Afghanistan: Why we should be there (or not), how to conduct the mission (or not) & when to leave

[Mike Baker]

People are stupid.  Treat them as though they are stupid and you can get your message across.

I never wanted to find out that I was stuped this way  :crybaby:  :kidding:

 

[ArmyRick]

I think too many people want to beleive there is a large conspiracy at work (Too many episodes of 24 I guess). Anyways, when most of these naive clowns get older and learn about "the real world" then maybe they will reflect back on their in fashion bash of anything right wing, pro military, pro harper, pro progression, etc, etc.

 

[Kirkhill]

Its a backgrounder. It is for the press. Take a look at some of the other backgrounders on things like the JSS, the Strat and Taclift, the medium trucks etc.  It lays out the details that the press seems to be perenially insufficiently briefed on.  (Even with the briefings it seems they still can't get things right).  This is putting on the record what the government told the press.  If the press now gets the facts wrong people like us, as well as the government, can now point to these and say "This is what the government said".

They also supply useful ammunition to counter sloganeering activists and the war rooms of other political parties.

Having said that - the government does need a bumper sticker on Afghanistan.  Generally three words although "Dear Lord, Please let there be another oil boom. I promise not to piss it all away again." was popular for a while.  As was "Let those eastern bastards freeze in the dark".  Those seem to be the upper limits of bumperstickerabilia.  ;D

 

[McG]

'Awful, evil mix' behind Afghan insurgency funding
Updated Sun. Jan. 7 2007 6:19 PM ET
Canadian Press

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- An "awful, evil mix'' of Taliban hardliners, drug lords, black marketers and corrupt officials are funding the insurgency that Canadian troops are battling in the Panjwaii and Zhari districts of southern Afghanistan, a senior Canadian officer said Sunday.


"I call them the predators,'' Col. Fred Lewis, deputy commander of the task force in southern Afghanistan, told The Canadian Press in an interview in which he discussed efforts to uproot the insurgency in the Arghandab River Valley area.


Despite years of drought, the region remains one of the country's bread baskets, with plentiful grape orchards -- along with huge marijuana and poppy fields that have developed into a major cash crop for farmers.


As Canadian troops continue to push ahead with Operation Baaz Tsuka in this former Taliban heartland, there seems to be a never ending supply of money to fund the hiring of more rebel fighters or for training suicide bombers brought in from Pakistan.


"I think more people are more and more convinced there's a pretty close connection (between the Taliban and the drug lords), which is pretty ironic because in 1996 when the Taliban took over the country one of their platforms was `we're not doing drugs anymore,''' Lewis said.


"Why would the Taliban fight so hard for this Arghandab Valley triangle area that we're all so familiar with now? The fact is that valley has water and it's green,'' he said.


Lewis said probably a third of the marijuana and opium crops under cultivation in the Arghandab Valley are drug-related.


"So why do you fight for that? Lewis said. "Well if you're a drug lord who is making millions and millions and millions of dollars, is it worth paying guys $200 to fight so that the coalition doesn't come into your valley?''


The Taliban pay their fighters about US$200 a month.


"Yeah, I think there's a pretty close connection between the Taliban and drug lords. Is it about financing? Maybe. It's just putting two and two together and it's not based on any secret intelligence reports or anything,'' he added.


Lewis said using the term Taliban to describe all the forces fighting Canadian troops is probably inaccurate. A number of groups: religious, political and criminal have a stake in the ongoing instability.


For the drug lords, it comes down to making sure farmers in the area plant marijuana or opium poppies, Lewis said, claiming that ordinary farmers were being coerced into the drug trade.


"An Afghan farmer gets $200 a month for farming opium but my understanding is when he farms grapes he gets $500 a month. The ones making all the money are the drug lords,'' he said.


"When you're making in the millions, are you willing to have a gang along who shows up at two in the morning who says to Farmer Smith: `You're growing opium next year, right?'''


Operation Baaz Tsuka, with the goal of helping Afghans defend themselves, is the only one that will eventually allow Afghanistan to emerge from the quagmire, said Lewis, who conceded that the Taliban are not going to go away.


There are probably about 500 Taliban hardliners in the province right now and likely still will be 10 years from now, he said.


"They may continue to exist for decades, but they (the Afghan people) can get to the level where they can deal with the situation,'' he said, noting that the overall population of the province is about two million.


Lewis said Canadians need to know that the war against the Taliban and their associates is winnable and a "noble cause'' and it would be wrong to leave the Afghan people at their mercy.


"They are the drug lords, they are the black marketeers, they are probably certain corrupt leaders. You add that to the Taliban leadership and it is just an awful, evil mix,'' Lewis said.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070107/afghan_insurgency_070107/20070107?hub=Canada

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act, from a very recent (6 Jan 07) edition of the Globe and Mail is a summary of the situation in Afghanistan, as seen through a Canadian political lens, by the Globe’s Jeffrey Simpson:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070105.cosimp06/BNStory/National/home 

A bad end looms over Canada's Afghan mission

JEFFREY SIMPSON
From Saturday's Globe and Mail

Now that we've seen the last of the Christmas feel-good stories about Canada's troops in Afghanistan, serious analysis can focus on the tasks ahead for those troops — tasks made more difficult by the lack of progress in 2006.

That lack of progress was not the troops' fault. Instead, it reflected wider, ominous developments over which the Canadians have little, if any, control. These developments include the growing Taliban presence in Pakistan, the refusal of other NATO countries to assume new responsibilities, the Americans' Iraq distraction, the ongoing failure of NATO's poppy eradication policy, and the inability to make a dent against endemic poverty and corruption.

Canada has about 2,500 personnel in the province of Kandahar. Of these, perhaps 800 to 1,000 actually go on patrol. Their job remains to bring peace and stability (with such Afghan soldiers as can be found) to territory roughly the size of Nova Scotia.

The enemies of peace and stability — the Taliban, al-Qaeda, jihadists — are in the province, and over the border in Pakistan. Throughout this winter, these groups have rested, reorganized and trained for the next onslaught.

Borders must be sealed to improve any counterinsurgency's chance of success. The Pakistani-Afghan border, by contrast, is wide open. One slice of territory inside Pakistan adjacent to the border — the so-called federally administered tribal areas — has become what diplomats and intelligence officials quoted in The New York Times call a “Taliban mini-state.”

Last month, the Times chronicled how foreign fighters have implanted themselves in the area, supplanting tribal leaders, sometimes by violence. The foreign fighters have imported from Iraq the use of suicide bombings, car bombs and roadside explosive devices. These tactics will be increasingly used in Afghanistan.

The enemies of stability are also recruiting in Pakistan's madrassas (religious schools). The Times quoted unnamed officials saying the list of youths lining up for suicide attacks is lengthening in the tribal areas and Quetta, the headquarters of al-Qaeda.

Pakistan signed an agreement with the area's tribal leaders that made everything easier for the Taliban and al-Qaeda — and, therefore, more ominous for the Canadians and other NATO forces. The agreement stipulated that Pakistan would withdraw forces from the area in exchange for a pledge by tribal leaders to prevent people from crossing into Afghanistan.

Pakistan's central government essentially gave up trying to control the tribal areas. The result has been a political vacuum into which the Taliban and other militants have moved. It's widely believed that some elements of Pakistan's security forces support the Taliban, either because they sympathize with the Taliban's ideology or prefer a weak Afghanistan.

The Americans went easy on Pakistan's safe haven for the Taliban in exchange for (fitful) co-operation in pursuing al-Qaeda, the use of some military bases, and the shutting down of A. Q. Khan's nuclear proliferation network. The U.S. and NATO retain much leverage over Pakistan.

While the situation in Pakistan deteriorated, so did NATO's overall commitment to the success of the Afghan mission. With security threats rising, NATO countries failed to correspondingly increase the number of forces and reconstruction funds committed to Afghanistan.

When the countries doing the fighting in the troubled south — Canada, Britain and the Netherlands — asked for help, they got next to nothing from the other allies (Poland excepted). These countries, therefore, will spend 2007 facing a redoubtable, better-equipped foe with essentially the same forces as in 2006.

The United States is completely overwhelmed by the catastrophe it created in Iraq. President George W. Bush will make one last desperate attempt to stabilize at least the Baghdad area by sending thousands of additional U.S. soldiers. That deployment means no more troops for Afghanistan.

Police training in Afghanistan, supposedly the responsibility of Germany, is going badly. Poppy eradication, supposedly the responsibility of Britain, is going backward, with the United Nations reporting a record crop in 2006. The profits from the poppy trade help fuel the insurgency and augment corruption. Judicial training, supposedly the responsibility of Italy, is a joke.

Barnett Rubin, the foremost U.S. academic expert on Afghanistan, visited the country four times last year. His eminence gave him access to leaders everywhere. His article in Foreign Affairs chronicles the problems and failures, although he rightly credits Canadians and others (without mentioning them) for preventing the Taliban from winning a fight for territory west of Kandahar.

Failure to provide enough aid, he writes, is leading to rising crime, lack of electricity, deepening poverty, police corruption, and a booming drug economy. Failure to persuade Pakistan to be helpful means a more difficult military challenge. Failure of NATO countries to step up their military contributions (and to redeploy to the dangerous south and east) and to increase reconstruction aid has placed the long-term success of the entire Afghan mission in doubt.

These are factors over which Canada has minimal control. But they are the ones, ultimately, that will determine the fate of the mission in Kandahar.

jsimpson@globeandmail.com

I do not normally pay much attention to Simpson when he strays out of his lane (Canadian domestic politics) and discusses foreign and defence matters.  But, this is, essentially, a rehash of Barnett Rubin’s Jan/Feb 2007 Foreign Affairs article - http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20070101faessay86105/barnett-r-rubin/saving-afghanistan.html as Simpson acknowledges.  ”Rubin is Director of Studies and a Senior Fellow at New York University's Center on International Cooperation and the author of The Fragmentation of Afghanistan. He served as an adviser to the Special Representative of the Secretary-General at the UN Talks on Afghanistan in Bonn in 2001.”  Rubin is a credible source; his views, synopsized for a quick easy read by Canadian decision makers, matter and should be considered.

More important: this summary was read and considered yesterday morning by an influential if often credulous audience – including Conservative Party caucus members.  Some points to note, I think are:

1. “Borders must be sealed to improve any … chance of success …” This is a self evident truth, I believe, but much, much easier said than done because it must refer to more than just the Afghanistan/Pakistan border – Afghanistan also borders Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and China.  All but China have porous borders with Afghanistan;

2. “…foreign fighters have implanted themselves in the area, supplanting tribal leaders, sometimes by violence. The foreign fighters have imported from Iraq the use of suicide bombings, car bombs and roadside explosive devices.”  This also seems self-evident and reinforces the problem enunciated in 1, above;

3. “The enemies of stability are also recruiting in Pakistan's madrassas …”  These Saudi funded ‘schools’ preach and teach a narrow form of Islam, to mainly destitute children, designed to create fundamentalists who will see jihad and martyrdom as paths to a better existence (it could hardly get much worse).  This problem is bigger than Pakistan.  The rich Saudi Wahabbis, bankrolled and protected by the Saudi royal family, are one of the tangled roots of the radical Islamist movements.  They sponsor the madrassas;

4. “Pakistan's central government essentially gave up trying to control the tribal areas. The result has been a political vacuum into which the Taliban and other militants have moved … some elements of Pakistan's security forces support the Taliban …”  This makes eradicating the madrassas and sealing the border even more difficult;

5. “Police training in Afghanistan, supposedly the responsibility of Germany, is going badly.”  Effective national, regional and, especially, local police is one of the keys to making Afghanistan governable.  If we cannot make Afghan governable by Afghans, for Afghans we will have failed.  Thanks, NATO/Germany;

6. “Poppy eradication, supposedly the responsibility of Britain, is going backward, with the United Nations reporting a record crop in 2006. The profits from the poppy trade help fuel the insurgency and augment corruption.”  As Ruxted pointed out at - http://ruxted.ca/index.php?/archives/35-More-than-a-hammer.html - there needs to be a fresh look at how to take the profits from the opium poppy away from the bad guys without bankrupting poor farmers who cultivate poppies on arid land where little else can be grown for an honest profit; and

7. “Judicial training, supposedly the responsibility of Italy, is a joke.”  This exacerbates the problem at 5, above.  Thanks NATO/Italy.

In addition, Simpson takes a shot at the military’s tooth-to-tail ratio, too.  That will not pass unnoticed and, it seems to me it highlights the less than adequate job that MND Gordon O’Connor has done in explaining not just the ‘why’ of Afghanistan but also the ‘who,’ ‘what,’ and ‘how’ of the mission.  A few reporters have tried to explain why it requires about two C3, medical and service support people to back-up every battle group soldier but they have not managed to convey either the criticality of solid C3 and logistical support or the universal nature of admin tails in all allied armies.  Too bad; Simpson is likely to stir up controversy where none is warranted.

I just wish some politicians and members of the national commentariat would take note of the final self evident truth expounded by Simpson: ” These are factors over which Canada has minimal control.”  Our military has to fight and work within the constraints imposed by all the problems Rubin/Simpson enunciate; ditto our development workers, diplomats and officials and generals in Ottawa and their political masters, too.  The fact that we cannot exercise much ‘control’ for the situation in Afghanistan is not a good reason to pack up and come home before the job we can do is done.

 

[zipperhead_cop]

That is kind of a smart switch in tactics, though.  Instead of trying to hammer home that Mr. Harper has an "unbalanced mission" and such, run with "it's everyone elses fault, and we shouldn't have to pay for their lack of help/success".  Paint our guys as the heroes/patsies, and then make the situation seem obvious that the troops need to be pulled, since they are getting jerked around by NATO.  God knows Canadians love to paint themselves as victims.  Then the NDP can come rushing in and say "see, that is what we were trying to tell you all along" and the Lieberals can say "whoa, they sure hung us out.  That isn't what we bought into". 
Games, but cunning moves just the same. 

 

[Zell_Dietrich]

Zipperhead, I think you're 100% right on that point.  To attain a goal politicians changes their message for different groups.  It isn't about saying the right message, it is about getting the right result.  I believe that the NDP and other anti-afghanistan-mission people truly believe in their objectives.  I see no reason why they wont grab at any loose thread and yank, hoping to unravel the tapestry that holds the mission together.  Frankly,  the fact that some NATO countries are 'seemingly' leaving us out to dry is a very good and powerfull point.  It shows precedence that other respectable countries don't think the mission is worth their lives,  so why do we,  and secondly it shows that we're doing more than our share so we can pull back with no discrace. 

I believe that we truly need to get Afghanistan up on its feet as a working country again.  If we fail to do so we'll be condemning generations of Afghans to more wars and oppressive regimes while condemning generations of westerners to terrorist attacks and other serious problems.  For far to long we ignored their plight,  choosing not to get involved.  Because we didn't want to get mired inside an "Arab" problem,  we simply ignored the signs of genuine trouble coming our way. It was only when we felt threatened (yes attacked) that we finally removed the Taliban from power.  Do we now allow them to regain power and threaten us all over again - and they will.

 

[Spr.Earl]

The debate is mute now,we are there now and have to stay through thick and thin and do what we are good at.

 

[observor 69]

Most people, at least in this group, know the "why" the trouble is with the "how."  Is the cause noble and worthy, probably. Is Pakistan the new Cambodia, probably. Is the battle going to just sputter out due to a lack of commitment of personnel and resources by the the NATO members and the weary Bush administration, probably.

And I wouldn't put my money on the public "always" being stupid, sometimes they show an amazing amount of common sense and insight.

 

[MarkOttawa]

Another take on Rubin's Afghanistan piece in Foreign Affairs--headline Jan. 6 in the Ottawa Citizen:

Afghan mission 'doomed to fail'
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=87414256-04d1-442f-a43b-03855cfc8da2&k=75000

The phrase in quotes appears nowhere, as the quotes suggest, in the Foreign Affairs article and are the words of the reporter himself.  I thought it was standard journalistic practice to use quotes in a headline only when referring to words other than those of the reporter.

Indeed, a headline writer with a different agenda could have written this using a phrase that actually is in the article:

"Battle for Afghanistan 'is still ours to lose'"

But that would not suit the agenda of many of our journalists, who seem to be lusting for defeat.

The Citizen may print a letter of mine on this Jan. 9.

Mark
Ottawa

 

[Good2Golf]

Mark, the problem is, the majority of the public will not read Barnett's works, thus they take the 'quote' at face value...this isn't very professional of a journalist, IMO.  There is a difference between 'doomed to fail' and 'our's to lose'.  Shame on The Citizen!

G2G 

 

[North Star]

Actually, the best argument about Afghanistan was by the PM, and didn't involve moral issues. UIf we fail in Afghanistan, we'll simply end up there again and again...

 

[CForc3]

This is an article that all Canadians should read. Military or civilian.

 

[The Bread Guy]

Another take on Rubin's Afghanistan piece in Foreign Affairs--headline Jan. 6 in the Ottawa Citizen:

Afghan mission 'doomed to fail'
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=87414256-04d1-442f-a43b-03855cfc8da2&k=75000

The phrase in quotes appears nowhere, as the quotes suggest, in the Foreign Affairs article and are the words of the reporter himself.  I thought it was standard journalistic practice to use quotes in a headline only when referring to words other than those of the reporter.

Indeed, a headline writer with a different agenda could have written this using a phrase that actually is in the article:

"Battle for Afghanistan 'is still ours to lose'"

But that would not suit the agenda of many of our journalists, who seem to be lusting for defeat.

The Citizen may print a letter of mine on this Jan. 9.

Mark
Ottawa

Anyone care to guess how many editors who are writing headlines for such pieces read either the entire piece, or the source article it's based on?  Anyone?  Anyone? :

BTW, I take it your letter didn't make it since it's not posted??

 

[MarkOttawa]

milnewstbay: Not published--they phoned and said were considering.

It's not just how much the headline writers read, it's what their agenda is (and that of some reporters).

Mark
Ottawa

 

[The Bread Guy]

Shared in accordance with the "fair dealing" provisions, Section 29, of the Copyright Act.

Document outlines Canada's military plans in Afghanistan
CBC Online, 28 Jan 07
Article Link

The Canadian military effort in Afghanistan will be complete when Afghan security forces are established and the Afghan government gains full control of the area, says a new document from the military's chief of defence staff.  The document — authored by Gen. Rick Hillier and obtained recently by CBC News —stated that the military's job in Afghanistan is considered successful and completed:

    * when new Afghan security forces "are established" and "fully controlled" by the Afghan government.
    * when those forces are trained and can conduct their own "counter-insurgency operations."
    * when the forces can defend against foreign fighters and "effectively control borders."
    * and when "terrorist groups are denied sanctuary within Afghanistan."

The military plan is achievable, but not in the short term, said Rob Huebert, a military analyst at the University of Calgary's Centre for Military and Strategic Studies.

"The Taliban-al-Qaeda threat has not been entirely neutralized, and the big problem we have right now is the Pakistani border provides refuge," Huebert said. "Once that border gets sealed, then you can start dealing with the problem more effectively."

The military objectives also outline how the Canadian Forces will accomplish their goals using air and ground combat operations against al-Qaeda, the Taliban and other armed grounds within Afghanistan.

To date, Canada has yet to deploy any combat aircraft, but it has 2,500 Canadian soldiers on the ground in Afghanistan.

There are still many questions, said Denis Coderre, the Liberal defence critic, adding that if the government wants to meet its military goals, it will have to extend the mission.

"When you look at the end state of that paper, long term means exactly that," Coderre said.

The prime minister's office concurred with Coderre's comments, indicating success in Afghanistan will take time.

Thirty-six soldiers and one diplomat have been killed since their the deployment 14 months ago.

Earlier this weekend, two more groups of soldiers left Canada for a six-month tour of duty in Afghanistan as part of a troop rotation that will see their counterparts in the country's war zone return home over the next two months.

 

[rmacqueen]

The news report CBC radio this morning stated the report was marked SECRET.  If this is true there is a big problem at NDHQ

 

[The Bread Guy]

The news report CBC radio this morning stated the report was marked SECRET.  If this is true there is a big problem at NDHQ

True, but should we also worry about whether such obvious truths have to be marked SECRET?

 

[GAP]

It was marked Secret on the news last night, but obtained through the Freedom of Information Request system, so it must have been declassified for some reason.....maybe to get the word out why we are there?

 

[vonGarvin]

I thought that this morning as well when I heard the story.  Even though broadcast, if something's marked "SECRET" and that classification still applies, isn't it criminal to air it?  I think even the cbc wouldn't do such a thing, ergo, I believe that parts of this document were declassified, or vetted for public consumption....