Mullah Omar, the Taliban chief had ominously warned of a bloody summer in Afghanistan in 2006. The operations during the year, so far, have borne the typical Taliban stamp: burning of school buildings, bombings including new tactics of suicide strikes, attacks on government forces, ambushes, threat to aid workers and extortion. The resurgence of the Taliban should have been easily foreseen. The Islamic rebels had been subdued in 2002 but their support base in the South and East of the country remained out of government control. The Taliban, expelled to the sanctuaries on the Durand Line in the Pushtun areas of the Pak Afghan border, astride Waziristan and Balochistan, reorganized itself and a coordinated strategy appears to be in play. The overall campaign is controlled by Mullah Omar or covert Pakistani leadership, provided by the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), which is said to have established safe houses for the Taliban in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan. Thus, while the Pakistan Army is fighting militants in Waziristan, it appears that the ISI is indulging the Taliban for its own ends. The large presence of foreign civilians and troops on Afghan soil has been subtly exploited, with incidents as the deaths in an accident of American Army truck in Kabul, being portrayed as an anti-Afghan conspiracy by the antagonists. This registered swelling support for the Taliban in the country. The increased production of poppy in the Southern areas in 2005 has considerably helped the Taliban in its resurgence. With an overall production of 4100 tons, the total produce is said to have yielded $ 410 million, enough to sustain an insurgency for a couple of years.

The responsibility of controlling the insurgency in South Afghanistan has devolved on NATO forces from August 2006. The period is portentous even as the just concluded Operation Mountain Thrust by Allied forces in Afghanistan killed 600 Taliban in the region. However, the rebellion by the Islamic militants, extending in a wide swathe of territory from Farah, Nimroz, Helmand and Kandahar in the South to Paktika, Nangarhar and Nuristan in the East, shows no signs of subsiding. The strength of the Taliban, ranging from 1000 to 2000, requires more than the 19,000 presently deployed NATO troops. Moreover, NATO forces are relatively inexperienced in fighting a guerrilla war. They are more equipped to provide security cover to development activities rather than hunting down the guerrillas. But the reality of the situation is such that if you do not winkle out the guerillas, the insurgents will strike at you. NATO troops are also conducting anti-narcotics operations, which are not considered people-friendly, as locals are increasingly taking to growing poppy, especially in a drought year with poor spring rains. What will be the NATO's response, if challenged, is not very clear. Many of its contingents are very small and their commitment tentative, perhaps even less than the British and Canadian forces. There is also an overall deficiency of troop levels in the country. The Afghan National Army is not measuring up to expectations and is likely to take another three to five years to stabilize, if it is provided a relatively peaceful rise.

The economic and development scene in the country is also very dismal. 2.5 million Afghans are reported to be facing food insecurity and a massive $ 76.4 million in aid is required to prevent a humanitarian crisis. The country is facing dangers of a looming drought, which will drive more people into the folds of the Taliban. The aid agencies have not been able to penetrate the hinterland, which is the fountainhead of insurgency, mainly due to lack of security. Evolving a security-development grid, planned and executed in 2002, might have prevented Taliban the desired space. This would have also strengthened the Karzai regime, which is being increasingly seen by the Afghans as a weak government, playing into the hands of the West. This is the most dangerous sign in Afghanistan, for the fiercely independent Pathans loathe seeing subjugation of sovereignty to any foreign power. Their deep sense of history evokes a natural anti foreigner feeling and fanned by the Taliban it would place the Karzai regime under increased pressure.

The war in Lebanon will also have its spin-off effects in Afghanistan, for it has emboldened the belligerent Iranian regime to dabble in regional power politics. The discomfort of Western forces in Afghanistan is sweet music to. Much to US discomfort, the growing signs of a Shia-Sunni consolidation in the Middle East would facilitate the mullahs' liaison with the Taliban. The situation in Afghanistan is, thus, far from stable. NATO forces need to be extremely vigilant and adapt to the challenging environment of Southern Afghanistan, to establish a modicum of normalcy and raise the confidence of the people.