How can the US hope to win the hearts and minds of the Afghan people when we don't even know how they think?

o Bilal Baloch and Jim Williams
o guardian.co.uk, Monday 19 October 2009 14.30 BST

Rene Descartes once mused over common sense: "No one thinks he needs more of it than he already has." This glib attitude is no less prevalent centuries later. Today, the US army faces a mammoth task in Afghanistan, where by the admission of its top general in the country, Stanley McChrystal: "No one has an idea of the complexity of what we are dealing with." At the bottom of this challenge is a very simple notion: We do not understand local common sense.

Speaking at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London, McChrystal warned of the difficulties the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) faces in Afghanistan. He declared that "in the end [victory will] be decided in the minds of the Afghan people". Winning hearts and minds is nothing new. But this is the first time a four-star general has understood precisely which ingredients can make it happen in Afghanistan.

In short, McChrystal claims it is essential that the international mission in Afghanistan adopt a "fundamentally new" approach to be able to defeat the Taliban – one of "humility".

Perhaps it is the general's commendable modesty, however, that prevents him from providing clear-cut solutions to the problems he identifies. One such problem is what McChrystal terms "counterinsurgency mathematics". For some, the death of two enemy combatants is progress, for surely this means a lower insurgent count. But the death of just one insurgent, McChrystal points out, generates mourners who care nothing for talk of safe havens and international terrorism – who seek revenge, pure and simple. And the inevitable result? A larger body of militants up in arms. Not a particularly revolutionary idea, but one that has evaded ISAF for some eight years.

ISAF is not alone. NGOs, charities and thinktanks have all tripped over Afghan cultural nuances. As McChrystal points out, in Afghanistan "the outcomes of actions we take, however well-intended, are often different from what we expect".

Indeed, McChrystal states even the simple act of building a well, taken upon every day by countless aid agencies, can cause negative repercussions. What if the traditional community leader chosen as an intermediary builds the well in his own private courtyard? What if the well disrupts customary irrigation and water sharing? Resulting problems can include illicit taxes and accelerated power struggles, which in turn paint those that build the well in a negative light.

Misplaced generosity can be as damaging as precision-targeted violence. This isn't just a village-level problem, however. Our entire strategic approach to Afghanistan makes the same mistake – and McChrystal's strategy is no different.

In the face of such complexity, the general puts up his hands and concludes that to win Afghan affections we have to think "counter-intuitively". And that's when we see the sand under the foundations. If we have to think counter-intuitively to win popular affections, then we have a long, long climb ahead of us. How can we win the minds of a population when we don't even know how they think?

Real humility would be to admit that we are yet to understand the variations of common sense from village to village. Community development councils have been established to empower the population – but we don't know what separates one community from the next, so we get it wrong. We label people who shelter insurgents "militant supporters", forgetting that sometimes custom dictates that strangers must be given hospitality – so we get it wrong. We try to remember that Pashtun society is tribal – but in some areas tribal society has been torn apart, so we get it wrong. At best we look like idiots, but insurgencies thrive on precisely such idiocy.

So, what must be done?

ISAF and the Afghan government must put research first. The broadest strategy and the smallest project must act on local common sense. To their credit, the US military runs a programme to understand local behaviour: the controversial "human terrain system". It works by embedding anthropologists in military units, much as journalists often are with combat patrols. The downside is that the presence of a bunch of heavily armed grunts somewhat distorts local behaviour, to put it lightly.

Thankfully, there's a simple answer: train locals to research their own communities – just as we train the Afghan police. Such a nationwide programme will be expensive, but without making this first hurdle who knows how many billions of dollars will be wasted?

The second step is to employ this knowledge in decentralising and "Afghanising" civil and military engagement. Provide a cordon to identify and solve local problems locally. ISAF and Kabul have taken strides in this direction, but without basic local knowledge they are tripping over their own feet.

We assume that our own common sense is universal. After all, that's the point. But that which we take for granted – values, standards of behaviour, cautionary tales – all differ radically from society to society. Afghans are no exception.

By Roy Gutman | McClatchy Newspapers

If there's one place in Iraq outside the parliament itself that will set the tone for the country's politics, it's Najaf, a dusty city of about 900,000 that was neglected under Saddam Hussein's Sunni Muslim dictatorship. Najaf is to Shiites what Vatican City is to Roman Catholics, but some of Shiite Islam's highest spiritual figures operate here out of public view, issuing occasional utterances on issues they consider central to Iraqi society.

Does anyone think the UN would be imposing this runoff without the whistle-blowing by fired deputy UN representative Peter Galbraith? Until he spoke up, the UN was going to sweep the fraud under the carpet and keep US puppet Karzai in office. Galbraith's dad would be proud!

* Afghan mission likely to kill off NATO - general
* Blasts NATO's lack of cohesion, clarity

By David Ljunggren

OTTAWA, Oct 20 (Reuters) - The splits inside NATO over the Afghan war have turned the alliance into a rotting corpse that will be virtually impossible to revive, says the former head of Canada's armed forces.

General Rick Hillier also said the 28-member alliance was "dominated by jealousies and small, vicious political battles" and bemoaned its "lack of cohesion, clarity and professionalism" at the start of the Afghan mission.

Hillier made the angry comments in a new book called "A Soldier First: Bullets, Bureaucrats and the Politics of War", which was purchased by Reuters on Tuesday ahead of its scheduled publication date next week. Hiller stepped down as chief of the defense staff last year.

Canada often complains that its 2,700 soldiers in southern Afghanistan are bearing the brunt of the war while other NATO members insist their troops be stationed in more peaceful parts of the country and limit what they can do.

"Afghanistan has revealed that NATO has reached the stage where it is a corpse decomposing and somebody's going to have to perform a Frankenstein-like life-giving act by breathing some lifesaving air through those rotten lips into those putrescent lungs or the alliance will be done," Hillier wrote.

"Any major setback in Afghanistan will see it off to the cleaners, and unless the alliance can snatch victory out of feeble efforts, it's not going to be long in existence in its present form."

So far, 131 Canadian soldiers have died in Afghanistan. The combat mission is due to end in 2011 and Ottawa says it has no plans to extend it.

Hillier, who commanded the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan from February to August 2004, said he was alarmed to discover the extent to which the body had split into factions.

"It was more important within the alliance that every nation get to build up its fiefdom than it was to put together a solid team for a successful mission," he said.

"Some nations were meticulous about selecting the best people for the job ... many did not, and some of my headquarters officers didn't show up at all."

Hillier also complained that when NATO took over control of ISAF in 2003 it had "no strategy, no clear articulation of what they wanted to achieve ... it was abysmal".

He added: "NATO had started down a road that destroyed much of its credibility and in the end eroded support for the mission in every nation in the alliance. Sadly, years later, the situation remains unchanged."

Hillier -- who had an unusually high public profile and was always happy to talk to the media -- also attacked the federal bureaucracy in Ottawa, saying it was jealous of the boost in defense spending that occurred under the Conservatives.

He also complained that officials working for Prime Minister Stephen Harper told him he should be making fewer public pronouncements. He ignored the advice.

A spokesman for Harper declined to comment on the book.

UK navy forces to return to Iraq

British naval personnel are to return to Iraq to train local forces, Armed Forces Minister Bill Rammell has said.

The announcement comes after politicians in Baghdad passed legislation allowing their return.

The six-year British military mission in Iraq ended on 30 April this year with all UK personnel withdrawn in July.

The Ministry of Defence said that the navy personnel would be back in Iraq next month.

Mr Rammell told the Commons it was agreed "training activity should resume as soon as possible".

In a written statement, he said: "The government intends to notify the Iraqi government within the next few days that the UK is ready to bring this agreement into force."

Between 100 and 150 British service personnel withdrew to Kuwait in July after the Iraqi parliament failed to ratify an agreement allowing them to remain.

Training of the Iraqi Navy has been paused since June and it is important to resume this activity as soon as possible
Armed Forces Minister Bill Rammell

The MoD has indicated that about the same number of Royal Navy personnel would return.

more

KUNDUZ, Afghanistan, Oct 22 (Reuters) - A military helicopter crashed in northern Afghanistan on Thursday, causing casualties, but it was not yet clear whether the aircraft was Afghan or foreign, a senior intelligence official said.

The helicopter crashed in the northern part of the Hindu Kush mountains in Baghlan province, said the province's intelligence chief General Majid.

He said the helicopter had not been shot down.

Officials for both NATO-led forces and foreign troops under the U.S. military command said all of their aircraft had been accounted for.

Afghan security officials in Kabul were not immediately available for comment.

A senior Afghan army general in the northern region, Murad Ali Murad, confirmed a military helicopter had crashed, but said the aircraft did not belong to Afghan troops. more

"U.S. troops in Iraq have time on hands" by Aamer Madhani, USA TODAY

CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE ADDER, Iraq — Pfc. Adrian Vesik heard that war could be hell.

He was happy to discover when he arrived in Iraq earlier this year that his war experience also would include salsa dancing, yoga and martial-arts classes.

"When I signed up for the Army, I thought I was going to be a hero — go out and do some fighting," says Vesik, 19, during a break at a Filipino-Okinawan jujitsu class. "I haven't come close to doing anything that I was trained to do. I work, maybe, four to five hours a day. I have time to try all these new things. It's not so bad."

Because of new rules that require Iraqi approval for all U.S. missions, and a general decline in violence nationwide, many of the 117,000 U.S. troops stationed in Iraq say they now have more idle time than at any previous point in the six-year war.

Combat is still a daily reality in some parts of Iraq, and U.S. troops are being killed here at a rate of about one a week.

But for many troops in places such as this large military base in southern Iraq, traditional soldiering such as kicking down doors and searching for roadside bombs has at least partly given way to book clubs, karaoke nights, sports and distance-learning university programs.

Attention military decision makers. Has anybody yet noticed that when you stop invading the private spaces of others (countries, homes, etc) and shooting at the residents, then they stop shooting at you?

Ruling paves way for asylum-seekers to be returned

The Independent, By Robert Verkaik, October 23

Hundreds of Afghans living in Britain face being deported after immigration judges ruled that their home country's bloody conflict did not make the region an unsafe place to return failed asylum-seekers.

The test ruling opens the way for deportation flights to southern parts of the war-torn country where thousands of civilians have lost their lives since the toppling of the Taliban in 2001.

Three judges of the Immigration and Asylum Tribunal ruled on Wednesday that the level of "indiscriminate violence" was not enough to permit Afghans to claim general humanitarian protection in the United Kingdom. Hundreds of asylum-seekers a year are returned to Afghanistan if they have not convinced a court they are in fear of persecution or that their lives are in danger. The ruling on Wednesday prevents them from arguing that the country is a dangerous place.

New York Times, By Thom Shanker, October 23

BRATISLAVA — NATO defense ministers gave their broad endorsement Friday to the counterinsurgency strategy for Afghanistan laid out by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, increasing pressure on the Obama administration and on their own governments to commit more military and civilian resources for the mission to succeed.

General McChrystal, the senior American and allied commander in Afghanistan, landed here early Friday to brief NATO defense ministers on his strategic review of an 8-year-old war in which the American-led effort has lost momentum to a tenacious insurgency. The closed-door session — which had not been disclosed in advance — added a note of drama to the sort of NATO ministerial meeting that is often mundane.

“What we did today was to discuss General McChrystal’s overall assessment, his overall approach, and I have noted a broad support from all ministers of this overall counterinsurgency approach,” said NATO’s secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

Although the broad acceptance by NATO defense ministers of General McChrystal’s strategic review included no decision on new troops, it was another in a series of acknowledgements that success there cannot be achieved by a narrower effort that calls only for capturing and killing Al Qaeda-linked terrorists. That counter-terrorism strategy is identified with Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

New York Times, By Peter Baker, October 23

Prague — Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. had a blunt response on Friday to the latest broadsides from former Vice President Dick Cheney: “Who cares?”

In the latest exchange between old and new administrations, Mr. Biden rebuffed his predecessor’s criticism about President Obama’s handling of Afghanistan as “absolutely wrong.” And Mr. Biden rejected the last review of the war conducted by the White House under former President George W. Bush and Mr. Cheney as “irrelevant.”

The dismissive reply, which came at the end of Mr. Biden’s three-day swing through Eastern Europe during an interview with reporters traveling with him, underscored the weariness in the current White House with Mr. Cheney’s periodic assaults. At the same time, advisers to Mr. Obama and Mr. Biden consider the former vice president a useful public foil and have not shied away from escalating the debate by taking him on directly.

This entry is part of an ongoing series, The Warlord and the Election.

One of the questions underlying Barack Obama's Afghan strategy review is the extent to which the U.S. can win the support of Afghanistan's fiercely independent tribes, particularly in rural Pashtun areas along the Pakistani border. The area remains one of the most dangerous in Afghanistan: Earlier this month, Taliban fighters overran an American outpost in Nuristan province, killing 8 American soldiers. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, has acknowledged that the U.S. cannot field enough soldiers to secure the sparsely-populated region; he has begun withdrawing troops to population centers.

James Foley embedded with an army unit in eastern Afghanistan earlier this year. Here, in three parts, is his report on the army's troubled efforts to "rent" a local warlord to provide security during the August election.

Pt One: The Shura

24 Oct 2009 18:27:36 GMT
Source: Reuters
(Adds NATO response from statement, details)

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, Oct 24 (Reuters) - NATO-led forces in Afghanistan said on Saturday they would investigate the killing of four Afghans, reported by police to include a child and two women, by foreign troops in southern Kandahar city.

"We are deeply sorry for the loss of any life, especially civilians," spokesman Colonel Wayne Shanks was quoted as saying in a NATO statement.

A Kandahar police official said a U.S. military convoy opened fire on a civilian vehicle, killing a child, two women and a man. A spokesman for NATO was unable to confirm the age and gender of the casualties.

The convoy involved appeared to belong to U.S. Special Forces, police official Shah Agha told Reuters.

The NATO statement said one of its convoys had shot at a civilian vehicle after it failed to stop when signalled to do so, killing four aboard and possibly wounding two others. It would not disclose the nationality of the troops involved.

"ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) troops tried repeatedly to signal the fast-approaching vehicle with passive measures, but fearing for their safety fired on the vehicle," the statement from the alliance said. more

Sikh gets rare permission to wear turban, beard in US Army
US News

Oct 24, 2009, 15:11 GMT

Washington - The US Army on Friday granted a Sikh permission to serve on active duty
while wearing a turban, long hair and beard in a rare exception allowing him to display his religious faith.

Captain Kamaljeet Singh Kalsi, who had trained as an Army doctor, would become the first Sikh in more than 23 years to receive the exception, the New York-based Sikh coalition said.

Kalsi successfully appealed an order he received earlier this year to cut his hair and remove his turban before showing up for active duty.

The Army prohibits soldiers or officers from displaying religious symbols while on duty, but allows soldiers to seek waivers on a case- by-case basis, Lieutenant Colonel George Wright, an Army spokesman, said.

The rules enacted in the 1980s are in place to maintain cohesion and discipline within the ranks as part of the dress code. Kalsi's waiver can, however, be revoked if he is transferred to a new assignment or deployed overseas, Wright said.

In a letter provided by the Sikh Coalition, Army Major General Gina Farrisee told Kalsi his beard and hair must be kept 'neat and well maintained at all times.'

Kalsi studied medicine in the Army for eight years before being summoned for active duty.

'I am overjoyed by the Army's decision to allow me to serve my country,' Captain Kalsi said in a statement. 'Like the many Sikhs who fought before me, I know I will serve America with honor and excellence.'

The Sikh Coalition welcomed the decision in Kalsi's case but called on the Army to revise its policies that prevent many other Sikhs from serving.

'We look forward to the day when the Army finally welcomes the service of all Sikhs, not just Captain Kalsi,' the coalition said.

PRESSURE, PRESSURE, PRESSURE! I have a feeling the Dutch will be threatened with some form of punishment if they plan to leave Afghanistan.

Despite a majority vote in parliament ruling out an extension of the Netherlands' mission in Afghanistan, the Dutch defence minister, who is attending a Nato conference in Bratislava, says the cabinet is keeping all options open.

Two weeks ago a majority in the Dutch parliament adopted a motion demanding the withdrawal of all Dutch troops from Uruzgan province in Afghanistan by December 1, 2010. The motion had the support of two partners in the coalition government: Labour and the orthodox Christian ChristenUnie.
Yet it seems the Dutch government has still not given up hope of keeping a Dutch military presence in Afghanistan beyond 2010.

"You have to make the distinction between Afghanistan and Uruzgan. The parliamentary debate was only about Uruzgan. The motion is a fact, now it is up to the cabinet to make the next move. It is still open," defence minister Eimert Van Middelkoop told NRC Handelsblad in Bratislava on Friday. Van Middelkoop is in Slovakia for a two-day informal meeting of the Nato foreign ministers.

Pressure from Nato allies

The minister's words appear to be at odds with what the parliament decided two weeks ago. An extension of the mission is unacceptable, not just in Uruzgan, but elsewhere in Afghanistan too, Labour member of parliament Martijn van Dam said after the vote in parliament. "You can't withdraw from Uruzgan and start a similar operation somewhere else in Afghanistan."

The Netherlands currently has about 1,450 troops in the southern province Uruzgan, where it has been the 'lead nation' in Nato's mission since 2006. When the mission was last extended in 2007 the government promised the troops would come home in 2010 at the latest.

But the Netherlands has been under increasing pressure from its Nato allies to keep some kind of military presence in Afghanistan beyond the 2010 deadline, possibly as part of a joint Provincial Reconstruction Team for which Dutch soldiers would provide protection.

"What's important now is what Nato thinks about this, and how the international community will react," Van Middelkoop said. The minister said the impression he got from his Nato colleagues was that the Dutch withdrawal is seen as "a remarkable Alleingang, which is at odds with recent developments within the alliance". This sounds ominous

Leaving a void

The pressure from other Nato members is still "subtle", the minister said, but he expected it to increase by early December, when the Nato foreign ministers meet. By that time the second round of the presidential elections in Afghanistan will be over, and US president Barack Obama will have taken a decision about whether or not to send more troops to Afghanistan.

Van Middelkoop: "I'm taking what I'm hearing here back to The Hague. I have been approached by various countries: Britain, Australia, the US. The Australians [who also have troops in Uruzgan] are particularly worried. They're afraid of the void that a Dutch withdrawal would leave." Source

_{Tolerating prostitution is tolerating abuse and torture of women and children.}

From the WaPo:
"We have some people, powerful people, inside and outside government, who can freely smuggle drugs," said Nur al-Haq Ulumi, a member of the Afghan parliament from Kandahar. "If we had an honest government, the government could track down and arrest these people -- everybody knows this."

It's been a racket all along... Same thing here in the States!
--
Hongpong.com

This was a zero win before it even began. Consult the stars... Read the tea leaves. The outcome was DOOM at it's very initiation. The pit opens beneath the Empire...

27 Oct 2009 04:58:18 GMT
Source: Reuters
(Adds quotes and details)

DUBAI, Oct 27 (Reuters) - An al Qaeda-linked group has said it carried out the twin suicide bombings that killed 155 people in Baghdad on Sunday and revived doubts about security in the run-up to Iraq's elections in January.

The statement dated Oct. 26 was posted by the Islamic State in Iraq group on a website often used by militants to announce responsibility for such attacks.

"Suicide bombers targeted the dens of infidelity and pillars of the rejectionist Shi'ite state in the land of the caliphate," the statement said.

It employed language often used by Sunni Arab militants to describe the Shi'ite Muslim majority that has dominated the Iraqi government since the U.S.-led invasion of 2003.

"Among the chosen targets were the ministry of oppression known as the ministry of justice and the Baghdad provincial assembly ... The enemies only understand the language of force," said the statement.

The authenticity of the claim could not be immediately verified.

more

Foreign Service officer and former Marine captain says he no longer knows why his nation is fighting

By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 27, 2009

When Matthew Hoh joined the Foreign Service early this year, he was exactly the kind of smart civil-military hybrid the administration was looking for to help expand its development efforts in Afghanistan.

A former Marine Corps captain with combat experience in Iraq, Hoh had also served in uniform at the Pentagon, and as a civilian in Iraq and at the State Department. By July, he was the senior U.S. civilian in Zabul province, a Taliban hotbed.

But last month, in a move that has sent ripples all the way to the White House, Hoh, 36, became the first U.S. official known to resign in protest over the Afghan war, which he had come to believe simply fueled the insurgency.

"I have lost understanding of and confidence in the strategic purposes of the United States' presence in Afghanistan," he wrote Sept. 10 in a four-page letter to the department's head of personnel. "I have doubts and reservations about our current strategy and planned future strategy, but my resignation is based not upon how we are pursuing this war, but why and to what end."

The reaction to Hoh's letter was immediate. Senior U.S. officials, concerned that they would lose an outstanding officer and perhaps gain a prominent critic, appealed to him to stay.

U.S. Ambassador Karl W. Eikenberry brought him to Kabul and offered him a job on his senior embassy staff. Hoh declined. From there, he was flown home for a face-to-face meeting with Richard C. Holbrooke, the administration's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"We took his letter very seriously, because he was a good officer," Holbrooke said in an interview. "We all thought that given how serious his letter was, how much commitment there was, and his prior track record, we should pay close attention to him."

While he did not share Hoh's view that the war "wasn't worth the fight," Holbrooke said, "I agreed with much of his analysis." He asked Hoh to join his team in Washington, saying that "if he really wanted to affect policy and help reduce the cost of the war on lives and treasure," why not be "inside the building, rather than outside, where you can get a lot of attention but you won't have the same political impact?"

Hoh accepted the argument and the job, but changed his mind a week later. "I recognize the career implications, but it wasn't the right thing to do," he said in an interview Friday, two days after his resignation became final.

"I'm not some peacenik, pot-smoking hippie who wants everyone to be in love," Hoh said. Although he said his time in Zabul was the "second-best job I've ever had," his dominant experience is from the Marines, where many of his closest friends still serve.

"There are plenty of dudes who need to be killed," he said of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. "I was never more happy than when our Iraq team whacked a bunch of guys."

But many Afghans, he wrote in his resignation letter, are fighting the United States largely because its troops are there -- a growing military presence in villages and valleys where outsiders, including other Afghans, are not welcome and where the corrupt, U.S.-backed national government is rejected. While the Taliban is a malign presence, and Pakistan-based al-Qaeda needs to be confronted, he said, the United States is asking its troops to die in Afghanistan for what is essentially a far-off civil war.

As the White House deliberates over whether to deploy more troops, Hoh said he decided to speak out publicly because "I want people in Iowa, people in Arkansas, people in Arizona, to call their congressman and say, 'Listen, I don't think this is right.' "

"I realize what I'm getting into . . . what people are going to say about me," he said. "I never thought I would be doing this."
'Uncommon bravery'

Hoh's journey -- from Marine, reconstruction expert and diplomat to war protester -- was not an easy one. Over the weeks he spent thinking about and drafting his resignation letter, he said, "I felt physically nauseous at times."

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bbc

Eight US soldiers have been killed in bomb attacks in southern Afghanistan, say Nato-led forces.

An Afghan civilian was also killed in the multiple attacks.

The Italians were renting quiet in their zone via Taliban bribes but they didn't tell anyone else in NATO evidently - at least not the poor saps controlling their replacements. Of course things went to hell when the bribes stopped. Obviously the bribes were a good idea from the Italian perspective, and in keeping with local politics, but it really proves NATO as a whole is hosed because they're obliged to pretend it can't be done (or else face the music about the whole structure of it).
Link etc
--
Hongpong.com

UK Times Online by Jeremy Page - Oct 23

In 1985 the Soviet campaign in Afghanistan was at a turning point. Mikhail Gorbachev had just become Communist Party chief and was looking for an exit strategy. The Red Army wanted more troops.

Both had lost faith in Babrak Karmal, the Afghan President whom they installed in 1979 but who was now weak, incompetent and confined mostly to his palace.

Sound familiar?

It is easy to overstate the parallels between the Soviet and Nato campaigns in Afghanistan. President Obama faces similar challenges as he prepares to decide — probably in the next month — how to avoid the same fate as the British in the 19th century and the Soviets in the 20th.

He, too, faces calls for a surge of up to 80,000 more troops to defeat a militant alliance nurtured in neighbouring Pakistan. And he, too, has lost faith in President Karzai as a credible partner, for many of the reasons that the Soviets started to doubt Mr Karmal.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/28/world/asia/28intel.html

Didn't we "uncover" this before?

_{I feel the American worker has been sacrificed to the capitalist idols in the ancient Mayan fashion. - Sue Lamb, NYT reader}

28 Oct 2009 06:01:05 GMT
Source: Reuters
(For full coverage of Afghanistan, click on [nAFPAK])

* Hotel blasts suggest coordinated attacks

* Three militants dead in guest-house attack

* Bloodiest month for U.S. troops in eight years of war

* Obama weighs added troops, to meet military chiefs

* Hillary Clinton in neighbouring Pakistan

(Updates death toll, adds U.N. stall all foreigners)

By Golnar Motevalli and Sayed Salahuddin

KABUL, Oct 28 (Reuters) - Six U.N. foreign staff were killed when Taliban militants attacked an international guest-house in Kabul on Wednesday, while rockets were fired at a foreign-owned hotel in the Afghan capital, forcing 100 guests into a bunker.

An increasingly resurgent Taliban have vowed to stage attacks ahead of a run-off in Afghanistan's presidential election on Nov. 7 and the apparently coordinated assault on Wednesday will raise questions about security for the vote.

The attacks occurred as U.S. President Barack Obama weighs whether to send more soldiers to Afghanistan to fight a Taliban insurgency at its fiercest since 2001.

"The number right now is six dead, all of them U.N. staff," said Adrian Edwards, spokesman for the United Nations mission in Afghanistan, adding at least nine were wounded in the attack on the guest-house.

Their nationalities were unclear. Afghan forces exchanged gunfire for hours with militants inside the house, police said.

Later the bodies of three suspected suicide bombers, apparently ripped apart when they detonated their explosives, could be seen lying inside the compound.

Abdul Ghaim, a policeman at the scene, told Reuters: "We think they (the militants) are Pakistani."

Officials said the shooting was over but one female guest at the house was still missing and a search was under way inside the building, covered by bullet holes and badly damaged with its walls charred and windows shattered.

"Several Taliban suiciders (took) hostage several U.N. workers in Kabul," the Islamist movement said in an English-language text message sent to Reuters.

more

AFP
Published: Tuesday October 27, 2009

US drone strikes against suspected terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan could be breaking international laws against summary executions, the UN's top investigator of such crimes said.

"The problem with the United States is that it is making an increased use of drones/Predators (which are) particularly prominently used now in relation to Pakistan and Afghanistan," UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions Philip Alston told a press conference.

"My concern is that drones/Predators are being operated in a framework which may well violate international humanitarian law and international human rights law," he said.

US strikes with remote-controlled aircraft against Al-Qaeda and Taliban targets in Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan have often resulted in civilian deaths and drawn bitter criticism from local populations.

"The onus is really on the United States government to reveal more about the ways in which it makes sure that arbitrary extrajudicial executions aren't in fact being carried out through the use of these weapons," he added.

Alston said he presented a report on the matter to the UN General Assembly.

He urged the United States to be more forthright about how and when it uses drone aircraft, something about which the US Defense Department and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) usually keep silent.

"We need the United States to be more up front and say, 'OK, we're willing to discuss some aspects of this program,' otherwise you have the really problematic bottom line that the CIA is running a program that is killing significant numbers of people and there is absolutely no accountability in terms of the relevant international laws," Alston said.

Since August 2008, around 70 strikes by unmanned aircraft have killed close to 600 people in northwestern Pakistan.

"I would like to know the legal basis upon which the United States is operating, in other words... who is running the program, what accountability mechanisms are in place in relation to that," Alston said.

"Secondly, what precautions the United States is taking to ensure that these weapons are used strictly for purposes consistent with international humanitarian law.

"Third, what sort of review mechanism is there to evaluate when these weapons have been used? Those are the issues I'd like to see addressed," the UN official said.

U.S. defense bill would pay Taliban to switch sides
Tue Oct 27, 2009 4:48pm EDT

* Bill includes provision to woo Taliban fighters

* Plan is to emulate Iraq program

* Obama plans to meet military commanders on Friday (Adds Obama's meeting with joint chiefs, quotes, details)

By Susan Cornwell

WASHINGTON, Oct 27 (Reuters) - The defense bill President Barack Obama will sign into law on Wednesday contains a new provision that would pay Taliban fighters who renounce the insurgency, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin said on Tuesday.

The provision establishes a program in Afghanistan similar to one used in Iraq where former fighters were re-integrated into Iraqi society, Levin told Reuters.

Obama plans to sign the bill authorizing Pentagon operations for fiscal 2010 on Wednesday, the White House said.

Reaching out to moderate Taliban members is part of the Obama administration's plan to turn around the eight-year war in Afghanistan. Levin also has advocated trying to convince Taliban fighters to change sides by luring them with jobs and amnesty for past attacks.

Under the legislation, Afghan fighters who renounce the insurgency would be paid for "mainly protection of their towns and villages," Levin said.

It would be "just like the sons of Iraq," he said, referring to the program used in Iraq which military commanders say helped turn around a failing war.

"You got 90,000 Iraqis who switched sides, and are involved in protecting their hometowns against attack and violence." L

The bill authorizes using money from an existing Commanders Emergency Response Program, which U.S. commanders can use for a variety of purposes. It does not set a specific dollar amount for the fighters' re-integration program.

There is $1.3 billion authorized for the fund in fiscal 2010, which began Oct. 1. The money must still be allocated by defense appropriators, who are working to finish the legislation.

As part of his overall strategy review on Afghanistan, Obama is debating whether to send more U.S. troops to the region and is set to meet on Friday with Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the heads of the military services, the White House said.

The meeting was "probably getting toward the end" of Obama's decision-making process, said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.

The Joint Chiefs office recently completed an internal assessment of the two leading proposals for troop levels in Afghanistan.

These were sending roughly 40,000 additional troops, as his commander for Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, has recommended, or a far smaller number, an option McChrystal and other defense officials see as having a higher risk of failure.

WASHINGTON, Oct 29 (IPS) - The revelation by the New York Times Wednesday that Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, has long been on the payroll of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency is only the tip of a much bigger iceberg of heavy dependence by U.S. and NATO counterinsurgency forces on Afghan warlords for security, according to a recently published report and investigations by Australian and Canadian journalists.

U.S. and other NATO military contingents operating in the provinces of Afghanistan's predominantly Pashtun south and east have been hiring private militias controlled by Afghan warlords, according to these sources, to provide security for their forward operating bases and other bases and to guard convoys.

Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal has acknowledged that U.S. and NATO ties with warlords have been a cause of popular Afghan alienation from foreign military forces. But the policy is not likely to be reversed anytime soon, because U.S. and NATO officials still have no alternative to the security services the warlords provide.

A report published by the Center on International Cooperation at New York University in September notes that U.S. and NATO contingents have frequently hired security providers that are covertly owned by warlords who have "ready-made" private militias which compete with state institutions for power.

The report cites examples of major warlords or their relatives or allies who have been contracted for security services in four provinces. More

_{Tolerating prostitution is tolerating abuse and torture of women and children.}

Source: Reuters
(For more on Afghanistan, click on: [ID:nAFPAK])

* Extra polling centres planned because of improved security

* Bomb attacks kill eight in Afghan east

* Karzai assures U.N.'s Ban security will be increased

By Golnar Motevalli

KABUL, Oct 30 (Reuters) - Afghan election officials on Friday defended plans to open more polling centres for next week's presidential run-off despite fears not enough is being done to prevent a repeat of the fraud which marred the first round.

Security is also a major concern ahead of the Nov. 7 run-off, which the Taliban have vowed to disrupt, underlined by a suicide attack this week on a guest-house used by the United Nations in which five foreign U.N. staff were killed.

Western officials have already described as "disturbing" plans for the run-off, which both Kabul and Washington hope will end weeks of political uncertainty.

It also comes as U.S. President Barack Obama weighs whether to send thousands more troops to Afghanistan, where violence this year has reached its worst levels since the Taliban were ousted by U.S.-backed Afghan forces in 2001.

The run-off between President Hamid Karzai and his main rival, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, was triggered by a U.N.-led fraud investigation into the first round of voting which which found widespread fraud in favour of Karzai.

With little time to organise the run-off, security concerns keeping voter turn-out down in the first round and winter fast approaching, election officials last week said fewer polling centres would be open for the run-off than in August.

But the government-appointed Independent Election Commission (IEC) now says the number of polling centres would increase slightly, largely because of better security in former Taliban strongholds in the south where U.S., British and Afghan forces have been fighting major offensives.

"The number of polling stations is not too many ... it is because of better security in certain areas," Daoud Ali Najafi, Chief Electoral Officer for Afghanistan, told Reuters.

Western officials have expressed fears increasing the number of polling centres would raise rather than lessen the risk of fraud.

Najafi said 6,315 polling centres were set up in the first round, although many never opened because of poor security and Taliban threats. He said authorities were setting up 6,322 centres for the run-off, mainly reflecting better security in parts of southern Helmand province.

"In the first round ... we had more (polling centres) than we needed. But there are seven more centres in Helmand in districts that have been secured since then and they will open for the second round," Najafi said.

Whether the polling centres would actually open on Nov. 7 would depend on security at the time, he said.

SECURITY FEARS

Karzai, who is expected to win the run-off, assured U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon in a telephone call overnight that the United Nations would provide better security for U.N. staff after Wednesday's attack.

"President Karzai assured the U.N Secretary-General that Afghanistan ... will do everything to provide proper security to all U.N. staff in the country and better security measures for U.N installations," said a statement from the president's palace.

Ban said the United Nations, which has been operating in Afghanistan for almost 60 years, will beef up its security. U.N. officials in Kabul have said they will continue to support the run-off.

The Taliban have said the guest-house was targeted because of the U.N. role in helping organise the vote.

Sporadic attacks took place across Afghanistan during the first round but failed to disrupt the process entirely.

In a further sign of escalating violence, eight civilians were killed when their vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb in eastern Nangarhar province on Friday morning, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

Truthdig, By Scott Ritter, October 29

There is a curious phenomenon taking place in the American media at the moment: the lionization of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the American military commander in Afghanistan. Although he has taken a few lumps for playing politics with the White House, McChrystal has generally been sold to the American public as a “Zen warrior,” a counterinsurgency genius who, if simply left to his own devices, will be able to radically transform the ongoing debacle that is Afghanistan into a noble victory that will rank as one of the greatest political and military triumphs of modern history. McChrystal’s resume and persona (a former commander of America’s special operations forces, a tireless athlete and a scholar) have been breathlessly celebrated in several interviews and articles. Reporters depict him as an ascetic soldier who spouts words of wisdom to rival Confucius, Jesus and Muhammad.

[...]

McChrystal operates under the illusion that American military power can provide a shield from behind which Afghanistan can remake itself into a viable modern society. He has deluded himself and others into believing that the people of Afghanistan want to be part of such a grand social experiment, and furthermore that they will tolerate the United States being in charge. The reality of Afghan history, culture and society argue otherwise. The Taliban, once a defeated entity in the months following the initial American military incursion into Afghanistan, are resurgent and growing stronger every day. The principle source of the Taliban’s popularity is the resentment of the Afghan people toward the American occupation and the corrupt proxy government of Hamid Karzai. There is nothing an additional 40,000 American troops will be able to do to change that basic equation. The Soviets tried and failed. They deployed 110,000 troops, operating on less restrictive lines of communication and logistical supply than the United States. They built an Afghan army of some 45,000 troops. They operated without the constraints of American rules of engagement. They slaughtered around a million Afghans. And they lost, for the simple reason that the people of Afghanistan did not want them, or their Afghan proxies.

MEETING WITH JOINT CHIEFS President looks to send fewer additional troops

Washington Post, By Anne E. Kornblut & Greg Jaffe, October 31

President Obama has asked the Pentagon's top generals to provide him with more options for troop levels in Afghanistan, two U.S. officials said late Friday, with one adding that some of the alternatives would allow Obama to send fewer new troops than the roughly 40,000 requested by his top commander.

Obama met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the White House on Friday, holding a 90-minute discussion that centered on the strain on the force after eight years of war in two countries. The meeting -- the first of its kind with the chiefs of the Navy, Army, Marine Corps and Air Force, who were not part of the president's war council meetings on Afghanistan in recent weeks -- prompted Obama to request another such meeting before he announces a decision on sending additional troops, the officials said.

The military chiefs have been largely supportive of a resource request by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, that would by one Pentagon estimate require the deployment of 44,000 additional troops. But opinion among members of Obama's national security team is divided, and he now appears to be seeking a compromise solution that would satisfy both his military and civilian advisers.