The new Taliban government was formally announced yesterday. One would expect to see new faces, but that is not the case. Instead, the “new” government leadership is made up of the same old terrorists.

I wish I was kidding, but I’m not. Every member of the Taliban leadership are the same old terrorists who ran Afghanistan prior to 9/11. Every single one. 

The Taliban formally declared a caretaker government on Tuesday, appointing acting cabinet ministers who were largely loyalists from the group’s first years of rule in the 1990s.

The list of ministers was the clearest indication yet that the group sees power as something to be shared exclusively among the victors, rather than fulfilling their promise of an inclusive government that factored in the reality of a changed Afghanistan where women and ethnic minorities were represented in decision making.

The New York Times helpfully gives us a primer on each of them. 

1. Mullah Muhammad Hassan, prime minister: A founding member of the Taliban in the 1990’s. 
2. Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, deputy prime minister: One of the most brutal commanders who quelled the northern resistance in the 1990’s.
3. Sirajuddin Haqqani, interior minister: His network is an internationally known terrorist network responsible for assassinations, and truck bombings. The network is also a full partner with Al Qaeda 
4. Amir Khan Muttaqi, foreign minister: Has a well known background in propoganda and psych ops.
5. Abdul Haq Wasiq, intelligence chief: now leading the same intelligence agency he was part of in the 1990’s. Was freed from GITMO when Obama exchanged him and four other Taliban terrorists for that whiny pissant Bowe Bergdahl.
6. Zabihullah Mujahid, deputy information and culture minister: He’s the public face of the Taliban, the one who keeps telling the world that the war is over in Afghanistan, for realz.
7. Khalil Haqqani, minister for refugees: A known terrorist who has been on the UN and U.S. terror watch lists for over twenty years. And he’s in charge of the refugees? What could possibly go wrong?

Such very nice people aren’t they? The absolute BEST. No wonder people in Afghanistan are desperately trying to stay leave!

Will they be kinder, gentler rulers this time around? Does a scorpion ever get rid of its stinger? 

Currently, women are allowed back into college, albeit the classrooms are segregated. Will those women students be allowed to ask questions? I doubt it. I also give it less than a month for the Taliban to decide college is no longer necessary for women, nor is school for the girls. Especially since the Taliban government has declared they will put Sharia law back into place. 

The Taliban want “strong and healthy relations with our neighbours and all other countries based on mutual respect and interaction”, said the statement, released in English – with the caveat that they would respect international laws and treaties “that are not in conflict with Islamic law and the country’s national values”.

The Taliban has had twenty years of hiding out in Pakistan, Qatar, and elsewhere to determine what kind of government they want. It’s evident from the moves they’ve made in recent weeks, while the Biden Administration was botching the withdrawal, that their new way of governing will the same as it ever was in the 1990’s. The statement above, by the Taliban’s Supreme Leader should be taken with vast amounts of skepticism considering the track record of the entire Taliban leadership. 

As we’ve noted here multiple times, the DoD and the State Department have spent the last weeks assuring us that the Taliban have been every so helpful with the withdrawal process. I mean, my gosh! Our government gave the Taliban info on our Afghan SIV’s so they could help them get to the airport in time! Which, as we all know, was not the case. 

But now, the State Department is welcoming the Taliban government with open arms, albeit with one teeny tiny complaint. 

The State Department on Tuesday expressed concerns over the makeup of the new interim Afghan government announced by the Taliban, including the lack of female leaders and the past actions of some of those appointed to top posts.

A State Department spokesperson said in a statement shared with The Hill that although the Taliban “has presented this as a caretaker cabinet,” the U.S. “will judge the Taliban by its actions, not words.”

Yeah, about those actions. One only has to look at the track record of these leaders terrorists to understand that scorpions don’t suddenly change into gentle little butterflies.

State clearly doesn’t know that they throw women off buildings, hang them From cranes…and if not they are raped by several Taliban members.

— VOTE YES ON RECALL (@fadde) September 8, 2021

The problem is, the State Department we have now, has their head so far in the sand, they are in China. 

2) If you actually read what the Taliban wrote on Voice of Jihad, as we did at @LongWarJournal, you wouldn't be surprised. The Taliban was very clear about its vision for its government. It always said the resurrection of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan was its singular goal.

— Bill Roggio (@billroggio) September 8, 2021

As Bill points out, the new Taliban government is so “moderate” that the new/old terrorist Supreme Leader sent his son out to be a suicide bomber, with great success that he blew himself up in 2017. 

We are supposed to believe that this Taliban government will bring peace, harmony, and inclusiveness to the region. Evidently that inclusiveness doesn’t include the Black Lives Matter movement. 

Taliban paints over George Floyd mural in Afghanistan. https://t.co/BmGaIr4Ybb pic.twitter.com/spENOlZae9

— Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania) September 8, 2021

The new Taliban government is so new it’s the same old terrorists we dealt with in the 1990’s. They are the same terrorists who gave rise to Osama Bin Laden. The scorpions still have their sting and still speak with forked tongues.

Feature Photo Credit: Afghanistan flag, country by GDJ via Pixabay, cropped and modified