Pakistan Should Rubbish Any Thoughts Of Forcible Regime Change In Afghanistan

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ recent US-inspired “democracy building” rhetoric about Afghanistan ominously suggests that Pakistan might be preparing an American-backed regime change operation.

Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs concluded a recent press release on their country’s clashes with Afghanistan, which are the most intense in years, by writing that “We also hope that one day, the Afghan people would be emancipated and they would be governed by a true representative government.” This resembles the US’ “democracy-building” rhetoric and shouldn’t be surprising considering those two’s rapprochement this past year which restored Pakistan’s traditional status as the US’ top regional partner.

Trump has also shared plans to return US troops to Afghanistan’s Bagram Airbase, which can only realistically occur with Pakistan’s facilitation despite Islamabad officially opposing it, while reports have recently circulated about Pakistan’s arguably complementary plans to give the US an Arabian Sea port. The “democracy-building” rhetoric espoused by Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs should therefore be taken seriously since it could serve as the pretext for another regime change operation in Afghanistan.

The Taliban won’t budge on Trump’s Bagram demands while Pakistan increasingly considers the group to be a top security threat due to their alleged patronage of “Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan” and “Balochistan Liberation Army” terrorists. As early as January 2023, it was assessed that “Pakistan Might Be About To Launch A ‘Special Military Operation’ In Afghanistan” for these reasons, which would predictably receive some degree of US support (most likely arms, intelligence, and logistics) if it ever happens.

Afghan-Pakistani tensions have since worsened while the US now openly wants to return to Bagram, which preceded Pakistan repeating the US’ “democracy-building” rhetoric, thus making this scenario more credible than ever. Moreover, Pakistan’s comparatively new Tajik partner who hosts elements of Afghanistan’s “National Resistance Front” (NRF) lethally clashed with the Taliban in late August, and this preceded the first-ever non-fundamentalist Afghan opposition meeting in Pakistan a month later.

The Tajik dimension is significant since the ethnic Tajik-led NRF is an influential hybrid militia-movement, yet Russia still has a base there whose troops are tasked with protecting Afghan border, so Moscow likely wouldn’t let Dushanbe overthrow its new Taliban partners. Nevertheless, Pakistan’s unprecedented hosting of non-fundamentalist Afghanistan opposition members and its latest US-influenced “democracy-building” rhetoric hint at coordination with Tajikistan, even if its role only remains political.

Tajiks constitute Afghanistan’s second-largest ethnic group, are concentrated in the north, and there are more of them in Afghanistan than in Tajikistan itself. Most are fiercely secular, much more favorable to representative democracy than others in the country, and have historically opposed fundamentalist Pashtun nationalists like the Taliban. That would make them, the NRF, and Tajikistan strange bedfellows with Pakistan, the Taliban’s former patron, but such is the nature of the region’s evolving realpolitik.

Any US-backed Pakistani “special operation” in Afghanistan would thus enjoy varying degrees of support from them, but the West’s failed occupation of Afghanistan proved that the Taliban has the wherewithal to fight back, punish its enemies, and win. In this scenario, Pakistani troops in Afghanistan would face countless ambushes while civilians at home could be targeted by a wave of terrorist attacks, so Pakistan should rubbish any such plans unless it’s ready to accept these spiraling costs that risk destabilizing it.