The original gangsta Vulcan, the ever avuncular popular Regime Changin’ rowdy ex Def Sec Donald Rumsfeld (and still hot! for an ancient cat - maybe it’s all those superior hand gestures he’s mastered over the years) reminds Great Satan, her friends, frienimes and oath sworn enemies that the urge to Surge in Afghanistan, Talibanistan and Pakistan is the way forward.

As I watched on television as the coffins of five more young British soldiers were carried from an aircraft at RAF Brize Norton yesterday, and with the number of British dead in Afghanistan now over one hundred, a small part of me thought, ‘is it really worth it?’

Yet this thought changes when you begin to hear the families of these soldiers speak. You see for them and their son, it was worth it. They explain how their sons died doing jobs they loved. Their commitment to their jobs was moving. One family described the lengths their son went to in learning the language of local villagers to improve his and his colleagues’ relations with them.

Coinciding with the arrival of the soldiers bodies in Britain, and the visit of President Bush to Downing Street, was the announcement that 230 more British troops would be sent to Afghanistan by next spring, making the total number of British personnel exceed 8,000, which is second only to the US, who have well over 20,000 troops in the region. The new troops shall be mainly specialists such as engineers, interpreters and liaison officers, and shall bolster the British presence in Kandahar and Helmand - two regions in the south which have experienced increased fighting and thus casualties over recent months.

Does this mean the Taleban are outperforming our forces? I would argue not. Defence Secretary Des Browne says the Taleban have switched from insurgency to terrorist tactics - including recruiting suicide bombers from ‘vulnerable’ Afghan communities. Yet Browne says troops are having success in southern Afghanistan, militarily, and through the reconstruction work they are assisting with, as well as the ongoing task of training many more Afghan police and army personnel to improve security.

Unfortunately, the sceptics say Browne is over-exaggerating the successes, and the proof of failure is in the intensified violence and increased number of British casualties. I would argue however, this simply means the Taleban are relying far more on cowardly, terrorist tactics, because they know the Western countries are militarily superior, and they cannot defeat them. For example, within British personnel, the Parachute regiment are challenging the Taleban more than ever, and 3 Commando Brigade are due to be deployed in the autumn to provide further support. Naturally, planting more roadside bombs appears the only logical option for the Taleban.

It’s important that we remember why we are in Afghanistan. There are two reasons, both equally important. Firstly, it’s in our national interest. When I say ‘we’, I mean all Western nations. Our own security depends on success there. If we leave, the Taleban move back in, regain control of the provinces, and return to educating young men in terrorist training camps, in preparation to launch attacks upon the West, as they did before 9/11. This must never happen.

Secondly, our presence there is the morally right thing to do. It’s right to protect the democratically elected government of Hamid Karzai. It’s right to end the oppression of women. It’s right to ensure all children receive an education. It’s right to free villagers from intimidation and guarantee their basic human rights. It’s right to end the drugs industry which sustains local war lords who act as mafia bosses. It’s right to ensure citizens have access to basic amenities such as clean water, electricity and healthcare. If the Taleban have control in Afghanistan, none of these goals would be achieved. If we leave, we effectively say to the world, ‘it’s okay to abuse people’s rights, rule by terror, train terrorists, and attack our cities and people’.

Whilst Nato’s International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) comprises of 17 countries, and 53,000 troops, the majority of the hard fighting is being carried out by American, British, and Canadian forces. Whilst it would be fantastic to see all countries increase their funding and troop numbers, this is an overly optimistic vision. Britain’s European neighbours are as reluctant as ever to recognise the importance of the battle, and the role they ought to be playing in it. Therefore, the already largest contributors (Britain alone has spent £2 billion since 2001, with American spending far outweighing this) must increase their resources further to the area, to ensure our troops have the best possible chance of defeating the Taleban.

The hope of this happening is not as bleak as one might expect however. A key difference between the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in Britain is that the latter is far more popular in the House of Commons, the media, and the general public. The war in Iraq had nowhere near the amount of popular support. This can be used to increase the strength of our presence there. Of course, you always hear remarks and phrases which threaten to reduce the morale of our troops. For example, in one BBC news report last night, the reporter referred to the conflict in Afghanistan as ‘the so-called war on terror’. Phrases such as this must be eradicated from public discourse. We did not start the violence and oppression; we are simply trying to end it. If troops don’t think we believe in what they’re doing, they will inevitably start to believe their mission is not worth it – which would be fatal.

Casualties for British troops are now higher in Afghanistan than they are in Iraq. The latter country is now more secure than the former. Whilst there are still problems in Iraq, we removed the tyrants from power there and eradicated the threat they posed. In Afghanistan, whilst we have removed the Taleban from positions of power, they still pose a dangerous threat. In a Sky News interview recently, the reporter asked President Bush, because the British and Soviet empires ended after they left Afghanistan, would the US empire similarly end if America left? Bush was right to say that this war is not about empire and control; it’s about ‘freedom’s march’; good versus evil.

The war will be a long, hard, and drawn out struggle. More young men will unfortunately die at the hands of the Taleban. But if our success there prevents another 9/11, guarantees the Afghan people basic human rights, and sends a message across the world that tyranny, terror, and lawlessness will not be tolerated, and freedom will prevail – the struggle, and the casualties it has and will continue to bring, will be easier to bear. The soldiers will not have died in vain. It may be a remote, faraway land, but the war in Afghanistan is a fight we simply can’t afford to lose.

Casting covetous analytical eyes on events in and around the Land of Pure, the data supports way more than Pakistan’s new pres weighing in on the War On Terror lets on.

” Pakistan has had this concept of Afghanistan as its client state,
and it’s always endeavored to keep it in its back pocket. That’s why it was so keen to get the Taliban in power, because the movement was basically born in the madrassas of Pakistan.

Now, Indians have moved into the country very quickly. They’ve
invested lots of money—they’re building the new parliament and there are about 3,000 Indian workers in the southwest, building a road that would link Afghanistan to the Persian Gulf without going through Pakistan. At the moment, Afghanistan is entirely dependent upon Pakistan for sea access, so they’re obviously very concerned about that development. “

ISI is prepping to take Pakistan to war against Great Satan.

(more…)

More breaking news from the Afghan/Pakistan border:

The US has conducted another cross-border airstrike inside Pakistan’s tribal areas. The attack occurred in South Waziristan just as a senior US military commander completed a visit to Pakistan and urged the government to reform Pakistan’s intelligence agency.

Could this be a sign of increased cooperation with Pakistan?  Are the Pakistanis waking up to the danger of not working with the US, as world opinion begins to shift against them?

Well it better be, otherwise we’re in for a fight.

The Taliban, al Qaeda, and allied terrorist groups have established 157 training camps and more than 400 support locations in the tribal areas and the Northwest Frontier Province, US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal.

This is a major terrorist operation.  The Pakistani government can only ignore it or condone it for so long.  The US and NATO need to be willing and prepared to go beyond what Pakistan allows.  Only pressure and firm resolve will win this war.

Yemeni security forces outside the US embassy

According to The Long War Journal’s Jane Novak, the US Embassy in Yemen was attacked today by a militant group carrying machine guns, RPG’s, and setting off a series of explosions.  The terrorist force was repelled after blowing killing 16 people, and attempting to breach the US compound.  After a fierce gun battle, the militants were repelled.  No US citizens were killed, though many Yemeni security officers were killed or wounded in the fight.

A group calling itself Yemeni Islamic Jihad took credit for today’s attack. The group last month claimed responsbility for a July suicide car bombing at a police station in Hadramout killed one policeman and injured 18. The police station had been previously bombed with no injuries. Yemeni Islamic Jihad also threatened a future attack in the capital.

This is not the first attack or attempted attack on a US embassy or consulate this year.  In July, the US consulate in Ankara, Turkey was attacked leaving several dead. Luckily both attacks proved to be failures, unlike some of the major suicide bombings we’ve seen in India and Afghanistan recently.

(more…)

~by Christopher Hitchens

An excellent article by Fraser Nelson in London’s Spectator at the end of July put it as succinctly as I have seen it:

At a recent dinner party in the British embassy in Kabul, one of the guests referred to “the Afghan-Pakistan war.” The rest of the table fell silent. This is the truth that dare not speak its name. Even mentioning it in private in the Afghan capital’s green zone is enough to solicit murmurs of disapproval. Few want to accept that the war is widening; that it now involves Pakistan, a country with an unstable government and nuclear weapons.

“Don’t mention the war,” as Basil insists with mounting hysteria in Fawlty Towers. And, when discussing the deepening crisis in Afghanistan, most people seem deliberately to avoid such telling phrases as “Pakistani aggression” or—more accurate still—”Pakistani colonialism.” The truth is that the Taliban, and its al-Qaida guests, were originally imposed on Afghanistan from without as a projection of Pakistani state power. (Along with Pakistan, only Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates ever recognized the Taliban as the legal government in Kabul.) Important circles in Pakistan have never given up the aspiration to run Afghanistan as a client or dependent or proxy state, and this colonial mindset is especially well-entrenched among senior army officers and in the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, or ISI.

~read the rest at Slate

Shit is hitting the fan in Afghanistan/Pakistan while the US media focuses on Sarah Palin’s carnivorous appetite for small children:

A US military incursion into the Taliban-controlled tribal agency of South Waziristan was aborted after Pakistani troops opened fire on the force, reports from Pakistan indicate.

At least two American helicopters were fired on after crossing the Pakistani frontier near Angoor Adda in South Waziristan, Geo TV reported. “The U.S. choppers came into Pakistan by just 100 to 150 meters at Angor Adda. Even then our troops did not spare them, opened fire on them and they turned away,” an anonymous security official told Reuters.

The incident has not been confirmed by the US or Pakistan military.

~read the rest at The Long War Journal

Yesterday, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf resigned.

What do you think?  Good for America, bad for America?  Good for Democracy?

Or is it only good for the extremists?

Your thoughts are appreciated.

~by Bill Harrison

“We have been all over India and we have decided that India isn’t big enough for such as us.”

“We are not little men, and there is nothing that we are afraid of except Drink, and we have signed a Contrack on that. Therefore, we are going away to be Kings.”

British Indian Army Sergeants Danny Dravot (Sean Connery) and “Peachey” Carnehan (Michael Caine) to Rudyard Kipling announcing that they are off to Kafiristan in John Huston’s adaptation of Kipling’s The Man Who Would Be King.

As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more nonmilitary assistance to accomplish the mission there.

Barack Obama in an op-ed appearing in the New York Times on July 14, 2008

________________________________________________________

Leaving aside the fact that Barack Obama is not proposing any sort of “new strategy” for Afghanistan, what are the challenges facing the United States, Afghanistan and our NATO partners in stabilizing Afghanistan against a Taliban insurgency allied with al Qaeda that emanates across the border with Pakistan? Perhaps a brief history lesson is in order here.

The provinces of eastern and southern Afghanistan where most of the trouble is and the sanctuaries for the militants across the border in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) are the realm of the Pashtuns, fiercely independent tribesmen whose resistance to central authority goes back to the time of classical antiquity and Alexander the Great’s inability to bring the area under his control. But while the Pashtuns are uniformly hostile to attempts to control them from afar they are also hospitable to outsiders who come as travelers as is codified in the Pashtunwali, or “Way of the Pashtuns”, their unwritten tribal code. This code governs all forms of Pashtun societal intercourse from the local ruling councils (jirgas) to the conception of honor (nang) and most importantly for our purposes here nanawatey or “truce/asylum”.

We are all now familiar (or should be so) with Osam bin Laden’s “last stand” at Tora Bora in 2001 and his subsequent flight with his band of Uzbek, Chechen and Arab fighters into the FATA back in December of 2001. Not long thereafter a report surfaced in the Washington Post (article no longer available on the web) from an American filmmaker traveling in the region that he encountered foreign militants living openly in the tribal regions as “honored guests”. This would be fully in keeping with the Pashtunwali’s emphasis on giving succor to outsiders provided that they observe tribal customs. Most Americans would be astounded to learn this but until the Soviet war it was quite possible to travel in this region (with connected local escorts, of course) as a Westerner without undue fear as did a friend of mine who was studying Hindi and the local languages and history of the region while we were both graduate students at the University of Virginia in the early 1980s and had traveled there as an undergraduate in the mid 1970s.

In reality the border separating Afghanistan from the FATA is more of an arbitrary division. The Durand Line separating the two has never been accepted in Afghanistan and is merely a British contrivance left over from the days of the “Great Game” in southwest Asia of the mid-nineteeth century. These are Pashtun lands on both sides of this line of demarcation and the Pakistani government and army in Islamabad composed of Punjabis has over the years from time to time encouraged militancy in the area as a form of exerting influence over its neighbor Afghanistan. The Taliban (Pashto for students) originiated in the refugee camps of the FATA during the Soviet-Afghan war and the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) may or may not be (probably the latter) purged of Taliban-al Qaeda sympathizers with most of this faction allied with the former head of the ISI — Gen. Hamid Gul whose views in this regard should be viewed with alarm.

Under the Musharraf government, Pakistan would make periodic forays into the FATA in brief but bloody engagements with local militants. But the Pakistani army is composed of primarily Punjabi officers and the paramilitary Frontier Corps (which goes back to the famed Khyber Rifles of the British raj) composed of local Pashtuns is poorly equipped and led. Over the past seven years these engagements have brought little in the way of stability to the region or succeeded in neutralizing the troublemakers but they have alienated many of the local tribles. Periodic truces with the militants have accomplished little more. And economic aid projects in the area, of equal importance to security operations, have not really gone forward and planned stepped up US aid to Pakistan in this regard remain mired over questions of possible corruption in Islamabad.

Now no one questions the need for additional ISAF forces in Afghanistan. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has made repeated calls for more soldiers from our NATO allies but aside from a battalion of French special forces and the continuing commitment of Danish, Dutch, Canadian and UK soldiers to the spear’s tip in the south and east the rest of NATO continues to sit on its collective hands. Things have gotten so bad in this respect that even former German foreign minister Joschka Fischer has lambasted his fellow Germans and the Merkel government for refusing to allow Bundeswehr soldiers to serve in the fighting area. Nor are things much better on the economic aid front which is just as important as the military effort. At a recent donors conference in Paris in June, while the United States pledged 1/5th of the total $50 billion pledged, the EU contingent’s pledge amounted to a niggardly $770 million.

Notwithstanding the recent spectacular attack that claimed the lives of nine US soldiers, there have been successes in southern and eastern Afghanistan. Aid projects and tribal security have been improved and the militants seldom launch the type of attack mentioned above. Building on the success of similar tactics employed in Iraq, US forces have begun deploying Human Terrain Teams to the area which employ an array of both ’soft” and “hard” power in classic counterinsurgency tactics and strategy.

So while it is clear that what Barack Obama is talking about isn’t any sort of “new” strategy at all the central fact remains that until such time as the Pakistani government alters its approach in the FATA, and indeed its policies in this regard as described by Jim Hoagland yesterday in the Washington Post can best be called delusional, any such beefed up NATO presence across the border is likely to come to very little in solving this problem in the long run. In Vietnam, despite the presence of 500,000 US soldiers and Marines the war effort there even after the change in tactics to “clear and hold” under Gen. Creighton Abrams who replaced Gen. William Westmoreland as MACV CINC in ‘69 and the US incusion into Cambodia as long as North Vietnamese forces were able to use Cambodia and Laos as staging and supply areas there could be no good outcome. At present I am at wit’s end as to offer a suggested plan to get Pakistan off its duff in the FATA or to address the massive problems associated with the growing of opium poppies in both Afghanistan and the FATA that finance much of the instability on both sides of the border and are the source of the world’s heroin supply. If Barack Obama has a plan in this regard, I’m all ears but so far all I’m hearing is the typical lofty and pretty empty rhetoric that isn’t even true as regards recent US actions in the area.

Author’s Note: While the opinions expressed in this piece are mine and mine alone I wish to acknowledge the work of fellow Newsvine members and friends Shaheen Buneri (who reports from the region) and BlaiseP. Their knowledge of the region and its peoples has much to teach us all and I would strongly suggest that fellow Newsviners visit their columns often.

Good news from the Pakistan/Afghanistan border in the mountainous tribal region currently playing host to both the resurgent Taliban and the quasi-defunct Osama bin Laden.

Locals say that a grand Jirga of eleven sub tribes of Orakzai tribe was held Friday at the Dabori area of the agency in which tribal elders and local religious scholars expressed their grave concern over the raising militancy in the tribal region.

The Jirga decided to unite and expel all foreign militants from the tribal agency and help the military to regain control over the security checkposts earlier occupied by militants of the Pakistan Taliban Movement.

It’s not always easy to unite against the growing power of the Taliban however.  They have grown increasingly strong in the last few years, insulated and untouchable amongst the Pashtuns.  The Pakistani government is basically impotent without tribal cooperation, so this could come as a major turning point on that front.

So far, 250 tribal elders have been killed by different militant groups in FATA. Most of the slain tribal elders were supporting government agencies against the Taliban. Some reports suggest that a large number of tribal elders also migrated to other parts of the country due to fear of a Taliban backlash in the past.

This is similar to the situation on the ground in Iraq, until sheiks there finally took a stand against foreign fighters and al Qaeda.  Speaking of those sheiks–

Sheik Ahmad al-Rishawi has studied the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan and believes he can help lead a rebellion against al-Qaeda and the Taliban in both Afghanistan and Pakistan, and wants to fight alongside Americans to put his plans into action.

I say, if the rest of the world is unwilling to throw its weight behind America in Afghanistan and finally, once and for all, put an end to the Afghani peoples suffering there, then we need more sheiks like Ahmad al-Rishawi.

Well, as per usual, the internet is buzzing with information, news, a wide variety of topics.  I’ve taken it upon me to find just a few of the most interesting, riveting, and thought-provoking bits.

CNN reported on the arrest of over 500 people allegedly linked to al Qaeda.  Liberals in America will be pleased to hear they won’t be going to Gitmo to suffer the atrocities of the American military prison system, but will instead be comfortably housed in Saudi prisons, where undboubtedly they will be treated with good, old-fashioned Wahhabi hospitality.

In a written statement, the ministry said the cell’s leader was found with a letter from al Qaeda’s second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, “urging him to raise funds and that [al-Zawahiri] will provide him with the personnel, whom they called the mujahedeen.”

(more…)