Conflict between the two militias soon escalated into a full-scale war.
Due to the sudden initiation of the war, working government departments, police units or a system of justice and accountability for the newly created Islamic State of Afghanistan did not have time to form. Atrocities were committed by individuals of the different armed factions while Kabul descended into lawlessness and chaos as described in reports by Human Rights Watch and the Afghanistan Justice Project. Because of the chaos, some leaders increasingly had only nominal control over their (sub-)commanders. Human Rights Watch writes:
After Taliban captured Kabul, Iran's assistance to the Northern Alliance increased dramatically. Iran established an "airbridge" between Mashhad and the Afghan airbases of Bagram and Kulyab to ferry large quantities of arms to the Northern Alliance.
On August 1, 1997 the Taliban launched an attack on Sheberghan, the main military base of Abdul Rashid Dostum. Dostum has said the reason the attack was successful was due to 1500 Pakistani commandos taking part and that the Pakistani air force also gave support.
In October to November 1998, the Northern Alliance used Iranian and Russian arms to recapture territory from the Taliban near the Uzbekistan and Tajikistan border.
In 1998, Iran accused Pakistan of sending its air force to bomb Mazar-i-Sharif in support of Taliban forces and directly accused Pakistani troops for "war crimes at Bamiyan". The same year Russia said that Pakistan was responsible for the military expansion of the Taliban in northern Afghanistan by sending large numbers of Pakistani troops, some of whom had subsequently been taken prisoner by the anti-Taliban United Front.
In 2000, the UN Security Council imposed an arms embargo against military support to the Taliban, with UN officials explicitly singling out Pakistan. The UN secretary-general implicitly criticized Pakistan for its military support and the Security Council stated it was "deeply distress[ed] over reports of involvement in the fighting, on the Taliban side, of thousands of non-Afghan nationals". In July 2001, several countries including the United States, accused Pakistan of being "in violation of U.N. sanctions because of its military aid to the Taliban".
In 2000, British Intelligence reported that the intelligence agency ISI was taking an active role in several Al-Qaeda training camps. The ISI allegedly helped with the construction of training camps for both the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. From 1996 to 2001 the Al Qaeda of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri became a state within the Taliban state. Bin Laden sent Arab and Central Asian Al-Qaeda militants to join the fight against the United Front among them his Brigade 055.
With the fall of Kabul to anti-Taliban forces in November 2001, ISI forces worked with and helped Taliban militias who were in full retreat. In November 2001, Taliban, Al-Qaeda combatants and ISI operatives were safely evacuated from Kunduz on Pakistan Air Force cargo aircraft to Pakistan Air Force bases in Chitral and Gilgit in Pakistan's Northern Areas in what has been dubbed the "Airlift of Evil".
The role of the Pakistani military has been described by international observers as well as by the anti-Taliban leader Ahmad Shah Massoud as a "creeping invasion". The "creeping invasion" proved unable to defeat the severely outnumbered anti-Taliban forces. UN officials stated that there had been "15 massacres" between 1996 and 2001. The report by the United Nations quotes eyewitnesses in many villages describing Arab fighters "carrying long knives used for slitting throats and skinning people".
The Taliban repeatedly offered Massoud money and a position of power to make him stop his resistance. Massoud declined. He explained in one interview:
<blockquote>The Taliban say: "Come and accept the post of prime minister and be with us", and they would keep the highest office in the country, the presidentship. But for what price?! The difference between us concerns mainly our way of thinking about the very principles of the society and the state. We can not accept their conditions of compromise, or else we would have to give up the principles of modern democracy. We are fundamentally against the system called "the Emirate of Afghanistan".</blockquote>
<blockquote>There should be an Afghanistan where every Afghan finds himself or herself happy. And I think that can only be assured by democracy based on consensus. He also stated:
<blockquote>The Taliban are not a force to be considered invincible. They are distanced from the people now. They are weaker than in the past. There is only the assistance given by Pakistan, Osama bin Laden and other extremist groups that keep the Taliban on their feet. With a halt to that assistance, it is extremely difficult to survive.</blockquote>
In early 2001 the United Front employed a new strategy of local military pressure and global political appeals. Resentment was increasingly gathering against Taliban rule from the bottom of Afghan society including the Pashtun areas. Many civilians fled to the area of Ahmad Shah Massoud. National Geographic concluded in its documentary "Inside the Taliban": "The only thing standing in the way of future Taliban massacres is Ahmad Shah Massoud". At the same time he was very wary not to revive the failed Kabul government of the early 1990s.
On September 9, 2001, two Arab suicide attackers, belonging to Al Qaeda and posing as journalists, detonated a bomb hidden in a video camera while interviewing Ahmed Shah Massoud in the Takhar province of Afghanistan. Commander Massoud died in a helicopter that was taking him to a hospital. He was buried in his home village of Bazarak in the Panjshir Valley. The funeral, although taking place in a rather rural area, was attended by hundreds of thousands of mourning people.
The assassination of Massoud is considered to have a strong connection to the attacks in the U.S. two days later, which killed nearly 3,000 people and which appeared to be the terrorist attack that Massoud had warned against in his speech to the European Parliament several months earlier. John P. O'Neill was a counter-terrorism expert and the Assistant Director of the FBI until late 2001. He retired from the FBI and was offered the position of director of security at the World Trade Center (WTC). He took the job at the WTC two weeks before 9/11. On September 10, 2001, John O'Neill told two of his friends,
<blockquote>We're due. And we're due for something big. ... Some things have happened in Afghanistan [referring to the assassination of Massoud]. I don't like the way things are lining up in Afghanistan. ... I sense a shift, and I think things are going to happen. ... soon.</blockquote>
O'Neill died the following day, when the south tower collapsed. With both nations seeking to increase or maintain their regional power through opposing factions on the ground, observers came to view the conflict in Afghanistan as a proxy-war between the two state powers.
From 2002 to 2004, war activity in Afghanistan was relatively calm. By 2006, however, with the support of Pakistan and Iran, a Taliban insurgency gained increasing strength. In 2010, Afghan President Karzai decided that the only way to end the Taliban insurgency was to call for peace. This process became accepted and supported by all international partners of Afghanistan, except by several key figures of the Northern Alliance such as Abdullah Abdullah, Ahmad Zia Massoud, Mohammad Mohaqiq, and others. The opposition, by then splintered into several parties, warned that Karzai's appeasement policy could come at the cost of Afghanistan's political and economic development, including the progress made in areas such as education and women's rights. Because NATO excluded the Karzai administration and the opposition leaders were excluded from secret talks with the Taliban, Karzai's political rhetoric was increasingly adjusted to Taliban demands, United Front leaders, and in late 2011, regrouped to oppose a return of the Taliban to Afghanistan.
Legacy
Between 1996 and 2001, the Northern Alliance blocked the Taliban and al-Qaeda from gaining control of the entirety of Afghanistan. Many internally displaced persons found shelter in areas controlled by Ahmad Shah Massoud. After the September 2001 attacks in the United States, U.S. air raids followed by ground troops of the United Front ousted the Taliban from power in Kabul. Between November and December 2001, the United Front gained control of most major Afghan cities. Had it not been for the United Front, the U.S. would have needed to deploy large number of ground troops, as was done in the Iraq War.
The United Front was influential in the transitional Afghan Government of Hamid Karzai from 2001 until 2004. Notably, Mohammed Fahim became the Vice President and Defense Minister, Yunus Qanuni became the Minister of Education and Security Advisor and Abdullah Abdullah became the Foreign Minister. Most foreign observers expected this dominance to continue and for Fahim or Qanuni to be selected as Karzai's Vice President in the 2004 elections. However, Karzai instead selected Ahmad Zia Massoud, younger brother of the former United Front leader Ahmad Shah Massoud. Karzai easily won the 2004 Presidential election with 55.4% of the vote, followed by three former leaders of the Northern Alliance, Quanuni (16.3%), Mohaqiq (11.7%) and Dostum (10%).
Some of the military strength of the UIF has now been absorbed into the military of Afghanistan, while many of the remaining soldiers were disarmed through a nationwide disarmament program. The existence and strength of the Afghan National Army has significantly reduced the threat of the former UIF elements attempting to use military action against the new NATO-backed Afghan government. Most of the country's senior military personnel are former members of the UIF, including Defense Minister Bismillah Khan Mohammadi.
Some members of the alliance are now part of the United National Front (Afghanistan) which is led by Rabbani and includes some former leaders of the UIF such as Yunus Qanuni, Mohammed Fahim, and Abdul Rashid Dostum. The United National Front has positioned itself as a "loyal" opposition to Hamid Karzai. Others like Abdul Rasul Sayyaf claim to be loyal to Hamid Karzai while, however, following their own agenda.
Abdullah Abdullah, a doctor of medicine and one of Ahmad Shah Massoud's closest friends, ran as an independent candidate in the 2009 Afghan presidential election and came in second place. On November 1, 2009, Abdullah, however, quit the runoff election because of widespread allegations of election fraud. Some of his followers wanted to take to the streets but Abdullah called for calm. Massoud Khalili, another of Ahmad Shah Massoud's close friends, became ambassador to India and subsequently to Turkey, while the younger brother of Massoud, Ahmad Wali Massoud, serves as ambassador to the United Kingdom. Massoud's ex-commander Bismillah Khan Mohammadi was chief-of-staff of the Afghan National Army, then as Minister of the Interior followed by Minister of Defense. One of Massoud's close intelligence agents, Amrullah Saleh, became director of the National Directorate of Security (NDS) in 2004 but had to resign in 2010.
Reformation (2011)
The National Front of Afghanistan, which was created by Ahmad Zia Massoud, Abdul Rashid Dostum and Mohammad Mohaqiq in late 2011 to oppose peace talks with Taliban, is generally considered as a reformation of the military wing of the United Front. Meanwhile, much of the political wing has reunited under the National Coalition of Afghanistan led by Abdullah Abdullah.
Former head of the National Directorate of Security (NDS), Amrullah Saleh, created a new movement, Basej-i Milli, with support among the youth. It mobilized about 10,000 people in an anti-Taliban demonstration in the capital Kabul in May 2011. Former Northern Alliance strongman Mohammed Fahim, Vice President of Afghanistan, remained in an alliance with Hamid Karzai until Fahim's death in 2014.
2021 resurgence
Following a takeover of Kabul and much of Afghanistan by the Taliban in 2021, the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, led by Ahmad Massoud, son of late Afghan politician Ahmad Shah Massoud, and Vice President Amrullah Saleh started gathering strength in the Panjshir Valley. The flag of the ‘Northern Alliance’ or the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan was hoisted for the first time since 2001 in the Panjshir Valley, signalling their return.
Human rights issues (1996–2001)
thumb|[[Ahmad Shah Massoud (right) with Pashtun anti-Taliban leader Abdul Qadir (left) in November 2000]]
The human rights situation during combat was heavily dependent on the specific commander and his troops. The situation for different leaders and their troops of the United Front thus shows sharp contrasts. Also, the quality of life of the Afghan population was heavily dependent on the specific leader that was directly controlling the area in which they lived. Sharp contrasts could also be witnessed regarding life and structures in those areas.
Area of Ahmad Shah Massoud
Ahmad Shah Massoud controlled the Panjshir area, some other parts of Parwan and Takhar province. Some parts of Badakshan were under his influence while others were controlled by Burhanuddin Rabbani. Badakshan was the home region of Rabbani.
Massoud created institutions which were structured into several committees: political, health, education and economic. Women also did not have to wear the Afghan burqa. There was a huge humanitarian problem as there was not enough to eat for both the existing population and the internally displaced Afghans. In 2001, Massoud and a French journalist described the bitter situation of the displaced people and asked for humanitarian help. when Dostum controlled most of the north.
According to Human Rights Watch in 1997, some 3,000 captured Taliban soldiers were summarily executed in and around Mazar-i Sharif by Dostum's Junbish-i Milli forces under the command of Abdul Malik Pahlawan. The killings followed Malik's withdrawal from a brief alliance with the Taliban and the capture of the Taliban forces who were trapped in the city. In 2009, Dostum denied the accusations.
Dostum belonged to those commanders making their own, often draconian, laws. Human Rights Watch has released documents alleging widespread crimes targeted against the civilian population.