis - fighters for pure faith have little in common. Rather, we can call it Islamic Quasi-Nazism. Quasi (imaginary, not real) - because in the place of the nation, latter-day Wahhabis put quasi-religion, heavily implicated by hate.
The main object of their hostility - West, which they billed for colonial oppression, and for the present prosperity of the "golden billion" countries. Wahhabis are united and well organized, although it is unlikely they are guided by bin Laden - too much he loves to show off in public. They seriously want to conquer the world. They also support Osama bin Laden.
Behind them, there is a lot of money, which the West itself pays for its destruction by buying from the East oil and drugs. Behind them, there is the mass of illiterate and fanatical supporters, which is not a sin to deceive and throw for slaughter for "Holy work." Finally, some argue they are the future - the power of Islamic countries will increase dramatically when they create in their modern industry, and their "fifth column" in the West reaches a critical value. However, that is exactly what extremists do not want to wait for - because well-fed people are much less susceptible to radical slogans than hungry and illiterate. Taliban movement members also belong to such extremists, which in the end of the twentieth century created a dictatorial Islamic state on the territory of Afghanistan.
Works Cited
Afsar, Shahid, Chris Samples, and Thomas Wood. The Taliban: An Organizational Analysis. Naval Postgraduate School Monterey Ca Dept Of National Security Affairs, 2008.
Griffin, Michael. Reaping the whirlwind: The Taliban movement in Afghanistan. Pluto Pr, 2001.
Magnus, Ralph H., Eden Naby, and Dan Rather. Afghanistan: Mullah, Marx, and Mujahid. Boulder: Westview Press, 2002.
Parenti, Michael. The terrorism trap: September 11 and beyond. San Francisco: City lights books, 2002.
Tanner, Stephen. Afghanistan: a military history from Alexander the Great to the war against the Taliban. Da Capo Press, 2009.
