'Not your fathers Afghanistan': Has the West taken its eye off the al-Qaeda ball?

Background

Following the Afghan Taliban’s return to power 2021, Western intelligence services have faced a significant human intelligence (HUMINT) collection vacuum in Afghanistan, alongside a limited ability to engage with in-country HUMINT sources. Operational limitations combined with the fact that sources felt abandoned by the U.S. and its coalition partners, have curtailed cooperation with Western ‘three-letter’ intelligence agencies such as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, aka MI6). As a result, these agencies have had to rely on regional liaison partners, such as the Jordanians, for in-country HUMINT collection.

The Afghan Taliban does have a growing intelligence relationship with U.S. intelligence agencies, although the veracity of the intelligence it provides remains open to debate, as noted recently by Ahmad Zia Saraj, a former head of Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security, who has questioned the Afghan Taliban’s repeated narrative of a ‘secure Afghanistan’. As a result, much of the intelligence relating to terrorist groups in Afghanistan is publicly available information or gathered on an open-source basis. This piece draws upon both.

A "jihadist’s utopia"

It is worth noting at the outset that the triad of the Afghan Taliban, the Haqqani Network (a Sunni Islamist Afghan militant organization) and al-Qaeda – together with its affiliates – are now, to a large degree, indistinguishable. The Taliban provides governance experience (albeit limited, given they’ve only been in power for just over four years), ideological leadership and operational infrastructure; al-Qaeda brings global coordination capabilities and the symbolic continuity of Osama Bin Laden's legacy; and the Haqqani Network is known for its sophisticated and ruthless military operations, playing a crucial role in logistical support and strategic planning. This mutual reliance has resulted in Afghanistan becoming, yet again, a safe haven for terrorist groups operating both within and from the country. As of April 2024, Afghanistan was the country most affected by Islamist terrorism, and between 1979 and 2024 the Afghan Taliban and its various offshoots (such as the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or colloquially Pakistani Taliban) was the deadliest terrorist group, accounting for over three-quarters of the victims of terrorist attacks that year.

It is no longer accurate, however, to discuss Islamic terrorist groups as distinct entities such as ‘core’ or ‘central’ al-Qaeda, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Islamic State Khorasan Province, Boko Haram, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Pakistani Taliban or al-Shabaab. Rather, all of these groups, and many others, cooperate operationally and self-describe as an Islamic Army seeking to establish a global caliphate under the leadership of Hamza bin Laden (one of Osama bin Laden’s sons who, according to reports, could still be alive despite the first Trump administration asserting that he was killed in an airstrike in 2019) and Saif al-Adl, al-Qaeda’s de facto leader.

During 2025, the Afghan Taliban has quietly lifted restrictions on foreign and regional militants operating on Afghan soil. Afghanistan’s permissive turn is particularly disturbing as it coincides with what Colin Smith, UN Coordinator of the Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team, has described as "mounting indications that al-Qaeda’s ambitions for external operations are once again on the rise".

The Afghan Taliban deny that Afghanistan is a safe haven for terrorists. However, a July 2024 UN Monitoring Team’s report stated that al-Qaeda “still uses Afghanistan as a permissive haven under the Taliban.” Even regional actors such as Russia and China have called for coordinated efforts to prevent the use of Afghan territory for terrorist activities. According to Ahmad Zia Saraj, Afghanistan is a "jihadist’s utopia," arguing that “al-Qaeda’s presence in Afghanistan today is multilayered and extensive”. In a statement that came as no surprise to those who study the region, a group of representatives from the European Union and 13 other countries stated on 1 October 2025 that they were “concerned over the persistent terrorist threat and cross-border migration security challenges emanating from Afghanistan”.

Growing operational capabilities

Whilst the Global War on Terror succeeded in disrupting and degrading al-Qaeda between 2001 and 2021, the group and its affiliates have reconstituted and grown substantially since 2021, aided by the tacit support of the Afghan Taliban and other regional actors such as Iran. Al-Qaeda is now operationally far more capable than before the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Two examples may be instructive.

Firstly, prior to 2001, al-Qaeda operated a small number of training camps in Afghanistan, the largest of which were Tarnak Farm near Kandahar and Zhawar Kili near Khost. There is compelling evidence from the UN that the group now operates at least 10 training camps (with some separate unconfirmed estimates anywhere from 30 to 100), as well as safe houses and other facilities. Some of these camps and facilities are former CIA and Joint Special Operations Command installations, according to a source familiar with the matter. Fighters also have access to an enormous stockpile of military assets, valued at over $7 billion, that were either transferred to Afghan National Defence and Security Forces prior to the withdrawal or left behind by foreign forces, such as 17,000 pairs of night vision devices and over 23,000 Humvees.

Estimates of the number of fighters ‘graduating’ from these camps vary widely, but recent research by Dr. Hamza Khan indicates that under al-Qaeda’s decentralised structure, almost 500 seasoned al-Qaeda commanders have slipped into Taliban and Pakistani Taliban ranks. There are over 7,000 Pakistani Taliban fighters, 1,500 Baloch separatists and thousands more linked to al-Qaeda, Islamic State Khorasan Province, the Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement, and Jaish-ul-Adl spread out across Afghanistan. It is also noteworthy that many Hamas operatives involved in the 7 October 2023 attacks in Israel trained in Afghanistan.

Secondly, the U.S. government’s Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction has confirmed that the U.S. government has transported at least $2.9 billion in cash to the Afghan Taliban, ostensibly for humanitarian assistance, but in fact, distributed by its leadership as it sees fit, thus potentially funding terrorist groups it is aligned with. In addition, since 2022 the United Nations has purchased and transported at least $3.8 billion into Afghanistan to fund international aid organization operations. The U.S. continues to transfer at least $40 million in cash per week to the Afghan Taliban for ‘aid’, as well as an additional $47 million per week as part of the Doha Agreement’s counterterrorism provisions. Incredibly, these payments continued during the recent U.S. Government shutdown.

Although some effort is being made to reduce elements of this funding package, the degree to which this funding continues – combined with the number of training camps and facilities highlighted above – should provide significant cause for concern. This funding is complemented by legitimate sources of revenue, such as Afghanistan’s mining sector, as well as more nefarious income streams, some of which may eventually benefit terrorist groups aligned with the Afghan Taliban.

Together, these are two brief but concerning examples of the leap in both potential external operational capabilities and funding for these terrorist groups. In addition to this in-country infrastructure that assists in training new fighters, recruits are increasingly being radicalised and recruited online, thus exponentially increasing the potential pool of new fighters, many of whom may never even need to set foot in the training camps.

Diplomatic efforts and awareness campaigns

In recent years, Western intelligence and diplomatic institutions have focused their resources on other priorities such as Russia, China, great-power competition and the ongoing tensions between Israel and its neighbours, arguably have overcorrected away from counterterrorism to these other priorities.

There is, however, some cause for optimism, particularly in relation to recent public pronouncements by several government officials and respected commentators. Under the new leadership of Joe Kent, a former Green Beret (the U.S. Army’s Special Forces), the National Counterterrorism Center’s recent intelligence product displays a willingness to place relevant intelligence in the public domain. In addition, unclassified intelligence shared by the likes of Syed Khalid Muhammad of CommandEleven - a private intelligence firm based in Pakistan - has further raised public awareness of the ongoing threat posed by jihadi terrorist groups.

As it pertains to the UK threat environment, a recent speech by MI5 Director General Ken McCallum warned that “al-Qaeda and Islamic State are once again becoming more ambitious, taking advantage of instability overseas to gain firmer footholds. They are both personally encouraging and indirectly inciting would-be attackers in the West”. U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard also recently stated that “Islamist terrorism continues to pose the greatest – both short- and long-term – threat to the American people, freedom and Western civilization”. These pronouncements may serve as an inflection point – collectively, they will serve to raise awareness of transnational jihadi terrorist groups that many observers had forgotten about or at least thought posed no credible threat.

In addition, U.S. diplomats regularly engage with the Afghan Taliban government on matters of mutual concern, including the future of Bagram Air Base, while the Afghan Taliban itself has conducted extensive diplomatic outreach, including persuading Russia to formally recognise it as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. On 2 October 2025, India restored its diplomatic presence in Kabul, paving the way for formal recognition of the Afghan Taliban – although this decision may be more about safeguarding its own national interests by antagonising and weakening Pakistan than building relations with the Afghan Taliban.

At a military level, Pakistan has recently conducted strikes again Pakistani Taliban facilities in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region, an indication that it has lost patience with its neighbour in failing to combat terrorism. Meanwhile, resistance groups such as the National Resistance Front, led by Ahmad Massoud (whose father Ahmad Shah Massoud fought against the Taliban until he was assassinated two days before 9/11) and the Afghanistan Freedom Front have vowed to liberate Afghanistan, but their lack of co-ordination or unified command hinders their progress in becoming a new Northern Alliance, the coalition of militias who opposed the Taliban between 1992 and 2001.

Conclusion

The growing and potent threat emanating from Afghanistan is greatly underestimated. Unfortunately, despite diplomatic and other efforts to raise awareness of the threat, local communities, law enforcement and intelligence agencies allocate their limited resources to other priorities. As a former UK ambassador to a neighbouring country to Afghanistan remarked in a conversation with the author, “This is not your father’s Afghanistan. The image of a terrorist in a tunic and sandals is a misnomer. I can’t believe how far they have come. Their capabilities are infinitely greater than before 9/11 and we ignore them at our peril.”

Graham Aikin is a part-time PhD student in the Department of War Studies, King’s College London, where he is researching the resurgence of terrorist groups in Afghanistan since the 2021 withdrawal. He has studied extensively the events of 9/11, its antecedents and the subsequent ‘Global War on Terror’. His Master’s dissertation focused on the UK Investigatory Powers Commissioner’s role in overseeing the UK intelligence agencies’ treatment of detainees and the sharing of intelligence with their liaison partners.