TALIBAN AT THE BORDER

The unfinished war in Afghanistan has taken a turn with the expansion of the supposedly defeated Taliban into neighboring Pakistan.

The latest expression of concern over the new threat came last weekend from Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende as 1,400 Dutch troops moved into Afghanistan to help counter the Taliban-led insurgency. He told a press briefing that part of the challenge was “people coming from Pakistan.” He urged that the presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan jointly address the problem.

Pakistan’s help is not likely, suggests a recent report from the remote border area by Nicholas Schmidle, a fellow of the nonprofit Institute of Current World Affairs and a freelance writer spending two years studying ethnic and sectarian issues in Pakistan. He wrote that a recent visit to a sensitive spot where the Taliban are gaining popular support “convinced me that the spread of the Taliban owed more to political and military decisions taken in Islamabad than to any Islamist ideology.”

Explaining, he said that a military operation in October 2003 aimed at destroying al-Qaida and Taliban networks in the border province of Waziristan ended in a disaster. Local tribesmen regarded the Pakistan Army as an intruder and many joined the Taliban. He found local tribesmen ready to accept Taliban rule whenever the army conducted new attacks.

Mr. Schmidle traced Waziristan’s present circumstance to what happened during the Soviet-Afghan war in the 1980s, when American, Saudi and Pakistani intelligence agencies armed and indoctrinated the mujahideen Islamist fighters. When the United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001 and overturned the Taliban rule, many of the Taliban fled into Pakistan. Today, the Taliban, not the Pakistan government, rules Waziristan. Many Pakistanis fear that “Talibanization” will sweep across the country.

Foreigners are barred from Waziristan, but Mr. Schmidle was able to visit nearby Bannu, a city of 250,000, and found Taliban rule well en-trenched there.

Earlier this year, The Guardian newspaper reported that Taliban inroads have triggered alarm in Islamabad and marked a big setback in America’s “war on terror.” Correspondent Declan Walsh reported that militants are strongest in Waziristan, where barbers may not shave beards and shopkeepers may not sell music or films. He wrote that militants collect taxes from passing vehicles at new checkpoints, and that the army’s continuing campaign is faltering, with an assault against an alleged al-Qaida training camp leaving more than 100 dead.

The White House has yet to fully acknowledge this growing threat to Pakistan and Afghanistan’s governments, to the American soldiers stationed in Afghanistan and, indirectly, to the security of the United States. Yet the warning signs have been there for years that the Taliban was merely regrouping after U.S. forces pushed them from power four years ago.

Both President Bush and Congress have a responsibility to meet what Mr. Bush told Afghan President Hamid Karzai in 2004: “[The U.S.] government reaffirms its iron-clad commitment to help Afghanistan succeed and prosper. Security is essential for steady progress and growth. … Together, we will maintain the peace, secure Afghanistan’s borders and deny terrorists any foothold in that country.”

The commitment was made when times seem more hopeful; now that the Taliban has regained its strength, it is time to ensure the commitment stands.