Taliban fighters

Michael Hughes: ISIS is the primary enemy of external actors while, inside Afghanistan, the Taliban have a higher probability of capturing Kabul and beheading any government officials insane enough not to have fled. Hence, dropping a 21,600 pound bomb on ISIS caves in Nangarhar – as was down by the U.S. on April 13 – does seem like a relatively disproportionate application of resources with respect to the nature of the threat. In fact, the Taliban could benefit from a hyper-focus on ISIS, whose aspirations differ only in terms of geography. Whereas ISIS wants to establish a brutal Islamic State across the entire region, the Taliban want to re-establish the same inside Afghanistan. Click here to read more.