New Delhi: Afghanistan’s former spy chief Amrullah Saleh has presented an analysis of Pakistan’s new strategy to deal with the Taliban, saying that it marks a significant shift in Islamabad’s approach.
Saleh classified it through a five-pillar initiative, through his pro-democracy Afghanistan Green Trend, which characterised this as a departure from traditional diplomacy towards a more aggressive Islamabad, intended to destabilise the current regime in Kabul.
This has come at a time when both the South Asian neighbours are engaged in tit-for-tat strikes that have intensified with Pakistan bombing Kabul. Islamabad has been demanding that the Taliban stop providing safe haven to anti-Pakistan groups.
On 24 February, the Taliban launched a large-scale military operation alongside the disputed Durand Line and said that several Pakistani soldiers had been “caught alive”—a claim denied by Islamabad.
In a retaliatory measure, Pakistan’s defence minister Khwaja Asif declared “open war” against Afghanistan, with the airstrikes targeting military installations in Kabul, Paktia, and Kandahar.
The Five Pillars
According to Saleh’s analysis, the first pillar involves the weaponisation of trade, where Islamabad has explicitly linked economic ties to security by closing border crossings and putting pressure on the Taliban to extract political concessions.
This, he said, has created a situation where Kabul is dependent on northern supply routes, which are already in danger of disruption due to the joint operation led by the US and Israel on Tehran.
To our dismay:
Pakistan's new strategy toward Afghanistan and the Taliban appears to involve five parallel initiatives, packaged into a cohesive policy. Cutting through the fog of rhetoric and mutual blame, this marks a significant shift in Islamabad's approach.
First, Pakistan… pic.twitter.com/Ul40ulEi1g
— Afg Green Trend (@AGTAfghanistan) March 1, 2026
Islamabad’s military’s air superiority over Kabul and selective airstrike over any part of Afghanistan at its will is largely aimed at exploiting the Taliban’s lack of anti-air defences, he said.
The lack of military strength, coupled with a lack of international legitimacy, has effectively turned the group more into a militant insurgency than a governing body, Saleh said.
As per the third pillar, the strategy is bolstered by a rare domestic concession with Pakistan on broad internal cohesion and political support from these cross-border military actions. The strategy is bolstered by a domestic consensus within Pakistan over the airstrikes in Afghanistan, the post explained.
Saleh compared this to Israel’s operations in Lebanon and Syria, where cross-border actions are backed by national unity.
According to the fourth measure, Islamabad is repeatedly seeking international support over its ongoing counterterrorism campaign, which has partially evolved into an anti-Taliban effort.
Due to infighting within the various factions in the Afghan Taliban, combined with the lack of international support, as no country has provided any meaningful support, has rendered Kabul as a “territory without any functional state,” he said.
Russia is the only country to formally recognise the Taliban government in Afghanistan since the group captured Kabul in 2021.
Pakistan, according to the former head of the National Directorate of Security, is actively reaching out to anti-Taliban forces to consult on “post-Taliban” political arrangements. He further suggested that by positioning itself as a regional hegemon, Islamabad intends to dismantle the remnants of US and NATO infrastructure.
“None of these steps would have been feasible—or even imaginable—if the Taliban had avoided hubris, arrogance, and shortsightedness over the past four years and pursued a genuine Afghan-led political solution. Now, it may be too late,” Saleh, a critic of the Taliban, said in his assessment of the situation.
(Edited by Tony Rai)