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Do the Taliban leaders have clashes

between themselves?
By Abdulsamad Haidari
November-1-2009
As far as the U.S. and Pakistan are concerned, there is now some "credible evidence" that
Baitullah Mehsud, the murderous head of the Pakistani Taliban, was killed in a CIA-
operated drone strike on, Aug. 5. Conclusive proof, said that, Pakistani Interior Minister
Rehman Malik, could come only from a DNA test on what remains of Mehsud (the drone
strike reportedly severed his body in half). However, the remote village in South
Waziristan where the attack took place is dominated by the Taliban and other militants,
and that was so hard and difficult to access in there. And that inaccessibility has made the
details of the battle to become the successor to Mehsud equally hard to pin down.
Through the weekend, speculation has been rife that Hakimullah Mehsud and Wali-ur-
Rehman, two Taliban leaders tipped for the top slot, turned their guns on each other as
the power struggle within turned bloody. Malik insisted that one of the men was dead.
General James Jones, President Barack Obama's National Security Adviser, said that
signs of internal dissension were encouraging. But on Sunday, Wali-ur-Rehman called a
Reuter’s reporter familiar with his voice to assert that he was still among the living and to
deny any rift, claiming that Baitullah was also alive. On Monday, Hakimullah, also
speaking to reporters who said they recognized his voice, made the same assertion.
Baitullah Mehsud, however, has not surfaced to say he is alive, as he has done after
previous claims of his death. Many analysts say it is only natural that the Taliban would
deny Mehsud's death as they struggle among themselves to decide on a new leader.
Replacing Mehsud will not be that easy for the Taliban. Under his charismatic and
fearsome leadership, at least 13 separate and disparate groups were able to forge a
fractious but powerful alliance. If Mehsud is gone, that alliance is likely to fracture. His
replacement will determine the new direction of the Pakistani Taliban: it may fall under
the greater influence of al-Qaeda, concentrate on fighting in Afghanistan, continue
fighting chiefly in Pakistan or break up into small, rival groups.
Interior Minister Malik warned on Monday, Aug. 10, that al-Qaeda is trying to install its
own "chief terrorist" as the next leader while the Pakistani Taliban lies in disarray. "It
will take some time for [the Pakistani Taliban] to regroup," he said. "The other thing
which is a bit worrying is that al-Qaeda is getting grouped in the same place, and now
they are trying to find out somebody to install him as the leader ..." Al-Qaeda has long
wielded influence over Mehsud and the Pakistani Taliban, using the tribal areas along the
Afghan border as a hiding place and trading funds and training for scores of suicide
bombers prepared to carry out its attacks in the upcoming times. In the same way,
Reports from Pakistan say the leadership council of the TTP, the umbrella organization of
insurgent groups united under Mehshud, has already begun consultations on who should
succeed him as the emir, or prince next. It's unlikely the council will meet under one roof,
for fear of being obliterated, like Mehsud, by a missile from a CIA-operated drone. This
means the discussions will have to take place through proxies and go-betweens,
substantially delaying the process. Even in the best of times, succession in tribal
leadership is rarely smooth. There are invariably multiple contenders, and it is common
for outside moderators to be brought in to judge rival claims.
Still, experts believe that Baitullah's successor will likely be one of three top TTP figures:
Hakimullah, Azmatullah and Wali-ur-Rehman. Of the three, Hakimullah Mehsud had the
largest number of men at arms under his direct command: up to 8,000 fighters. He was
thought to be in charge of recruiting and training suicide bombers. Azmatullah's claim
may rest on his being the most closely related to Baitullah: they both come from the same
branch of the Mehsud tribe. As a maulana, or Islamic scholar, he may have the best
religious credentials of the three. Wali-ur-Rehman, long Baitullah's spokesman, is
thought to have been his most trusted lieutenant. Said to have strong ties to many clans
and tribes, he may be the least divisive figure of the three. But some how it would be a
abet unlikely that al-Qaeda will install one of its own members in the leadership slot like
Baitullah Meshud. "All Taliban groups have links with al-Qaeda," says Amir Rana, an
expert on Islamist militancy. "But at the same time, they want to keep their identity
independent. They don't mix in the structure of the Taliban. They want to avoid any
confrontation happen with them. They want to stay there, use their facilities for training
while providing ideological leadership." The Pashtun-dominated Taliban are also
unlikely to accept an Arab jihadist as their leader. But another possible direction is for the
group's new leadership to concentrate its fire west of the border, in Afghanistan. “Shaukat
Qadir Says" Baitullah was the only one who was focusing [most] of his attention on
Pakistan and trying to create a disturbance here rather than Afghanistan, and a retired
army brigadier turned analyst. "His followers will probably shift focus back to
Afghanistan. This is one of the reasons that why he has lost support among his own
tribesmen." So that this shift could come about if rival Waziri militant groups isolate the
Taliban's Mehsud group and seize control for themselves. Mehsud had notoriously
clashed with Waziri commanders Maulvi Nazir in South Waziristan and Hafiz Gul
Bahadur in North Waziristan, who, unlike Mehsud, have focused on mounting cross
border attacks on U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan. When Mehsud assumed the
leadership of the Pakistan Taliban in late 2007, Bahadur had been one of his closest
rivals. “Rana says," that this will be an opportunity for the Wazir tribe to take back its
position in the Taliban. A focus on Afghanistan may also suit another powerful
commander in the region, Sirajuddin Haqqani, who has influence with the Pakistani
Taliban. As the head of the Haqqani network, the son of mujahedin leader Alluding
Haqqani has used his madrassas in Waziristan to mount vicious attacks on U.S. forces in
Afghanistan. Similarly, Mullah Omar, the leader of the Afghan Taliban, may intervene to
back one of the men in contention. Aftab Sherpao, Pakistan's former Interior Minister
says Omar's support was crucial to Mehsud's ambitions when the Pakistani Taliban was
formed.
A third option is for the Pakistani Taliban's leadership to pass to one of its leaders farther
north in the tribal belt. Maulvi Faqir Mohammed, who had been continuously leading the
Taliban in the Bajaur tribal agency, has been named as a possible, albeit unlikely,
successor. Like Bahadur, he was a contender when Mehsud assumed the leadership of the
group. In 2008, after his cohorts faced a steamrolling military offensive, he became the
beneficiary of a peace deal with Islamabad.
But for the moment, the apparent death of Mehsud and the infighting among his loyalists
has opened a small window of opportunity for Pakistan. "It has to be more proactive and
not let the new leader to establish himself," says Sherpao, the former Interior Minister.
"The government will have to try and win over some of the tribes who were too afraid to
challenge the militants." Over the weekend, elders from the Mehsud tribe announced that
they were prepared to fight the Taliban if they received government backing. That
challenge, in the form of a local tribal militia, is already paying off against other Taliban
militants to the north of the Swat valley. In Waziristan, it may succeed where previous
military operations have failed.

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