Conditions are such in Afghanistan that the only basis for unity is the army and religion. These two forces constitute the cohesive unity that unifies this society.They are the only institutions that have a universal character that spreads itself across the length and breadth of Afghanistan. Conditions are so primitive in Afghanistan that there is an absence of the value relations, as a universal social form, necessary to establish a social cohesion that can lead to the historical development of Afghanistan into a modern capitalist economy. Instead there exists a patchwork quilt of diverse relations many of which are based on tribal conditions. Consequently there is a tendency for individual tribal and village communities to exist independently of each other. These social features are laced over with barter and exchange relations. There are also pockets of small industrial and merchant capital together with landowners. However there is a conspicuous absence of any overriding social relation of production that establishes a social unity among the people that populate Afghanistan. Consequently the only forces capable of unifying Afghanistan is the Taliban army and Islam. In many ways there is no Afghan society. Indeed in so far as Afghan society exists it is constituted by the Taliban state which chiefly consists of the Islamic fundamentalist army of the Taliban.
The objective conditions that prevail in Afghanistan are the causes of the political and religious conditions that prevail there. It is not, as Yankee imperialism would have us believe, a mere subjective question. It is not a matter of these bad guys, the Taliban, creating a theocratic state with despotic features. The Taliban's theocracy is the political expression of a combination of the specific domestic and international conditions that prevail in Afghanistan. The political and ideological character of Afghanistan is a product of both the internal relations obtaining and the specific way in which imperialist capital has related to Afghanistan. In many ways then the Taliban's success in establishing a state in the extraordinary way that it has is the only way possible given the tremendously contradictory nature of Afghanistan. In many ways it constitutes an extraordinary achievement on the part of the Taliban. In so far as the Taliban is despotic and ruthless it is not because this is its wilfully subjective predilection. It is because objectively this is the only way, under the narrow constraints that prevail, in which a state can exist in Afghanistan. This is the only way, given the extraordinary circumstances, in which the Afghani state can exist. The Taliban state is not a capitalist state. Consequently it inevitably bears an entirely different character to the bourgeois state. This being so it is pure idealism to compare the model of the bourgeois state with the Taliban. They are qualitatively different political forms. If the Taliban were capable of adopting a liberal democratic secular programme they would never have established state power. The conditions for a liberal democratic secular state just don't exist. This is why it is farcical to hear the West discuss the need to establish in Afghanistan a liberal democratic state in the aftermath of the fall of the Taliban. This amounts crass subjective utopianism. Such suggestions amounts to a form of subjective idealism which is equivalent to religion. The objective conditions don't exist for the establishment of bourgeois democratic state are conspicuously absent in Afghanistan. The objective conditions must be first created. Yet imperialism has been busying itself with the destruction through air strikes of the those very objective conditions that can contribute to the development of those conditions. The destruction by US bombs of whatever infrastructure and key buildings that exist there is actively furthering the objective conditions necessary for the existence of the Taliban state together with its fundamentalist ideology. One of the chief reasons as to why the Northern Confederation has been no match for the Taliban is because the Taliban has organised itself into a state. In contrast the Northern Confederation is disorganised and does not exist as a coherent unified force. Among other things it lacks an ideology that unites them. The extreme character of the Taliban's Islamic doctrine is the specific and unique glue that, ideologically and culturally, holds the Taliban together. A more liberal less extreme form of Islam could not have served this purpose. Islamic fundamentalism forms an integral part of the Taliban army. It is the unification of the Taliban army and fundamentalist Islam that constitute the unique conditions that render the Taliban more effective as a force than the Northern Confederation. It is this inseparable unity that constitutes the state. The organisation of the Taliban is superior to that of the Northern Confederation. The peculiar character of its Islamic fundamentalism is not just an ideology but a social form specifically adapted to the conditions in Afghanistan. With its mosques and other social institutions it constitutes Afghani society in a way that is beyond the capacity of the Northern Confederation. Consequently the imperialist bourgeoisie's attempt to destroy this unique state is tantamount to the destruction of the very conditions necessary if Afghanistan is to emerge from its medieval like conditions. The imperialist bourgeoisie's massive attack on the Taliban is evidence of the limitations and obsolescence of that class and the need to replace it. It demonstrates the imperialist bourgeoisie's crass stupidity. Instead of seeking to build on the conditions constructed by the Taliban to create the objective conditions required for a democratic secular society it feverishly strives to destroy such conditions. The Taliban army's Islamic fundamentalist character invests its soldiers with a passionate drive that renders them fearless in the face of the enemy. In many ways the Taliban is analogous to Cromwell's Roundheads. Regards Karl Carlile (Communist Global Group) Be free to join our communism mailing list at http://homepage.eircom.net/~kampf/
