Dissension has broken out in the top ranks of Afghanistan’s Taliban. The group has muddled along without an operational head since February, when Mullah Mohammed Omar’s second in command, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, was arrested in Karachi, Pakistan. (It was Baradar who directed the Taliban’s day-to-day affairs while the Taliban’s living symbol and spiritual leader, Mullah Omar, stayed safely hidden from the Americans.)

Zabibullah worries that Gul Agha’s claim to power, with no hard evidence but a letter (which Zabibullah has not seen), is spreading confusion and doubt in the Taliban’s ranks. Another senior Taliban commander, the deputy leader of the Peshawar shura, recently told mourners at a funeral that Baradar’s designated successor is one of the group’s three top officers, a rear-echelon commander named Akhtar Mohammad Mansoor—not Gul Agha. “This is no good,” says Zabibullah. “One man says he has a letter, while another may say he dreamed that Mullah Omar has appointed him. What’s real?”

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Mullah Omar, leader of Afghan Taliban remains
in hiding scared of spies and drones.

Taliban punks remain restless, on short leash
some have broken their leashes.