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>> andrew mines is a research fellow with the george washington university's program on extremism joining us to talk about potential terror threats out of afghanistan since the us withdrawal. andrew mines,welcome to washington journal . >> guest: thanks for having me on n the one we will start with the question of who is thisgroup we've heard so much about, isis-k ? >> guest: isis-k, people have seen a bunch of different acronyms for the group that this is the official branch of the islamic state operating in afghanistan. the ek stands for khorosan covering parts of eastern afghanistan and pakistan and elsewhere in central asia but the group is now focused on afghanistan. they formed in 2016 when members of the pakistan cattleman, the afghan

taliban, al qaeda and other members of different jihadist groups coalesced all around one leader who'd been nominated as the governor or the top leader to oversee this ranch operating in afghanistan. not long after that they embarked on one of the most deadly campaigns of terrorism we've seen ever in the afghanistan pakistan region and by 2018 they were one of the top four deadliest terrorist organizations on the planet. >> host: the taliban has been aligned with al qaeda in the past but what is isis-k's relationship with al qaeda? >> these groups are vehemently opposed to each other. there's a history that dates back to the syria and iraq war where both organizations were butting heads, leadership were butting heads. since then there's been a local competition between the two organizations so that has played out in afghanistan. we haven't seen isis-k and al qaeda butting heads with each

other but because of their relationship to the afghan taliban we've seen isis-k going at it with the afghan taliban. >> host: they showed us decades if not centuries of internal conflicts between tribal groups and works that represent different sets of people. is that basically what we have here continuing today? >> i think it's difficult to paint it so broadly because we've seen and afghan voices have told us this last 20 years has been one of significant hope for them. at the same time we've seen this competition between different jihadist organizations play out. in some respects there are definitely components of this that play out along ethnic lines with different factions deciding which groups to

align with and which ones meet their agenda but for all intents and purposes there's a global component which is the islamic state branch and the al qaeda brand playing out in afghanistan. >> it seems the biden administration faces multiple threats from afghanistan or was not always the case ? >> historically and definitely in the immediate years that was pretty much al qaeda. i think over time we've been able to degrade that threat but not destroyed it completely. i think any of the claims that al qaeda has been defeated tend to be premature and they have been premature forbasically since the group's inception . right now of course, the competition between these two groups shows that there's multiple threat vectors. we've got threats coming from the ex-islamic state khorosan and threats coming from al qaeda. right now they're focused locally on afghanistan but this pressure to remove from either of these organizations

if we take our eye off our own defense and intelligence officials told us both of those groups could pose a direct threat to us, to our western allies anywhere from 18 months to 36 months with the estimate as it started this year. >> host: without any military boots on the ground and any significant other us boots on the ground terms of intelligence, how will the us keep continuing counterterrorism? the us and its partners continue counterterrorism in the region? >> i think now we're starting to be a little bit more from the united kingdom these kind of preliminary forays into over-the-counter capabilities and what this means is that us air access will be flying missions from bases in them middle east . tomost likely into afghanistan to conduct strikes against islamic state targets. a part of over the horizon relies on access to human sources on the ground to

provide either locations for target information about when they will be traveling so the problem is historically we've relied immensely on the afghan intelligence for that. i think a lot of people have kind of seen the last few weeks just the bracket fall but we can't forget that we have relied on those forces for a significant period of time especially afghan intelligence. without them now their reliance on the taliban as a terrorism partner to provide that intelligence is really an open question and one that we don't have good answers to just yet. >> host: andrew mines is with george washington's university program on extremism . we welcome yourcalls and comments . republicans 202-748-8000 one, independents and others 202 evan 48 8002.

mister minds, you have a masters in clinical psychology. does that bring you to try to understand what is the mindset of these terrorist groups? >> guest: i'm actually still working on it . this is actually my last semester in it and that's been a great relief. i think it's definitely helped kind of understanding a lot of the stuff on the domestic side and working with white americans like to join these organizations and why they decide to attack in the united states. it's more of a political science background, more of a comparative politics and history that helps us understand what's going on in afghanistan and across the country. >> host: do you think the withdrawal of us forces has emboldened people to take part and join the taliban

there? what about isis-k, as this help their recruiting in this country? >> guest: on the al qaeda side absolutely. the group released a statement congratulating the afghan taliban and declaring the 20 year war or so against the americans has paid off. this is perceived as a huge victory. that's the top-down dissemination we're seeing. we've also seen osama bin laden's former security head was spotted in afghanistan so that doesn'tbode well for what the organization plans to do in the immediate immediate future . we've seen al qaeda's affiliates post celebrating this as a huge victory for their group and the broader jihadist movement but discussing a lot about traveling over to afghanistan now to join al qaeda and to

join the taliban. that poses problems because they're going to have expectations of the taliban and if those noexpectations aren't met, they risk being driven into the ranks s of isis-k. there a curious position because they need to show over the next few weeks, months and years that the taliban and is not able to deliver security and that together they cooperate with the west. they are illegitimate because they do anycooperation with the united states . we've seen this play out with counterterrorism. they willview that as heretical . that's what's driving the issue into isis-k ranks. if the taliban concedes on ideological issues that rests driving fighters into isis-k ranks. this is a precarious time for the country and the region and people need to wake up and see how precarious that is right now. >> let me read you another

view on what's going on. an opinion piece, biden didn't see the isis-k threat in afghanistan untilit was too late . he writes in there that the united states puts the taliban a potentially awkward d position where they share the same. should the united states work with the isis-k against the islamic state? there are two paths, one of which the biden administration appears to be leaning to is to cooperate with the taliban including intelligence sharing and the united states could choose to do nothing and let the taliban, theirallies and isis-k battle it out . >> my colleague highlights an important consideration which is that there are no good options. if we let the taliban control isis-k we've seen them engage in traditional classes, more conventional warfare where

there are groups of afghan taliban will go after isis-k when they held defensive positions in various areas. we've seen them do that. we haven't seen them secure and govern a city and pursue in urban areas counterterrorism against another institution. we simply haven't seen it yet so there's capacity to do that we don't know. we truly do not know what their capacity is. that's a bigunknown and it has the risk of , it has the risk of being incredibly dangerous because they produce the same kind of strategy syrians have made. it has a game plan to move through this period and to research and consolidate territory and course populations and conduct violent attacks and all the things it needs to do over the long run to establish that same caliphate we saw in iraq and syria, to establish

a version of that in afghanistan. on the other side what happens if overtime let's me look at for example a few months, even a few years. what happens over time if we're sharing intelligence with afghan, and they're sharing intelligence. and if overtime afghan that are coming up with members in particular, what if they get tired of working with the us and being seen as a part of thecounterterrorism apparatus and if they're defecting over . those are real questions and considerations we need to look down the line. there's no good answers here. it is s the long and short of it first up is jeff in cape coral florida. republican line. good morning. >> i'm on the air? >> go ahead.>> just a few questions. why didn't we see a any

presence from isis-k during 2014 to 2019 and what are the chances that we could see homegrown based tax sense by his failure. >> you moan you be homegrown in attacks in the us? >> yes. >> thanks for your call. >> the morning, thanks for your question. just to your first question about why didn't the biden administration, why didn't we see isis-k coming while iraqi in syria was reaching its people. publicly the public may not have seen this but there's been a lot blof reporting

indifference news outlets and there's been a lot of activity by the us legislation to combat this. 2016, 2017, 20 18th be conducted hundreds of airstrikes and drone strikes against this new invasion well between the two. we've seen the largest non-nuclear bomb in our arsenal on this. the only time we've ever done by the way, the onlytime we've done that in 2017 . as well as i should mention on the ground special forces operators working with afghan partners to take back territory that isis-k controls. so we have seen this. we have been fighting it, you have been working with our afghan partners to degrade their capability area what that's going to look like now i really can't tell you. in terms of your second question in terms of the chances of homegrown attacks, these are from al qaeda or isis inspired individuals in the us. certainly that chance has

risen in the immediate future. it's especially the online english language and other language propaganda of these organizations will sit out as i'm sure we've seen in the immediate future. a lot of material encouraging disdain of its supporters abroad . either to travel to afghanistan or conduct attacks. the same time over the last 20 years are dhs fbi and other law enforcement partners have gotten better at identifying and interdicting attacks t. we can't ignore the fact we are much better preparednow that we have been in the past . to identify and to interdict attacks like those. so there's cause for concern. for vigilance but i don't think there's any. >> host: going to john bozeman, massachusetts. >> i'm john larocque from

massachusetts. i'm kind of like a news junkie and i've been following this whole thing with biden is not very shy about the whole cheap labor, worldwide just being on wall street and george soros and all thesetypes of people . i'm wondering if the money is going to you and if you go on tv and go along with something that binds all about maybe we could get all kinds of minerals out of afghanistan or that green new deal that biden and hunter they just love all this money that they can get because they're in politics. >> go to paul and osprey : florida, democrats line. >> could you in some detail explain the components of the taliban and, or major

components. >> people. >> i think it's at the highest level in town and is not monolithic. i think the last months, last several years definitely since the founding have shown us that. that is kind of the highest level of things. there are components of the afghan, then right now like the honey network that are significant members of those organizations are at significant risk of overtime, it's the organization as a whole. as it comes to govern territory in afghanistan and to deliver government to the people. is there criteria on it, if they feel that the implementation of what they want is the islamic government to look like is not met.

there risk of joining the rival jihadist organizations like sk or pursuing the agenda. this is by no means a monolithic organization. the biggest fear that we've heard from afghans on the ground and civil rights activists just kind of general civil society activists is that they actually don't know what to expect from the afghantaliban right now . they've seen hain the north and south and in the capital and elsewhere. so what the afghan man does next will kind of the precedent for how this these allied organizations that are part of the taliban would proceed through this next period and the answer is we don't know what that's what you look like you . >> but he has to about our reporting in the wall street journal about the broader effect , the headline is in jo the india awards of terrorist threat after the shift, the child has with takeover has brought the power and afghan government more closely aligned with pakistan, storing security concerns of neighboring india and

potentially raising tensions between the two nuclear armed rivals . officials in india the right to support the us backed government have warned in recent days to come and return to again make the country a haven for terrorists. thailand has said it would no longer allow afghanistan to be used against other countries but indian officials are skeptical. quote, it's the same taliban that was there 20 years ago. he is chief of defense said last week at a meeting on the us india partnership. what you think of that you professor? >> i haven't gotten to that. thank you though. >> .. >> the pakistani government to make sure that afghanistan, to coordinate with other governments in the region, russia and