US Base Overrun in Afghanistan

This is a horrific example of what we face in Afghanistan. A significant body of Taliban troops has overrun a Forward Operating Base or outpost and has inflicted devastating casualties with small arms and RPGs.

Taliban insurgents killed nine US troops when they attempted to overrun an American base as bloody fighting broke out in several parts of Afghanistan today.

Nato reported that the small American Combat Outpost in Dara-I-Pech district of Kunar Province, on the border with Nuristan Province in the east of the country, came under heavy fire at around 4.30am local time. Heavy fighting continued throughout the day with US forces calling in artillery, fast jets and Apache helicopters.

Nato spokesmen warned of casualties "on both sides", and in the last few minutes it has emerged that nine American soldiers were killed, making it one of the biggest single losses in a day for the coalition since military operations began in the country.

"Insurgents have been firing at the COP with small arms, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars using homes, shops and the mosque in the village of Wanat for cover," said a Nato statement.

All I can say after that is, holy shit. This is bad. No amount of spin can be used to mask what this means--our troops are in for a long fight in Afghanistan and the enemy are getting bolder and more dangerous.

--WS

Winning With Body Counts

It sounds like an impressive number, but boasting about how many insurgents you've killed isn't an ideal way to practice Counterinsurgency (COIN) tactics.

A U.S. Marines commander said Wednesday his troops have killed 400 insurgents in southern Afghanistan since late April.

Col. Peter Petronzio, the commander of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, said the figure came from the governor of the southern Helmand province, where his troops have been deployed since late April.

Some 2,200 U.S. Marines moved into the town of Garmser in Helmand province to clean the area of insurgents.

Helmand province is the world's largest opium poppy growing region, the main ingredient in heroin. It is also the area with the highest level of insurgent activity in the country.

After months of fighting around Garmser, Petronzio said the area is not yet secure but is more stable.

"The Taliban proved they wanted to fight for Garmser and we took the fight to them," he told a news conference in Kabul.

Really, do we have to keep hearing about airstrikes, body counts and "last throes?"

...a body count tells you little, because you usually can’t know how many insurgents there were to start with, how many moved into the area, how many transferred from supporter to combatant status, or how many new fighters the conflict has created.

"The King of the Prison"

Another excellent piece from McClatchy on the al Qaeda detainees. Some of these stories are so basic in their explanations--as in, we got the wrong guys and if you don't torture them right, they'll die. Today's installment is about a senior Taliban member who defied the US. Do you think this story might explain why we're going to have a hell of a time convincing people that we know what we're doing?

Pakistani intelligence officers dragged him [Abdul Salam Zaeef] out of his house in Islamabad in late December 2001 or January 2002 and took him to Peshawar. "Your Excellency, you are no longer Your Excellency," he recalled one of them saying.

The Pakistanis handed him over to U.S. troops, who he said threw a sack over his head and pushed him into a helicopter. The Americans flew him to a warship, where he was held for about a week in a small cell that reminded him of a dog kennel, he said.

"I was afraid about what would happen to me," Zaeef said in an interview in Kabul, wearing slightly crooked gold-rimmed glasses and speaking in a near-whisper. "I didn't know if it was a dream or not. I never imagined this would happen to me."

Yet from mid-2002 till September 2005 at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Zaeef became a leader again. He helped orchestrate hunger strikes and exploit the missteps of a U.S. detention system that often captured the wrong men, mistreated them, then incarcerated them indefinitely without legal recourse.

The insurgency he helped launch in Guantanamo capitalized on the Americans' ignorance of Islamic customs and a pattern of interrupting prayers, shaving off prisoners' beards and searching their copies of the Quran.

I don't have any sympathy for this notion that we needed to be one hundred percent perfect in our handling of these men. While some were innocent, many more were actual terrorists who had either killed Americans or had been caught in the act of trying to kill Americans. What Democrats need to emphasize is that we are every bit as capable of fighting and defeating these elements as anyone else. We need to emphasize that we are not going to go into this fight without respecting the rule of law--to do so means we'll allow the enemy a huge propaganda victory.



Zaeef behaved somewhat like Frank Sinatra in Von Ryan's Express:

When he arrived at Guantanamo in the spring or summer of 2002, Zaeef was exhausted from the harsh treatment he'd received at Kandahar and Bagram.

He slept as often as he could and was just another detainee, Internment Serial Number 306. He got up when the guards came, and shuffled off in his orange prison clothes and flip-flops to answer questions about the Taliban leadership.

"He was very weak, physically, when I saw him at Guantanamo," said Mohammed Saduq, an Afghan who'd commanded Zaeef during the fight against the Soviets. "It is very difficult to know the inside of a man, and it's hard to say how it affected him — going from an ambassador to being in a cage — but he told me in Guantanamo that he was suffering badly."

The rules at Guantanamo, Zaeef said, reminded him of Bagram. The men weren't supposed to talk in their cells. They were supposed to say "please" and "sir" when they addressed the guards. In Guantanamo, however, the guards weren't beating the men, he said, and prisoners could speak up.

"After a month, we decided we could not accept these extremist measures. We must react," Zaeef said. "So we began shouting to each other. The soldiers came and asked if we were talking to each other. We said, 'Yes, we are not dogs.' We began throwing water at them, spitting at them; we said, 'If you want to kill us, fine.' "

A high-ranking officer came and spoke to the detainees, Zaeef said. The rules were rescinded. It was a victory in a game of inches.

Zaeef used his position as a leader of the detainees to push for Geneva Convention rights. What was our official response to this man? We let him go.

In June 2005, detainees at Guantanamo staged their biggest hunger strike yet: As many as 100 men refused to eat.

Prison authorities gathered detainee leaders and discussed their demands. Zaeef represented Afghans and Pakistanis, joining detainee representatives from several other nations.

After consulting with detainees in the cellblocks, Zaeef and the other leaders produced a list of demands that included Geneva Convention rights, court trials, less time in isolation cells, better treatment from the guards and so on.

However, the meetings among the detainees broke down before negotiations with U.S. authorities could proceed, Zaeef said, because the detainees worried that the Americans were eavesdropping to find out who their cellblock leaders were.

Zaeef was released that September.

Was this man dangerous? was he a threat to the United States? The problem I have with what's being done in our name is that we seem to be letting a lot of these people go. Should they have been detained in the first place?

Taliban takes Afghan villages, NATO plans counter-offensive

Hundreds of Taliban fighters seized several Afghan villages in southern Afghanistan today, prompting NATO and the Afghan forces to redeploy to counter the rebel forces. The villages that were taken over are in Arghandab district of Kandahar, the former stronghold of the fundamentalist Taliban forces.

Arghandab lies just north of Kandahar city -- the Taliban's former stronghold -- and a tribal leader from the region warned that the militants could use the cover from Arghandab's grape and pomegranate orchards to mount an attack on Kandahar itself.

''All of Arghandab is made of orchards. The militants can easily hide and easily fight,'' said Haji Ikramullah Khan. ''It's quite close to Kandahar. During the Russian war, the Russians didn't even occupy Arghandab, because when they fought here they suffered big casualties.''

The push into Arghandab comes three days after a sophisticated Taliban attack on Kandahar's prison that freed hundreds of insurgent fighters being held there.

NATO spokesman Mark Laity said NATO and Afghan military officials were redeploying troops to the region to ''meet any potential threats.''

''It's fair to say that the jailbreak has put a lot of people (militants) into circulation who weren't there before, and so obviously you're going to respond to that potential threat,'' he said.

Two powerful anti-Taliban leaders from Arghandab have died in the last year, weakening the region's defenses. Mullah Naqib, the district's former leader, died of a heart attack last year. Taliban fighters moved into Arghandab en masse last October, two weeks after his death, but left within days after hundreds of security forces were deployed there.

A second leader, police commander Abdul Hakim Jan, died in a massive suicide bombing in Kandahar in February that killed more than 100 people.

The Taliban offensive took place three days after a massive jailbreak that freed hundreds of prisoners, about half of them actual hardened militants.

Both the jailbreak and the Taliban offensive occurred in the wake of insurgent violence spiking upward by 50% in April and May.

Thank goodness we went to Iraq for aWol's vanity war so our forces are bogged down there and we can't mount an adequate response to this!

I swear to god, if the drooling dimwit had set out to do the damage he's managed, he couldn't have done a better job.

~~BG

Why Baitullah Mehsud Matters

The man that some believe responsible for the killing of Benazir Bhutto is the primary link between Pakistan and the Taliban. A recent deal between Pakistan and the militants may allow Mehsud to consolidate his power:

Daniel Markey, a former State Department specialist on South Asian issues, sat down with the Council on Foreign Relations to speak about the rise of the "Mehsud" tribes and their leader.

...the Pakistani army has really moved into the area in force and enforced an economic blockade against Mehsud tribes before starting negotiations. It has inflicted various punishments on some of the tribal villages to demonstrate that the army, in fact, has the upper hand. That's one difference. The other difference that I was told about on my trip is that this time the Pakistani government claims to be negotiating, not with the Taliban directly, but with tribal leaders. This is a potentially significant difference because the army—or the Pakistani government—claims that by negotiating with tribal leaders, not militants, they can hold these tribal leaders accountable for enforcing the agreement and make them, the tribal leaders, crack down on the militants who are among them.

So who is Baitullah Mehsud and why should we care about him?

He is viewed as a menace to internal security in Pakistan and is also probably connected to broader terrorist and militant activities in the region and possibly beyond that. Now on the other hand, he comes from the Mehsud tribe in South Waziristan. He is not a traditional leader of the Mehsud tribe. He is a self-appointed leader of a group called the “Pakistani Taliban.” There are other leaders, people who have gained leadership either through hereditary titles or because they are popular representatives of the wider tribe, who would be normal negotiating partners with the Pakistani army under these conditions. Those are the leaders whom the Pakistani government claims to be working with to hammer out a deal. Those are the leaders who would be held responsible for making sure people like Baitullah Mehsud and his associates are kept in line if a deal is worked out.

Now the relationship between those more legitimate tribal leaders and militants like Baitullah Mehsud is not entirely clear. By many accounts, at this stage of the game Baitullah Mehsud and the other militants actually have more power than the tribal leaders and are really calling the shots, in which case this may not be a serious distinction that the Pakistani government may be making. That's one reason why the United States and others need to be concerned about this deal.

Markey breaks down why it is important to know who Mehsud is and why he may either be yet another distant cousin of a wannabe terrorists or someone who may one day be a more deadly threat to the West than Osama bin Laden:

I think there are three broad categories that the United States needs to be worried about in Pakistan's tribal areas. The first would be that of Baitullah Mehsud, a Pakistani militant of the Pakistan Taliban. The second would be the Afghan Taliban, sort of symbolized by Mullah Omar, the former leaders of Afghanistan prior to September 11 who fled to Pakistan. The third would be al-Qaeda and other foreign, international terrorists. Now the connections between all of these as well as many other types of militant organizations in the area are often very, very difficult to discern.

It would appear, given Baitullah Mehsud's own rhetoric, and he's talked about the need to destroy New York, to destroy London, to destroy Washington, that he is definitely, at least rhetorically, on a similar page as al-Qaeda. He has claimed to have had contact with al-Qaeda leaders, including Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former al-Qaeda leader who was killed in Iraq. Also his wide use of suicide bombing as a tactic is something that didn't really happen much in Pakistan much beforehand. So it’s a relatively new thing and it's obviously very consistent with the wider al-Qaeda strategy. So he may be connected to that as well. Whether he is actually involved in helping to harbor senior al-Qaeda leaders or has regular connections with them, is at this point impossible to say.

What's especially troubling is that, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the Bush Administration lacks a cohesive plan for dealing with the likes of Mehsud. In a report entitled "The United States Lacks Comprehensive Plan to Destroy the Terrorist Threat and Close the Safe Haven in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas" from April of this year, the Mehsud tribes and Baitullah Mehsud are not even identified by name. But the most troubling aspect of the report is this:

The United States has not met its national security goals to destroy the terrorist threat and close the safe haven in Pakistan’s FATA region. Since 2002, the United States has relied principally on the Pakistani military to address its national security goals. There have been limited efforts, however, to address other underlying causes of terrorism in the FATA by providing development assistance or by addressing the FATA’s political needs. Of the over $10.5 billion that the United States has provided to Pakistan from 2002 through 2007, we identified about $5.8 billion specifically for Pakistan’s FATA and border region; about 96 percent of this funding reimbursed Pakistan for military operations in the FATA and the border region. According to Defense and State Department officials, Pakistan deployed up to 120,000 military and paramilitary forces in the FATA and killed and captured hundreds of suspected al Qaeda operatives. In October 2007, State reported that it had determined that Pakistan was making “significant” progress toward eliminating the safe haven in the FATA. However, we found broad agreement, as documented in the unclassified 2007 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), State and embassy documents, as well as among Defense, State, and other officials, including those operating in Pakistan, that al Qaeda had regenerated its ability to attack the United States and had succeeded in establishing a safe haven in Pakistan’s FATA.

No comprehensive plan for meeting U.S. national security goals in the FATA has been developed, as stipulated by the National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, recommended by the independent 9/11 Commission, and mandated by congressional legislation. Since 2003, the administration’s national security strategies and Congress have recognized that a comprehensive plan that includes all elements of national power—diplomatic, military, intelligence, development assistance, economic, and law enforcement support—was needed to address the terrorist threat emanating from the FATA. Furthermore, in 2004, a provision of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 (Intelligence Reform Act) established the NCTC to develop comprehensive plans to combat terrorism that included clear objectives, the assignment of tasks among executive branch departments, and interagency coordination. We have previously reported on the need for these and other elements to enhance interagency cooperation and improve effectiveness. The NCTC also was tasked with monitoring each department’s efforts. However, neither the NCTC, the NSC, nor the other executive branch departments have developed a comprehensive plan that integrates the capabilities of the executive agencies and the intelligence community. As a result, since 2002, the embassy has had no Washington-supported, comprehensive plan to combat terrorists and close the terrorist safe haven in the FATA. In 2006, the U.S. government, in conjunction with the government of Pakistan, began an effort to focus more attention on other key elements of national power, such as development and public diplomacy, to address U.S. goals in the FATA. In support of this effort, Defense, State, and USAID began to develop department-specific plans and hold interagency meetings to address security and development issues in the FATA.

The GAO went on to call for the Bush Administration to:

We recommend that the National Security Advisor and the Director of the NCTC, in consultation with the Secretaries of Defense and State, and the Administrator of USAID, the intelligence community, and other executive departments as deemed appropriate, implement the congressional mandate to develop a comprehensive plan using all elements of national power to combat the terrorist threat and close their safe haven in Pakistan’s FATA region.

The comprehensive plan should also include key components called for in the Intelligence Reform Act, the Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act of 2007, and components that we have previously reported as being needed to improve the effectiveness of plans involving multidepartmental efforts to combat terrorism.17 The plan should (1) place someone directly in charge of this multidepartment effort to improve accountability; (2) articulate a clear strategy to implement the national security goal to destroy terrorists and close the safe haven in the FATA; (3) clarify roles and responsibilities of each department for implementing the goal; (4) provide guidance on setting funding priorities and providing resources to meet these national security goals; and (5) require a monitoring system and provide periodic reports to Congress on the progress and impediments to meeting national security goals in Pakistan.

So there is no question--Congressional oversight means nothing. Despite the best efforts of the Congress to try to do something, anything to get the Bush Administration to actually fight terrorism, they drag their feet and do nothing. Not surprisingly,

State and ODNI did not comment on our recommendation, while Defense and USAID concurred with our recommendation. In general, they all commented on their individual planning efforts and interagency meetings to coordinate these efforts that began in 2006. This, however, was not the focus of our review; our report assessed whether a comprehensive plan had been developed that incorporated all elements of national power. We plan to conduct a detailed assessment of the individual agency efforts from 2002 to the present as part of our broader engagement efforts and look forward to working closely with ODNI, Defense, State, USAID, and other agencies in assessing their plans and efforts to meet national security goals in Pakistan.

State’s comments assert that embassy and U.S. government efforts to date have resulted in a comprehensive strategy. We disagree and note in our report that, while the initiatives begun by Defense, State, and USAID are being coordinated by the embassy, they have not been fully approved or integrated into a formal, comprehensive plan. While we acknowledge that this effort is a step in the right direction toward implementing the 2003 national security strategy, the recommendations by the 9/11 Commission, and Congress, it is unclear whether the new approach will include all of the key elements of national power, such as intelligence, economic, and law enforcement support.

ODNI’s comments stated that they agreed with our finding that the United States had not met its national security goals in Pakistan’s FATA and that countering the growth of terrorist safe havens requires all elements of national power. They disagreed, however, that the United States lacks plans to combat terrorism in the area.

Your Bush administration at work. While actual terrorists are busy working out the details, they're paralyzed by the Iraq War and they're more concerned with glossy pictures in the entryway, a phony legacy that has already dissipated into nothing, and anything but actually stopping them.

A Surge™ for Afghanistan?

In recent weeks the Pentagon has begun discussing adding up to 7,000 addition American Soldiers and Marines to Afghanistan to make up for shortfalls from NATO allies as they begin to draw down forces or withdraw completely. If the options currently being discussed are carried out, it will raise the number of American service personnel to about 40,000 - higher than at any time in the six-and-a-half-year-old war.

The increasing proportion of United States troops, from about half to about two-thirds of the foreign troops in Afghanistan, would be likely to result in what one senior administration official described as “the re-Americanization” of the war.

“There are simply going to be more American forces than we’ve ever had there,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was discussing future military planning.

A dozen NATO countries have pledged a total of about 2,000 troops, according to senior NATO officials, who provided the information on condition of anonymity according to standard diplomatic rules. Senior alliance commanders in Afghanistan have said they need about 10,000 more troops.

Only one country so far has actually begun preparing more troops to deploy: France, which is sending 700 to Afghanistan, NATO officials said.

Few of the additional troops are expected to arrive any time soon, the officials added.

Officials stressed that no formal new American deployment plans for Afghanistan had been presented to the Pentagon or the White House, and that the decision could be left to the next president, though they would not rule out the prospect that Mr. Bush would order a troop increase.

Mr. Bush has long faced criticism that the Iraq war distracted the country from confronting the Qaeda threat in Afghanistan, and Democrats as well as Republicans have expressed general support for shifting more attention to Afghanistan.

There are about 62,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan, about 34,000 of them American, up from just 25,000 American troops in 2005. The American troops are divided into a force of 16,000 who operate under NATO command and 18,000 who conduct counterterrorism and other missions under American command outside the NATO structure, according to Pentagon statistics. The initial planning under way would send about two additional brigades of American forces, or about 7,000 troops, to Afghanistan next year. That would meet two-thirds of what commanders have portrayed in recent months as a shortfall of three brigades, or about 10,000 troops, including combat forces, trainers, intelligence officers and crews for added helicopters and troop carriers.

Initially, the Bush administration asserted that NATO ought to step into the breach and cover some American tail because the good ole U.S. of A is bogged down in Iraq - and publicly, the administration has applauded the efforts of the alliance. But...

The results of the NATO session disappointed commanders in Afghanistan. A NATO military spokesman issued a diplomatically worded statement this week. “In the run-up to and during the Bucharest meeting, nations added extra contributions,” the statement from Kabul said. “However, shortfalls still exist.”

Julianne Smith, director of the Europe Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a nonpartisan policy institute, said the meeting did not live up to the expectations or the public celebration during the session.

“If you look at what the NATO commanders got, it’s hard to see the silver lining,” she said.

So Gates is looking at options to fill the void, and one of them is replacing the 3,200 Marines that were added in recent weeks under the understanding that the troop increase was temporary, when their rotation ends. He also said last month that the U.S. was preparing to increase troop levels in Afghanistan in 2009, but made no indication of degree. One unnamed official said that Gates made that statement after consulting with Bush, and impressing upon the empty-headed little nimrod that a public proclamation of commitment - putting your Marines where your mouth is - was necessary to retain the remaining support with out allies.

However, 7,000 is about all the forces the U.S. can muster - thanks to the fact that Iraq is eating resources and manpower at a phe-fucking-nomenal rate, and bin Laden laughing his skinny ass off from across the border while the Taliban regroups and gains strength and grows more effective.

Another reason to get the hell out of Iraq, fully fund the VA and the DoD health care systems, start rebuilding the Army and start the culling of the feckless from the herd where the senior officer corps is concerned. You want to know how to judge a senior officer? Provide his or her full, unvarnished bio - for instance, if you are reviewing Boylan you damned sure bring up that knife wound sustained off post in Korea, and you put that tall tale under the microscope - a million soldiers who have rotated though Korea would lose liquids through their nasal passages upon hearing that bullshit story that flies by civilians unchallenged - and then you stand that person in front of a group of current and former military personnel and give them the option of saluting, or turning their backs

If the feckless bastard sees shoulders, that's all you need to know.

A Day in the Life of Pakistan

A suicide bomber killed at least 25 27 people, including two police officers and several children; and injured dozens in Charsadda, Pakistan in the turbulent North West Frontier province, an area where Islamist extremists have been battling government forces for control. It was the latest act in a wave of rampant violence that has steadily worsened since Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated on December 27.

The bomber struck at a rally organized by the secular Awami National Party, which opposes Islamist parties for support among the local ethnic Pashtun population. Abdul Waheed, a 22 year old who survived the attack but was seriously burned, said the bomber blew himself up as a member of the party was leading a recitation of verses from the Quran. ''I only heard the blast and cries and then something hit me and I fell down,'' Waheed told The Associated Press from his hospital bed in Peshawar.

All of Pakistan has been a powderkeg since the assassination of Ms. Bhutto, and nowhere have tensions been higher than in the lawless North West Frontier Province, in the border region with Afghanistan where the remnants of Al Qaeda are thought to ave sought and found safe haven after they were allowed to slip away at Tora Bora. Islamic militants in the region have been somewhat successful in battling government forces and challenging government control.

Because of the worsening violence, parliamentary candidates standing in the February 18 elections have shunned large outdoor rallies, opting to campaign in smaller, more intimate settings held inside the walled compounds of party stalwarts. The television footage of the aftereffects of the blast, the bloodstained clothing, overturned chairs, and the scenes of general chaos that littered the grand meeting hall of a party members sprawling private home drove home the point that even these tightly controlled settings are susceptible to attack by determined terrorists.

In spite of the overt danger, 100,000 members of Ms. Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party defiantly gathered in a sports stadium in Thatta as the party resumed its campaigning following the end of the traditional 40 day mourning period following her death. Her widow, Asif Ali Zardari, vowed in an emotional speech to carry forth his murdered wife's mission, and he beseeched the assembled masses to ''give me strength so that we can serve the country.''

''I have the responsibility to save Pakistan,'' Zardari said. ''This is our country and we have to save it.''

A 24 year old laborer who attended the rally said that the reputation of Mr. Zardari was not very good, but that devotion to Benazir compelled many to to attend the rally. ''We will avenge the blood of Benazir. We don't have bombs. We are not terrorists, but we have political power and we will capitalize on this political power to avenge the death of Benazir,'' said another supporter, Haji Jaffar, 75, a retired teacher. The martyring of Ms. Bhutto has strengthened the resolve of her supporters and shored up the strength of her party.

Elsewhere in Pakistan, approximately 1,500 lawyers attempted Saturday to march to the barricaded home of the Chief Justice of the countries Supreme Court, who was suspended from his position last March by Pervez Mushareff last November in an attempt to control the judiciary which opposed his authoritarian rule. As the lawyers attempted to cross the barbed-wire barricade, hundreds of riot police unleashed tear gas and water cannons, topped off with a baton charge. Although there were no reports of serious injury, several lawyers were roughed up. Earlier Saturday, the countries Bar Council announced that the lawyers nationwide will boycott the courts through election day in an attempt to restore the suspended judges.

Insurgencies are becoming entrenched along Afghan-Pakistan border

Radical Islamic fundamentalist militants are bolstering their numbers and expanding their scope of influence in the forbidding terrain of the lawless tribal areas that flank the border on both sides.

From here, they traffic in disarray, violence and chaos over a vast area of both countries. This is the area that the remnants of al Qaeda fled to when they were allowed to escape at Tora Bora. Here they have found fertile soil and they have set about the business of regrouping, recruiting and resurging. The violence and bloodshed are spreading from the border areas to the Pakistani heartland and threatens to destabilize the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan - governments which have allied themselves with the United States and the western allies in those volatile countries.

From McClatchy:

In Afghanistan, U.S. and NATO forces are facing "a classic growing insurgency," Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Friday.

But the U.S. military, stretched thin by the war in Iraq, is hard-pressed to send more than the 3,200 additional Marines the Bush administration is dispatching to Afghanistan. The growing insurgency there is fueling rifts within the NATO alliance as Germany and other nations refuse to allow their troops to participate in offensive operations in Afghanistan. The Afghan army is making progress but still cannot operate independently.

"Make no mistake, NATO is not winning in Afghanistan," warned an Atlantic Council of the United States report last week. The report was directed by retired Marine Corps Gen. James Jones, the former top NATO commander. "What is happening in Afghanistan and beyond its borders can have even greater strategic long-term consequences than the struggle in Iraq." (emphasis added)

The Pakistani army is ill-suited to confront a home-grown insurgency in the tribal areas - it is geared toward fighting a conventional land-war against India. To date the Pakistanis have avoided the George Bush modus operandi of "when the only tool you have is a hammer..." and avoided sending forces to battle the insurgency (using them to chase down al Qaeda has been volatile enough). The military leaders are reluctant to turn their guns on the insurgents because they fear that heavy casualties would prompt schisms within the military along ethnic and sectarian lines and that would destroy the Pakistani armed forces.

All the U.S. and the NATO allies can do is train a few Pakistani troops because U.S. military action would spark outrage among the populace, already on the verge of boiling over with anti-U.S. and anti-government fueled outrage.

But it gets better - the threat of terrorists trained and indoctrinated in the tribal areas directed at Afghan, Pakistani and even western targets is greater than it has ever been.

"The Taliban in Afghanistan now control more of the country than at any time since 2001, and their confederates in the tribal areas of Pakistan are expanding their operations almost day by day. While our attention has been diverted by Iraq, we've overlooked a potentially far more serious threat to the security of all Americans," Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph Biden, D-Del., told McClatchy.

There's no hard evidence of direct collusion between the Afghan Taliban and a new Pakistani Taliban alliance, both of which are made up mostly of Pashtun tribesmen, who dominate the region of soaring mountains and rugged deserts that span the frontier. Indeed, the Afghan Taliban deny links with the Pakistani insurgents.

But the ties among the Pashtuns are personal, historic, ethnic and ideological, and experts worry that the region faces a growing jihadi movement that's aided by al Qaida with Arab and Central Asian fighters, coordination, money and motivation.

"You see some indication that there is a blurring of the lines and some associations that are not helpful," said a senior U.S. defense official, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

Husain Haqqani, a political scientist and former aide to the late Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto said that the group "have become a seamless whole." The common thread that unites them all is that the groups calling themselves "Taliban" on either side of the border are descended from the Mujahadeen, the Islamic guerrillas that fought the Soviets in Afghanistan from 1979-89. Back then, they were the standard-bearers for the west and they battled the Soviets with arms that were supplied by the United States, Saudi Arabia and Britain and flowed through Pakistan.

One point enjoys widespread support: The Bush administration bears much of the blame for the current FUBAR security situation in the least stable nuclear nation on earth.

First, in Bush's idiotic invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan was left to twist in the wind after the focus changed and left that poor, beleaguered nation unsecured after the 2001 invasion. Then the Bush administration turned the screws on Pervez Musharraf to send troops into the tribal areas to hunt down al Qaeda operatives who had escaped there from Tora Bora. The presence of these troops outraged the tribes, and cemented opposition with heavy-handed tactics and high civilian casualties. While this was going on, little heed was paid to the Taliban, and their support among a pissed-off populace took root. Growth in support exploded after Musharraf ordered a strike against The Red Mosque last summer. That raid killed scores of people.

The Taliban Movement of Pakistan, which was only established in December of 2007, has already extended it's reach into all seven tribal agencies, as well as the North West Frontier Province.

Taliban-sponsored violence has shaken the provincial capital Peshawar to it's very foundation. It has killed hundreds of security forces personnel. Ammunition deliveries have been hijacked, major thoroughfares have been seized, and for the first time ever, a major city has been cut off from the rest of the country by militants.

Across the border in Afghanistan, the Taliban has expanded the territory under their control and now moves around freely in spite of heavy combat losses last year with NATO troops. "The number of districts in which the Taliban operate exploded last year," said John McCreary, a former senior intelligence analyst with the Joint Chiefs of Staff who's now with the private contractor dNovus RDI. "This is the first year they have managed to sustain over 100 attacks per month for the whole year since they started to climb back. One hundred attacks per month used to be surge figure. Now it's the new norm."

Diplomats Expelled from Afghanistan

A diplomatic set-to is brewing in Afghanistan in the wake of a Briton and an Irishman being declared "Persona Non Grata" and ordered to leave the country by Thursday. The men, who work for the European Union and the United Nations stand accused of threatening state security by meeting with Taliban insurgents. Both men have worked in Afghanistan for over a decade, even when the Taliban was in charge in the country. Both are well versed in local languages and customs.

The Afghan government accused the men of meeting with members of the Taliban in the southern province of Helmand, where the Taliban insurgency has a stronghold. Helmand province where the majority of the opium poppies are grown and harvested. "Not only did they hold talks with the Taliban, but also had given them money," the Afghan official said. "It is not clear whether they were supporting the insurgency or not."

It is unclear at present whether the meeting was a personal undertaking, or whether they were acting in an official capacity. Approximately 50 Afghans, some of whom are colleagues of the men, have been detained for questioning and investigations over their links to the matter.

Western diplomats sprang to the defense of the two men, insisting that it was all a misunderstanding, and that they hoped the men would be allowed to return quickly. They insist that the men were likely meeting with tribal leaders, and didn't set out to negotiate with the taliban. The skill set the men possess are vital to the success of the multiple programs and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that are struggling to run reconstruction and development projects.

The greatest threat to humanitarian progress in Afghanistan is the strengthening Taliban insurgency, particularly in the southern and eastern portions of the country where the remnants of Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network sow distention and stoke the fires of insurgency.

The unnamed Afghan official that spoke to Reuters said that the meeting in question took place in the Musa Qala district of Helmand province. Musa Qala is the region that sparked controversy earlier in the year when British forces withdrew after a deal was brokered with tribal elders to police themselves. That agreement was blasted by the Afghan government after Taliban insurgents promptly took over control of the region and held it until they were driven out two weeks ago by NATO and Afghan forces.

The Afghan government has little popular support in the Taliban strongholds, and insists publicly that it does not negotiate with insurgents, but unofficially it is commonplace for frequent contacts to take place. Likewise, western governments and diplomats hold a similar public line, while privately arguing that dividing the insurgency and splitting the leadership is a legitimate strategy to be pursued.

Remember Afghanistan?

Sure you do - the country in which bin Laden and his warren of terrorists found safe haven from which to plot the terror attacks of September 11. Think hard. It'll come back to you.

And when it does, consider that we should be applying the lessons of Vietnam to the situation there. One lesson in specific...As the end drew nigh and helicopters on the roof of the embassy became inevitable, an exchange took place between two battle-hardened Colonels, Harry Summers from the United States Army, and Colonel Tu from North Vietnam. Stinging from the defeat, Summers reportedly said “You never beat us on the battlefield.” To which Tu replied, “That may be so, but it is also irrelevant.”

That is the lesson that we should be heeding in Afghanistan.

But instead...

White House assessment of the war in Afghanistan has concluded that wide-ranging strategic goals that the Bush administration set for 2007 have not been met, even as U.S. and NATO forces have scored significant combat successes against resurgent Taliban fighters, according to U.S. officials.

The evaluation this month by the National Security Council followed an in-depth review in late 2006 that laid out a series of projected improvements for this year, including progress in security, governance and the economy. But the latest assessment concluded that only "the kinetic piece" -- individual battles against Taliban fighters -- has shown substantial progress, while improvements in the other areas continue to lag, a senior administration official said.

And while the Taliban gradually takes back territory - they now hold 54% of the land area of the country - The military points to tactical successes while the intelligence branches point to strategic failures; and any chance of realizing United States objectives in that beleaguered nation slip further and further away.

Benazir Bhutto returns from exile, Taliban-led assassination attempt kills over 100 supporters

The Aftermath

More than 100 people perished late Thursday as bombs detonated along the parade route as former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto returned to her home city of Karachi after eight years in exile.
Hundreds of thousands of jubilant Pakistanis lined the streets and danced atop cars as her entourage passed.

Then...Chaos erupted.

...After an initial small explosion, a huge blast came just feet from the front of the truck carrying Ms. Bhutto during a procession through Karachi. The blast shattered windows in her vehicle, The A.P. said.

Televised views of the scene showed bodies in the nighttime city streets, crowds running through traffic that is at a standstill and the noises of sirens and people screaming.

Before the explosions, hundreds of thousands of supporters lined the streets, dancing on bus roofs, waving banners and surging forward for a glimpse of their leader as she inched her way through the city atop a bullet-proof truck.

The huge and enthusiastic turnout earlier on Thursday made it an emotional homecoming for Ms. Bhutto, who was twice turned out of office and has lived in self-imposed exile. It was also a vindication for her politically that after leading two short-lived governments and being accused together with her husband of corruption and mismanagement, she could still command fervent support on the streets

The throngs that greeted Ms. Bhutto on Thursday were larger than those that lined the streets in 1986 when she returned from exile the first time, to face politically - and prevail over - Muhammed Zia-al-Huq, the General who had deposed her fathers government and installed martial law for the third time in Pakistan's short history as an independent nation.

That return from exile preceded Ms. Bhutto's historic rise to power. She was the first woman in the Muslim world to be elected Prime Minister and lead a nation.

Before the bombings, Ms. Bhutto looked out on the teeming crowds of mostly working class Pakistanis. Many were unemployed young men, a great many of whom had traveled hundreds of kilometers and camped along the roadside leading to the airport, anxiously awaiting her arrival.

In words that later seemed prescient, she spoke strongly against terrorism and the need to save Pakistan from extremism through democracy. “The time has come for democracy,” she said. “If we want to save Pakistan, we have to have democracy.”

She has been outspoken against militants and Al Qaeda and repeated the same comments as she flew in. “The terrorists are trying to take over my country and we have to stop them,” she said.

The New York Times is now pegging the death toll at 115 and counting, and the Taliban, allied with (the real) al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the bombing and assassination attempt against Ms. Bhutto, who is determined to take a hard line against their thuggery and extremism.

Remember the Taliban?

Turns out rumors of their demise were greatly exaggerated. Five years after they were ousted from power, they continue to fight on and wreck bloody havoc.

Seven were killed by Taliban fighters Saturday as they engaged in a mine-clearing operation in western Farah Province in Afghanistan. The ambush killed three members of the mine-clearing team, three guards, and an Afghan woman who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Five were wounded.

The dead were employees of Ronco Consulting Corporation, a demining company based in the United States. The attack was the latest in a wave of violent attacks that have been attributed to Taliban fighters.

Elsewhere in Afghanistan on Saturday, U.S. warplanes strafed Taliban positions, killing several rebles and destroying a weapons cache in a cave.

So folks, here is the talking point…The next time you hear the noise machine bemoaning the Democrats as “defeatocrats” intent on losing in Iraq – remind them that we were not the ones who surrendered to the terrorists in Afghanistan to go running off to fight a vanity war in Iraq that has cost billions of dollars, thousands of American lives and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi’s.