KABUL (Pajhwok): The Afghanistan Islamic Movement’s Suicide Front, calling itself heir to Taliban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar, is a remnant of the faction led by dreaded commander Mullah Dadullah Mansoor Akhund.
Mullah Dadullah, who belonged to the Kakar tribe of Uruzgan province, lived in Kandahar -- the Taliban movement’s birthplace. A powerful insurgent commander born in 1966, he led 6,000 fighters, says a former official, who does not want to be named.
He had thousands of vehicles, BM-40 weapons and other heavy arms at his disposal according to the ex-Taliban official. Dadullah’s participation in war was always perceived as a guarantee of victory against the enemy.
During Taliban’s rule, he led the battle against the now defunct Northern Alliance and led his men to the capture of many mountainous districts, including the Yakawlang district of Bamyan province, the source adds.
A watcher of Taliban activities, Mohammad Hasan Haqyar, also acknowledges Dadullah’s rare guerrilla warfare skills and effective combat strategy. Following his killing in a 2007 airstrike by British and American special forces, his brother Mansoor Dadullah took over as chief of the Islamic Movement’s Suicide Front.
Haqyar characterises the Dadullah brothers as strong-headed men, who were widely feared for their ruthless tactics. Killings, intimation and beheadings were nothing unusual for the two top commanders. The analyst reveals Mullah Omar had twice sacked Mansoor Dadullah.
But in 1999, when the Taliban lost control of many areas in the north and the Northern Alliance knocked at the gates to Kabul, Omar once again gave Dadullah a lot of resources and tasked him with defending the capital and regaining the ground lost to the enemy.
Shortly after Taliban’s ouster from power, Dadullah brought together a large number of fighters to launch guerrilla operations in Kandahar, Helmand and Uruzgan provinces. He inflicted heavy losses and Afghan and foreign forces in the insurgency-plagued south.
By 2008, Dadullah gained a stronghold foothold in Helmand and Uruzgan, with many Taliban fighters defecting to his group. He was mysteriously killed in 2007 when he was replaced by Mansoor Dadullah, who was also reviled by the Taliban leadership. Before being warned, he was expelled from the Taliban movement.
He was surrounded by Pakistani forces in the Zhob district of southwestern Balochistan province in 2009. The commander fought for 18 hours, killing nine Pakistani security personnel and losing two of his men. A year later, he was wounded in a firefight with Pakistani soldiers being detained. He was released in 2014.
Waheed Muzhda, a bureaucrat during the Taliban regime, also says the Islamic Movement’s Suicide Front has been set up by Dadullah Mansoor’s supporters. Currently, the outfit is led by Najibullah Wardak, who managed to escape Taliban’s captivity.
In Late July, the Front announced the death of Taliban’s supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar Akhund in a Karachi hospital and his secret burial in southern Afghanistan. It also claimed sharp divisions among senior commanders of the insurgent movement.
mud
