Reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan, and Washington — Afghan soldiers held the mullah at gunpoint outside his house while they stabbed at the walls and floors with bayonets, searching for hollow spots where he might have hidden explosives or weapons.
The mullah pulled a government document from his pocket stating that he had forsaken the Taliban and had been granted amnesty. He showed it to an Afghan soldier, who shoved it back at him.
"He said, 'That letter means nothing to us,' " said the mullah, recalling the encounter last fall at his Kabul home. " 'We have reports about you.' "
The mullah was jailed for three days, then released without explanation. The episode left him regretting that he ever trusted Afghan authorities and so fearful of reprisals that months later he spoke only on condition of anonymity. "That's why I joined this reconciliation process -- to get this letter," the mullah said. "I don't even carry it anymore."
The Afghan government, U.S. officials and NATO are preparing a new effort to bring mid- and low-level Taliban fighters back into society. In doing so, they face the task of convincing militants that the jobs and amnesty they promise this time will materialize.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has long pressed efforts to peel Taliban fighters away from the insurgency.
Thousands of Taliban militants laid down their Kalashnikov assault rifles and signed up for the old program, which lasted 4 1/2 years and cost $3 million. But many fighters didn't get the money and land they were promised and rejoined the insurgency. Others took the cash and returned to the Taliban.
"That program was ridiculous," said Mohammad Arsalan Rahmani, a former Taliban deputy minister and now a senator in Afghanistan's parliament. "Taliban fighters who surrendered have been arrested. They never got the land and money that were promised.
"Everything depends on the U.S. government. If there's no sincerity, it won't work."
Britain and Japan will head a new, much larger international fund aimed at persuading fighters to switch sides, British officials said Tuesday. Japan, Britain and the United States are expected initially to be the largest contributors. The fund, which will be formally announced this week at an international aid gathering in London, is expected to reach $500 million.
During the White House strategy review last fall, Obama administration officials pushed the military to begin a process to flip rank-and-file insurgents, a tactic used with success in Iraq. The approach would target Taliban fighters who are at large, as well as those who have been captured and imprisoned.
But senior officials said the effort has lagged, most notably because the international military command in Afghanistan has been unprepared to strike deals with fighters.
Under pressure from the White House, officials have begun to rejuvenate the effort. This month, an admiral overseeing detention systems renewed plans to use the U.S. and Afghan prisons to help teach former Taliban fighters basic skills and entice them back into Afghan society.
At the same time, senior military officials say,an influx of troops into eastern and southern Afghanistan could sap the will to fight from less-committed Taliban foot soldiers.
The White House strategy envisioned a two-stage process: returning former fighters to society and bridging differences between extremist leaders and the Afghan government.
Mohammad Masoom Stanakzai, reintegration advisor to Karzai, said the previous program foundered because of inadequate international funding.
The Bush administration focused on militarily uprooting insurgents. Like the mullah in Kabul, the Afghan capital, Taliban members who signed up for the previous program were given letters certifying their participation. But poor coordination between Afghan law enforcement and intelligence agencies, as well as North Atlantic Treaty Organization-led forces, led to the jailing of many Taliban who had committed to leaving the insurgency.
"Now there will be an arrangement that will provide robust coordination between the security agencies, the international security forces and the Afghan government," Stanakzai said.
U.S. officials believe thousands of Taliban foot soldiers can be pried away from an insurgency that is far from a monolithic collection of fighters ideologically committed to Mullah Mohammed Omar, the former Taliban leader of Afghanistan.
Many fighters are from dirt-poor villages and towns, and are drawn to the insurgency for the money the Taliban offers. Others seek revenge for a relative wounded or killed by Afghan or U.S.-allied forces.
