Dead Taliban Leader Still Disrupts

Saeed Shah and Margherita Stancati have an article in today's Wall Street Journal [ Taliban Leader’s Death Derails Peace Effort ] that shows a Taliban leader, dead for two years now, can still disrupt international relations and the cause of peace.  That is only the way they see it, because the whole idea of a meeting being postponed because the death of Mullah Omar was announced, is ridiculous.  The Taliban knew he was dead when this latest peace initiative was being planned.  They are just confused about who the new leader is going to be, and don't want another dog fight during this next meeting with the Afghan government.

Mullah Mansour is "calling for 'jihad until we establish an Islamic state'."   He is trying to out-ISIS the competition so he can lead with the same kind of tactics ISIS is using.  We have to ask ourselves if our State Department Friend, Pakistan, is looking for peace, or looking for a caliphate like ISIS is trying to manufacture in Syria.  Maybe they believe they might eventually replace ISIS with a more organized and behaved regime.  Mansour is hardly that kind of leader, but he is their leader.  They are stuck with him.

Pakistan has been hiding the death of Omar for two years because choosing between two guys who don't really like each other and will end up settling their disagreements the way the Taliban always has, car bombs and assassinations.

They are really talking about the leadership of Afghanistan, not the Taliban per se.  Pakistan will help the Taliban take back Afghanistan after years of retreat, and billions of U.S. dollars trying to avoid just that.  The real enemy here is not the Taliban.