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Has anyone been unlucky enough to have participated in all five?
WASHINGTON — Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has given the new U.S. commander in Afghanistan 60 days to conduct another review of the American strategy there, the fifth since President Barack Obama took office less than five months ago.
The Defense Department announced Monday that Gates has ordered the new U.S. military commander in Afghanistan, Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, and his deputy, Lt. Gen. David Rodriguez, to submit a review of the U.S. strategy within 60 days of their arrival in Afghanistan.
I suppose this was inevitable. General McChrystal and his team are going to have to get their own eyes on this problem set. I just hope they build their work upon the four reviews which have preceded this one.
(h/t Spencer)
On the subject of more
On the subject of more reviews and reports for everyone's favorite region... the Center For American Progress had an event today for a report they released last month. The video is up now.
http://www.americanprogressaction.org/events/2009/06/pakistan.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10agPj0Vzu4&feature=related
Funny... Don't see the
Funny... Don't see the people outside the gates of the WH with pitchforks and torches yet.
Maybe Obama has some demons of his own to exorcise.
Like how to unwind our position there before the whole mess spills over into the rest of Central Asia, and by extension, the whole Afraqipak (and the Horn Of Africa too...) region
Sorry... No short-term solution to the dilemma... As I said earlier, marry into the local families for a few generations, then ask nicely (leave the guns at the door) for their resources and cooperation, and MAYBE they'll deal.
Well, McChrystal already
Well, McChrystal already directed the Joint Chiefs' review for Mullen, right? So presumably he won't be starting from scratch, here.
Wonder how many times our
Wonder how many times our allies and enemies have adjusted? Do we act in a vacuum?
MC MasterChef didn't exactly
MC MasterChef didn't exactly make this mistake, but it's been driving me crazy in all the coverage of McChrystal lately, so I need to make a public service announcement: he is the Director of the Joint Staff, not the Director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The JCS is composed of the four four-star chiefs of the services, plus a vice-chair and a chairman.
The Joint Staff is composed of a great many staff officers who work for the Joint Chiefs in one of eight functional staff directorates (J1 through J8).
Sorry for the interruption. Now back to regularly scheduled commenting (/Buffalo ranting incoherently).
Wonder how many times our
Wonder how many times our allies and enemies have adjusted? Do we act in a vacuum?
Probably a lot, since the enemy isn't acting at much more than a tactical and operational level. Can anyone point to an overall strategic direction for the enemy in Afghanistan (or even a strategically unified "enemy")?
New Company Commander
New Company Commander conducts inventory? But we just did inventory!
This is interesting though: "The administration promised that within weeks it would establish benchmarks to measure progress in Afghanistan. On Monday, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell told reporters that the administration is still drafting those benchmarks." But certainly you saw that too...
Wonder how many times our
Wonder how many times our allies and enemies have adjusted? Do we act in a vacuum?
A high-ranking official from one of the key ISAF countries (e.g. one doing a lot of fighting in the South) recently told me that there was little if any consultation in McChrystal's appointment, much to their dismay. One hopes (but doesn't expect) that this latest review will actually engage with the allies doing some of the heavy lifting.
But on our enemies adjusting, I agree with Chris. I think at most one can see in general a rise in the use of suicide bombings (although that may have leveled off), an increase in the size and frequency of IEDs, and fluctuations over time in different regions in terms of the size of insurgent groups involved in attacks.
Wonder how many times our
Wonder how many times our allies and enemies have adjusted? Do we act in a vacuum?
A high-ranking official from one of the key ISAF countries (e.g. one doing a lot of fighting in the South) recently told me that there was little if any consultation in McChrystal's appointment, much to their dismay. One hopes (but doesn't expect) that this latest review will actually engage with the allies doing some of the heavy lifting.
I don't think there's going
I don't think there's going to be a 6th review.
The media is losing the Pentagon's disinformation machine and going for the truth:
"Col. George Amland spoke to journalists at Camp Leatherneck, a rapidly expanding base now home to around 7,000 U.S. Marines preparing to push deeper into Helmand province, an insurgent stronghold and a haven for violent criminals controlling a massive opium-poppy industry. Some 3,000 Marines are already deployed elsewhere in the province."
Source, AP
Let it be noted this article DID NOT finger the Talib as the Opium growers as most of the Pentagon's pap-PR has been wont to do publicly. Hopefully they know better than to think religious Muslims would have anything to do with the drug trade... They ain't Mormons ya' know? Eschew cigs and alcohol, yet feel it's perfectly ethical to sell them.
It's Different, HONEST (unless you're pointing a gun at them), in Central Asia (people live longer with all their body parts undamaged that way).
The Pentagon's propaganda machine will eventually choke on the truth.
The sooner, the better = less dead-for-nothing US soldiers and Afghan civilians.
The truth will out.
Now GET OUT!
Time has an article about
Time has an article about the 'uptick' in quantity, quality, and tactics of IEDs use in Afghanistan:
"Along with the frequency of road attacks, military officers say the power of the bombs employed has gone "way up." Twenty-pound charges have been replaced by oil drums packed with hundreds of pounds of explosives, set off by trip wires and pressure plates, that are capable of reducing up-armored humvees to pieces. Under cover of darkness, IED teams burrow deep under the tarmac or wheelbarrow bombs into rain culverts, which number into the thousands in some provinces, spread out over hundreds of miles of road.
Faced with high technology and drones, the Taliban has resorted to its own innovations. When the militants ruled in Afghanistan, it was common to find spools of discarded cassette tape hanging from tree branches as a warning against banned pop music. They've since devised more lethal uses for the recording medium. After a recent roadside bombing of an American convoy in Ghazni province that killed three Afghan police officers, streams of tape were found ahead of the blast crater. The reflective quality of the tape, soldiers said, had allowed militant spotters to be forewarned of the arrival of enemy forces and to time the explosion from afar. Once the detonation cord was traced back to a village compound, the bombers were long gone."
Source, Time
I suppose the village was destroyed because the locals couldn't do a dang thing about the resistance fighters in their 'hood' (even if they wanted to...)
Good luck with your un-winnable dirty war. Before long, they'll be making sandals from purloined or blown up HumVees just... like... "'Nam".
Remember Vietnam? The Buddist ethic says "Do NO Harm", and they beat the gong anyway.
The Afghani Ethic says: "Do You". Guess what's gonna happen?
Believe the answer maybe
Believe the answer maybe that we plan in a vacuum facing the Battle Space....Space is our vacuum.
Are we planning using mathematical models more useful as actuaries than as strategists? There has been some very good work now appearing among the financial "after action" types who have cratered our treasury following some models that were very effective in justifying investments equal to that necessary to sustain a world war but could not predict the dire outcome that occurred - the Black Swan. The cancer snake oil people are likewise starting to analyze real survivability rates over broader time margins - survivability rates may not have changed much since the 1950 - detection timelines have improved (we know earlier that it will kill you, we just will make you suffer til then.)
Maybe the real measure is the video tape placed in the trees -- a symbol of an underlying cancer that we are better at detecting but not any better at eliminating than the chemo guys.. we will make the patient very sick and pain plagued during the treatment. Cancer going dormant (remission) will be declared victory. When it revives, new wave of tactics will be applied until new remission or the patient dies.
A Mortician's Craft: "I
A Mortician's Craft: "I can't change the course of events, but I can attempt to make it a little easier" for families. Washington Post Wednesday 10 June.
This is what the Pentagon is doing. A mortician is more honest than a planner.
Off topic, but this is bad
Off topic, but this is bad bad news with regards to the refugee-crisis in Pakistan:
http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/06/09/
an_other_consequence_of_the_peshawar_bombing
Is there any US plans for helping out, directly or indirectly? It could be a crucial battle in the Af/Pak hearts&minds war, and its happening right now.
OT, but one more request for
OT, but one more request for tweaking the blog: could you have the header image (with Abu Legoma'n) be a clickable link to the main blog page? I always try to click the damned thing when I'm exiting a specific post, then remember I can't (when it doesn't work). Yes, I'm retarded, but blogs should cater to people like me, too, dammit.
Is there any US plans for
Is there any US plans for helping out, directly or indirectly? It could be a crucial battle in the Af/Pak hearts&minds war, and its happening right now.
Fnord - According to Holbrooke, the US has pledged around $300M, although who knows how much of that will materialize. I can't find an article, but I seem to recall the US offering direct aid earlier this year, and Pakistan turning it down. I might be wrong on that, though.
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN08349998
during the election Obama
during the election Obama was all sound and fury re Afghanistan - I said at the time it was bullshit, it was him trying to look tough because he couldn't use Iraq for such purposes given his opposition to it - how likely is it that this is all about him trying to get someone to tell him what he wants to hear? namely: give me something that I can sell as victory or get me the hell out of this place.
MK - It's good to see you
MK - It's good to see you back up on the net.
While we must plan at least partially in vacuum (due to our less-than-perfect understanding of the enemy situation), another review seems warranted to me. Although McChrystal may have conducted a review with the Joint Staff, he'll have a different lens as the incoming commander. Additionally, he'll have a different audience for the review. In this new one he'll be focused on what he needs to accomplish the mission. The Joint Staff review was undoubtedly focused on national level issues.
It's a difference of perspectives. But that's not to say that I would have liked to have been a part of all five reviews. That sounds like a nightmare for a staff officer.
You're missing what everyone
You're missing what everyone REALLY is complaing about, Exum.
QDR.
I always had the sense that
I always had the sense that multiple reviews simply meant that the previous reviews returned the "wrong" answer. What was the "wrong" answer and what is the "right" one that is supposed to emerge from this review? Force levels? Strategic objectives?
Fnord http://wwww.reliefweb.i
Fnord
http://wwww.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/MUMA-7SV2RX?OpenDocument
download the full report. Reliefweb posts these whenever they are cleared by USAID.
Long story short: it will slow things down a bit but it certainly won't stop the response. The initial aid is already out there.
MK, visitor. Thanx. Its a
MK, visitor. Thanx. Its a shame that the UN has been starved so much the last years, they would have been the weapon of choice of a free market society (wich includes China) in a paralel universe, a serious military and aid-delivering force with moral standing. Would have done another Aceh possible if a relief mission was aided by US logistics but headed by int. personel. And was approx 4 times as funded as they are now. I keep on thinking that all those chilean Blackwater dudes and their friends could have been under UN command and ROE, and done a lot of good.
FNord - there was some UN
FNord - there was some UN involvement and presence in Pakistan, but it's been under steady assault by the TTP along with all other international presence. I believe the bombing of the Pearl Continental in Peshawar killed some UN agency officials.
You just totally proved my
You just totally proved my point.
...who BTW NO LONGER support
...who BTW NO LONGER support your wars, so hunker down and make up more lies, rationales, and denials.
You STILL lose. Including the loss of 4500+ of your 'brothers', at least that what you call them.
See you in the streets, and Fnord, I know so-called 'lefties' that rationalized this abomination too, and for the most part, their 'theory' (and investment goals) outweighed their 'common sense'.
Was Ex on TV again? The
Was Ex on TV again? The damned trolls are all riled up again and it's playing merry hell with the rhythm of the thing. Or does CNAS naturally attract trolls?
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