The future of Afghanistan

There is much discussion among the punditry as to what the future holds for Afghanistan. Will the Taliban be a new improved Taliban 2.0? Starting as the end, I suspect not. Religions are inherently conservative; they are based in faith; and faith is often, perhaps even axiomatically, impervious to facts. The Taliban has promised to be a nicer Taliban, respectful of women and education; but while the Taliban leadership may be making promises it knows Western donors want to hear so as to ensure that the money taps aren't turned off, it's unclear that the foot soldiers, steeped in its peculiar brand of Islam are on board with those pronouncements. Early evidence from the country suggests they are not. Indeed it's not clear that the leadership means what is says, at least as a matter of principle. 

However there is some reason to believe that foreign nationals who could not be evacuated before the US pulled out on August 30th might yet get out without having to flee across a Taliban controlled land border.  The Taliban might want to get the "trouble-makers" off Afghan soil and avoid incurring the immediate wrath of the foreign governments on whose largess the country's economy depends. 

But for Afghan nationals the prospect is bleaker. The Taliban understands that foreign powers will not want to go into battle (again) for the sake of human rights half way round the world.  The primary rationale for the invasion twenty years ago was to deny Al Qaeda safe haven; standing up the institutions of civil society was a goal adopted only after the invasion, and one which the US may well now have realized was overly ambitious.  That provides the Taliban with much greater governing flexibility.  And they are unlikely to permit a mass exodus of those who have enjoyed a taste of freedom; that would be to admit that their world-view is not the be-all-and-end-all.  

The question has been asked whether those who have become accustomed to a less medieval form of government over the last 20 years will "push back", holding out the prospect of resistance and reform or even the possible over-throw of the newly reinstated Taliban regime. That seems based more in hope that reality.  The more likely outcome is increasingly harsh repression (much as is currently happening in Myanmar at the moment - about which, tellingly,  there is no reporting in the US media). With the US and its allies now departed and the camera crews packed up and gone, Afghanistan will be out of sight, out of mind for the West. The Taliban will then have a freer hand and few qualms about imposing its interpretation of Sharia law in the same brutal fashion is has in the past.