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US 2011 drawdown in Afghanistan will be 'limited': Gates
by Dan De Luce
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Amid growing clamor against the war in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has cautioned that large numbers of US troops will remain even after a "limited" July 2011 drawdown.
Netherlands becomes first NATO country to end its combat mission in Afghanistan
By Robert H. Reid The Washington Post Monday, August 2, 2010; A08
KABUL -- The Netherlands became the first NATO country to end its combat mission in Afghanistan, drawing the curtain Sunday on a four-year operation that was deeply unpopular at home and even brought down a Dutch government.
Taliban don't have stinger missiles: Gates
Sun Aug 1, 3:16 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – US Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Sunday dismissed reports that Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan use anti-aircraft stinger missiles similar to those directed against Soviet forces in the 1980s.
Burden of war in Afghanistan shifts even more to the U.S.
U.S. troops now account for about two-thirds of the NATO force in Afghanistan, and Americans make up more than two-thirds of July's Western military fatalities.
Los Angeles Times By Laura King August 1, 2010
Reporting from Forward Operating Base Kunduz - The platoon sergeant was inspecting the gaping crater left by a roadside bomb in northern Afghanistan when a second thunderous blast went off just 20 feet away.
US Military Officials Condemn Leaks of Afghan War Documents
VOA News August 1, 2010 Michael Bowman | Washington
America's top military officials are condemning last week's public dissemination of thousands of secret U.S. military documents on the war in Afghanistan, but insist the nine-year effort to root out insurgents and terrorists is not a lost cause.
Witness says WikiLeaks investigators sought to limit disclosure
By Ellen Nakashima Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, August 1, 2010
Before the online site WikiLeaks published a trove of classified documents about the Afghanistan war, government investigators interviewed Boston-area acquaintances of a military analyst charged with providing other documents to the site in an effort to prevent additional leaks, according to one person interviewed in the probe.
NATO not concerned over withdrawal of Dutch troops from Afghanistan
KABUL, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- The spokesman of NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said on Sunday that the alliance wasn't concerned about the withdrawal of Dutch forces from Afghanistan after conclusion of a four-year mission.
U.S. diplomat to serve as advisor to Afghan Attorney General
KABUL, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- A U.S. diplomat to Afghanistan Hans Klemm has been appointed to serve as advisor to Afghanistan Attorney General Mohammad Ishaq Alako, a local newspaper reported on Sunday.
Suicide car bomb kills 5 kids in south Afghanistan
By Mirwais Khan, Associated Press Writer
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan – A suicide car bomber blew himself up next to a police truck bringing a southern Afghan official to work early Monday, killing five children nearby, officials said.
Afghanistan minibus bombing kills 6
Vehicle is full of civilians as it strikes roadside bomb
Sunday, August 1, 2010 The Associated Press (Canada)
A minibus full of civilians struck a roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan early Sunday, and Afghan officials said six people on board were killed.
Afghans march in Kabul to denounce NATO strikes that killed civilians
By Joshua Partlow Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, August 2, 2010; A08
KABUL -- Afghan protesters marched through downtown Kabul on Sunday morning chanting anti-American slogans and denouncing NATO bombardments that have killed civilians.
Afghan, NATO troops kill armed militant in Kabul
People's Daily - Jul 31 11:09pm
Afghan and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) killed an anti-government militant during a joint operation in the Afghan capital Kabul, said a statement of the alliance released on Sunday.
Rules for Afghanistan: Fight Taliban, corruption, "drink lots of tea
By the CNN Wire Staff August 1, 2010
(CNN) -- Fight the Taliban "relentlessly." Don't tolerate corruption. Drink "lots of tea" with the locals.
Those admonitions are among the two dozen guidelines for counterinsurgency warfare that Gen. David Petraeus issued to U.S. and allied troops in Afghanistan on Sunday. In his first major public pronouncement since taking command in early July, Petraeus urged American troops and the NATO-led International
Singapore to help target Afghan corruption
The Japan Times Sunday, Aug. 1, 2010 SINGAPORE (Kyodo)
Singapore will collaborate with Japan to help war-torn Afghanistan train its civil servants in combating corruption.
American forces enter uneasy alliances with tribal strongmen in Afghanistan
Practice raises questions among some US officials
Washington Post By Karin Brulliard August 1, 2010
NOW RUZI, Afghanistan - Haji Ghani is an illiterate, hashish-producing former warlord who directs a semiofficial police force. In this Taliban nest west of Kandahar, he is also a key partner of US forces.
Targeted Killing Is New U.S. Focus in Afghanistan
The New York Times - Technology By HELENE COOPER and MARK LANDLER July 31, 2010
WASHINGTON - When President Obama announced his new war plan for Afghanistan last year, the centerpiece of the strategy — and a big part of the rationale for sending 30,000 additional troops — was to safeguard the Afghan people, provide them with a competent government and win their allegiance.
Afghanistan: which way now?
As the British and US governments ponder their next move, the Observer's foreign affairs editor Peter Beaumont examines the four most likely scenarios
guardian.co.uk Peter Beaumont Sunday 1 August 2010
The Basra option - During the latter period of the British occupation of the Iraqi city of Basra, two questions emerged: whether the high profile of British troops actually provided a target and made the violence worse? And whether the escalating conflict in that area was a direct result of primarily military efforts to bring security to it?
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US 2011 drawdown in Afghanistan will be 'limited': Gates
by Dan De Luce
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Amid growing clamor against the war in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has cautioned that large numbers of US troops will remain even after a "limited" July 2011 drawdown.
Despite mounting casualties and public doubts, Gates said Sunday the US-led force was making headway and Taliban insurgents would not be able to wait out American forces because a major troop withdrawal was not on the horizon.
"I think we need to reemphasize the message that we are not leaving Afghanistan in July of 2011," said Gates, referring to a deadline set by President Barack Obama for the start of a withdrawal.
"My personal opinion is that drawdowns early on will be of fairly limited numbers," he told ABC's "This Week."
Asked if the Taliban could simply "run out the clock" until the mid-2011 target, Gates said that he would "welcome that, because we will be there in the 19th month, and we will be there with a lot of troops."
The war has become increasingly unpopular with the American public and among Democratic lawmakers, amid a rising US death toll and a lack of confidence in Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
The United States also faces questions about whether it can win back Afghans from a resurgent Taliban without remaking Afghanistan in the sort of nation-building exercise it has pledged not to undertake.
Defending the US war effort, Obama told CBS's "Early Show" that Washington's goals were "fairly modest" and that the United States had no plans to turn Afghanistan into a Western-style democracy.
"What we're looking to do is difficult, very difficult, but it's a fairly modest goal, which is, don't allow terrorists to operate from this region," he said in an interview broadcast Sunday.
"That can be accomplished," he added. "We can stabilize Afghanistan sufficiently and we can get enough cooperation from Pakistan that we are not magnifying the threat against the homeland."
The US-led invasion of Afghanistan in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks ousted from power the Taliban regime and scattered Osama Bin Laden and members of his Al-Qaeda network.
But in almost nine years since, a Taliban insurgency has become increasingly emboldened despite the presence now of almost 150,000 NATO and US troops.
Complicating the situation is a lack of faith in Karzai, who returned to power after elections generally regarded as fraudulent, and faces accusations of corruption and even ties to the drug trade.
The international coalition is also seeing signs of wear -- and shrinkage.
Dutch troops ended their mission in Afghanistan Sunday in the first significant drawdown of troops from the Afghan war.
The Netherlands' deployment began in 2006 and has cost the lives of 24 soldiers.
Switzerland is the only country to have withdrawn its forces until now, bringing its two soldiers home from Afghanistan in March 2008, NATO said.
Canada is withdrawing its entire force of 2,800 troops in Afghanistan next year, while Britain and the United States have signalled that some troops will also leave in 2011 with an overall aim to end combat operations in 2014.
Obama has staked his term in office on success in the war and campaigned on a platform of devoting greater attention to the conflict.
But as the deadline he set for beginning troop withdrawals approaches, there has been little tangible progress, and key Democratic allies have said they expect US troops to begin coming home soon.
Senator John Kerry, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said the administration needed to explain that the fight was key to US national security.
"They should be talking about... the way in which they have actually put al-Qaeda under pressure," he said on CNN's "GPS" program. "To walk away from that or to diminish that I think... history would be pretty harsh in its judgment."
Gates's comments Sunday echoed remarks by Vice President Joe Biden who has said that as few as 2,000 troops might withdraw from Afghanistan by July 2011.
But the top Democrat in the House of Representatives, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, said Sunday that Americans wanted to see a more significant troop withdrawal.
"Well, I hope it is more than that," Pelosi told ABC, referring to the 2,000 figure offered by Biden. "I know it's not going to be turn out the lights and let's all go home on one day."
A total of 413 foreign troops have died in the Afghan war so far this year, according to an AFP tally based on that kept by the icasualties.org website.
Two more foreign soldiers were killed in southern Afghanistan on Sunday, NATO said.
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Netherlands becomes first NATO country to end its combat mission in Afghanistan
By Robert H. Reid The Washington Post Monday, August 2, 2010; A08
KABUL -- The Netherlands became the first NATO country to end its combat mission in Afghanistan, drawing the curtain Sunday on a four-year operation that was deeply unpopular at home and even brought down a Dutch government.
The departure of the small force of nearly 1,900 Dutch troops is not expected to affect conditions on the ground. But it is politically significant because it comes at a time of rising casualties and of growing doubts about the war in NATO capitals, even as allied troops are beginning what could be the decisive campaign of the war.
Canada has announced that it will withdraw its 2,700 troops in 2011, and Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski has promised to pull out his country's 2,600 troops the year after.
That is likely to put pressure on other European governments such as Germany and Britain to scale back their forces, adding to the burden shouldered by the United States, which expects to have 100,000 troops in Afghanistan by the end of next month.
President Obama has pledged to begin withdrawing American troops starting in July 2011. But Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates told ABC's "This Week" broadcast Sunday that only a small number of troops would leave in the initial stage.
The end of the Dutch mission took place amid bad news from Afghanistan -- including rising casualties and uncertainty over a strategy that relies heavily on winning Afghan public support through improved security and a better performance by Afghanistan's corrupt and ineffectual government.
July was the deadliest month of the nearly nine-year-long war for U.S. forces, with 66 deaths. U.S. commanders have warned of more losses ahead as the NATO-led force ramps up operations in longtime Taliban strongholds in the southern provinces of Kandahar and Helmand, which accounted for most of last month's American deaths.
Two more international service members were killed Sunday in fighting in the south, NATO said without specifying nationalities.
Twenty-four Dutch troops have died in Afghanistan since the mission began in 2006. Most of the Dutch force was based in the central province of Uruzgan, where it will be replaced by troops from the United States, Australia, Slovakia and Singapore.
-- Associated Press
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Taliban don't have stinger missiles: Gates
Sun Aug 1, 3:16 pm ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) – US Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Sunday dismissed reports that Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan use anti-aircraft stinger missiles similar to those directed against Soviet forces in the 1980s.
"I don't think so," Gates told CNN's "State of the Union" program in response to a question on the matter.
Documents released by whistleblowers' website WikiLeaks one week ago suggested Taliban insurgents had the shoulder-fired, heat-seeking, surface-to-air missiles.
The use of stingers against US forces would be a step-up in the insurgency's capabilities although there have been no reports of US aircraft in the country being brought down by one during the near nine-year war.
The CIA delivered hundreds of stingers to Afghan fighters during the 1980s Soviet occupation. They destroyed up to 300 helicopter gunships, fighter jets and transport aircraft, prompting Russia's humiliating withdrawal.
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Burden of war in Afghanistan shifts even more to the U.S.
U.S. troops now account for about two-thirds of the NATO force in Afghanistan, and Americans make up more than two-thirds of July's Western military fatalities.
Los Angeles Times By Laura King August 1, 2010
Reporting from Forward Operating Base Kunduz - The platoon sergeant was inspecting the gaping crater left by a roadside bomb in northern Afghanistan when a second thunderous blast went off just 20 feet away.
A choking dust cloud enveloped him. He had no feeling in his left leg. When the soldiers who rushed to his rescue shouted questions at him, he couldn't hear them.
"I'm lucky to be alive," he said Saturday, two days after the explosion. Requesting that his name and hometown not be mentioned to protect his family's privacy, he spoke at the military hospital where he was being closely monitored for signs of traumatic brain injury.
For American troops, July was the deadliest month of the nearly 9-year-old war in Afghanistan. At least 66 U.S. service members were killed, surpassing what had been a record 60 American fatalities in the previous month.
The means of death were as varied as the hazards of war: helicopter crashes, firefights, ambushes, sniper fire and, especially, the kind of homemade bombs that nearly claimed the 32-year-old sergeant.
But the pattern of combat deaths in July pointed up an overarching truth that is likely to endure as the conflict grinds onward: More and more each day, this is an American war.
With their numbers approaching 100,000 as a consequence of the troop buildup ordered by President Obama in December, U.S. troops now comprise about two-thirds of the NATO force in Afghanistan. And American deaths are commensurate with that dominance, accounting for more than two-thirds of Western military fatalities in July, according to figures provided by icasualties.com, an independent website.
With North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies distancing themselves from the notion of an open-ended stay in Afghanistan, the American aspect of the war comes increasingly to the fore.
In the United States, the rapidly rising combat toll in Afghanistan is feeding congressional doubts about the war's aims. But such qualms are rarely heard in the ranks, particularly in units that have arrived in the last six months as part of the buildup.
"You know it's a possibility, getting killed; but honestly, I don't think we think about it as much as the public does," said Capt. Alain Etienne, a 37-year-old from Brooklyn with the 10th Mountain Division's 1-87 Infantry Brigade in the northern province of Kunduz. "You do your job."
Although most of the arriving U.S. troops are being deployed in the south, the spiritual home of the Taliban and the scene of near-constant fighting between NATO forces and insurgents, American forces are also pushing into parts of the country where they have never been present in large numbers.
That includes a wide swath of Afghanistan's north, where until just a few months ago German troops made up the bulk of foreign forces.
The north was once considered a quiet corner of Afghanistan. But Taliban fighters have ensconced themselves in Kunduz and another strategic province, Baghlan, a threat that commanders are seeking to quell with the deployment of about 2,500 troops with the 10th Mountain Division.
A morning battle briefing Saturday at Forward Operating Base Kunduz, just outside the provincial capital, reflected a quickening tempo of hostilities: a suspected sighting of the Taliban "shadow governor"; small-arms fire aimed at a German aircraft; three mine-resistant vehicles knocked out of commission in 24 hours by improvised bombs; rockets fired into Kunduz city, though they did not explode.
In the base's windowless tactical operations center, with the glow of computer screens providing almost the only light, the battalion commander, Lt. Col. Russell Lewis, fired questions: Can we speed up the outfitting of ground-penetrating radar? How long will it take to repair the damaged mine-detection vehicles?
The U.S. commanders described the German force as a reliable partner in the fight, though both NATO and Afghan officials have conceded that the security situation in the north has deteriorated sharply in the last 18 months.
But Germany, like other NATO allies, is paying heed to unmistakable antiwar sentiment at home, putting further pressure on U.S. forces. Canada has announced plans to bring its troops home from Afghanistan in 2011. Britain handed over a particularly dangerous district of Helmand province to American control.
And the 1,600-member contingent from the Netherlands, based mainly in the province of Oruzgan, heads home this week, a development greeted with satisfaction by the Taliban. Spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid congratulated the Dutch for what he called a wise decision.
With greater overall visibility than other national contingents, the United States and its forces often become a lightning rod for Afghan resentment over civilian suffering, even if American troops are not involved in a particular incident.
Angry anti-U.S. protests broke out Friday in Kabul, the capital, after a vehicle driven by American contractors with DynCorp International was involved in a traffic accident that killed at least four Afghans, police said.
In the north, the Americans are sometimes welcomed, but with a distinct undercurrent that the people believe the fight could go either way.
A week ago, troops based in Kunduz went on patrol in the district of Aliabad, fanning out in a village they were visiting for the first time. Trailed by a gaggle of giggling children, they spent two hours walking dusty lanes, meeting with the most important village elder, asking residents what kind of help they needed: wells dug, or seed for crops.
But the Afghan commander of a police checkpoint at the village's entrance sounded a note of caution.
"The Taliban are right over there, just across the river," he said pointing with his chin toward a line of trees a few hundred yards away.
"We are five police in this checkpoint, and they are 50. They have enough munitions, but we do not. And if they want to come, they will."
laura.king@latimes.com
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US Military Officials Condemn Leaks of Afghan War Documents
VOA News August 1, 2010 Michael Bowman | Washington
America's top military officials are condemning last week's public dissemination of thousands of secret U.S. military documents on the war in Afghanistan, but insist the nine-year effort to root out insurgents and terrorists is not a lost cause.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates had this response when asked how he feels about Internet site Wikileaks' publication of classified documents on the Afghan war.
"Mortified. appalled. And if I am angry, it is because I believe this information puts those in Afghanistan who have helped us at risk," Gates said. "It puts our soldiers at risk."
Gates was speaking on ABC's This Week program. His comments echoed those of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, who has said that Wikileaks and its source could have the blood of a U.S. soldier or an Afghan family on their hands.
U.S. officials believe the Taliban is searching the documents for names of people who have cooperated with multinational forces in the country.
Speaking on NBC's Meet the Press program, Mullen downplayed the significance of documents alleging a connection between Pakistan's intelligence apparatus and Taliban forces in Afghanistan.
"That there are elements of the Pakistani intelligence agency that are connected, or have had relationships with extremists is certainly known, and that has to change," Mullen said.
The admiral had a similar response to assessments in the leaked documents that the Taliban's strength has grown in recent years. Mullen said the United States recognizes the challenges U.S. forces must overcome in Afghanistan, adding that he believes America's strategy can succeed.
Indications of growing Taliban strength come amid a rise in U.S. casualties in Afghanistan. July was the deadliest month for American forces in the nine-year war. The indications also occur as the United States prepares for an eventual draw-down of forces in the country.
But Defense Secretary Gates says no one, especially the Taliban, should assume American forces will disappear overnight.
"We are not leaving Afghanistan in July of 2011," Gates said. "We are beginning a transition process and a thinning of our ranks. And the pace will depend on the conditions on the ground. The president has been very clear about that. And if the Taliban are waiting for the 19th month [the end of the surge in U.S. forces], I welcome that. Because we will be there in the 19th month, and we will be there with a lot of troops."
Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives approved $37-billion in new funds for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Public-opinion surveys in the United States show declining support for the Afghan war effort and growing pessimism about the chances for success in eradicating terrorists and extremists.
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Witness says WikiLeaks investigators sought to limit disclosure
By Ellen Nakashima Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, August 1, 2010
Before the online site WikiLeaks published a trove of classified documents about the Afghanistan war, government investigators interviewed Boston-area acquaintances of a military analyst charged with providing other documents to the site in an effort to prevent additional leaks, according to one person interviewed in the probe.
The investigators from the Army and the State Department seemed to be "looking for classified documents that they thought to be in the Boston area," said the acquaintance, who would discuss the sensitive matter only on the condition of anonymity. "I got the impression that we're still in the process of containing a leak."
The man, a computer expert who met Pfc. Bradley E. Manning in January, said he told the investigators in mid-June that he knew of no such documents.
The interview was among at least two investigators conducted in the Boston area after Manning was accused of giving WikiLeaks State Department cables and a video of a helicopter attack in which unarmed civilians were killed in Baghdad. Officials have said they are investigating whether Manning leaked the Afghanistan documents made public last week, a disclosure that prompted condemnation from the Obama administration.
The computer expert also said the Army offered him cash to, in his word, "infiltrate" WikiLeaks. "I turned them down," he said. "I don't want anything to do with this cloak-and-dagger stuff."
Army Criminal Investigation Division spokesman Chris Grey declined to comment on the claim. "We've got an ongoing investigation," he said. "We don't discuss our techniques and tactics."
Another Manning acquaintance who was questioned said investigators "assumed that he was the one who did it and were trying to understand why, what was going on with him psychologically, to either make it so nobody gets to this point in the future or spot people who've gotten to this point and make sure they didn't do any damage."
This acquaintance, also a computer expert who spoke on the condition of anonymity, is affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He said he was interviewed twice in June in Cambridge, Mass., shortly after Manning was detained. Manning was charged in July.
Manning, who lived in Potomac and was stationed at Fort Drum, N.Y., before shipping out to Baghdad last year, had hoped he would serve his time and then use the G.I. Bill to go to college. His military attorney has declined to comment.
"He was definitely interested in making a positive impact on the world," said Danny Clark, a friend of Manning's who runs a small tech firm in Cambridge and has declined to be interviewed by military investigators.
Meanwhile, friends and family are raising money for Manning's defense, including a private lawyer to augment the Army-provided defense lawyer. The San Francisco-based war resisters' group Courage to Resist has raised $11,418 and is aiming for $100,000, assuming a "sizable contribution from WikiLeaks," said Jeff Paterson, project director.
Manning has been transferred from Kuwait, where he had been detained, to Quantico. He was charged in military court in July and will have a preliminary hearing to determine if he should face a court-martial.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is scheduled to appear on NBC's "Meet the Press" and CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday to further denounce WikiLeaks for endangering the lives of U.S. troops and Afghan civilians. White House officials are concerned that more potentially damaging information could be released by the group in the coming weeks.
One senior military official balked at a suggestion by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates that the WikiLeaks disclosure could cause the Pentagon to limit the distribution of classified information to combat field units, where it is harder to monitor what analysts are downloading.
"Limiting intelligence to troops in combat is a non-starter," said the official. "It doesn't make sense to use WikiLeaks as a reason to limit information to the troops who need it." Such limits could "get soldiers killed," the official said.
The classified computer systems in Iraq and Afghanistan don't have the same safeguards that exist in the United States. "In the States, there are rack and scoring servers that watch where analysts go," the official said. At the time of his arrest, Manning was an intelligence analyst at a relatively small base in Iraq.
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NATO not concerned over withdrawal of Dutch troops from Afghanistan
KABUL, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- The spokesman of NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said on Sunday that the alliance wasn't concerned about the withdrawal of Dutch forces from Afghanistan after conclusion of a four-year mission.
"This is just a kind of routine process and I don't see any concern on ISAF or Afghan National Security Force (ANSF) side," Brigadier-General Josef Blotz told a joint press briefing with NATO's Civilian Representative in Afghanistan Dominic Medley in Kabul.
The Dutch government decided in 2009 to begin pulling out troops from Afghanistan on August 1 this year.
He made the comments after Dutch military chief Gen. Peter van Uhm said on Thursday in Hague that his troops would leave Afghanistan as scheduled.
"The (Dutch) mission will continue by U.S., Australian and Afghan forces," NATO's civilian representative Medley told the press briefing.
NATO and ISAF remained committed to ensure Afghans are capable and ready to take security responsibility for their own country, he added.
Most of the 1,950-strong Dutch troops have been deployed in the southern Afghan province of Uruzgan under NATO-led ISAF to help stabilize the war-torn country.
Canada has also decided to end its military mission in Afghanistan next year while U.S. forces will begin pullout in July 2011.
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U.S. diplomat to serve as advisor to Afghan Attorney General
KABUL, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- A U.S. diplomat to Afghanistan Hans Klemm has been appointed to serve as advisor to Afghanistan Attorney General Mohammad Ishaq Alako, a local newspaper reported on Sunday.
"The U.S. ambassador on rules of law and law enforcement to Afghanistan, Hans Klemm on Saturday took office as an advisor to the Afghan Attorney General," daily Outlook writes.
Ambassador Klemm will cooperate with Afghan Attorney General office, High Court and the Ministry for Justice, the newspaper further said.
Citing a top official in the Afghan Attorney General office, the newspaper added that ambassador Klemm will help to build up capacity, training Afghan prosecutors and will cooperate to implement logistic and financial programs in judiciary organizations.
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Suicide car bomb kills 5 kids in south Afghanistan
By Mirwais Khan, Associated Press Writer
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan – A suicide car bomber blew himself up next to a police truck bringing a southern Afghan official to work early Monday, killing five children nearby, officials said.
The blast struck about 9 a.m. local time near a market area in Dand district to the west of Kandahar city, according to the district police chief Ahmadullah Nazak.
"I dropped down. Then I heard a second explosion," Nazak said. "It hit our car, but it didn't injure me." Five children who were near the site of the blast were killed, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.
A bodyguard who was driving with Nazak was wounded, he said.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, though it fits the pattern of Taliban attacks targeting government officials in the south. As additional U.S. forces have poured into southern Taliban strongholds in Kandahar and Helmand provinces, Taliban insurgents have mounted a counter-campaign of bombings and assassinations aimed at those affiliated with the Afghan government.
In the east meanwhile, NATO forces said they captured a local insurgent commander in Paktia province and killed "several insurgents" in an air strike on a vehicle after troops saw the commander putting an anti-aircraft gun inside. A spokesman for NATO forces, Sgt. Michael Reinsch, declined to say how many insurgents were killed.
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Afghanistan minibus bombing kills 6
Vehicle is full of civilians as it strikes roadside bomb
Sunday, August 1, 2010 The Associated Press (Canada)
A minibus full of civilians struck a roadside bomb in southern Afghanistan early Sunday, and Afghan officials said six people on board were killed.
Also Sunday, the last soldiers from the 1,600-member Dutch military contingent prepared to leave the country, marking an end to the Netherlands' four-year mission in the central province of Uruzgan.
They will be replaced by American, Australian, Slovak and Singaporean forces.
German Army Brig. Gen. Josef Blotz, a NATO spokesman, told reporters in Kabul that the Dutch pullout did not show a weakening of the international coalition.
"The overall force posture of (NATO) and of the Afghan security forces is increasing," Blotz said. However, the increase in NATO troops comes primarily from a surge of U.S. forces, who have recently taken over control of key areas in Helmand and Kandahar from British and Canadian forces.
The bus blast in Kandahar happened in the Maiwand district outside Kandahar city, according to provincial spokesman Zalmai Ayubi.
A NATO patrol arrived soon after the explosion and treated the wounded at the scene, the coalition command said.
Deadly summer for troops and civilians
U.S. and NATO forces are stepping up operations against the Taliban in Kandahar and nearby Helmand province. July was the deadliest month for U.S. forces in the nearly nine-year war, with 66 troops killed. Overall NATO deaths were highest in June, with 103 troops killed.
A NATO service member died Sunday after an insurgent attack in south, the coalition said in a statement. Details were not provided.
The escalation in military operations also threatens more civilian casualties, potentially undermining support for the U.S.-led mission among Afghans as well as the public in troop-contributing nations.
At least 270 civilians were killed in the fighting in July, and nearly 600 were wounded, Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary said.
That's a 29 per cent increase in civilian casualties from the previous month, he said.
NATO strike provokes protest
In the Afghan capital, Kabul, more than 200 demonstrators marched toward the presidential palace to protest the alleged killing of 52 civilians by a NATO rocket strike in the south.
NATO has repeatedly disputed the allegations of civilian deaths, and Blotz said Sunday that a joint assessment team has only confirmed that one to three civilians may have been killed in the attack in Helmand province's Sangin district.
Witnesses told the assessment team that six to eight people were killed, most of them insurgents, Blotz said. Aerial pictures of graves in the area before and after the July 23 incident showed only one grave site with a "small number of fresh graves," Blotz said.
Yet the Afghans gathered in downtown Kabul said they were sure the international forces were to blame. They carried photos of children allegedly killed or wounded in the strike and shouted "Death to America! Death to NATO!"
"We should not tolerate such attacks," said 22-year-old Ahmad Jawed, a university student. "The Americans are invaders who have occupied our country in the name of fighting terrorism."
He said the Afghan government was equally to blame for failing to exert control over NATO troops.
"We don't have a strong enough government to protect the rights of the Afghan people," Jawed said.
In a letter to NATO-led forces, the top U.S. and coalition commander, Gen. David Petraeus, reminded his troops they cannot succeed in turning back the Taliban without "providing (civilians) security and earning their trust and confidence."
"The Taliban are not the only enemy of the people," Petraeus said in the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press.
"The people are also threatened by inadequate governance, corruption and the abuse of power — the Taliban's best recruiters."
Petraeus told his troops to "hunt the enemy aggressively" but "use only the firepower needed to win a fight."
"If we kill civilians or damage their property in the course of our operations, we will create more enemies than our operations eliminate," he said.
Helmand campaign progressing 'very well'
Also Sunday, the British Defence Ministry reported a British-Afghan operation to push the Taliban out of a stronghold in the central part of Helmand province was progressing "very well" as it entered its third day.
No casualties have been reported and there has been limited contact with the Taliban, a military statement said. The operation, known as "Black Prince," is directed against Taliban forces in Sayedebad.
The departure of the Dutch from Uruzgan marked the end of a mission that was deeply unpopular in the Netherlands but widely seen in Afghanistan as among the most effective. Twenty-four Dutch soldiers have been killed since the mission began in 2006.
Only about 150 Dutch fighting forces are left in the country, and they are set to leave next week, said Maj. Henk Asma, said a spokesman for the Dutch military.
Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende's government collapsed earlier this year over the disagreement among coalition members on whether to keep troops in the country longer. His party, the Christian Democrats, suffered heavy losses in parliamentary elections in June.
The Dutch pioneered a strategy they called "3D" in Afghanistan — defence, diplomacy and development — that involved fighting the Taliban while at the same time building close contacts with local tribal elders and setting up numerous development projects.
Dutch troops, some of them riding bicycles, mingled closely with the local population. Often, they didn't wear helmets while walking around towns and villages as a way of winning the trust of wary local tribes.
In a message to Dutch troops, Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen said he was "deeply impressed by the professionalism and dedication" of the soldiers and Dutch civilians working on development in the region.
"The international community and NATO are helping Afghanistan to stand on its own legs so the country can defend itself against extremists who want to use it as a breeding ground for global terrorism," Verhagen said.
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Afghans march in Kabul to denounce NATO strikes that killed civilians
By Joshua Partlow Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, August 2, 2010; A08
KABUL -- Afghan protesters marched through downtown Kabul on Sunday morning chanting anti-American slogans and denouncing NATO bombardments that have killed civilians.
Led by a police escort, the couple of hundred demonstrators carried banners calling the United States the "guardian and master of [the] ruling Mafia in Afghanistan" as well as images of burned and bandaged children.
The protesters said they were angry not only about the civilian toll from ongoing NATO military operations in Helmand province but also a traffic accident Friday involving an SUV driven by DynCorp International contractors that killed four Afghans.
"Many times NATO troops and these cars have killed our innocent people. They never care whether we are Afghans or animals," said Samia, 26, an activist from Kabul who took part in the demonstration.
Samia, who like many Afghans goes by only one name, said that she did not want the Taliban to return to power in Afghanistan but that NATO has only aggravated the situation over the past decade and fed a parasitic and dependent Afghan government.
"We want NATO troops and American troops to leave Afghanistan. Even with their huge army, they couldn't do anything in the past 10 years. And in the future, they won't be able to do anything. The result will be just death and casualties, and our innocent Afghan women and children will die," she said.
After the traffic accident on Friday near the U.S. Embassy, an angry crowd surrounded the DynCorp vehicle and set it on fire. DynCorp employees who arrived to help were attacked, and their vehicle also was torched.
"We poor people are not just here to be killed," said an elderly woman named Rabia who was in Sunday's protest. She said she had witnessed the reaction to the traffic accident Friday. "The people were so emotional. They were throwing stones at the Americans' vehicles. If the police hadn't taken the Americans away, the people would have torn them to pieces. If I had the chance to do that, I would do the same thing."
Also Sunday, Afghan officials said six people were killed when a minibus hit a roadside bomb in Kandahar province.
NATO said insurgents have killed more than 590 Afghan civilians and wounded 1,350 this year.
Special correspondent Javed Hamdard contributed to this report.
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Afghan, NATO troops kill armed militant in Kabul
People's Daily - Jul 31 11:09pm
Afghan and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) killed an anti-government militant during a joint operation in the Afghan capital Kabul, said a statement of the alliance released on Sunday.
"Afghan and coalition force killed one armed insurgent in Kabul," the statement said, without mentioning the exact date of the operation and nationality of killed man.
However, it said that the insurgent was targeted and killed in Musahi district outside Kabul.
It also said that the killed insurgent belonged to a network that was planning double suicide bombing attacks in Kabul city.
Taliban militants who often target Kabul and other Afghan cities have yet to make comment.
Source: Xinhua
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Rules for Afghanistan: Fight Taliban, corruption, "drink lots of tea"
By the CNN Wire Staff August 1, 2010
(CNN) -- Fight the Taliban "relentlessly." Don't tolerate corruption. Drink "lots of tea" with the locals.
Those admonitions are among the two dozen guidelines for counterinsurgency warfare that Gen. David Petraeus issued to U.S. and allied troops in Afghanistan on Sunday. In his first major public pronouncement since taking command in early July, Petraeus urged American troops and the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force to learn and adapt to the culture of Afghanistan while battling the Taliban insurgents and their allies.
"The decisive terrain is the human terrain," Petraeus wrote. "The people are the center of gravity. Only by providing them security and earning their trust and confidence can the Afghan government and ISAF prevail."
Petraeus led the 2007-2008 campaign to stabilize Iraq after years of insurgent and sectarian warfare following the U.S. invasion of 2003. Some of the steps he took there -- ordering troops to work in closely with local allies in outposts close to the people, patrol on foot and without sunglasses and cultivate ties with the local population -- are included in Sunday's four-page order.
"Earn the people's trust, talk to them, ask them questions and learn about their lives," he wrote. Coalition troops should be "a good guest," learn the local history and "make sure you have the full story."
"Don't be a pawn in someone else's game," he wrote. "Spend time, listen, consult and drink lots of tea."
Petraeus called on American and NATO troops to "Pursue the enemy relentlessly" and "seek out and eliminate" insurgents who threaten Afghan civilians. But he also urged coalition forces to fight "with discipline" and be careful to avoid civilian casualties.
"If we kill civilians or damage their property in the course of our operations, we will create more enemies than our operations eliminate," he wrote. "That's exactly what the Taliban want. Don't fall into their trap."
He urged his troops to aggressively fight the Taliban by being "first with the truth," acknowledging setbacks and failures but highlighting the "extremist" and "oppressive" nature of the enemy. Allied forces should "Hang their barbaric actions like millstones around their necks," he wrote.
And in a country where corruption is endemic, the Petraeus guidelines press allied forces to be mindful of where coalition funds go and to help Afghans "confront, isolate, pressure and defund" crooked elements.
"The Taliban are not the only enemy of the people," he wrote. "The people are also threatened by inadequate governance, corruption and abuse of power -- recruiters for the Taliban." Afghan President Hamid Karzai has pledged to root out corruption, and allied troops should "work with our allied partners to help turn his words into reality."
Petraeus has taken command at a time when the nearly 9-year-old war is the subject of fierce debate in the United States and in many of the countries that have contributed troops to the mission. He replaced Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who was sacked after Rolling Stone magazine published disparaging comments about the Obama administration's civilian leadership by the general and some of his aides.
A highly publicized offensive in the southern town of Marjah has turned out to be less fruitful than expected, Petraeus acknowledged in June, while plans for a similar push in the Taliban heartland of Kandahar have stalled. Meanwhile, the Netherlands finished pulling its troops out of southern Afghanistan's Uruzgan province Sunday after four years and 24 combat deaths, nearly six months after an impasse over whether to extend their commitment brought down the Dutch government.
CNN Pentagon Correspondent Barbara Starr contributed to this report.
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Singapore to help target Afghan corruption
The Japan Times Sunday, Aug. 1, 2010 SINGAPORE (Kyodo)
Singapore will collaborate with Japan to help war-torn Afghanistan train its civil servants in combating corruption.
The training in anticorruption and public governance will be offered under an existing Japan-Singapore partnership program for joint technical assistance to developing countries, Singapore's Foreign Ministry said earlier in the week.
The ministry said this is the first time for the two countries to provide joint training in the area of anticorruption and public governance to Afghanistan.
Afghan officials are expected to come to Singapore for training, while Japan will provide some financing and also dispatch an expert on anticorruption to Singapore, other sources said.
"The program will strengthen the capacity of senior Afghan policymakers in the field of good governance and managing corruption, which are current key priority areas for the Afghan government," the Singaporean ministry said in a statement.
Singapore is known for its tough stance against corruption. It was ranked fourth in the world and first in Asia for having the least corruption in its economy in the World Competitiveness report issued last year by the Swiss-based IMD, one of the world's most eminent business schools.
The city-state has a special agency investigating such crimes that reports directly to the prime minister. About 95 percent of cases investigated annually end in a conviction.
The plan for Japan and Singapore to collaborate to provide the anticorruption and public governance training for Afghanistan was first unveiled by Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada at the International Conference on Afghanistan held in Kabul on July 20.
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American forces enter uneasy alliances with tribal strongmen in Afghanistan
Practice raises questions among some US officials
Washington Post By Karin Brulliard August 1, 2010
NOW RUZI, Afghanistan - Haji Ghani is an illiterate, hashish-producing former warlord who directs a semiofficial police force. In this Taliban nest west of Kandahar, he is also a key partner of US forces.
Never mind that the district governor says Ghani, 44, works against him, or that US soldiers describe him as godfather-like and his police as vaguely crooked. In an area rife with insurgents who stalk soldiers’ every move, Ghani’s militia has carved out a 4-square-mile bubble of tranquillity. Farmers can safely collect US-funded seeds, and children will soon attend a new American-backed school.
“What’s his is ours. What’s ours is his,’’ Lieutenant John Paszterko said of Ghani, a onetime anti-Soviet commander who now rules his tribal forefathers’ lands. “He’s a good friend to have.’’
As coalition forces struggle to weaken the Taliban, they insist that the key to doing so lies in bolstering Afghan institutions. Yet with government rule confined to certain densely populated areas, US officials rely on strongmen who can maintain order in the most treacherous locales, even if their commitment to formal governance is dubious.
That inconsistency is causing unease in Washington, where Congress is scrutinizing payments of US tax dollars to warlords who protected NATO convoys, and in Kabul, where critics fear a US-backed plan for village defense groups could spawn rogue militias or undermine government authority.
“In that scenario, the Afghan government doesn’t gain any strength or legitimacy,’’ one US official working in Kandahar Province said of such alliances.
The dynamic is present across this long-embattled nation, where former warlords are a dime a dozen and power is typically won with guns or money. Against that backdrop, Ghani is a minor player. With an AK-47 slung over his shoulder, he lords over 3,000 acres of farmland.
But Ghani’s area has suddenly become the focus of the US forces’ latest push to defeat the Taliban. It lies along a critical entry point into Kandahar city used by the Taliban as a supply route, and government leadership here has long been feeble.
So Ghani and his force of about 40 “soldiers’’ — he has about 50 more in reserve — are vital partners, according to US troops, who said the force might eventually be incorporated into the new village defense force plan.
US soldiers and the district governor say that only some of Ghani’s men have law enforcement training, but that the local police chief equips them all with uniforms and weapons anyway.
They are the closest thing in this area to an Afghan security force. The Afghan army soldiers set to share the US combat outpost near Now Ruzi have not yet been deployed. So when Pazsterko’s soldiers were ambushed by the Taliban recently, Ghani’s police helped fight them off.
Ghani is “one of the few people who does feel that responsibility’’ to fight the Taliban, said Captain Paul DeLeon, commander of Combat Outpost Durkin.
That is partly because his lifestyle would be fairly incompatible with Taliban rule. On Ghani’s land is a vast field of hemp used to produce hashish, which he insists he does not smoke.
Ghani says his wealth comes from his land, which he leases to farmers, and from the security services he provides to a Japanese company operating the large gravel quarry on his property. Gravel blankets the US outpost nearby — a gift from Ghani.
His partnership has been rewarded. US soldiers make sure his fighters have ammunition. Flowing through Ghani’s carefully tended garden is a gurgling canal, a project recently completed by the US Agency for International Development that beautified a public park on his land. Outside, construction on the schoolhouse is almost done.
Yet DeLeon said the builders complain that Ghani beats them when he is dissatisfied with their work. Farther west on Highway 1, Afghan army Captain Safi Ahmad said truckers complain that Ghani’s police demand illegal tolls and “torture’’ those who cannot pay. “By working with him, we’re essentially enabling him,’’ DeLeon said.
But DeLeon and NATO officials said they hold out hope that Ghani and others like him will serve as links between the population and the government.
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Targeted Killing Is New U.S. Focus in Afghanistan
The New York Times - Technology By HELENE COOPER and MARK LANDLER July 31, 2010
WASHINGTON - When President Obama announced his new war plan for Afghanistan last year, the centerpiece of the strategy — and a big part of the rationale for sending 30,000 additional troops — was to safeguard the Afghan people, provide them with a competent government and win their allegiance.
Eight months later, that counterinsurgency strategy has shown little success, as demonstrated by the flagging military and civilian operations in Marja and Kandahar and the spread of Taliban influence in other areas of the country.
Instead, what has turned out to work well is an approach American officials have talked much less about: counterterrorism, military-speak for the targeted killings of insurgents from Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
Faced with that reality, and the pressure of a self-imposed deadline to begin withdrawing troops by July 2011, the Obama administration is starting to count more heavily on the strategy of hunting down insurgents. The shift could change the nature of the war and potentially, in the view of some officials, hasten a political settlement with the Taliban.
Based on the American military experience in Iraq as well as Afghanistan, it is not clear that killing enemy fighters is sufficient by itself to cripple an insurgency. Still, commando raids over the last five months have taken more than 130 significant insurgents out of action, while interrogations of captured fighters have led to a fuller picture of the enemy, according to administration officials and diplomats.
American intelligence reporting has recently revealed growing examples of Taliban fighters who are fearful of moving into higher-level command positions because of these lethal operations, according to a senior American military officer who follows Afghanistan closely.
Judging that they have gained some leverage over the Taliban, American officials are now debating when to try to bring them to the negotiating table to end the fighting. Rattling the Taliban, officials said, may open the door to reconciling with them more quickly, even if the officials caution that the outreach is still deeply uncertain.
American military officials and President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan have begun a robust discussion about “to what degree these people are going to be allowed to have a seat at the table,” one military official said. “The only real solution to Afghanistan has got to be political.”
The evolving thinking comes at a time when the lack of apparent progress in the nearly nine-year war is making it harder for Mr. Obama to hold his own party together on the issue. And it raises questions about whether the administration is seeking a rationale for reducing troop levels as scheduled starting next summer even if the counterinsurgency strategy does not show significant progress by then.
A senior White House official said the administration hoped that its targeted killings, along with high-level contacts between Mr. Karzai and Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Pakistan’s army chief and a former head of its intelligence service — which is believed to have close links to the Taliban — would combine to pressure Taliban leaders to come to the negotiating table.
A long-awaited campaign to convert lower-level and midlevel Taliban fighters has finally begun in earnest, with Mr. Karzai signing a decree authorizing the reintegration program. With $200 million from Japan and other allies, and an additional $100 million in Pentagon money, American military officers will soon be handing out money to lure people away from the insurgency.
“We’re not ready to make the qualitative judgment that the cumulative effects of what we are doing are enough to change their calculus yet,” the White House official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly. But, reflecting the administration’s hope that the killings are making a difference, he added, “If I were the Taliban, I’d be worried.”
Mr. Obama’s timetable calls for an assessment in December of how his strategy is faring. The administration has not yet begun a formal review of the policy. But while several officials said Mr. Obama remained committed to the strategy he set out at the end of last year, they conceded that the counterinsurgency part of it had lagged while the counterterrorism part had been more successful.
That divergence could lead to a replay of last year’s policy debate, in which Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. pushed for a focus on capturing and killing terrorist leaders, while the Pentagon, including the current commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, pushed for a broader strategy that also included a strong focus on securing Afghan population centers with more troops.
Still, in an interview Thursday with “Today” on NBC, Mr. Biden appeared to reiterate his earlier stance.
“We are in Afghanistan for one express purpose: Al Qaeda,” he said. “Al Qaeda exists in those mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan. We are not there to nation-build. We’re not out there deciding we’re going to turn this into a Jeffersonian democracy and build that country.”
The administration’s shift in thinking is gradual but has been perceptible in the public remarks of various officials. The incoming commander of the military’s Central Command, Gen. James N. Mattis, was asked last week by Senator Jack Reed, Democrat of Rhode Island, whether the administration’s July 2011 date for starting to withdraw American troops implied a shift in emphasis from counterinsurgency to a strategy concentrating on killing terrorists.
“I think that is the approach, Senator,” he replied.
The emerging American model can best be described as “counterterrorism, with some counterinsurgency strategy that forces the hands of insurgent leaders,” said a diplomat with knowledge of the planning. It melds elements of both strategies in a policy that continues to evolve, as conditions change.
Some of the feelers to the Taliban are being put out by the Karzai government and some by the Pakistanis. Some, eventually, will be handled by General Petraeus and other military officials. Contacts are being kept under wraps, several officials said, because any evidence that insurgent leaders are talking to American or Afghan officials could be used against them by rival insurgents.
Another factor that has spurred talk of reconciliation is a classified military report, called “State of the Taliban,” prepared by Task Force 373, a Special Operations team composed of the army’s Delta Force and Navy Seals, which has captured insurgents and taken them to Bagram Air Base for interrogation.
While the report does not offer a silver bullet for how to deal with the Taliban, one official said that for the first time, it gives Americans and their allies “a rich vein of understanding of why the Taliban was fighting and what it would take them to stop.” The report depicts the Taliban as spearheading a fractured insurgency, but one in which conservative Pashtun nationalism and respect for Afghan culture are both at play, this official said.
Despite deep American concerns about Pakistan’s trustworthiness as an ally, Pakistan has also emerged in recent months as a potential agent for reconciliation. Mr. Karzai has held at least two meetings with General Kayani of Pakistan. American officials say they believe that their talks have not yet delved into the details of negotiations with insurgent leaders, but Pakistan is eager to play a role in talks with the Haqqani network, a major insurgent group based in the country that has close ties to its intelligence service.
The links between Mr. Karzai and General Kayani, officials said, helped seal a recent trade deal between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which required concessions on the part of the Pakistani military.
“The best hope for resolving Afghanistan lies in Pakistan, and we have made some progress there,” said Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and a frequent visitor to the region.
Eric Schmitt contributed reporting.
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Afghanistan: which way now?
As the British and US governments ponder their next move, the Observer's foreign affairs editor Peter Beaumont examines the four most likely scenarios
guardian.co.uk Peter Beaumont Sunday 1 August 2010
The Basra option - During the latter period of the British occupation of the Iraqi city of Basra, two questions emerged: whether the high profile of British troops actually provided a target and made the violence worse? And whether the escalating conflict in that area was a direct result of primarily military efforts to bring security to it?
Soldiers in Afghanistan have raised these questions too. They have noted that, the more they go out on operations, the more they are hit; and how, with each escalation on the side of the US and ISAF, far from dampening the conflict, it has been exacerbated.
So will a reduction, perhaps to the point of withdrawal, lead to less violence? Of all the ideas bubbling around potential alternative strategies for Afghanistan, this is the most radical – the antithesis of the present counter-insurgency strategy, designed by the new US commanding officer General David Petraeus with his predecessor, Stanley McChrystal. The latter strategy, criticised by some both inside and outside the military, has been based on increasing the number of soldiers on the ground in the short term to improve security in the hope that political benefits will follow.
What would it look like?
A reverse of the surge ordered by Barack Obama, it would see troops increasingly concentrated in large civilian centres and bases, a policy tried by the British, leading to a gradual withdrawal.
How would it work?
Its proponents, few as there are, have suggested that by putting the Afghan government and forces on the spot, it might create the opportunity for an Afghan solution to an Afghan problem, avoiding all the collateral political issues created by foreign forces supporting Hamid Karzai's government.
It argues, too, that it is the presence of foreign forces that is the catalyst both for a conflict that has succeeded in presenting itself, like the war against the Soviets, as an anti-occupation struggle, as well as standing in the way of inter-ethnic reconciliation.
What are the objections?
As a military strategy, it is based on something of a paradox. Conventional thinking focuses on the control of operational space. By withdrawing, it would potentially hand that space to the Taliban. Then there is the al-Qaida question. Conventional wisdom has it that such a strategy would allow al-Qaida to return and establish new bases, although some have argued that the Taliban of 2010 is not the Taliban of the late 90s and might not be inclined to replicate a relationship that led to its first downfall.
Equally problematic is precisely what Afghanistan's neighbours – Pakistan among them – might do, confronted with such a potential vacuum. The covert war option
Several variations of this option have popped up in the past few weeks, chief among their proponents Jack Devine, former CIA deputy director of operations, who was also head of the covert Afghan Task Force during the Soviet occupation. Another supporter is David Rieff, an international affairs analyst, writer and member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Devine, pictured, agrees with some of the thinking behind the Basra option: that the "large and visible occupying army" in Afghanistan is the wrong force in the wrong place. "Our presence in Afghanistan," he argued recently, "is better left unseen. Most Afghans, even those willing to deal with us, would rather we get our military out of their country. A covert action program would address this concern. It would also cost less than a military effort in treasure and lives, and allow the US to continue to protect its interests and the interests of the Afghans."
Rieff echoes some of Devine's concerns, arguing – in an article for the New Republic – that he would rather see much less fighting in Afghanistan and more drone strikes in Pakistan, and intelligence missions on home soil against potential terrorist threats.
What would it look like?
In some respects, it would look like other theatres of what used to be known as the "war on terror", where drone and missile strikes have been used to target wanted suspects. Devine's model is the CIA's covert actions of the 80s and 2001, when its officials rebuilt their networks among tribal leaders to help topple the Taliban.
What are the objections?
Well, the CIA's covert interventions in the 80s hardly left a stable Afghanistan. And a strategy that concentrates on cross-border drone raids is deeply problematic, both because of the unpopularity of the attacks in Pakistan and because the intelligence has not prevented large numbers of civilian casualties.
The save the north option Unlike the Basra option, this strategy has more visible support, most recently from Robert Blackwill, a former deputy national security adviser to George Bush and former US ambassador to India. Blackwill is among the growing group challenging the present counter-insurgency strategy which, he said in a comment piece for the FT earlier this month, is "likely to fail".
A policy that could also be called "give the Taliban the south", it is pessimistic, arguing that on the ever-shortening political timeline for finding a successful outcome in Afghanistan, it will be impossible to sufficiently weaken the Taliban to get them to the negotiating table.
Another prominent champion of a similar-looking plan is the Pakistani author and journalist Ahmed Rashid, who has suggested reconfiguring the mission in Afghanistan to easier objectives: providing security for large numbers of Afghans in the province around Kabul, where the Taliban is weak and support for the government is strong.
How would it work?
This strategy would see coalition forces abandon the south to the Taliban to prevent the west and north of the country falling to them, too. It would require a long-term military commitment of perhaps tens of thousands of troops. Its aim would be to prevent the further spread of the Taliban while concentrating on the twin tasks of strengthening a weak central government and potentially laying down the ground for future negotiations with the Taliban which – as Rashid argues – would have the south as a future bargaining chip in any political settlement.
What are the objections?
It risks opening up not only the issue of partition but the even more dangerous question of whether there should be a Pashtun homeland – Pashtunistan. When it is discussed, the issue of the Pashtuns living on the other side of the border in Pakistan is invoked.
The steady as she goes option
Given the inherent problems in the other strategies, you might think this was the least problematic. The recent revelations from the WikiLeaks document dump of the faltering progress of the war confirm the futility of just soldiering on.
The counter-insurgency strategy has become increasingly unpopular with soldiers on the ground and its lack of quick successes have led to criticism. Most problematic is that it now has a use-by date, when troops will begin, at least partially, to withdraw.
The relative failure of operations linked to the surge to improve security for more than short periods of time, and at high cost, suggests that a strategy that envisages a similar operation for the Taliban heartland of Kandahar may be fraught with difficulties.
What does it look like?
All too familiar, is the answer. Expect more large-scale operations. An increasing emphasis, too, will be put on training the Afghan security forces, in the hope that they'll take over in around four years' time.
What are the objections?
With June the worst month for coalition casualties since 2001, the evidence remains questionable that the Taliban is being substantially weakened or that ISAF operations have succeeded in improving security in the south and east.
The new emphasis on training – as a US report revealed last month – comes after billions of dollars have been spent. Nonetheless, little headway has been made in creating an army and police force capable of taking on the Taliban.
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