The Taliban movement was a Pakistani project, initially financed with Saudi money and with American blessing. Islamic schools in Pakistan, in the border area with Afghanistan, trained a generation of Afghan fighters during the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. The CIA and the ISI, the Pakistani secret service, pushed money and weapons into the mujahideen networks that later gave birth to the Taliban. The objective was simple: to transform Afghanistan into a nightmare for the Soviet Union. The Islamic resistance was victorious thanks to external support and the geopolitical context, and the Russians left in 1989. Afghanistan has always been a major geopolitical stake: located in an inhospitable area, landlocked, but at the crossroads of great powers—let’s not forget that the Great Game between Russia and the British Empire had Afghanistan as its main stake—it is nicknamed the “graveyard of empires”.

The result was a shattered Afghanistan, with numerous rival factions armed to the teeth and no plan for reconstruction or stabilisation from those who had financed the war. The civil chaos of the 1990s created the environment for the Taliban to impose themselves, the only ones who could bring order to a devastated state. By 2001, they controlled 90% of the territory. Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates were among the few states that recognised their government, thus maintaining their influence over Kabul.

Less than a month after 9/11, the United States entered Afghanistan, removed the Taliban regime in a matter of weeks, and began a 20-year war that cost over $2 trillion and tens of thousands of lives. Pakistan, which had built the entire Taliban organisation, officially became the United States’ ally in the “war on terror”. The ISI secret service continued to provide shelter to Taliban leaders, with the knowledge of the Americans. At the same time, the CIA used Afghanistan mainly for opium production and drug trafficking, simultaneously accusing the Taliban of these illegalities.

When Biden ordered the withdrawal in August 2021, creating a diplomatic disaster that Trump had negotiated in Doha in 2020 and let explode in his next term, the Taliban took over Kabul within two weeks. Drug production dropped by 95% in a single year, a sign that the CIA had indeed been exiled. Pakistan initially rejoiced: elites in Islamabad believed they had regained strategic influence over Afghanistan, and the Taliban would return gratefully.

But once back in power, the Afghan Taliban no longer needed Pakistan. Since the war was over, neither shelter on Pakistani territory nor logistical support was needed. However, Pakistan is home to the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a jihadist group fighting for autonomy for the border tribal areas, which launched over 1,000 attacks on Pakistani territory in 2025, the highest number of attacks in the last decade. The TTP took refuge in Afghanistan, passively protected by the Taliban in Kabul. The motivation is partly ideological, but the strategic reason is more important: if the TTP were eliminated, its fighters would defect to IS-Khorasan, the Taliban’s most dangerous rival. However, there is no information to demonstrate any direct Taliban aid to the TTP — most likely we are just talking about shelter.

Islamabad has tried to negotiate and sent various delegations but has failed to persuade the Afghans to turn against the TTP. The 31 deaths resulting from the February 6, 2026, bombing of a Shiite mosque in Islamabad pushed Pakistan to counterattack amid public outcry. On February 22, Pakistani jets bombed TTP camps in Nangarhar and Paktika. Yesterday, the Taliban launched “large-scale offensive operations” along the Durand Line, and today they have reached the point of direct bombing of Kabul.

Kabul is supported mainly by Russia, the first and only country to de jure recognise the Taliban government after the American withdrawal, and by India, which sees this rupture as a strategic advantage against Islamabad. For China, the situation is awkward: it cannot openly support the ally of its strategic partner Russia, given the $65 billion investment in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, but it wants the contracts to mine lithium in Afghanistan. As for the US, Kabul is suspiciously absent from Washington’s geostrategic agenda. Trump is reluctant to get involved again in Central Asia but will have to support Islamabad, given the government contracts to create a cryptocurrency given to World Liberty Financial, owned by the Trump and Witkoff families.

No one in the region wants a long war, and no one can afford one. Pakistan has the nuclear bomb, a military budget 62 times larger than Afghanistan’s, and a modern air force. But it also has 90 million people in poverty, an economy in chronic crisis, huge foreign debts, an internal political crisis triggered by the ouster of Prime Minister Imran Khan, and a domestic front with the TTP that cannot be resolved by bombing Kabul. A prolonged war would open a second front that Islamabad cannot manage as India presses it to the east. The Taliban have the experience of a 20-year guerrilla war won against the most powerful army in the world. But they have no functioning economy, no international recognition, their foreign assets are frozen, and an open war with Pakistan would deprive them of the last trade routes through which they survive. They have no interest in a prolonged escalation.

China will push for a swift and discreet de-escalation through its channels in both capitals. Qatar and Saudi Arabia, the states that brokered the October 2025 ceasefire—note the absence of the United Arab Emirates—will almost certainly be involved again. The interesting question is what public discourse will result from a possible peace deal: will Trump once again be allowed by the Putin–Xi couple to claim a diplomatic victory, or will Beijing take credit for it, as it did with the normalisation of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran?

By Daria Gusa