AFGHANISTAN

COMEBACKS have rarely been as brutally quick as the Taliban’s dramatic surge across Afghanistan since the start of July.

Eleven regional capitals have fallen to the insurgents in six days and hundreds of thousands of Afghans have fled their homes, fearing life under Islamic fundamentalism.

Funded by an annual budget believed to be in the region of $1.5bn, cash comes direct from drug-running, extortion, and the imposition of local taxes in areas and regions the Taliban control. Their forces include up to 85,000 fighters and their weaponry include AK-47 assault rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, mortars, other small rockets, anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons, suicide bombers, Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), plus weapons captured from the Afghan army.

It is time to ask how a group reviled as savage religious extremists and sponsors of international terrorism could recover from utter defeat two decades ago to become Afghanistan’s rulers-in-waiting.

Does the Taliban’s apparent impending victory mean that the country is destined to hurtle back to the brutal medieval regime that ruled there in 2001?

Day by day, the plight of Afghanistan and its people grows ever more desperate.

Emboldened by the withdrawal of Western troops, the resurgent Taliban is sweeping through the country with alarming speed.

Nearly a third of the 35 provinces are under their control, with insurgents in striking distance of Kabul. The fact that 600 British troops – mostly from the Parachute Regiment – are being sent to oversee the immediate evacuation of all our nationals suggests the fall of the capital is just days away.

There are already reports of atrocities – summary executions, torture and mutilation. If the Taliban take the whole country, this wicked and hideous persecution will again become the norm.

This is not a problem the West can brush aside. American invaded after 9/11 to oust the Taliban and stop Afghanistan being a sanctuary for terror groups. Following their withdrawal, how long before the jihadis are plotting mayhem in the West?

Meanwhile, with up to 100,000 refugees fleeing each month, many will soon begin arriving in Europe seeking asylum. This is the world’s problem. Who will help Afghanistan’s fragile Government fight off the barbarians at their gate?

President Biden’s woefully nonchalant remarks that Afghans “need to fight for themselves” suggests America has shamefully washed its hands of its responsibilities.

To his credit, UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, a former soldier, tried to put together a British-led coalition. But without US engagement, it was never likely to happen. The lily-livered UN stands impotently by. The Islamic world is troublingly muted.

Afghanistan’s plight will be distressing to British soldiers who lost 455 colleagues trying to keep the Taliban out. Not for the first time, brave men and women who gave so much for our safety are left to rue the cost of politicians’ foreign misadventures. A tragedy that shames the world.