USA and the Taliban: Forced alliance with the Islamists

M.I killed crusaders and their interpreters and spies – these cynical words were found in the letter of confession that was published on the Internet on the evening of the attack at Kabul airport about the numerous military and civilian victims of the terrorist act. The “Islamic State – Khorasan Province” (ISKP) praised the suicide bomber who had reached the airport with his bomb and warned the Americans and their allies that the “soldiers of the caliphate” would continue to fight them. The letter published on behalf of the terrorist group also spoke of “apostates” who had set up checkpoints on the way to the airport. Apparently the Taliban are meant. The devastating attack, in which at least 170 people were killed and 200 others injured, also sheds light on the competition among Islamist groups – and on the security challenges that the Taliban are now facing in Afghanistan.

Such an attack had been warned for days. According to their own statements, even the Taliban themselves had passed on warnings to the Americans. However, the extent of the horror on Thursday exceeded most fears. Thousands of people crowded in front of the airport grounds, as they had for days, in the hope of finding entry and being able to leave the country. In front of the “Abbey Gate”, an entrance to the eastern part of the airport, it was so overcrowded that people stood in a canal with rubbish and barbed wire in it. In this area, the assassin detonated his bomb in the midst of waiting families in the late afternoon.