At one time the country was nailed down now this.

signed,

Cant wait till '08
Afghan force 'needs more troops'

Canadian troops near Kandahar, Aug 29

Phone video of battle
Nato's top commander, General James Jones, has urged member countries to provide reinforcements to the mission in southern Afghanistan.

He admitted the military alliance had been taken aback by the extent of violence in the region.

But he predicted that the coming weeks would be decisive in the fight against Islamist Taleban guerrillas.

Commanders on the ground had asked for several hundred additional troops and more helicopters and airlift, he said.

"We are talking about modest reinforcements," he told reporters at Nato European headquarters in Belgium.


We should recognise we are a little bit surprised at the level of intensity, and that the opposition in some areas are not relying on traditional hit-and-run tactics
General James Jones

Send us your comments

Several Nato soldiers, most of them British or Canadian, have been killed in fierce fighting with Taleban guerrillas since the alliance extended its peacekeeping mission to the south a month ago.

Nato troops took over leadership of military operations in the region from the US.

Gen Jones is due to meet generals from the 26 Nato nations this weekend in Warsaw, Poland.

The US marine general said he would initially ask for reinforcements from existing contributors to the 37-nation International Security Assistance Force (Isaf), including Germany, which has several thousand troops in the calmer north of the country.

'Before winter'

He told reporters that Nato forces had expected some opposition in southern Afghanistan, but added: "We should recognise we are a little bit surprised at the level of intensity, and that the opposition in some areas are not relying on traditional hit-and-run tactics."

However, he said he was confident the situation could be contained relatively quickly.

"It is my feeling that... certainly before the winter, we will see this decisive moment in the region turn favourably to the forces that represent the (Afghan) government and the efforts we are trying to achieve."

He said reinforcements "will help us reduce casualties and help us bring this to a successful conclusion in a shorter period of time".

The Taleban ruled Afghanistan until late 2001 when it was toppled by US-led forces in the wake of the 11 September attacks on New York and Washington.

W is for Western Pakistan.

__________________
-Marty

1986 300E 220,000 miles+ transmission impossible
(Now waiting under a bridge in order to become one)

Reading your M103 duty cycle:
http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/showpost.php?p=831799&postcount=13
http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/showpost.php?p=831807&postcount=14

I hope the general is right.

The question here of course is how come the Taleban are on their feet again? Hadn't the Daisy Cutters wiped them completely off the planet. So whose helping them? Where's their support coming from? Seems the same is happening that the Russians experienced: they too appeared to be in total control of the country, but couldn't hold their ground against the rising guerilla in the end, despite massive military efforts

__________________
2011 Prius

Lets hope that Rumsfeld does not fire him.

They (Taliban & Al Qaeda) never were militarily defeated in Kandahar. Since most Taliban are Pashtun, when they abandoned Kabul some went with the Al Qaedistas to Tora Bora but most of them went back to their tribal homeland. Most of those that went to Tora Bora died or were jailed. Some escaped into Pakistan and either stayed with Pashtuns in Pakistan or filtered back into Kandahar. The deal that Karzai (himself a Pashtun) reached with the Pashtun tribal chiefs was that so long as the former Taliban stayed "former" that Kabul would leave Kandahar semi-autonomous (like the other provinces).

But since the Al Qaedistas have linked-up with the former Taliban in Kandahar and have begun suicide bombings, and expanded into other provinces, the military let Karzai know that they were going-in unless the tribal leaders reeastablished control. The tribal leaders informed Karzai that they were powerless, Karzai was let-off tehir formal agreement, and the military went in.

When dealing with tribal cultures, the military in Afghanistan took the lead from the Special Forces and CIA and have worked within the paradigm as much as possible. This is in contrast with the military in Iraq, which has tried to run the occupation without concern for tribal influence.

Bot

Sounds plausible, but that sure wasn't the picture offered by the Pentagon at the time. Whatever. Question remains where the Taleban get their support from. Musharraf claims his ISI is not involved, Al-Qaeda doesn't have the capability to provide such loads of military hardware, funds maybe. Iran might be possible, but I don't think they are so stupid to give the US the ideal pretext to attack them. Growing local support seems the only option, which might even be more worrying to NATO, since that would mean we are now being considered occupiers instead of liberators.

__________________
2011 Prius

Actually, the Pentagon was where most of my information came from. Planners and analysts are allowed to publish a surprising amount of what they do in scholarly journals like Naval Institute Proceedings, Foreign Affairs or Wilson Quarterly among many others (those are three of my favorites).

Something happens between those people who know what is going on and the flacks that distill it for public consumption. Then the news media gets it and performs unnatural acts on the distillation and you get what the popular press provides you. Nuggets of information stuck together by human interest paragraphs and lived-up with the butcher's bill.

B

Looks they forgot to brief Gen Jones and NATO on this little detail.

__________________
2011 Prius

One of the many benefits of talking to the people who actually do the heavy lifting is that they are capable of providing a first-hand synopsis. Politicians hate it when the military talks to reporters.

The downside is that usually you don't get everything that the general may have said. You get what the reporter believes is important about what the general said. The reporter may think a lengthy, detailed, and confusing discussion of tribal politics and history isn't important while the general knows that an understanding of that dynamic is more important than knowing which cave Osama is hiding in.

A particularly instructive lesson that the USA failed to learn is the interaction between Special Forces (including all US and British SAS), CIA and the local tribes before the regular forces were on the ground. The war was nearly over BEFORE regular Army and USMC forces landed.

That method was wonderfully successful precisely because the CIA and SF took the time to build tribal relationships, speak their language and demonstrate to the locals their own commitment to those tribal leaders. That was exactly the model that was NOT followed in Iraq. Goodness knows why it wasn't. It would have saved billions of dollars and tens of thousands of lives and we'd probably be withdrawing right now (IMO).

B