Afghanistan - The war against the Taliban

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[Sirenoftitan]

<snip>
In any event, it is inevitable that his decision is likely to satisfy only a few and disappoint many. But so be it, his aides said this week. "The President is going to make a decision – popular or unpopular – based on what he thinks is in the best interests of the country," his press secretary, Robert Gibbs, said.

There were reports last night of a pointed exchange between the President and Senator McCain during the Tuesday meeting with congressional leaders. Mr McCain allegedly warned the man who beat him in the presidential race against allowing himself too "leisurely a pace" in reaching a decision. Mr Obama is said to have replied that no one understood the urgency of making a decision better than he did.

Obama is caught in political crossfire by David Usborne, The Independent

[Jaime from Wasilla]

I'm coming to the conclusion that the "crisis" in Afghanistan and the conflict between Obama and McChrystal is another media manifactured hoopla. I heard reports on NPR yesterday suggesting that the Pakistan military is finally coming around that their own toleration of the Taliban is no longer in their interest.  Our own media is pretty suspect. I doubt everything they report anymore.

I bet that given another couple of months, that Obama's strategy of using more diplomacy, and CAREFUL use of our military is much more effective in the long run.

As much of a peacenik as I am, I have never had a problem about our efforts in Afghanistan. I thought it was terrible that we abandoned the mujahedin and allowed the Taliban to rise in the first place. It seems a just conflict to me, with a solid moral high ground. The fact that Al-Qaeda was based there just adds weight to the reasons.

I've seen the media report all week that the President is losing support for the War in Afghanistan, but not from me. I still think we can't get out of Iraq fast enough. I've never supported being there at all.

[Lani]

As President Obama approaches a decision point on Afghanistan strategy and whether to increase troop levels, a 24-minute rough cut of the first act of Obama's War.

Frontline is presenting "Obama's War" this Tuesday.  The 24 minute clip is available now at the link that follows.  The website warns that the footage is graphic in language and imagery.  Frontline has widely promoted this show and the clip, and heated discussions have already begun.  The website includes the clip, comments, readings and related reports.

View it here: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/obamaswar/

[Forty Watt]

In 2001, Mullah Muhammad Omar, the leader of the Taliban, fled on a motorbike when we invaded Afghanistan. In 2009, he has made an extraordinary comeback, leading an insurgency that, we are told, is gaining ground in much of Afghanistan.

A recent assessment by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the top American commander in Afghanistan, identified the Taliban as the most important part of the insurgency, coordinating “loosely” with groups led by two prominent warlords. He concluded that “the insurgents currently have the initiative” and “the overall situation is deteriorating.”

The statement from Mullah Omar, one of a series issued in his name on each of the two annual Id holidays, offered a remarkably similar analysis. He, or his ghostwriter, praised the success of “the gallant mujahedeen” in countering the “sophisticated and cutting-edge technology” of the enemy, saying the Taliban movement “is approaching the edge of victory.”

For a recluse, he showed a keen awareness of Western public opinion, touching on the history that haunts foreign armies in Afghanistan (“We fought against the British invaders for 80 years”), denouncing fraud in the recent presidential election and asking of the American-led forces, “Have they achieved anything in the past eight years?”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/11/world/asia/11mullah.html?_r=2&hp=&pagewanted=all

[boodog]

Very graphic and hard to watch. Every American needs to see this and understand what war really is- especially those gun-loving, 'every muslim is a terrorist' believers sitting in the comfort of their homes who only yell 'send more troops' and have no clue. I certainly don't have THE answer to give President Obama. I don't have access to the information he has. I just can't get past the devastation of war, to all involved. In my opinion, war is not good for anyone.

[Forty Watt]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- It was chaos during the early morning assault last year on a remote U.S. outpost in Afghanistan and Staff Sgt. Erich Phillips' M4 carbine had quit firing as militant forces surrounded the base. The machine gun he grabbed after tossing the rifle aside didn't work either.

When the battle in the small village of Wanat ended, nine U.S. soldiers lay dead and 27 more were wounded. A detailed study of the attack by a military historian found that weapons failed repeatedly at a ''critical moment'' during the firefight on July 13, 2008, putting the outnumbered American troops at risk of being overrun by nearly 200 insurgents.

Which raises the question: Eight years into the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, do U.S. armed forces have the best guns money can buy?

Read the story here.

[Forty Watt]

Additional troops have already been sent to Afghanistan

President Obama announced in March that he would be sending 21,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. But in an unannounced move, the White House has also authorized -- and the Pentagon is deploying -- at least 13,000 troops beyond that number, according to defense officials.

The additional troops are primarily support forces, including engineers, medical personnel, intelligence experts and military police. Their deployment has received little mention by officials at the Pentagon and the White House, who have spoken more publicly about the combat troops who have been sent to Afghanistan.

[Forty Watt]

Dr. Sima Samar a brave Afghan woman who lost the Nobel Prize to PO

Dr. Samar is the chairwomen of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission and was the first Hazara woman to obtain a medical degree from Kabul University, back in 1982. She has had to repeatedly flee for her life but has insisted on returning time and time again to treat the poor and fight for women’s rights — in an area with feminists are routinely killed or sprayed with acid by extremists.

Most incredibly, she stood against the extremism of Sharia law and criticized the use of such religious courts in the country. Her opposition to religious radicals led to her being forced out as Deputy President and later Minister of Women’s Affairs in the interim government of Hamid Karzai. She has even campaigned against the compelled use of the burka and sought to organize and educate women in Taliban-controlled areas.

[Sirenoftitan]

Eight years into the war in Afghanistan: the most senior defence official running the conflict receives a letter from one of his officers. It is a depressing list of political and tactical failures.

"We should honestly admit," he writes, "that our efforts over the last eight years have not led to the expected results. Huge material resources and considerable casualties did not produce a positive end result – stabilisation of military-political situation in the country. The protracted character of the military struggle and the absence of any serious success, which could lead to a breakthrough in the entire strategic situation, led to the formation in the minds of the majority of the population of the mistrust in the abilities of the regime."

"The experience of the past years," he continues bleakly, "clearly shows that the Afghan problem cannot be solved by military means only. We should decisively reject our illusions and undertake principally new steps, taking into account the lessons of the past, and the real situation in the country..."

Same old mistakes in new Afghan war by Peter Beaumont, The Observer

[pacos_gal]

David Rohde, the reporter who was in Afghanistan and taken captive in November 2008, has written the first part of what will be a five part series on his experience.  He was held until he escaped in June 2009.  Seven months as a prisoner of the Taliban.  I can't even being to imagine what an ordeal that would have been for him and his family and friends.  He was held along with an Afghanistan reporter and their driver.  He and the Afghanistan reporter, Tahir Ludin, escaped together. 

This is his story in his words:

Held by the Taliban

[Lani]

Part 2 of Rhode's story is also available: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/19/world/asia/19hostage.html
It is a gripping and detailed account, made even more amazing because he lived to write about it.

From Part 1:

I had written about the ties between Pakistan’s intelligence services and the Taliban while covering the region for The New York Times. I knew Pakistan turned a blind eye to many of their activities. But I was astonished by what I encountered firsthand: a Taliban mini-state that flourished openly and with impunity.

The Taliban government that had supposedly been eliminated by the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan was alive and thriving.

[Sirenoftitan]

<snip>
Yes, there is real risk in going – but it is dwarfed by the risk of staying. A bloody escalation in the war is more likely to fuel jihadism than thwart it. If Obama is serious about undermining this vile fanatical movement, it would be much wiser to take the hundreds of billions he is currently squandering on chasing after a hundred fighters in the Afghan mountains and redeploy it. Spend it instead on beefing up policing and intelligence, and on building a network of schools across Pakistan and other flash-points in the Muslim world, so parents there have an alternative to the fanatical madrassahs that churn out bin Laden-fodder. The American people will be far safer if the world sees them building schools for Muslim kids instead of dropping bombs on them.

Johann Hari: The three fallacies that have driven the war in Afghanistan The Independent

[futurexpat?]

I absolutely agree with him. Charlie Wilson tried to get the government to spend more on building schools there instead of fighting there, and no one paid any attention to him either.

This country has never been governable. It is still in the Dark Age, and it really has no intention of moving anywhere near this century. The only way to change that is through education, particularly for women.

[Sirenoftitan]

US President Barack Obama has said he will "never rush" a decision to send more troops to Afghanistan, as he comes under pressure to set out a new policy.  Speaking to servicemen and women at a Florida naval base, Mr Obama said he would not risk their lives "unless it is absolutely necessary".   Earlier, he met his national security team again for talks on Afghan policy.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8327140.stm

[Sirenoftitan]

The Taliban today brought their insurgency to the heart of the Afghan capital, Kabul, storming a guesthouse used by UN employees and killing 12 people, including six UN workers, in a two-hour fight with security forces.

Terrified guests were seen running from the Bekhtar guesthouse during the early morning attack, some screaming for help and others jumping from upper floors as flames engulfed part of the three-storey building.

UN workers killed in Afghanistan attack by Jon Boone, The Guardian

[Sirenoftitan]

More than half of United Nations staff in Afghanistan are to evacuate the country for safety reasons after the killing of five of its staff last week.

In the latest blow to the US-led war against the Taliban the UN said 600 of its 1,100 staff in Afghanistan would be moved to secure locations outside the country for at least three weeks.

The move follows the death of five UN workers in a pre-dawn attack on a guesthouse in Kabul on 28 October – the most direct attack on its employees in decades of work in the country.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/05/un-evacuate-afghanistan-staff-attack

[Forty Watt]

I don't know if anyone caught Margaret Warner's interview with President Karzai on the NewsHour last night.  Video excerpt here.

There was a point when my husband and I both burst out simultaneously, "We just got to get out of there." In the transcript Karzai sounds reasonable, but watching the face and the *body language* was squirmingly unpleasant. Together with everything else to be said about him, the extent to which he despises the US was blatantly obvious.  Young people are dying to keep this piece of work in power.   

We keep doing this.  We never seem to learn.

[boodog]

I always seem to catch myself watching Karzai more than listening to him. I don't do this intentionally, but you're right Forty Watt, his words just don't go with what is going on with his body language, he seems to be hiding anger and lies.
And I'm afraid that the problems the soldiers bring home with them, affecting themselves, family and the community, will be problems we will be seeing for years to come. Sadly, I don't think they are getting anywhere near enough help from us.

[Forty Watt]

Update:

According to The Associated Press, President Barack Obama plans to reject all of the proposed Afghanistan war options presented by his national security team, changing directions instead toward revisions to clarify how and when U.S. troops would turn over responsibility to the Afghan government, a senior administration official said Wednesday.

Obama is still close to a final decision on his revamped war strategy — it is expected to finalize after he returns from a trip to Asia which ends on Nov. 19.

http://theloop21.com/news/update-obama-rejects-all-proposed-war-options-security-team

[pacos_gal]

I wonder if his decision had anything to do with the Ambassador to Afghanistan urging him to rethink his position.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/11/AR2009111118432.html?wpisrc=newsletter

The U.S. ambassador in Kabul sent two classified cables to Washington in the last week expressing deep concerns about sending more U.S. troops to Afghanistan until Afghan President Hamid Karzai's government demonstrates that it is willing to tackle the corruption and mismanagement that has fueled the Taliban's rise, said senior U.S. officials.