Abu Muqawama retains its autonomy and the views and beliefs expressed within the blog do not reflect those of CNAS.
From s British reader:
As President Obama and Prime Minister Brown have both stated clearly in recent speeches, our objective for entering Afghanistan in 2001 – the need to deny Al Qaeda a base from which to launch attacks on the world as it did in 2001, 2003 and 2005 – still holds true in 2009. To do this successfully we must support the Government of Afghanistan in dismantling the insurgency, which still threatens to provide that base, by using the dual approach of military power and political engagement.
The Afghan Security forces are not ready to provide the military power by themselves. That is why a coalition of 42 nations have troops in Afghanistan. Those troops are taking on the Taliban, and at the same time building up the Afghan forces so they can do this job for themselves.
This means that the international community will be involved in Afghanistan for many years, but it doesn’t mean international troops will be fighting for all that time. Members of the international coalition will look forward to the day their troops can come home – because this means the Afghans will be doing it themselves – though the international community will still be helping them with development. But for now, international troops will stay there as long as they are needed.
The international community is not trying to impose a western model on Afghanistan. But unless we can help the Afghan government give its people a stake in the future – through both economic and physical security - the progress there since 2001 will be wasted. The region will return to instability and terrorists will once again use it as a base from which to attack other countries.
The international effort is helping improve Afghan’s health and access to education. Child and maternal death rates have shown a marked fall, and basic healthcare now covers 82% of the country. In 2001 only a million children were in school, all boys. Today there are 6.6 million – more than a third girls - and the figure is expected to hit eight million by 2012/13.
The 20 August Afghan elections are an important milestone. The immediate priority is to ensure the elections are credible and inclusive, and are not undermined or disrupted by Taliban violence. The winning candidate must present a clear manifesto, and move quickly to implement it. This will lay the ground for a stronger Afghan state that is better able to tackle terrorism within its borders.
So what is still needed in Afghanistan? Dealing with insurgency requires a program of reconciliation and reintegration, leading to an inclusive political settlement in Afghanistan that draws in conservative Pashtun nationalists (providing they renounce violence and agree to abide by the Afghan political system). Afghanistan's neighbours (including Iran and Pakistan) also need to accept that Afghanistan's future is to be a secure country in its own right, in which each of its neighbours have a responsible and open stake in ensuring that Afghanistan does not once again become a safe haven for terrorists.
The Afghan population needs to be reassured that they have a secure future under the legitimate Afghan government - which will depend on credible, clean government at provincial and district level, working with the grain of tribal Afghan society. As demonstrated by numerous compacts and agreements (Bonn, London, Paris, etc) the international community will stand by Afghanistan as long as our support is needed (which will be long after the last combat troops have left). Such a commitment is essential to locking Al Qaeda out of Afghanistan.
Child and maternal death rates have shown a marked fall, and basic healthcare now covers 82% of the country.
BTW, Afghanistan has the highest fertility rates in the world. By 2050, on its current trajectory, it's population will have doubled. Anyone doing development work there (like NATO) is going to find it very difficult to reduce poverty in a sustainable way, since any productivity gains are going to be immediately eaten by population growth.
Liked the visitors comments, until the last one...
"which will depend on credible, clean government at provincial and district level, working with the grain of tribal Afghan society."
We can't get that in the USA, and I am doubtful about Britain (the Commons spending scandals).
I hope this person is not in a policy position.
@Malthus - let them eat poppy bread.
My Afghan strategy in brief: continuing to spend time and resources attempting to modify Afghan society [a kind word], whether in its cultural, political or military manifestations, is stupid, a waste of time and effort.
Consequences of above determination: let them have at it. If the Afghan army [another kind word] is still incapable of defending itself, too bad. If they can't fight for what they believe in maybe that's because they don't believe in anything worth fighting for. Either way, we can't do it for them.
Consequences of the consequences: retreat looks bad, even if it makes sense - the long term downside of just getting the fuck out may not be worth the short term upside of getting the fuck out - so maybe a retreat that isn't really a retreat? Annex a part of Afghanistan [hell, we've earned it - some prize!] for purposes of maintaining a large military base, stop all COIN operations [COIN is a waste of time if you can't change underlying culture] and from this bastion we continue to 'support' anything worth supporting and Predator the crap out of anyone that pisses us off. Concurrent with that, figure out some way to seal the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan [oh, boy] which is the only way to lop off the head of the Taliban serpent.
Or you could just get the fuck out.
Love this pollyannish diatribe - I can almost make out the ghosts of Condi Rice and Don Rumsfeld as backup singers to this melody. And I love the reference to 42 countries in the coalition, when the tiop six contributing countries make up more than 85% of the coalition. Who are we kidding?
"Such a commitment is essential to locking Al Qaeda out of Afghanistan."
Because they hate being guests of the Pakistani government? Because Somalia is too hot in the summer? If the goal is to stop al Qaeda from mounting future operations, then the current strategy isn't doing it. That's what the poster seems to miss in his declaration of support for the "status quo."
"...need to deny Al Qaeda a base from which to launch attacks on the world as it did in 2001, 2003 and 2005 – still holds true in 2009"
How we accomplish this objective is the heart of the debate, and it's not limited to the borders of Afghanistan or even the Asian continent.
I am actually in agreement with Great White North in part - but only after we - which now includes the Pakis it seems (that's key ) get to pound the Talib's from both sides of the border and the Air, which seems to be what we are doing. Afterwards it seems to be we bring them to the table if they want to talk.
And the price of peace we should extract must be Al Qaeda. Otherwise we shall simply be wasting our time and be made fools of, the same way the Paks were over the deals with the Taliban in FATA.
Until then...they can be "Triaged".
No offense, CNAS. I actually think Triage was a good step forward.
==========
Grand Strategy - what was Ghenghis Khan's and Caesars Grand Strategy? Is it not really for Historians?
You could argue Sherman had a Grand Strategy. Ummmmm.....about de-poppification....
I'm wondering whether the question as written is sufficient to answer the larger questions.
"Is the war in Afghanistan in the interests of the United States and its allies?"
By answering this question the way it is posed, we're evaluating the conflict as we are seeing and executing it today.
This first paragraph in today's post by the British reader provides an objective and an answer of how to accomplish that objective. In my view, that's where we should be focusing. Maybe a slight rephrasing, like, "Describe the interests of the United States and its allies in Afghanistan and the surrounding region." Leave the war out of it, because the original question adds a bias toward the context of how were are executing the war today.
Yawn. Another day of the vaunted "strategic dialogue." Waiting to hear your responses, AM, and will be real disapointed if you don't fully answer the question....
Do we have evidence either way that the Taliban would be happy to host Al Qaeda again? I've heard otherwise, but mostly people just seem to take it for granted that they would (or that they'd be unable to stop them, though I'm not sure we're doing better)
I think our real interests/concerns in this region center around preventing Pakistan's nukes from falling into the wrong hands, not in preventing AQ another operating base...what kind of strategy is that anyway? It sounds an awful lot like we're still prancing around the bear trap that is the vague idea of a "War on Terror." As mentioned above, terror exists in many places: Somalia, Pakistan, Indonesia, my dark moldy closet...but only only one of those places has nuclear weapons...
I didn't know that they had legalized marijuana in the UK.
Work means I'm away from these places most of the time now, but I think many will find this of interest. An interesting test of the new ROE and strategy employed by General McCrystal. Hopefully we will have found the sweet spot between ROE, Strategy, tactics (and the law).
Just don't know if we'll devote the time necessary to carry through on it.
Restrictions limit ability to return fire
By Alfred de Montesquiou - The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Aug 13, 2009 9:01:47 EDT
DAHANEH, Afghanistan — The British jet called in by U.S. Marines had the Taliban position in sight, but the pilot refused to fire, a decision that frustrated Marines on the ground but was in line with new orders by the top U.S. commander to protect civilians.
The Marines themselves didn’t attack militants shooting at them from a compound Wednesday during the same battle because women and children were there, an approach meant to avoid civilian casualties at all costs.
“They did that on purpose,” sniper platoon leader 1st Lt. Joseph Cull, 28, of Delafield, Wis., said of the Taliban. “They are trying to bait us.”
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2009/08/ap_marines_dahaneh_081309/
"...need to deny Al Qaeda a base from which to launch attacks on the world as it did in 2001, 2003 and 2005 – still holds true in 2009"
But Afghanistan doesn't have a monopoly on AQ. The Coalition currently prevents AQ from operating out of Aghan but in return its now operating out of other states in the Gap. As long as there is the Gap then there will remain havens for AQ to operate out of. The biggest inhibitor of AQ since 9/11 is arguably the Iraq war, where the local populations gradually turned on them, which was consequently beamed around the ME on satellite TV.
More than that every major attack has been 'native'. The 9/11 hijackers learnt in the US, not Aghan. There is no reason to believe that preventing AQ operating in Aghan will do anything to halt attacks around the world that simultaneously justifies the effort and investment of ISAF. Indeed there is reason to believe that the large COIN/state-building efforts common now are causing more problems in Eurasia for the counter-terrorists by causing radicalisation amongst ethnicities originating from AfPak.
"Dealing with insurgency requires a program of reconciliation and reintegration, leading to an inclusive political settlement in Afghanistan that draws in conservative Pashtun nationalists (providing they renounce violence.."
Renounce violence against whom? ISAF? The Afghan govt? The Pakistani govt? Each other? Regardless inter-community violence is a given. I don't want to walk down the old shallow-anthropology traps but these are tribal groups and an immediate renunciation of violence is just plain unlikely.
The best thing we could do is an intensive road and railway building project. The more communications improve, the more Afghan living standards will improve.
The Afghan govt. proved resilient post-Soviet withdrawal, contingent on Soviet support. It would be easy to withdraw from the rural areas (where, lets be honest, we will never have the resources or time to win), whilst offering air and intelligence support with drones, helicopters and light aircraft. SF, 'turned' Taliban and Intelligence agencies would be able to conduct counter-terrorism and prevent AQ. This would reduce the ludicrous costs, buy off the public dislike of the war (by making it so small as to be unnoticeable) and free up forces for use elsewhere.
We have what, maybe two years of public support left in the bag. We'll never finish a COIN strategy in that time so if we really want to help the Afghans we need to find a new strategy, one that is either super-fast or which makes ISAF efforts 'invisible' so that the public just ignores them. Otherwise in 2-3 years its helicopters over Saigon time with a total withdrawal and no more support for the Afghans, period.
"Afghanistan's neighbours (including Iran and Pakistan) also need to accept that Afghanistan's future is to be a secure country in its own right, in which each of its neighbours have a responsible and open stake in ensuring that Afghanistan does not once again become a safe haven for terrorists."
And how is this to be accomplished?
The overarching GOAL is to provide for the needs of the expanding global economy.
The STRATEGY is to transform the Third World such that it might better meet the needs of the expanding global economy.
The TACTICS are to modify the Department of Defense, the Department of State and the other elements of statecraft, and to marshal the capabilities of business and finance, and to also modify and marshal these capabilities within other nations with similar interests and goals, and then bring these entities and capabilities together to work more efficiently and effectively at accomplishing the "transforming the Third World" task.
Looking just at DoD for a moment, generally, and AFRICOM, specifically, we can see how this works:
DoD is being transformed to deal with the "hard power" aspects of this mission. Significantly greater and enhanced irregular warfare (IW) and counterinsurgency (COIN) capabilities will be brought on-line so as to better convience, coerce and compel Third World governments and people to make the "market-friendly" tranformation. In this regard, enhanced IW capabilities will be deployed to deal with Third World governments that are uncooperative or who are ineffective at making market-friendly reforms (regime change). Enhanced COIN capabilities will be used to deal with the ethnic, religous and tribal obsticals that are typically encountered when Third World nations, cultures and people are required to dramatically alter their lives to meet world-market needs.
An exceptionally important COIN task, re: this mission to transform the Third World, is to train the Third World's own police and militaries such that they might be more effectively used against their own people and within their own countries -- to deal with those individuals or groups that might resist the transformational process.
DoD, in fact, has actually become much smarter at this whole project. Today, with initiatives such as AFRICOM, the United States has learned to "get the horse before the cart." Instead of starting the transformational process by "breaking down the door," the US today (1) first trys to develop better relationships with Third World nations and (2) moves to train-up their militaries IN ADVANCE of the next big transformational "push." This can be seen as an exceptionally smart move, as this (hopefully) dramatically reduces the need for US troop involvement when the normal and expected ethnic, tribal and religious "push back" occurs.
In Afghanistan -- and because of 9/11 -- we do not have this "in advance" luxury. However, we must now consider Afghanistan as being important -- or not -- within the scope of the overarching GOAL noted above.
I find it difficult to read grayed AND italicized font. It seems like most of your posts are turning into this format, whether part of this "Afghanistan Strategy Dialogue" or whether when quoting other stories. My eyes already hurt, please don't hurt them even more.
I see this as two main wars we are fighting with different time lines, Jihadistan war and the Civilian war. The Civilian war has a short time line. The Jihadistan war is a long time line. You cannot win the Jihadistan war until you make a major step forward in the Civilian war. We place most the effort currently in Jihadistan because that is what militaries do. We need to place a greater investment in to the Civilian war. We have Af-Pak strategy for our militaries. We have no strategy for for the Civilian war and this is the one that needs to come first. We must get Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Coalitions nations to define Civilian war strategy so our military can support this effort that then in turn allows our militaries to fight the Jihadistan war.
We must have clear goals/strategy that allows civilians support of the military effort. Civilians must have a vested interest to be able to win the long war. Sitting down with Maliks can advance the cause in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Western marketing can advance the cause with Coalition civilians if we have clear goals and strategy that are realistic for the Civilian war.
We rely on this narrative of protecting the civilian population in Afghanistan and building up the government and state institutions, but many Afghans (and the ones most vulnerable to insurgents) do not even realize where the Durand line is or that their president is named Karzai. This is an info operations problem and less of a counterinsurgency problem.
It would seem to me that a great way to maintain opposition to AQ in Afghanistan is to make information more available to the people. For this, we need so many troops in the area. And having troops deliver the message may even be counter-productive.
Does anyone know what is being done to make information more available to the most disconnected Afghans? Are there any big broadband or telecommunication projects underway in Afghanistan?
Because AQ lives and breathes off of a message. And is not so confined by territory. Then what is the best way to counter this message?
Is it, The Taliban and AQ know very well America's counterinsurgency doctrine. Or is it something else?
Not to be overly sarcastic, but to echo Jason and SNLII, do unicorns somehow factor into this "strategy?" If the initial portions of this plan weren't unrealistic and hackneyed enough, what happened in the second to last paragraph? An inclusive political settlement with Pashtun nationalists broadly renouncing violence and Afghanistan's neighbors (Pakistan, India, Iran, et al) accepting the sovereignty and security of Afghanistan, assured by a transparent, honest, effective and competent government of Afghanistan? What?
As Madhu asks, how is this to be accomplished?
Dammit!
The italics portion I wrote in my above comment was supposed to read, "That is why a coalition of 42 nations have troops in Afghanistan" and not what it did.
I want to make a suggestion for the next "Dialogue" series... if there could be one.
My suggestion: A discussion on tactics that can be used to counter terrorist groups like AQ. This of course centering on our overall strategic focus to "disrupt, dismantle, and defeat" terrorist groups.
Gringo lost: Ground intel. Where is the Pakistani branch of Blackwater? ;-)
The security of Afghanistan is in US interests, but that does not necessarily mean continuing to occupy Afghanistan is too. If the primary US goal is to "disrupt, dismantle, and defeat" al-Qaida, a military occupation of Afghanistan seems counter-productive at best (especially when al-Qaida central is located in Pakistan).
The US must realize that the current framework does not reduce the demand for the al-Qaida brand but instead greatly enhances it. By relying on American military power and invading and occupying Muslim countries the demand for someone to stand up to the US is filled by groups like al-Qaida and the Taliban. Occupying Afghanistan in the name of defeating al-Qaida is therefore only strengthening al-Qaida's narrative of the US waging a brutal war against Islam while increasing support for and unifying insurgents under the banner of expelling the infidel invaders.
Furthermore, the porous Afghan-Pakistan border used by militants to safely hide inside Pakistan and then launch cross-border attacks is a geographic barrier that no amount of US troops can effectively counter. Additional troops should therefore be used largely to train the ANA and ANP, and should not be percieved as increasing the Western footprint in Afghanistan. This insurgency can only be won by Afghans.
The quicker we can build an Afghan security apparratus that is trustworthy, competent, and capable of mantaining law and order without the help of Western forces, the quicker we can leave. It could take several more years, but that should be our main priority. Feasibility is the only prerequisite to insurgency; a weak, corrupt central government makes insurgency feasible. Once the insurgents percieve that the central government has the abiilty to thwart any real attempts to usurp power, the insurgency is effectively finished.
After withdrawal, the US can and must continue to support the development of Afghanistan, but from behind-the-scenes.
As the author suggests, the larger strategy currently being employed is directed towards:
"... troops taking on the Taliban, and at the same time building up the Afghan forces so they can do this job for themselves."
This is a flawed strategy since:
i) together, our western military forces and Afghan security forces compbined are not sufficient to the task currently;
ii) ANA forces are not as capable, eguipped or sustainable and therefore have little prospect of assuming their own security in the forseeable future.
Therefore the concept that we can train them and have them replace our forces so we can bring them home just doesn't work. The strategy needs to accommodate security, reconstruction, rule of law, governance and economic development together. Army development only addresses a portion of the first pillar at the expense of all the others.
A final comment pertains to the imminent election. The current non-party imposition relegates any new president to the status of leading a less than minority government. A failed state requires a strong majority rule government capable of making decisions and implementing necessary reforms. This current form of government cannot do this and instead must pander to virtually all self-interest persons and groups as well as act subservient to donor nations' impositions and restrictive covenants. We can't constrain their own elected governments because we are afraid of what they may want for themselves.
@abu sharmouta (you know most people would rather not admit to having progeny working in the scandalous but lucrative field of prostitution ;))
I second this complaint. My eyesight has been adversely affected in the past week while reading the strategy dialogue responses.
abu m - please bold the text or forgo italics. Keep up the good work.
Ch.XI: Guerilla Warfare In General. ( from Small Wars by Colonel C.E. Callwell, Third Ed. 1906):
"It has been pointed out in earlier chapters that guerilla warfare is a form of operations above all things to be avoided. The whole spirit of the art of conducting small wars is to strive for the attainment of decisive methods, the very essence of partisan warfare from the point of view of the enemy being to avoid definite engagements. The inconveniences and dangers to regular troops when the adversary adopts this attitude, are fully recognised by competent commanders. But no amount of energy and strategic skill will at times draw the enemy into risking engagements, or induce him to depart from the form of warfare in which most irregular warriors excel and in which regular troops are almost invariably seen at their worst." (p.125)
and from Ch.XV:
"All orientals have an inborn love of trickery and deception, the Red Indians have won an evil notoriety by their duplicity and craftiness, and even mere savages like the Maori and the Kaffirs are constantly imposing upon regular troops by many forms of tactical artifice." (p.227)
By Jove! The British Army has always fought the wily Pathan!
Good gravy! I'm gone all day and someone adopts "Abu sharmouta" as a callsign. Perhaps I'll change mine to Ibn Gawad to really descend into abhorrent discourse.
But I do like (finally!) the citing of Callwell on the subject of strategy and the prudence of avoiding these sorts of messy conflicts (and, further on, when he talks about timelines).
Bully for Callwell.
the nature of a terrorist organization is that it can launch an attack without needing a physical base. 9/11 was not launched from Afghanistan, or even coordinated there. The real "base" consisted of bank accounts that provided training, housing and first-class plane tickets for the suicide hijackers - and those "bases" can be anywhere.
Given the sums of money involved in oil and heroin, and the fact that these sums move through the Middle East, and that a relatively small amount of money is all that is needed to finance an individual terrorist, and that at last count something like 90% of the Saudi street views Osama bin Laden as a national hero - well, that makes the "anti-terrorism" justification look ridiculous.
Terrorism is simply the criminal use of violence to achieve political ends - efforts to link anti-terrorism efforts to geopolitical, strategic and economic agendas are nothing more than propaganda. It's the same as during the Reagan era, when the claim was made that the USSR was supporting a 'global network of Islamic terrorism' - turned out to be bullshit, didn't it?
Some people are going to lose their cool and commit acts of violence, and some will plan extensively about how to make those violent acts as destructive as possible - Timothy McVeigh was the same way, wasn't he? Is there some kind of military action that would discourage the McVeighs of the world, or the KSMs? Hardly - that just encourages them.
Of course, once a terrorist crime has been committed, you need to capture and punish the perpetrators, as a basic point of law - but the same goes for murder, etc. Military actions cannot prevent terrorism any more than police actions can prevent murders - usually, it's about cleaning up the aftermath.
In order to prevent terrorism, you have to put an end to terrorist recruiting - and that means that you have to look into the conditions that generate easy recruits - and what do you find there? What makes a kid into a suicidal terrorist? Being treated unjustly by Israeli thugs, maybe? Seeing his whole family wiped out by a U.S. bombing run? Watching his country overrun so that the West can get their hands on the oil fields?
Guess we just gotta kill more people, right?
If the primary reason for military engagement in Afghanistan is to deter or destroy AQ, then how does locking them out of Afghanistan actually help?
AQ have shown that they are quite happy to move locations, and as the hardcore of AQ, Bin Laden etc diminish in stature and as AQ the idea grows, will putting his head on a stake actually help.
This is why my instinct moves toward finding an alternative rhetoric for our presence their. CT combined with COIN is all good and well, but if we caught Bin Laden tomorrow would that allow us to pull up stake and head home, or do we owe enough to stay to course.
6.6 million skids in schools – can’t speak to the quality but any schoolings better than none.
The President of the United States and the Prime Minister of the UK are elected officials. People who hold political and economic power in the nations led by these two men often have views on the use of power that are contrary to those held by the citizens of their nations. Almost all current members of the US Congress, regardless of party, were part of the former administration. That administration, before turning its awesome, terrorist-quelling powers on Iraq, reinstated a government of warlords in Afghanistan, the members of which have profited personally from their relations with the US, while the people of Afghanistan continue in destitution.
"The international community" to which this statement refers actually is the "military alliance of democratic states in Europe and North America" - NATO. An international community of sorts, but not "the" international community. The world is bigger than Europe and the US.
Yes, the people of Afghanistan require assistance that will enable them to develop their potential and resources. Continuing to use Afghanistan as the staging ground for a proxy war by NATO countries against Pakistan and Iran is not the same as giving the people of Afghanistan a stake in the future.
"Progress" in Afghanistan includes a change in ranking of world infant mortality from 4th in 2003 to 2nd in 2004, 2005 to 3rd beginning in 2006, according to the CIA World Factbook, 12/2008. The US prison industry is booming in Afghanistan, along with all the other businesses which profit from supplying our military, whether for materiel, infrastructure or to meet the needs of personnel. Afghanistan's most lucrative, sustainable crop is opium, a highly profitable commodity, whether it is controlled by illegal or recognized business interests. After eight years, it remains illegal and under the control of 'insurgents,' undoubtedly a prize eyed eagerly by international pharmaceutical corporations.
The most disastrous policies of the US, in terms of consequences both within the States and in other parts of the world, have depended upon secrecy and half-truths. Despite a precarious security supposedly increased by the erosion of civil law, we are not safe.
The US must end its use of military coercion and, confident in its strength, act openly and honestly in cooperation with others. Only by accepting limits to our own use of violence can we hope to limit the use of violence against us.
Edit: 1:48am comment - my apologies, Canada.
The world is bigger than Europe and North America.
Meanwhile, stuff happens in Afghanistan.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/13/afghanistan-ceasefire-deals-...
And other stuff...
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/08/new-zealand-sending-elite-troops...
Is there any indication that there is a gathering of national SF-forces building, out of rotation ? Would sound rational.
"As President Obama and Prime Minister Brown have both stated clearly in recent speeches, our objective for entering Afghanistan in 2001 – the need to deny Al Qaeda a base from which to launch attacks on the world as it did in 2001, 2003 and 2005 – still holds true in 2009."
Except that wasn't the reason you entered Afg in 2001, no more than giving ballot papers to Iraqis was the reason for entering there in 2003. These were the reasons pointed to after the fact for staying once the original objective was completed. You entered to wipe out al Qaeda's base of operations and the regime that harboured them and you've achieved both. You can now shoot at Islamic militants there until the end of time if you like. Which is exactly what the sentiment above entails.
Or perhaps you didn't consider what happens if you swap the digits. Will this not hold true in 2090 ? Will you consider letting al Qaeda operate from Afg then ? Does this not hold true for Antarctica also, let alone more pressing areas where they have a presence such as Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia ?
As I pointed out the other day, these fkers moved CONTINENTS already, and have now moved back. This appears to have been as trivial for them as operating just across the sketchiest border as they are now in the FATA. Unless you're waiting for the aQ space program, that would appear to cover the entire range of capabilities in packing your shit up and moving the fk somewhere else to keep doing what you do. This is the updated Flypaper Strategy, except this time the "over there" is supposedly the only country that they can operate in, while they're operating in a dozen others but not there.
Now either we're banking on the Pak/Sudanese monkey-bars not being as effective as the ones they build in Afg, and keeping them off the Afg monkey-bars at all costs is a meaningful achievement or that's simply no goal at all. They don't need Afghanistan. As per the intel, Pakistan's the identifiable link in the major plots surfaced for the duration. You may as well stay in Iraq to achieve the same goal.
And while we're on the topic of simple lies for simple audiences (which for some reason are far more palatable since inauguration day), nothing was fkn launched out of Afghanistan in 2001. The most crucial training location and staging area for 9/11 was Florida. Now there very well may be something about letting nutbags stare at nothing but rocks from horizon to horizon that lets them come up with some crazy shit, but the argument that Afghanistan being the only place people can think shit up, fire weapons and monkey-bar-acise hasn't yet been made. So either let's hear it or lets move on to the holy grail of the Afghan ballot box already.
Oh wait, we already have...
"The winning candidate must present a clear manifesto, and move quickly to implement it. "
Why must he ? Not doing this for the previous 7 years seems to have worked out just fine. He just got re-elected as a result. Likewise, why must the elections been seen as valid ? Is someone gonna pull stumps and leave if they aren't ? If a government official previously caught with tonnes of opium in his offices is found to have stuffed a ballot box, of what relevance will this be to anyone or anything ? What does any of this amount to other than endless wishful thinking in the absence of a clear set of defined and achievable goals in this campaign.
Perhaps on day 8 of the Afghan Strategy Dialogue, someone can recall that after at least 5 administration-instituted reviews of strategy in Afghanistan already undertaken, the last we heard was victory will be defined as "we'll know it when we see it". It's not as though a week of people arguing amongst themselves on a blog is any different than the other 51 weeks. Really, what's the point other than to post something that isn't a criticism of the only source for this strategy which has so far been found lacking.
"Comment by Boony waits to see if he makes the cut"
LOL.
Jihad in Afghanistan: Defending Muslims or Defending al-Qa'ida?
Visitor 4:00pm Jihad in Afghanistan
I am reminded of the admonition regarding a power teaching its foe, by example, the way to success in waging war. And also, of the suggestion that some, having a hammer, use the hammer when other tools may be more effective. A powerful entity may view any who do not submit to it as foes, which experience leads it to believe its power gives it the capability to eradicate. If circumstances are limited to such interactions what ensues is a cycle wherein the primary change is of the identity of the entity which is, in the end, more powerful.
Going from an omniscient view to that of the individual, entities with power derive their power from bodies, and the bodies suffer from that use. Thus, there is a countervailing force against the continuation of such a cycle.
Does Views from the Occident simply identify a group which presents itself as a foe?? Or is it actively instrumental in the formation of a view of others as a foe; arguably, thereby assisting in the unification of disparate others into an identifiable foe?
The DOD Buy amoxil online estimated that for everyone 8. Publication www. NAPHS reported hindmost week that Jeff Borenstein, M.
The DOD Buy amoxil online estimated that for everyone 8. Publication www. NAPHS reported hindmost week that Jeff Borenstein, M.
The DOD Buy amoxil online estimated that for everyone 8. Publication www. NAPHS reported hindmost week that Jeff Borenstein, M.
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