Afghanistan’s Terrorism Resurgence: Al-Qaida, ISIS, And Beyond

The threats posed by terrorism as well as the issues of the country’s security, stabilization, and state-building efforts are the domain of my work on Afghanistan, and the subject of my book, Aspiration and Ambivalence: Strategies and Realities of Counterinsurgency and State Building in Afghanistan (Brookings, 2013) as well as numerous reports — most recently “Afghanistan Affectations: How to Break Political-Criminal Alliances during Transitions from War to Peace”. I repeatedly conduct fieldwork in Afghanistan on these issues.

In my testimony, I first discuss U.S. interests in Afghanistan. I then analyze the state of Afghanistan today, including the influence of the Taliban and the growth of the Islamic State and the state of the military battlefield and politics in Afghanistan. Third, I examine the sources of militancy and terrorism in Afghanistan, including the role of external sponsors such as Pakistan and crucially, the role of poor governance and extensive predatory criminality and corruption in Afghanistan, and the measures that the Afghan National Unity Government (NUG) of President Ashraf Ghani and CEO Abdullah Abdullah have undertaken to tackle critical challenges. Finally, I end with a set of recommendations.