Seriously, think about human nature who are you ultimately going to side with? A foreigner who isn't really committed or a fellow tribesman who is?

Of course you are going to side with the fellow tribesman.

In between the first and second grafs is a lot of material, including this, which I think you also have to take into account:

Even though the Tolokan bombing may have hurt the insurgents, local residents say, the Taliban presence remains strong, and villagers dread the prospect of more violence. They complain they are caught in the middle of fighting that pits the Taliban against the government and their foreign allies.

Hajji Agha Lalai, a tribal elder and provincial councilor from the Panjwai district in Kandahar Province, gathered elders in his house several weeks ago to discuss what to do about the intensifying conflict. At a meeting that was held a day after the Tolokan bombing, he said, the death toll finally drove home a consensus: the Taliban must go.

"Everyone swore that we would cooperate with each other and not let the Taliban fight in our district," he said. "We are not going to pick up guns and fight the Taliban; we are going to go with bare hands, and come out of our houses and tell them: 'You have to kill us first before you can attack the government and the coalition from here.' "

A month ago, 200 to 300 Taliban were moving freely in the Panjwai district and the adjoining district, Zhare, the governor of Kandahar Province, Asadullah Khaled, said in an interview.

After the Tolokan bombing, the coalition forces and government estimated that the Taliban lost up to 80 men in new fighting and reported that the insurgents had pulled out of the district. "The situation in Panjwai has completely changed," Mr. Khaled said.

Colonel Hope, who took part in the operation in Panjwai, said that the presence of the Taliban was much reduced.

"We believe there are a number of small groups, numbering 10 or 5 men, who want to stay and will change their tactics to I.E.D. attacks," he said, referring to improvised explosive devices like roadside bombs. "For this reason we need to maintain our presence and security in these districts."

My view, that's what could happen on a larger scale, if the NATO force presence becomes pervasive enough, and if folks can start to believe that they can come off the fence. Panjwai is the area where the Canadians have seen the most fighting, judging from media accounts. The key is going to be having enough folks on the ground so that they can't run into areas where NATO doesn't have a pervasive presence - that'd be repeating the critical mistake that's happened thusfar. We're seeing what we're seeing to some degree because the Taliban no longer have it quite so easy in some of these provinces.

To be clear, I don't think that the most important thing is the the Canadians went into that region and ran up a big Taliban body count - one of the characteristics of guerilla warfare is that the other side can regenerate very, very easily; getting fixated on body counts is a major, major mistake. What I think is important on the kinetic side (which is the less important), in the battles that we've seen in that region is that a number of them were initiated by the Canadians, not the Taliban - according to the media accounts, intelligence was developped and spoiling attacks were launched. That said, a number of battles were also initiated by the Taliban, unfortunately. I think it will be a really good sign if we can increase the number of times that we're fighting on our initiative, not theirs - also important is being seen to unambiguously win when they decide to make it a stand-up fight.

As I've said elsewhere, too early to determine the trend here; things are really mixed and in 12 months of so we'll have a much better idea what's really going on - the fact that there's something in the accounts for folks of all outlooks to pick out that the agree with is testament enough to that, in my view.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.