Five Years Under the Taliban: The Resistance, Its Gains, Its Losses and What Comes Next

Five years after the Taliban returned to power, the Afghan resistance finds itself in a difficult and often misunderstood position. The Taliban have not been overthrown; they retain effective control over Afghanistan’s state institutions, security apparatus, roads, administrative structures, and intelligence infrastructure. The resistance possesses no comparable military system or secure national territorial base, and it has no major foreign power providing sustained military assistance.

(A National Resistance Front (NRF) fighter in Afghanistan's Hindu Kush mountains.)

Yet, the resistance has not disappeared. Anti-Taliban armed groups continue to operate, and reports of attacks have spanned a wider geographic area than during the initial post-2021 years. Opposition fronts have claimed operations across multiple provinces, with Badakhshan emerging as a clear hotspot of sustained armed opposition and local unrest. While individual claims and casualty figures remain difficult to independently verify and require analytical caution, the persistence and geographic spread of armed activity are undeniable.

This reality creates a far more complex picture than either side of the current debate acknowledges. The resistance has not demonstrated the capacity to threaten the Taliban's nationwide control, but the Taliban have likewise failed to eliminate organized armed opposition. The vital question is not whether the resistance is winning or losing—it is whether it can survive, adapt, and transform tactical survival into meaningful political leverage.

Table of Contents

1. Ahmad Massoud and the Burden of Leadership
    1.1 The Role of the NRF Leadership
    1.2 The Death of Hasib Quway Markaz: Betrayal or Strategic Exposure?

2. The Mechanics of Taliban Power and the Human Cost
    2.1 The Asymmetry of Intelligence
    2.2 The Cost Beyond the Battlefield
    2.3 The Information and Psychological Battlefield

3. Survival and Geographic Expansion
    3.1 Badakhshan and Local Grievances

4. The Path Forward: Transitioning to a National Movement
    4.1 Essential Questions for the Opposition
    4.2 Broadening the Base Beyond Armed Fighters

5. The Diplomatic Arena and Realpolitik

6. Conclusion: A Strategic Orientation for the Afghan Opposition

1. Ahmad Massoud and the Burden of Leadership

A persistent question hangs over the National Resistance Front (NRF): What responsibility does Ahmad Massoud bear for the fighters who continue to operate under his banner?

This inquiry has gained urgency following the deaths of senior commanders. However, evaluating leadership requires more than pointing to casualties and assuming commanders are being recklessly sent to their deaths.

1.1 The Role of the NRF Leadership

The NRF, led by Ahmad Massoud, son of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud (1953-2001), was the first group to emerge following the collapse of the republic, inspiring subsequent anti-Taliban formations. Massoud’s framework for the struggle encompasses several key realities:

• Resistance as a Last Resort: Massoud maintains that the NRF initially sought meaningful political negotiations before turning to armed defense.

• A Multi-Dimensional Strategy: The NRF presents armed struggle as only one element of a broader resistance that also depends on political organization, civil resistance, women’s participation, diplomacy, public communication, and public trust.

• The Structural Asymmetry: Asking civilians and fighters to resist a regime holding a massive state advantage creates a deep moral and strategic dilemma for the leadership.

This broader understanding of resistance is reinforced by internal analysis within the movement. NRF political analyst Abdullah Khanjani* noted in a speech analysis in late August 2026 that military performance alone cannot determine the strength or future of the resistance, emphasizing that organizational discipline, internal communication, public legitimacy, and public trust are equally decisive.

Khanjani's analysis points directly to the question of accountability within the resistance. He argues that legitimate criticism—particularly regarding organizational effectiveness, relations with commanders, responsibility toward the families of fallen fighters, and internal communication—should not simply be dismissed. At the same time, he distinguishes legitimate concerns from narratives amplified by hostile actors. For the NRF, the key institutional challenge is creating formal mechanisms to address these internal grievances without allowing misinformation to define the debate.

Addressing these dilemmas during his speech in Dushanbe, Massoud reiterated that armed struggle is not his primary preference, but an unavoidable response to Taliban authoritarianism. He argued that if the regime genuinely claims popular legitimacy, it should accept UN-supervised elections to allow the Afghan public to determine their own government.

1.2 The Death of Hasib Quway Markaz: Betrayal or Strategic Exposure?

The death of Hasib Panjshiri (Hasib Quway Markaz)—a prominent and recognizable NRF commander—highlighted the extreme risks facing opposition figures. Following his death, reports surfaced alleging internal disputes and unconfirmed betrayals involving high-ranking NRF figures like Tariq Mohammadi.

Evaluating these claims requires strict analytical discipline:

• Hypothesis vs. Evidence: An internal betrayal is operationally possible, but asserting it as fact without concrete proof mistakes suspicion for evidence.

• Operational Vulnerabilities: A prominent commander in enemy-controlled territory can be exposed through poor operational security, local surveillance, communications tracking, unauthorized movements, or long-term intelligence gathering.

• The Reality of Occupied Operations: The Taliban do not always need a high-level mole; often, sustained intelligence coverage simply catches up with high-profile targets over time.

A commander can be killed because of an insider. He can be killed because of poor operational security. He can be exposed through local observation, surveillance, communications, an unauthorized movement, or information gathered over time. And sometimes, particularly when a known opposition commander is operating inside territory controlled by his enemy, the enemy simply finds him.

The death of Panjshiri therefore deserves investigation and criticism where evidence supports it. But it should not automatically be transformed into proof of an internal conspiracy. Nor does his death automatically prove that Massoud "sent him to die."

The outcome of an operation does not, by itself, establish why it failed. A commander can be killed without betrayal, but leadership must still be accountable for how and why the commander was exposed. As Khanjani argues, accountability should lead to investigation and institutional learning rather than unsubstantiated blame. This is particularly important after the loss of senior commanders, because responsible communication and credible answers to fighters, families, and supporters are essential to maintaining the NRF's internal cohesion and public trust.

2. The Mechanics of Taliban Power and the Human Cost

Understanding the resistance's struggle requires evaluating the massive structural imbalance defining the conflict. The Taliban went from an insurgent movement operating from the mountains and terrorizing the Afghan population to the de facto authorities controlling Afghanistan.

(Taliban fighters at a checkpoint in Afghanistan, highlighting the extensive security presence and territorial control faced by resistance groups.)

2.1 The Asymmetry of Intelligence

The Taliban inherited two decades' worth of state infrastructure, military equipment, communications tracking tools, and administrative databases. Consequently, opposition figures face a deeply uneven operational environment:

• Constant Visibility: A high-profile commander operating inside Afghanistan cannot remain permanently invisible; movement, meeting people, procuring supplies, and managing communications inherently create persistent footprints.

• Layered Surveillance: The regime accumulates actionable intelligence over time through local checkpoints, administrative coercion, informant networks, and signals tracking without needing an insider in every cell.

• Operational Friction: Under these conditions, the discovery and elimination of resistance cells is usually the result of cumulative intelligence work rather than a single operational betrayal.

Understanding this asymmetry clarifies why exposure is rarely evidence of extraordinary operational failure or internal treason alone. While rigorous operational security remains vital, leadership must distinguish between structural exposure under state surveillance and deliberate betrayal when evaluating failed operations.

2.2 The Cost Beyond the Battlefield

The risks of opposition extend far beyond active fighters. Human rights organizations and UN reporting have documented systematic reprisals against former security personnel, suspected NRF sympathizers, and their families.

• Deterrence Through Retaliation: Arbitrary detentions, extrajudicial killings, and family harassment create a massive psychological deterrent against open rebellion.

• The Real Decision: An Afghan considering resistance is rarely deciding just on their own safety; they are weighing the immediate survival of their parents, spouse, and children.

• Requirements for Uprising: Courage alone cannot fuel a nationwide movement. It requires secure networks, sustained resources, and a realistic expectation that resistance will yield a viable alternative.

An Afghan considering joining the resistance may not be deciding only whether he is willing to risk his own life. He may be asking whether his parents, wife, children, siblings or other relatives could face retaliation.

That is one reason why the question "Why don't Afghans simply fight back?" is far more complicated than it sounds. The same human cost applies to how the resistance communicates about its own casualties. Khanjani argues that a fallen fighter should not be reduced to a statistic or political symbol. Information surrounding a death may initially be incomplete, and premature reporting can affect relatives, comrades, and the security of the wider network. Responsible communication therefore requires confirming what happened before publicly identifying the dead or injured, while balancing the public's need for truthful information against operational-security concerns.

Afghans have fought back. They continue to fight back. But turning opposition into a nationwide uprising requires more than courage. It requires organization, resources, secure networks and a political environment in which ordinary people believe that resistance has a realistic chance of producing something better.

2.3 The Information and Psychological Battlefield

The resistance is also fighting on an information battlefield. Khanjani argues that the Taliban and their supporters do not rely exclusively on military pressure; propaganda, misinformation, social-media activity, psychological pressure, and attacks on the credibility of opposition figures form another layer of the conflict.

The purpose of such activity, in his assessment, is not merely to promote the Taliban. It can also undermine confidence in the resistance, amplify reports of failure, spread rumors, deepen divisions among opposition groups, and discourage Afghans from openly expressing support for resistance.

Social media therefore becomes strategically important. Khanjani describes patterns in which apparently ordinary accounts repeatedly praise the Taliban, attack resistance figures, support Taliban policies, or engage in personal attacks against opponents. Whether every such account is coordinated cannot be established from individual examples alone, but the broader concern is significant: an information environment saturated with coordinated or misleading narratives can make it difficult for ordinary users to distinguish genuine public sentiment from organized influence activity.

This creates a particular challenge for the NRF. The answer cannot simply be to counter propaganda with propaganda. The movement's credibility depends on providing accurate information, correcting false claims, acknowledging uncertainty where facts remain unconfirmed, and communicating with the public without exposing sensitive operational information. Information resilience therefore becomes part of organizational resilience.

Khanjani's argument also extends to psychological pressure on activists, journalists, women, and resistance supporters.

(Afghan women under Taliban rule, amid the restrictions imposed on women's public and private lives. Photo: Sandra Calligaro / ITEM / SAIF IMAGES.)

Repeated insults, accusations, and harassment can discourage people from expressing opposition publicly even when they are not physically participating in armed resistance. In this sense, the information battlefield can reinforce the Taliban's broader deterrent effect: people may remain silent not because they support the regime, but because the perceived social and psychological cost of opposition becomes too high.

For the NRF, however, the information problem is not simply external. Khanjani's analysis suggests that the movement's own credibility is part of the same battlefield. If supporters receive incomplete, contradictory, or premature information from the resistance itself, distrust can grow even without deliberate hostile manipulation. The organization therefore faces a dual requirement: it must counter disinformation originating outside the movement while maintaining sufficiently accurate, timely, and responsible communication inside it.

This creates an important distinction between information warfare and information management. The NRF cannot control every narrative surrounding the resistance, but it can influence how vulnerable its own supporters are to those narratives. Clear communication, acknowledgment of uncertainty, correction of false claims, and mechanisms for addressing legitimate criticism can strengthen resilience without requiring the movement to respond to propaganda with propaganda of its own. 

3. Survival and Geographic Expansion

Despite these structural hurdles, the resistance has avoided eradication. What began as a localized fight in Panjshir and parts of northern Afghanistan has gradually expanded into a wider, more geographically dispersed pattern of operations.

By mid-2026, opposition groups claimed actions across a wide matrix of provinces:

• Northern & North-Eastern Focus: Badakhshan, Kunduz, Baghlan, Faryab

• Western Provinces: Herat, Badghis, Ghor

• Southern & Eastern Hubs: Kandahar, Helmand, Nangarhar

While individual skirmishes do not signal an impending military defeat for the Taliban, the regime's inability to eliminate organized armed opposition five years into its rule remains strategically significant. This does not mean that the resistance is close to military victory. It is not. Nor should every reported attack be described as a major strategic breakthrough. But five years after the Taliban returned to power, the regime has still not succeeded in eliminating organized armed opposition.

Yet Khanjani's analysis suggests that the resistance should not be measured exclusively through battlefield activity. Military operations are only one component of a broader movement whose durability also depends on organization, communication, public trust, and political legitimacy. A resistance can therefore suffer military setbacks while retaining political and organizational relevance; conversely, continued attacks alone do not demonstrate that a national movement is emerging.

3.1 Badakhshan and Local Grievances

Badakhshan illustrates a critical evolution: armed opposition overlapping with broader civilian discontent. In this region, resistance groups benefit from widespread local grievances against the regime:

• Forced implementation of aggressive poppy eradication policies without alternative livelihoods.

• Disagreements over local administration, taxation, and resource distribution.

• High-handed conduct by non-local Taliban-appointed officials.

This may be more important in the long term than the number of individual attacks. A resistance movement becomes more difficult to suppress when military opposition and civilian grievances begin to reinforce one another. The Taliban may be able to defeat an isolated armed cell. It is much more difficult to permanently eliminate the political grievances that produce opposition in the first place.

This is why the recent resistance should not be judged only by territory captured or Taliban fighters killed. The more important question is whether opposition can develop political depth. When military opposition intersects with organic civilian dissatisfaction, suppressing the movement becomes vastly more complex for the central authorities. 

4. The Path Forward: Transitioning to a National Movement

Survival alone will not overturn the status quo. The primary strategic challenge for Ahmad Massoud and the broader opposition is therefore transforming scattered armed formations and political networks into a unified, national political movement. Massoud has emphasized the need for greater internal unity and coordination among opposition groups, but the broader institutional questions of what such a movement would govern, how power would be distributed, and how it would avoid reproducing the failures of the former republic remain largely unresolved.

That transformation also requires internal reform. Khanjani's analysis highlights the need for clearer accountability, stronger communication between leadership and members, mechanisms for addressing legitimate criticism, and greater attention to the concerns of commanders, supporters, and the families of fallen fighters. These are not merely internal administrative questions. They affect whether the resistance can establish the credibility and public trust required of a future political movement.

4.1 Essential Questions for the Opposition

To present a viable alternative to the Taliban, the resistance must provide concrete answers to fundamental governance questions:

• Governance Model: What specific constitutional and political system will replace the Islamic Emirate?

• Power Distribution: How will administrative power be balanced between Kabul and the provinces to prevent past hyper-centralization?

• Ethnic Representation: How will Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks, and other communities be guaranteed meaningful, equitable representation?

• Rights & Institutions: What explicit guarantees will exist for women's full participation in public life, education, and governance?

• Justice & Reconciliation: How will accountability be handled regarding past war crimes, security sector reform, and former Taliban combatants?

• Anti-Corruption Safeguards: What structural mechanisms will prevent the return of warlordism, institutional corruption, and patronage networks that collapsed the former republic?

• Internal Accountability: What mechanisms will allow members, commanders, supporters, and affected families to raise legitimate concerns and receive credible answers without compromising operational security?

These are not secondary questions. They are central to whether the resistance can become a credible alternative. The objective cannot simply be the removal of one ruling elite. Afghanistan needs a political order in which power is exercised through institutions rather than personal networks, military commanders or factional loyalties.

That lesson is particularly important because the failures of the former republic cannot simply be forgotten. A post-Taliban Afghanistan cannot become a competition between different armed elites for control of Kabul. If the resistance wants to convince Afghans that it represents a genuine alternative, it must demonstrate what that alternative would actually look like.

4.2 Broadening the Base Beyond Armed Fighters

A credible political movement cannot rely exclusively on military figures or military performance. It must actively integrate non-combatant sectors while maintaining communication and trust between the movement and the wider public:

1. Women Leaders: Transitioning from treating women as symbols of resistance to positioning them as central architects of post-Taliban policy.

2. Civil Society & Professionals: Drawing on educators, journalists, legal scholars, and former administrators to build institutional blueprints.

3. The Global Diaspora: Leveraging diaspora expertise in economics, diplomacy, and international law to prepare for future state-building and governance transitions.

This is where the resistance has an opportunity. It can begin building the institutions of a future Afghanistan before it has political power.

It can develop proposals for administration, justice, education, economic recovery, civilian protection and constitutional reform. It can establish standards for accountability within its own ranks and develop mechanisms for communicating decisions and addressing legitimate criticism without compromising sensitive security matters. It can demonstrate that resistance to authoritarianism does not mean replacing one authoritarian structure with another. That would transform the meaning of resistance.

5. The Diplomatic Arena and Realpolitik

While fighting continues on the ground, a parallel contest is unfolding in the diplomatic arena. The Taliban are actively pursuing international normalization, leveraging pragmatic concerns over counterterrorism, border security, migration, and trade.

(Screenshot from the Financial Times, August 30, 2026, reporting on Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi's outreach to the Trump administration over potential mineral deals.)

Regional powers and international actors routinely engage with the de facto authorities out of practical necessity. For the Afghan opposition, countering this trend requires a calibrated approach:

• Reframing Engagement: Accepting that foreign powers will communicate with the de facto rulers, while demanding that practical contact does not turn into permanent political recognition.

• Proving Viability: Demonstrating to foreign governments that long-term stability in Afghanistan cannot be achieved through an exclusionary regime that suppresses major segments of its population.

• Offering a Concrete Alternative: Moving beyond anti-Taliban rhetoric to present foreign ministries with a clear, realistic road map for a stable, inclusive successor state.

Foreign governments need to know what comes after the Taliban. If the resistance wants international political support, it must be able to present a credible alternative. Not merely: “We oppose the Emirate.” But: “This is the Afghanistan we intend to build.”

At the same time, governments, international organizations, and civil society actors have a broader interest in understanding the security implications of Taliban rule. The consolidation of an armed Islamist movement that seized power through prolonged insurgency has implications beyond Afghanistan, particularly where extremist organizations observe that armed movements can ultimately translate military force into political power. The continued presence of terrorist organizations and militant networks in Afghanistan also means that the country's security trajectory cannot be treated solely as an internal Afghan matter.

That requires a political program, institutional capacity and a coalition broad enough to represent Afghanistan's different communities. Armed activity can create pressure. Political organization converts that pressure into leverage. Diplomacy can then turn that leverage into negotiations. Without the second and third stages, armed resistance risks becoming an endless cycle of attacks and retaliation.

6. Conclusion: A Strategic Orientation for the Afghan Opposition

The ultimate test for Ahmad Massoud and the broader resistance is therefore not simply whether they can continue fighting. It is whether they can transform survival into political leverage. Massoud himself argues that the resistance has already produced political effects beyond the battlefield. He points to the failure of most countries to formally recognize the Taliban government, the growing consolidation of anti-Taliban political forces, and what he sees as increasing skepticism in the region and internationally toward the Taliban's promises of an inclusive government. In his view, these developments demonstrate that resistance can generate political pressure even without possessing the military strength to defeat the Taliban outright. That requires several things at once: improved operational security, greater coordination between opposition groups, meaningful participation by women and civil society, institutional preparation, internal accountability, responsible communication, resilience against information warfare, and a political framework capable of attracting Afghans beyond traditional resistance networks. In other words, the resistance must become capable not only of surviving pressure from the Taliban, but also of managing its own internal weaknesses in ways that preserve the trust on which long-term political legitimacy depends.

Massoud's own description of resistance points in this direction. He has presented political organization, civil resistance, women's resistance, diplomacy and military resistance as interconnected elements of a wider struggle. But that vision now has to become more concrete. The resistance must learn from losses, protect its commanders and supporters as effectively as possible, address legitimate internal criticism, and confront internal disputes where credible evidence exists. It must also communicate with its supporters carefully enough to maintain public trust without compromising operational security. At the same time, it must answer the larger strategic question: What is the pathway from resistance to political change?

The killing of Hasib Panjshiri does not answer that question. Neither does the killing of other commanders. Nor does one successful ambush against the Taliban. Nor, from Massoud's perspective, does the absence of a military breakthrough necessarily mean that resistance has failed politically. His argument is that maintaining opposition, preventing the normalization of Taliban rule, consolidating anti-Taliban forces and creating pressure for negotiations can themselves constitute strategic gains. Whether those gains are sufficient to produce meaningful political change, however, remains an open question. The same is true in reverse. The survival of the NRF does not prove that the Taliban are close to collapse. The existence of armed opposition does not automatically constitute a national movement.

The strategic challenge is to connect these different forms of resistance into something larger: political resistance, civil resistance, women's resistance, armed resistance, diplomatic pressure and diaspora expertise. If these remain separate activities, the resistance may survive without changing Afghanistan's political trajectory. If they begin reinforcing one another, the situation could become very different.

Footnote:

*Abdullah Khanjani, an Afghan politician, former journalist and media executive, and former deputy minister at the State Ministry for Peace, is the head of the Political Bureau of the National Resistance Front (NRF). In an August 2026 speech, he provided an internal perspective on the movement's organizational and political challenges, focusing on accountability, internal communication, public trust, responsible information management, and organizational reform. His perspective is particularly relevant because it reflects concerns emerging from within the broader resistance environment rather than solely from external observers.