BACKGROUND: The number of violent incidents related to \'anti-government activities\' in the last six months of 2006 was almost double that in the first six months. The Afghan National Army (ANA) and the Afghan National Police (ANP) were among the prime targets, along with foreign troops and representatives of the new Afghan administration. Since early 2005, in fact, the security situation in Afghanistan has been deteriorating steadily, a trend which accelerated in 2006. The situation is at its worst in the southern and south-eastern, Pashtun-dominated areas along the Pakistani border, which used to be the heartland of the Taliban. But the area of rebel activity now stretches across the entire Pashtun belt, from the province of Farah in the west to Kunar and Nuristan in the east. Rebel activities have also gained a foothold in Wardak and Logar, two provinces close to Kabul. The capital itself, as well as other parts of the country that long enjoyed relative calm and stability, are now experiencing increased instability. Not only has the number of incidents increased; rebel tactics have also gradually changed. Suicide bombers, which used to be a marginal phenomenon in Afghanistan, have increased in number. Roadside bombs are now becoming widespread. The random and occasional ambush and hit-and-run attacks carried out by a few Taliban have been replaced by large-scale attacks, where hundreds of rebels, equipped with mortars and machineguns, fight for hours, before retreating to areas where they can regroup. In some provinces bordering Pakistan, the insurgency approaches regular warfare between rebels on the one hand, and American-led coalition forces and the Afghan military on the other. In 2006, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) expanded its mission area into the south and southeast, where it has replaced many of the American-led coalition forces. In August, ISAF assumed responsibility for the southern Helmand, Kandahar and Oruzgan provinces. Shortly thereafter, its expansion also stretched to Afghanistan\'s troubled eastern provinces. In order to rise to the much more demanding tasks it now faces, NATO has more than doubled its forces. The United Kingdom has the largest contingent in the south. It has sent approximately 5,000 troops to the vast and lawless Helmand province, which alone produces a third of the world\'s opium poppies. In neighboring Kandahar, Canadian troops confront a similar challenge. NATO forces in this region have met with furious resistance. Former British Defense Secretary John Reid\'s hope that British troops would leave Afghanistan without firing a single bullet has been replaced by croaking about a fourth Anglo-Afghan war. These developments are the result of a complex set of circumstances. Since they escaped from Kabul in 2001, the Taliban have managed to regroup and reorganize. Rebel activities are directed from five different centers, which are to some extent cooperating and coordinating. The eastern centre is led by the notorious warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, while others are led by prominent Taliban leaders, all of whom enjoy strong support from outside Afghanistan. The Taliban benefit from being able to plan, recruit and train their soldiers in Pashtun areas at the other side of the Afghan-Pakistani border that were never truly ruled either by Pakistan or the British Raj. The Taliban have a strong ideological base in the Pashtun belt. Conservative Afghans in the countryside look with great suspicion on the government\'s reform programs, and view them as a threat to traditional cultural and religious norms. With time, the Taliban have also learnt how to circumvent the financial sanctions that followed their toppling. They are financed by sympathizers in Pakistan and in the Gulf, but also by the lucrative opium trade. Opium production in Afghanistan grew from 4,100 tons in 2005 to 6,100 tons in 2006, and the country now produces 92 percent of the world\'s opium. Cooperation between the Taliban and drug lords is potent. Quite apart from the Taliban, growing criminality linked to the expanded opium trade is in itself a source of violence and instability. IMPLICATIONS: The Taliban resurgence is not just a result of sympathy for their ideology. Circumstances in Afghanistan have helped Taliban recruitment. Although the mid-ranking rebel commanders consist mostly of Afghans recruited from the refugee camps and radical madrasas in Pakistan, the ordinary foot soldiers are predominantly recruited in Afghanistan, where extreme levels of poverty work in the Taliban\'s favor. With small amounts of cash, the Taliban can buy themselves the needed support from young Afghans who feel deprived of a future and without jobs, and are driven by frustration and poverty rather than by ideology. The Taliban offer these young Afghans an opportunity to support their families, at a time and place where no other options are available. There is also widespread disillusionment and disappointment among Afghans over the lack of progress since 2001. The enormous and largely unrealistic expectations on the new Afghan administration and on the international community have not been met. Just as when the Taliban movement was born in 1994, this is a revolt against the government. Disenchantment with President Hamid Karzai\'s weak, fractured and corrupt administration, which has proven unable and unwilling to challenge the much-hated warlords, should not be underestimated. The Afghan security forces are notoriously corrupt and tend to work on the basis of their own interests, rather than on the interests of the people. The thinly spread and poorly equipped Afghan National Police (ANP) is as much a part of the security problem than its solution. A part of the Taliban supporters are hence more correctly seen as a movement against the government than as a movement for the Taliban cause. Rivalry between different clans is another factor. Some Pashtun clans consider themselves marginalized by the central administration. Regardless of the fact that president Karzai himself is a Pashtun, he is widely seen as under the sway of the Tajiks, who still have a firm grip over the power ministries. Fear has also been put to effective use. The Taliban have systematically killed representatives and supporters of the new government, in order to undermine Karzai\'s administration and frighten those who back it. Support for the Taliban is not necessarily active or positive, but may be a result of a calculation of risks. In a situation where the central authorities are so weak, many feel there is no choice but to adapt to the Taliban presence, whether one likes it or not. Other factors than the Taliban contribute to fueling the violence. The criminal networks, stronger and better equipped than before, are one factor; another is the illegal militias that have not yet been dismantled; a third is the windfall from the narcotics industry, which greases every wheel in the Afghan economy. CONCLUSIONS: In the southern parts of Afghanistan, the Taliban have moved from controlling small areas where the central administration never had any control, to running entire districts in some provinces. Yet another disturbing factor is that the Taliban have managed to set up parallel administrations and courts in some areas. The geographical expansion of their attacks mirrors an aspiration to extend their struggle beyond their core areas in the south and southeast. At the same time, the administration lacks a long-term strategy on how to tackle the security situation, a task that gets harder by the month. President Karzai has responded to the increased violence with blaming the outside world – Pakistan because it does not prevent the Taliban from using its territory as a safe haven; western countries because they have not contributed enough troops in response to the problem. President Karzai has also reintroduced the traditional, clan-based militias, the same groups that the international community has spent US$150 million to try to disarm and disband over the past few years. The long-term engagement which the international community has promised Afghanistan will be vigorously tested, as the Karzai administration back-slides on its commitments and Afghanistan becomes more dangerous. Changes take time. The international presence in all its forms – political, military and development assistance – will be needed for a long time to come. The growing insurgency should not be allowed to overshadow the need to build the solid government institutions that Afghanistan requires to achieve stability. The West will need both patience and courage to press the Afghan leadership to stand up to its commitments. Stronger pressure is needed on Karzai and his government to reform, not least in the parts of the country where the Taliban do not yet have a foothold. Greater efforts are needed to reform the judiciary, and to put an end to the culture of impunity. There is also a need for a willingness on the part of the international community to back up the Karzai administration – not only with words but with brute force if necessary – when it does challenges the many powers that do not hesitate to destabilize the country. Despite the latest reinforcement, the NATO force seems to be under-equipped for the challenges that confront them. There is a significant unwillingness among NATO countries to send additional troops. That is not least the case for the type of troops which have the necessary training and political backing at home to enable them to challenge the Taliban or a local warlord and troublemaker in their own heartland. A comprehensive, regional approach, to deal with the substantial Pakistani part of the problem, is also desperately needed. When the winter lull comes to an end in the next few weeks, the security situation in Afghanistan is likely to deteriorate further. A huge challenge awaits the international community, if it is to stand by its commitments and not abandon Afghanistan and its peoples yet again. AUTHOR’S BIO: Diana Janse is a Swedish foreign service officer, currently serving as a Deputy Director at the Minstry for Foreign Affairs. In 2004 to 2006, she worked as a Counsellor for Political Affairs in Kabul. The views expressed in this article reflect those of the author only and do not necessarily reflect those of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs.