Endless War: A Visit with the Taliban in Afghanistan - SPIEGEL ONLINE

More than 17 years after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, the country is still at war. The Afghan army is weak, a resurgent Taliban is mounting fresh attacks and new peace negotiations do not include Kabul. Peace remains a distant goal.
Mullah Niazi sits on top of his mountain and waits -- waits for news from his commanders, waits for his fighters and waits for victory. He's been living up here in his mountaintop fortress -- where the shacks are as brown as the mountain and where no motorcycle, car or tank can travel -- for two-and-a-half years. He is waiting for God's rule to once again take hold on the streets of Afghanistan's, just like when he was a spokesman for Taliban founder, Mullah Omar. His patience seems to be paying off.

Slowly, Niazi's fighters, who are taking us to him, ascend the final slope. The air is still damp and cold from the night before, and it smells like the scree that is dislodged by our every step. The only sound is the fighters' heavy breathing and the metallic clink of ammunition belts against their machine guns.

Apart from our group, silence envelops these mountains southeast of Herat, a range known locally as Haft-Darband. It is where Mullah Niazi is lying in wait to reclaim what the Americans took from the Taliban: control over Afghanistan. Things haven't looked this good for the Islamic fundamentalist movement for 17 years.

Surrounded by his heavily armed men, a smiling Niazi is standing at the entrance to his fortress. He is wearing a black vest over his shalwar kameez along with a black turban. His long, gray beard is forked. "The Americans," he says, "are no longer an enemy. They are pulling out. They have lost."

War has been a constant in Afghanistan for the last 41 years, but recently it has become bloodier than it has been in a long time. The Taliban are on the advance, with just 55 percent of the districts in the country currently under the control of the government, according to a U.S. report. The U.S. military dropped more bombs in 2018 than in the 10 previous years and the big cities have seen repeated attacks. - Read More

Endless War: A Visit with the Taliban in Afghanistan