Afghan Resistance opens "Kabul Front"

The forces of resistance to the ruling regime in Afghanistan are changing the tactics of armed struggle. The two main groups opposing the Taliban, Ahmad Massoud's National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF) and General Yasin Zia's Afghan Freedom Front (AFF), decided to coordinate their actions. Resistance fighters will concentrate their main efforts to fight against the Taliban in Kabul.

The leaders of the Afghan Resistance, Ahmad Massoud and General Yassin Zia, agreed to coordinate actions in the fight against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. Observers called the isolation and often competition between the NRF and the AFF one of the reasons for the weakness of the Afghan Resistance. Now an attempt has been made to overcome this shortcoming: General Zia invited Ahmad Massoud to coordinate joint operations of the two fronts against the Taliban for three months.

“We are talking specifically about a three-month coordination of the actions of the NRF and the AFF, and not about the merger of two fronts into one organization,” Samad Abdul Samadi, one of the political leaders of the Afghan Freedom Front, commented on the situation to the author. – Rumors about the alleged complete merger of the NRF and the AFF are not true. But we will test our combat interaction in practice.” It is expected that already in the beginning of summer, the groups of Massoud and General Zia will begin their first joint military operations.

“The operations of the Resistance forces in Kabul have a great military and political effect. They receive wide resonance in the country and abroad, clearly show the vulnerability of the Taliban terrorist regime and its inability to effectively respond to the actions of our fighters,” indicates Samad Abdul Samadi, reminding that the Afghan Freedom Front has already carried out a series of successful operations in Kabul, killing dozens of Taliban. At the same time, the AFF fighters did not suffer losses. Samad Abdul Samadi explains this by the good combat training of the AFF “urban guerrillas,” where vast majority are former officers and soldiers of the Afghan special forces.

AFF fighters carried out one of their last operations in Kabul on May 10, when in the Khairkhan area they attacked a group of militants fr om the Taliban's Main Intelligence Directorate (GID), who were trying to arrest several residents of the Afghan capital. As a result of a 10-minute battle, four Taliban were killed by General Zia's guerrillas, and civilians detained by the GUR were released. “This was the sixth operation of the FSA forces in Kabul over the past two weeks,” said Samad Abdul Samadi, emphasizing that all of them took place without losses for the Freedom Front.

In the spring, supporters of the National Resistance Front of Ahmad Massoud moved their main activity focus to Kabul. According to NRF representatives, during the month of Ramadan alone (from March 11 to April 11), Massoud's fighters carried out 24 attacks on Taliban militants, killing 40 and wounding 37 Taliban.

“Of the 24 attacks, 17 were carried out in Kabul, wh ere the Taliban suffered the most losses with 24 killed and 28 wounded. The rest of the FNSA attacks took place in the northern Afghan provinces of Baghlan, Takhar, Ghor and Parwan,” a representative of the organization explained to the author.

Afghan political expert Sultan Ahmed Shoaib draws attention to the fact that the spring combat activity of the NRF coincided with the reorganization of the organization’s management bodies: “Ahmad Massoud not only made personnel changes in key positions in the leadership of the NRF, but also took over the planning and implementation of combat operations inside Afghanistan. All NRF operations in the month of Ramadan were carried out under the personal supervision of Massoud.”

According to representatives of the NRF, on May 5, their supporters carried out two attacks in Kabul, calling them “special operations in support of the residents of Badakhshan seeking freedom and justice.” As a result of these actions, seven Taliban militants were killed and wounded in the capital. The NRF promised, as a sign of solidarity with the Badakhshan people, to attack the Taliban in Kabul, as well as in other areas of Afghanistan, within a month. It is likely that these actions will already be coordinated with General Zia's Freedom Front.

The transfer of the combat activity of the resistance forces to Kabul creates new prospects for the NRF and the AFF, as well as new threats to the Taliban regime. It is obvious that Ahmad Massoud and General Yassin Zia have so far abandoned plans to create their own stable bridgehead inside Afghanistan, as for this the resistance does not have the necessary forces, as well as external support, yet. However, the NRF and AFF are capable of opening a new “Kabul front” against the Taliban, using the “hit and run” tactics of special forces and urban guerrillas. As statistics from the spring activity of the resistance show, the Taliban are not ready for such attacks by supporters of Ahmad Massoud and General Zia in the Afghan capital. The Taliban structures are not only unable to prevent attacks by urban guerrillas, but also cannot inflict counter damage on them: when killing the Taliban, the resistance fighters do not suffer losses.

According to sources in Kabul, the spring activities of resistance fighters have already made the Taliban commanders and influential functionaries afraid to move around the city at night. This is primarily due to the ability of urban guerrilla groups to conduct targeted operations, that is, to destroy not any random militants, but specific Taliban commanders and officials. In particular, the intelligence agency of General Yasin Zia's Freedom Front has a strong position in Kabul and is able to track the movements of Taliban functionaries, which makes them vulnerable targets for AFF fighters.

During the spring, the intelligence service of the political organization Afghanistan Green Trend (AGT), whose leader is the former head of Afghan intelligence Amrullah Saleh, also demonstrated its impressive intelligence capabilities. Its employees publish sensational, revealing secret data about the structure and personnel of the Taliban's power ministries almost daily, which has already caused panic among the Taliban leadership. AGT intelligence is available to Afghan Resistance fighters and helps in planning urban guerrilla attacks in Kabul. Combining the intelligence and combat potential of the structures of Ahmad Massoud, Yasin Zia and Amrullah Saleh opens up new opportunities for the Afghan Resistance in the fight against the Taliban regime.