Afghanistan Conundrum: From Intelligence Havoc to Sustainable Peace

After spending trillions of dollars, making Afghan war the U.S longest combat, and jeopardizing the future of Afghan generations; ‘Not War But Peace’ became the reality on February 29, 2020 when Tehreek-e-Taliban Afghanistan (TTA) deputy leader Mullah Abdul-Ghani Bradar and American peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad signed the Peace Agreement in Doha, Qatar.The foundation of peace that Pakistan once wanted to build in Kabul by recognizing the Taliban regime became truth after 18 years of U.S. combat in Afghanistan that witnessed continuous chaos, instability, civil war, and turmoil beyond borders. Presence of Pakistan at the time of Doha ceremony is adamant to 1996 decision of Islamabad when the then Taliban Regime was recognized to avoid instability and install regional peace. This article makes the point that the farsightedness of Pakistan rightly realized the strength and resilience of Taliban and therefore took the right decision to bring them into mainstream diplomatic exposure in 1996. This fact was also recognized by Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and United Arab Emirates (U.A.E) who stood by with the reality of Afghanistan and too accepted Taliban as the legitimate political authority in 1996. A notion which was true in 1996 became reality of the day that “peace in Afghanistan is peace in Pakistan”. By incorporating deductive approach, this paper is descriptive in analysis and uses historical method of inquiry to establish facts and infer conclusions. Regional Complex Security Theory has been contextualized to refer to intelligence havoc that allowed regional states to sustain the chaos, instability, and turmoil in Afghanistan.