Little Blue Pills Among the Ways CIA Wins Friends in Afghanistan

By Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, December 26, 2008; A01

The Afghan chieftain looked older than his 60-odd years, and his bearded face bore the creases of a man burdened with duties as tribal patriarch and husband to four younger women. His visitor, a CIA officer, saw an opportunity, and reached into his bag for a small gift.

Four blue pills. Viagra.

"Take one of these. You'll love it," the officer said. Compliments of Uncle Sam.

The enticement worked. The officer, who described the encounter, returned four days later to an enthusiastic reception. The grinning chief offered up a bonanza of information about Taliban movements and supply routes -- followed by a request for more pills.

For U.S. intelligence officials, this is how some crucial battles in Afghanistan are fought and won. While the CIA has a long history of buying information with cash, the growing Taliban insurgency has prompted the use of novel incentives and creative bargaining to gain support in some of the country's roughest neighborhoods, according to officials directly involved in such operations.

In their efforts to win over notoriously fickle warlords and chieftains, the officials say, the agency's operatives have used a variety of personal services. These include pocketknives and tools, medicine or surgeries for ailing family members, toys and school equipment, tooth extractions, travel visas, and, occasionally, pharmaceutical enhancements for aging patriarchs with slumping libidos, the officials said.

"Whatever it takes to make friends and influence people -- whether it's building a school or handing out Viagra," said one longtime agency operative and veteran of several Afghanistan tours. Like other field officers interviewed for this article, he spoke on the condition of anonymity when describing tactics and operations that are largely classified.

Officials say these inducements are necessary in Afghanistan, a country where warlords and tribal leaders expect to be paid for their cooperation, and where, for some, switching sides can be as easy as changing tunics. If the Americans don't offer incentives, there are others who will, including Taliban commanders, drug dealers and even Iranian agents in the region.

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David Edwards and Stephen C. Webster
Published: Saturday December 27, 2008
links and video at Raw Story

One way to quell a violent and deteriorating situation, according to the U.S. military, is to flood the place with guns.

That's exactly what is planned for Afghanistan, where a rising tide of chaos is slowly pushing the country past Iraq as the most dangerous battlefield Americans tread upon.

"The U.S. military plans to help the Afghanistan government recruit, train and arm local Afghans to fight a resurgent Taliban," reported CNN's Barbara Starr.

"For the United States, the most sensitive part of the proposal will be the use of American military funds to purchase small arms, most likely AK-47 rifles, that will be given to local Afghans, according to a U.S. military official."

"There are worries," Starr continued, "putting even more weapons in the hands of local communities could lead to tribes fighting each other instead of the Taliban. U.S. troops could get caught in the middle." The plan would also hinge upon the weak Afghan government to maintain the loyalties of the newly armed populace.

The last time the U.S. poured weapons into Afghanistan was during the administration of Ronald Reagen, who opted to back the Mujahadeen against occupying Soviet Union forces. The CIA spent billions arming the Afghans through the Pakistani and Saudi intelligence services, finally resulting in driving the Soviets out.

Ultimately, the wealth of destructive force and financial heft given to the Afghans concentrated around two groups: Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda, and the Taliban.

This 'new' strategy will be presented for President-elect Obama's consideration, Starr said.

links and video at Raw Story

Ashraf Ghani: Afghanistan is a failing state. It needs a Marshall Plan

Monday, 29 December 2008

The Obama Presidency provides a second chance to get Afghanistan right. The President-elect has made it clear a stable Afghanistan is his priority. That stability will only come when Afghanistan can govern itself. To reach that point, three key assets must be harnessed: first, American forces and resources; second, the instruments of national and international power; and third and most crucially, the Afghan people, who are as eager to see the restoration of order and justice.

The current impetus for a new perspective in US interventions comes from the military, in the form of the new counter-insurgency doctrine. Building on lessons learned by the British in Malaysia and the French in Algeria in the 1950s and 1960s, a group of thinkers organised by General Petraeus in the US have formulated the thesis that the struggle for the people is the central issue in any counter-insurgency campaign. While 20 per cent of the campaign might centre on use of force, 80 per cent depends on political and economic efforts. Under this doctrine, the definition of partners rests on the litmus test of dedication to the people. The incoming administration must translate this doctrine into a focused strategy for Afghanistan. This will require a fresh look at the polity, the economy, and foreign aid.

Afghanistan's first chance was in 2001, when the UN General Assembly and the Security Council resolved to create a legitimate government in Afghanistan. At that time, Afghans were united in requesting the deployment of forces to liberate and protect them and looked to the international community to solve 20 years of conflict. This open moment was squandered by a double failure: the Afghan political elite could not overcome their differences to become founding fathers of a nation; and international actors were fragmented and unable to build legitimate institutions. This created space for criminalisation of the economy, which fuelled the insurgency and corroded public sector integrity. Afghanistan has slipped 60 places in Transparency International's global corruption index.

The spread of corruption and bad governance imposes injustices, and often daily hardships, on ordinary Afghans, whose hopes for better lives are frustrated by the lack of services. These citizens want their current and future governments to be accountable.

Containing the threat of narcotics to the region and the world requires a bold economic approach. The break point between illegal and legal economies is a legal income of $4 per capita per day. In order to reach this threshold in Afghanistan, three major sectors of the economy must be revitalised: mining, agriculture, and services. Afghanistan is rich in minerals including copper, iron, marble, chromite, manganese and emeralds. With good governance in place, these assets can generate funds. Connecting farmers to markets through careful investment, organisation and infrastructure would provide livelihoods in rural areas. In urban areas, a fresh approach to municipal governance could mobilise the service industry, particularly construction, to create jobs. If Europe wanted to do more, a package of trade and enterprise partnerships could be as significant as any commitment of troops. And in the medium and long term, the most effective investment of all will be education and vocational training programs for the rising generations. Used for this purpose, one month of current military expenditures could change the life opportunities of five generations of Afghans.

The instruments currently used by the international community in Afghanistan, however, are part of the problem. The system can be made effective and efficient by eliminating the tens of thousands of scattered efforts, which create waste and parallel structures, and instead unifying foreign aid behind the single instrument of the Afghan national budget. The government and its international partners should delineate a set of objectives to deliver a dividend to the population and establish clear rules for accountability and transparency, including the creation of joint decision-making committees that bring international figures together with Afghan civil society and business oversight. This kind of partnership will require a new design for the use of aid, by a group similar to that which designed the Marshall Plan.

The present crisis was not inevitable, but rather the result of avoidable missteps. The Afghan population is still waiting, still hoping for an approach to answer their aspirations for a stable and just order. With that hope as its foundation, the right approach can bring Afghanistan to true stability.

Ashraf Ghani was Afghan finance minister 2002-2004, is the author of Fixing Failed States, and is chairman of the Institute for State Effectiveness: effectivestates.org

30 Dec 2008 06:35:32 GMT
Source: Reuters
(Adds detail)

JAMRUD, Pakistan, Dec 30 (Reuters) - Pakistan suspended supplies going to foreign forces in Afghanistan on Tuesday as security forces launched an operation against militants in the Khyber Pass region, a government official said.

Militants have launched a string of attacks in recent months aimed at choking off supplies trucked to foreign forces in landlocked Afghanistan through northwest Pakistan from the port city of Karachi.

Khyber's top administrator, Tariq Hayat, told reporters that a curfew had been imposed and the main road leading to the Afghan border had been sealed.

"Supplies to NATO forces will remain suspended until we clear the area of militants and outlaws who have gone out of control," he said

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as opposed to the militants they control? lol

By Timothy Williams
Published: December 30, 2008

FALLUJA, Iraq: In Falluja, a town that rises abruptly out of the vast Syrian Desert an hour west of Baghdad, nearly every building left standing has some sort of hole in it.

Mosques are without their minarets. Apartment walls have been peeled away by artillery shells. A family's kitchen is full of tiny holes made by a fragmentary grenade .

Of all the places fighting has raged since the American invasion nearly six years ago, Falluja — the site of two major battles and the town where American security contractors were killed and their bodies hung from a local bridge — stands out as one of the bloodiest and most intractable.

This month, as the last American marines prepare to leave Camp Falluja, the sprawling base a few miles outside of town where many of the American troops who fought the two battles were stationed, Falluja has come to represent something unexpected: the hope that an Iraqi town once at the heart of the insurgency can become a model for peace without the United States military.

As part of the reduction of United States troops from Iraq, by Thursday there will be few marines left in or around this mostly Sunni city of about 300,000 people. The closing of Camp Falluja is one of the most prominent symbols yet that America's presence in the country, which at times had seemed all encompassing, is diminishing.

As recently as a year ago, the base closing was cause for alarm. The calm that seemed to have taken hold here was fragile enough that both Iraqi and American officials feared the potential consequences of the marines' departure.

Today they look forward to it.

"That will make our job easier," said Colonel Dowad Muhammad Suliyman, commander of the Falluja Police Department. "The existence of the American forces is an excuse for the insurgents to attack. They consider us spies for the Americans."

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the Soviet's loss in Afghanistan.

Reuters, By Tim Cocks, January 4

BAGHDAD - The US military took a step toward pulling combat troops from Iraqi cities yesterday, moving out of a Baghdad base that Iraqi officials said would be dismantled and converted back into a shopping mall.

It was the first US military base to be handed over to Iraq since American forces came under Iraqi authority on Jan. 1, in compliance with a new security agreement between the two countries.

Brigadier General Robin Swan, deputy commander of US forces in Baghdad, said the transfer of Forward Operating Base Callahan in northern Baghdad was "tremendously significant."

"By June 30th, combat formations are out of the cities. This was a major forward operating base, with 600 soldiers . . . three short weeks ago," Swan said.

PressTV, January 4

At least 38 pilgrims, most of them Iranians, have been killed and 65 injured in a suicide bombing at a revered Shia shrine in Baghdad.

The explosion took place at a checkpoint outside the Imam Moussa shrine in Kadhimiya, a mainly Shia area northwestern of the Iraqi capital.

Most of the casualties were pilgrims from Iran, security spokesman Major-General Qassim Moussawi said. Iraqi security forces put the death toll at 38.

"A woman wearing an explosive vest managed to reach one of the security checkpoints near the revered Kadhim shrine and exploded herself among a crowd of pilgrims," he said in a statement.

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hassan Qashqavi on Sunday strongly condemned the terrorist act as inhuman, saying, "Such measures run counter to Islamic and human values."