The Sandbox and Areas Reports Thread August 2009

[MarkOttawa]

U.S., Allies Plan to Bolster Kandahar Force (with useful interactive map)
Wall St. Journal, Aug. 26
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125122932329657897.html

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- The U.S. and its allies are planning to reinforce Afghan police and army units guarding Kandahar with American and Canadian troops, a move that acknowledges the deteriorating condition of the south's largest city.

According to senior military officials, U.S. and Canadian soldiers will for the first time deploy to bases on the outskirts of the city. The local Afghan forces will be bolstered by an expanded number of embedded American trainers.

The plan represents a high-stakes wager that the Afghans have the ability to keep Kandahar safe, a mission they and North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces have so far largely been unable to accomplish. It is also a tacit admission that the U.S. and its NATO allies erred by sending troops to sparsely inhabited parts of eastern and southern Afghanistan instead of to major population centers, such as Kandahar.

NATO has grown increasingly concerned about Taliban encroachment into Kandahar, the militant group's spiritual birthplace. Nearly 4,000 Marines are embroiled in a major offensive in neighboring Helmand province and military officials say the Taliban appear to have taken advantage of the fighting to infiltrate the city with significant numbers of operatives.

In a sign of the escalating violence that has accompanied election season, Kandahar was rocked Tuesday by five simultaneous car bombs that killed at least 41 people and wounded at least 66, the Associated Press reported, citing local officials. The blast, which flattened several buildings, appeared to target a Japanese construction company that employs mostly Pakistani engineers. Also Tuesday, the U.S. military said a bomb blast killed four soldiers in southern Afghanistan, pushing this year's death toll of foreign soldiers to 295, more than the number who died in all of last year...

"It's vulnerable," said Brig. Gen. Jonathan Vance, who commands the 2,800 Canadian troops in Kandahar province. "I don't see it as precarious; but if we don't address it more thoroughly we could be in deep trouble [emphasis added]."..

Under the plan, the U.S. would send hundreds of the new troops into Kandahar to train and live with Afghan security forces [emphasis added]. The Afghan police and army will retain primary responsibility for protecting the city and reversing the recent Taliban encroachment [seems there was some over-optimism about that this spring], Gen. Nicholson ["Brig. Gen. John Nicholson, the top U.S. commander in southern Afghanistan"] said.

He said the bulk of the American reinforcements will be deployed to new bases on the main approaches into the city, population centers in their own right. Additional forces will be sent to the Arghandab River Valley, a fertile region of the province that also houses a significant share of the area's population, he said...

Mark
Ottawa

 

[GAP]

Articles found August 27, 2009

Officer sues RCMP over treatment in Afghanistan
By The Canadian Press Thu. Aug 27 - 4:46 AM
Article Link

VANCOUVER — In March of 2007, veteran RCMP Sgt. Derrick Ross headed to Afghanistan as part of the Mounties’ continuing mission to help train that war-battered nation’s civilian police force.

Once there, however, he claims his scheduled year-long tour of duty turned into a nightmare.

According to Ross, a Metis, his stay was marked by racial tension and condescension from other RCMP members. He was further perturbed, he says, by the practice of some Mounties to accompany military excursions, which Ross felt was beyond their prescribed policing responsibilities.

After just six months, Ross, who had raised questions over behaviour he thought was improper, was sent home, after a computer incident from which he was subsequently cleared of any wrongdoing.

Now, in a statement of claim to be filed in the Supreme Court of British Columbia Wednesday, Ross is suing senior RCMP officers over his treatment in Afghanistan and alleged harassment once he returned.
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Young Afghan freed from Guantanamo to sue US gov't
By HEIDI VOGT (AP) – 3 hours ago
Article Link

KABUL — The family of one of the youngest prisoners ever held at Guantanamo plans to sue the U.S. government to compensate him for mistreatment and an adolescence lost to nearly seven years in a cell, his lawyers said Thursday.

Mohammed Jawad returned to Afghanistan this week after a military judge ruled that he was coerced into confessing that he threw a grenade at an unmarked vehicle in the capital in 2002. The attack wounded two American soldiers and their interpreter.

Afghan police delivered Jawad into U.S. custody and about a month later he was sent to the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Jawad and his family say he was 12 when he was arrested, and that he is now 19 years old. The Pentagon has said a bone scan showed he was about 17 when taken into custody. His defense lawyers decline to give an exact age for Jawad, who does not have a birth certificate, but say photos taken in Guantanamo showed that he had not gone through puberty.

"I was an innocent child when they put me in prison," Jawad told The Associated Press in an interview at the offices of an Afghan lawyer association. A round-cheeked man with a scraggly beard, Jawad spoke tentatively, glancing at his lawyer. He wore a white robe and a traditional beaded cap as he sat stiffly on an office couch.
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Delay Further Muddies Afghan Vote Count
By REUTERS Published: August 27, 2009
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KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan officials said on Thursday they had delayed releasing further results from the nation's disputed presidential poll, adding further confusion to a contest which appears headed for a second round.

Votes from about 17 percent of 27,000 polling stations have been counted so far, meaning results could swing wildly in the coming days. Preliminary final results are due on September 3, with the final tally about two weeks later.

Afghanistan has been in political limbo since the August 20 vote, with partial results released so far showing President Hamid Karzai leading his main rival, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, by about 43 percent to 34 percent.

Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission (IEC) said only votes from provincial council elections, held concurrently with the presidential poll a week ago, would be counted on Thursday.

Adding to an already chaotic picture, computer software failures meant counting was going slower than expected, said IEC deputy head Zekria Barakzai.

The election is a major test for Karzai after eight years in power and for U.S. President Barack Obama, who has poured in thousands of extra troops as part of his new regional strategy to defeat the Taliban and stabilize Afghanistan.

The picture will not become any clearer for at least two days, with no counting planned for Friday, a Muslim holiday.
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U.S. police to bolster Canadian cop ranks in Afghanistan
By Matthew Fisher, Canwest News ServiceAugust 26, 2009
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KABUL — Canadian police mentors in Kandahar City are going to get help soon from the U.S. army.

"These are not just any Americans. It is a company of military police," assistant commissioner Graham Muir of the RCMP said in an interview on Wednesday.

"What is about to unfold," the senior Canadian police officer in Afghanistan said, is that Canadian mentors based in the country's second largest city are going to be "a little more robust in the field" because the U.S. military police that they will soon work with "have fighting skills."

The more than 100 newcomers from the U.S. are to work directly for Brig-Gen. Jon Vance, the Canadian who runs Task Force Kandahar. A battalion of U.S. army infantry already reports to Vance, whose command will soon number more than 4,000 troops, including 2,800 Canadians.
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[MarkOttawa]

Afghanistan: protecting the people is the mission
Conference of Defence Associations' media round-up, Aug. 27
http://www.cdaforumcad.ca/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1251393302

...
Recommended reading
...
Damian Brooks for The Torch blog criticizes the propagation of Taliban viewpoints in the international media.
http://toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com/2009/08/real-propaganda.html ...

Mark
Ottawa

 

[GAP]

Articles found August 30, 2009

Canadian soldier wounded by own weapon in Afghanistan
By Matthew Fisher, Canwest News ServiceAugust 28, 2009
Article Link

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — A Canadian soldier is in critical but stable condition after apparently being shot with his own weapon.

The incident occurred Thursday morning in a bunker near the Canadian living quarters at the Kandahar Airfield, said Maj. Mario Couture of Task Force Kandahar. Such bunkers, which are often as large as a baseball dugout, are a common sight at the base, which is the hub for NATO's war against the Taliban and al-Qaida in southern Afghanistan.

Other Canadian military and civilian personnel rushed to provide first aid before the wounded soldier, who had recently arrived in Afghanistan, was taken to the Canadian-led military hospital at the base.

As with most seriously wounded Americans and Canadians from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the wounded soldier is expected to be flown to a U.S. army medical facility at Landstuhl, Germany for highly specialized treatment before returning to North America.

Thursday's shooting was not disclosed publicly until Friday because it took some time to locate and inform the next of kin, Couture, the task force's senior spokesman, said. The Canadian Forces have a long-standing policy of not releasing the names of wounded soldiers.

"The soldier received non-battle related injuries caused by a weapon that is believed to be his own," Couture said.
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  U.S. reporter wounded in Afghanistan
updated 5:56 a.m. EDT, Sat August 29
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A CBS News reporter was seriously injured Friday in a roadside bombing in Afghanistan that also killed a U.S. soldier, the network said.

Cami McCormick, 47, was riding in the same army vehicle as the soldier in eastern Logar province when the vehicle was hit by an improvised explosive device, the U.S. network said.

The army was on a routine mission at the time of the blast, NATO's International Security Assistance Force said. It did not provide any other information.

Before CBS, McCormick worked for CNN and CNN Radio in Atlanta, Georgia.

McCormick was on assignment for CBS Radio News. She underwent emergency surgery at a field hospital before being taken to Bagram Air Base for further treatment, CBS said. She is in stable condition.
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  Life imitates art as gunmen attack crew of Afghan war movie
updated 1:27 p.m. EDT, Fri August 28, 2009
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LONDON, England (CNN) -- When David Whitney traveled to Pakistan to shoot his film about a man forced to flee Afghanistan after falling foul of the Taliban he didn't expect fiction to turn into reality.

But that's exactly what happened three weeks into shooting political thriller "Kandahar Break" in late 2008.

Gunmen attacked the first-time director and his crew near the Afghan border. Four Pakistani crew members were shot and wounded in the incident and the entire crew was forced to flee the region.

Pakistani authorities later told Whitney that the gunmen were affiliated with the Taliban and were in fact targeting the Western members of the team.

"I was very upset. It was terrifying to know that somebody was trying to attack us, trying to shoot us," Whitney told CNN.

With the help of local security forces the team was immediately evacuated to Islamabad and put on a flight out of the country in 24 hours.

Whitney had only managed to film three-quarters of the script and the film's future lay in the balance.
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Grieving Saskatchewan First Nation remembers two soldiers killed in crashes
By Jennifer Graham (CP) – 17 hours ago
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Grief and pride are tearing at a northern Saskatchewan First Nation as band members say goodbye to two young soldiers and rising stars who were killed in separate car crashes on the same day.

Kyle Whitehead, a private in the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, died Aug. 22 when a car he was driving on the Big River First Nation went into a ditch and rolled several times.

In another country thousands of kilometres away, another soldier from Big River, Sgt. Darby Morin, 25, who was serving with the U.S. Army, died in a vehicle rollover in Afghanistan.

"The young people that died here are certainly role models," Chief Lawrence Joseph of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations said after Whitehead's funeral Friday.

"This young man we buried made a choice to serve in the Canadian Army. He made a choice as a young person to do something, extremely dangerous work when we know that there are conflicts around the world, but he made that choice."
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Counterterrorism official killed in Afghanistan
By RAHIM FAIEZ (AP) – 8 hours ago
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KABUL — Militants gunned down a provincial counterterrorism chief in eastern Afghanistan after ambushing his convoy, an official said Sunday.

Fayez Khan, who headed counterterrorism operations for Khost province, was driving home Saturday evening in a convoy with police and bodyguards when he was ambushed, said Tahir Khan Sabari, the province's deputy governor. Khan was killed immediately, though a short gunbattle ensued as the security forces battled the attackers, Sabari said.

Sabari said he believed the attackers were Taliban fighters because Khan's job made him an obvious target and because Khan was not known to have any personal feuds that would account for the attack.

One of the attackers was also killed and another wounded, Sabari said. There were no other injuries.
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Afghan election fraud probe grows
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Opposition candidates say some ballot boxes have been filled with fake votes

Election complaints officials in Afghanistan say they are looking into more than 560 major allegations of fraud from the 20 August vote.

The tally doubles the figure of serious allegations reported two days ago.

Full preliminary results are due next week, but the final results will not be made official until major fraud allegations are investigated.

The latest partial results give President Hamid Karzai 46% of the votes compared to Abdullah Abdullah's 31.4%.

A candidate needs 50% of votes cast to avoid a second round run-off which, if needed, would be held in October.
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Richards had warned of shortages in Afghanistan
Sun, 30 Aug 2009
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Britain's new head of the Army says he had warned about troop shortages in Afghanistan three years ago when he commanded the NATO mission in the war-weary country.

Gen. Sir David Richards explained how officials within NATO and Britain's Ministry of Defense were upset when he 'forcefully pointed out' that the Afghanistan war burden required more forces,The Times reported.

"The international community's effort there was approaching something close to anarchy," said the general who took command of NATO's International Security Force (ISAF) in 2006.

The comments come as Britain's record-high death toll from a counterinsurgent campaign in Afghanistan's Helmand province, namely Operation Panther's Claw, is being increasingly blamed on poor logistics.
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[MarkOttawa]

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown pays surprise visit to troops in southern Afghanistan
AP, Aug. 29
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090829/world/as_afghan_britain_1

KABUL - Britain's prime minister paid a surprise visit Saturday to British troops in southern Afghanistan, promising more help to cope with Taliban insurgents who have inflicted casualties on the embattled force and undercut support in Britain for the war.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown, speaking to British soldiers and journalists at the British base in Lashkar Gah, pledged to provide more equipment to help overcome the threat of Taliban roadside bombs, a major threat to NATO forces.

More than 200 British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since the war began in 2001 - more than Britain lost in the Iraq conflict.

Last week, British troops cleared 337 roadside bombs from some of the most dangerous roads in Helmand province, which has been centre-stage in the recent fighting...

British officials said they recognize the need for better-armoured vehicles and more helicopters in Afghanistan and that they would get then here as soon as possible.

Brown also said he wants to accelerate the training of the Afghan army so the Afghans can assume a greater role in defending the country. He called for speeding up the target of training about 50,000 additional Afghan troops, which would bring the overall level trained to around 135,000.

The prime minister arrived with Air Chief Marshal Jock Stirrup, chief of the British Defence Staff, and met with senior commanders including the top U.S. officer, Gen. Stanley McChrystal.

Support for the war is slipping in Britain. Critics believe the mission is too open-ended, and its goals too vague...

Brown's promise of more help followed news reports in Britain that the new British army chief, Gen. David Richards, warned three years ago there were not enough troops to carry out the mission in Afghanistan [emphasis added].

Richards told The Times of London that his remarks upset senior figures in NATO and the British Ministry of Defence... 

Taliban's growth in Afghanistan's north threatens to expand war
McClatchy Newspapers, Aug. 28
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/74543.html

BAGHLAN-I-JADID, Afghanistan — Taliban insurgents have taken over parts of two northern provinces from which they were driven in 2001, threatening to disrupt NATO's new supply route from Central Asia and expand a war that's largely been confined to Afghanistan's southern half, U.S. and Afghan officials said.

Insurgents operating out of Baghlan district along the highway from Tajikistan launched coordinated attacks during the Aug. 20 presidential elections, killing the district police chief and a civilian, while losing a dozen of their own men, local officials said. It was the worst bloodshed reported in the country that day.

The violence has been on the rise in recent months, however, as the Taliban and al Qaida-linked foreign fighters have staged hit-and-run attacks, bombings and rocket strikes on German, Belgian and Hungarian forces in Baghlan and neighboring Kunduz provinces.

The insurgents now control three Pashtun-dominated districts in Kunduz and Baghlan-i-Jadid, a foothold in a region that was long considered safe. With a force estimated at 300 to 600 hard-core fighters, they operate checkpoints at night on the highway to the north, now a major supply route, local officials said, and are extorting money, food and lodging from villagers...

Northern Afghanistan's nine provinces, dominated by ethnic minorities who opposed the Taliban, have mostly been peaceful since local forces aided by U.S. support ousted the militia in late 2001. About 5,700 German-led international troops have been overseeing major aid and reconstruction efforts from their headquarters in Kunduz [emphasis added].

The Taliban infiltration into Kunduz and Baghlan began 18 months ago with the return from Pakistan of insurgent leaders who ran the provinces during the Taliban rule of Afghanistan, U.S. and Afghan officials said. The establishment of the new NATO supply route may be a factor that drew Taliban from the south...

Several U.S. military officials said Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the recently installed U.S. commander in Afghanistan, hopes to stem the problem by deploying additional Afghan troops accompanied by U.S. military trainers [emphasis added], an idea that appealed to local officials who fear an influx of American soldiers would fuel violence and bloodshed.

Barekzai, the Baghlan governor, said that he only has about 1,400 police officers and 500 Afghan troops to call on. About 200 Hungarian forces deployed to secure aid projects in are barred from conducting offensive operations [emphasis added]...

Marine Wing Support Squadron 371 Builds One of the Largest Marine Corps Airfields
2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade News, Aug. 28
http://www.marines.mil/units/marforcom/iimef/2ndmeb/Pages/MarineWingSupportSquadron371BuildsOneoftheLargestMarineCorpsAirfields.aspx

Camp Bastain, Helmand Province, Afghanistan-Marines from Heavy Equipment Platton, Marine Wing Support Squadron 371 "Sand Sharks", operate grating machines to prepare the soil before aluminum matting is placed for the expansion of the airfield on Camp Bastion, Afghanistan May 22.

Marines with Marine Wing Support Squadron-371 have been working diligently on the expansion of the airfield here. Once finished, it will be one of the largest airfields in the Marine Corps, with multiple interconnected taxiways and aircraft maintenance bays.

"The airfield is expanding to house the aircraft in support of Marine Expeditionary Brigade-Afghanistan," said Chief Warrant Officer 2 Ronald Neal, the officer-in-charge of the squadron's heavy equipment platoon. "Our Marines have been here for almost three months now and through sandstorms, hot weather, and aircraft flying over, they are here every day, Sunday to Sunday."..

This airfield is scheduled for completion later this summer and will be a testament to the hard work and dedication of the Marines of MWSS-371, whose home station is Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz., and are here as members of Marine Aircraft Group 40, the aviation combat element of MEB-Afghanistan.

U.S. Sets Metrics to Assess War Success
Washington Post, Aug. 30
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/29/AR2009082902402.html

The White House has assembled a list of about 50 measurements to gauge progress in Afghanistan and Pakistan as it tries to calm rising public and congressional anxiety about its war strategy.

Administration officials are conducting what one called a "test run" of the metrics, comparing current numbers in a range of categories -- including newly trained Afghan army recruits, Pakistani counterinsurgency missions and on-time delivery of promised U.S. resources -- with baselines set earlier in the year. The results will be used to fine-tune the list before it is presented to Congress by Sept. 24.

Lawmakers set that deadline in the spring as a condition for approving additional war funding, holding President Obama to his promise of "clear benchmarks" and no "blank check."

Since then, skepticism about the war in Afghanistan has intensified along with the rising U.S. and NATO casualty rates, now at the highest level of the eight-year-old conflict. An upcoming assessment by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the new military commander in Afghanistan, is expected to lay the groundwork for requests for additional U.S. troop deployments in 2010 [emphasis added].

The administration's concern about waning public support and the war's direction has been compounded by strains in the U.S. relationship with the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Facing their own public opinion problems, both appear increasingly resentful of U.S. demands for improved performance in the face of what they see as insufficient American support...

U.S. fears clock ticking on Afghanistan
As public support wanes, the Obama administration feels it needs to deliver speedy progress in Afghanistan so that it can gain time and backing for its long-term military strategy.
LA Times, Aug. 30
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-us-afghan30-2009aug30,0,5417839,full.story

Reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan, and Washington - The Obama administration is racing to demonstrate visible headway in the faltering war in Afghanistan, convinced it has only until next summer to slow a hemorrhage in U.S. support and win more time for the military and diplomatic strategy it hopes can rescue the 8-year-old effort.

But the challenge in Afghanistan is becoming more difficult in the face of gains by the Taliban, rising U.S. casualties, a weak Afghan government widely viewed as corrupt, and a sense among U.S. commanders that they must start the military effort largely from scratch nearly eight years after it began.

A turnaround is crucial because military strategists believe they will not be able to get the additional troops they feel they need in coming months if they fail to show that their new approach is working [emphasis added], U.S. officials and advisors say.

"Over the next 12 to 15 months, among the things you absolutely, positively have to do is persuade a skeptical American public that this can work, that you have a plan and a strategy that is feasible," said Stephen Biddle, a military expert who advises the U.S.-led command in Afghanistan...

Besides reversing Taliban advances and strengthening the central government, U.S. officials will strive to hold the NATO alliance intact while reshuffling deployments to consolidate gains, especially in the eastern part of the country, near the Pakistani border [emphasis added]...

Diplomatically, U.S. officials have begun a push to persuade NATO countries to send more forces to Afghanistan. And they are also trying to stave off departures by key allies.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, with its 38,000 troops, is considered important both to combat efforts and to the international credibility of the war.

But Canada, which now oversees the southern regional command, is scheduled to pull out its combat troops in 2011, and the Dutch are scheduled to leave next year [emphasis added]. A German opposition party, the Free Democrats, this month called for the removal of Germany's 4,500 troops. And in Britain, public support for the war is flagging.

Any departures mean more work for U.S. forces, but are also likely to raise questions at home about why Americans are shouldering so much of the burden of the conflict.

"We cannot afford to re-Americanize the war [emphasis added]," said a senior administration official...

Mark
Ottawa

 

[GAP]

Articles found August 31, 2009

Doctor made people mutilated by war whole again
By Craig Pearson, Canwest News ServiceAugust 31, 2009
  Article Link

WINDSOR, Ont. — They came in every day, all day, sometimes in groups, often missing legs and arms.

And that's when Dr. Mark Thibert went to work, or perhaps continued his work, making people whole again amid the horror of war.

"The bad thing was these people usually had a multiplicity of injuries," said Thibert, who was born and raised in Windsor and now works as a plastic surgeon in Thunder Bay. "Most people did not have any particular single injury. They were multiply traumatized people, which you don't often see in a civilian environment.

"But in war, there are many, many people with severe, life-altering, life-threatening injuries."

Thibert returned to his hometown Saturday — to attend a dinner honouring his University of Windsor professor parents, Roger and Audrey Thibert, who together have 112 years of teaching experience. Thibert delivered a presentation about his two-month tour of duty in Afghanistan from July 27 to Oct. 3, 2008, as the first Canadian plastic surgeon serving in a combat zone in Afghanistan.
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Suspected Taliban Torch NATO Supplies In SW Pakistan
By REUTERS Published: August 31, 2009
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CHAMAN, Pakistan (Reuters) - Suspected Taliban militants set fire to 18 container trucks carrying supplies for Western forces in neighbouring Afghanistan in the Pakistani border town of Chaman, police said on Monday.

Some 300 trucks were parked near the border crossing in the country's southwest, as the border had been closed by Pakistani authorities since Friday in a row with their Afghan counterparts over the checking of trucks coming from landlocked Afghanistan.

"The attackers probably had planted explosives under one of the oil tankers which went off, setting others on fire," Abdul Rauf, a senior border police official, told Reuters. "Eighteen trucks have completely been destroyed."

Witnesses, however, said the militants lobbed a grenade onto the trucks, setting them on fire.

"They came on motorcycles. They first opened fire with guns, then threw a rocket-propelled grenade towards our vehicles and ran away," Akhtar Mohammad Niazi, a driver, told Reuters.

Rauf said the authorities had reopened the border crossing after the incident, which took place late on Sunday.
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Canadians teaching Afghan army savour small victories with big challenges
By Matthew Fisher, Canwest News ServiceAugust 30, 2009
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STRONGPOINT DOG, Afghanistan -- Canadians instructing Afghans on how to fight and prepare for war are following an honourable tradition, says Canada's top Operational Mentor and Liaison Team adviser to local forces in Kandahar.

"Lawrence of Arabia was an OMLTeer, too," said Col. Greg Burt, referring to the celebrated British army officer who helped lead the Arabs into battle against the Turks nearly a century ago. "It fits the Canadian ethos. We can lead from the front and help others."

The widespread opinion of Canadian troops now deployed in Kandahar is that when the current combat mission of its battle group ends in 2011, the OMLT unit, which helps train the Afghan army, will not only continue, but will likely be expanded.

U.S. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, President Barack Obama's new Afghanistan commander, says such teams are key to the success of NATO's military commitment.
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  Escalating insurgency in Afghanistan's Kunduz province rooted in past
www.chinaview.cn 2009-08-31
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KABUL, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- The killing of a senior judicial official in Kunduz province of Afghanistan last week once again threw spotlight on the growing militancy in this northern trouble-spot of the country.

    Qari Jan Gir, the chief of the provincial Justice Department, was killed when a roadside bomb hit his car as he was on his way to office on Wednesday.

    Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid prompted to claim responsibility for the attack, adding that his men planted the mine to kill the official.

    Insurgent incidents have been taking place in Kunduz for the last several months, which have struck alarm bells in the capital city of Kabul.

    While the international forces were busy for years grappling Taliban insurgents in southern and eastern Afghanistan, no fear ever existed that militancy would also raise its head in the otherwise peaceful northern parts of the country.
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Afghanistan: Nato troops destroy bunker in raid near Pakistan border
Nato-led troops killed a large number of militant fighters and destroyed a bunker complex in a day-long raid close to the Pakistan border, military officials have said.
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The complex was used as a supply base and safe haven for foreign fighters by the Haqqani network, a Nato statement said.

Troops backed by helicopters fought repeated firefights and called in airstrikes during the 24-hour operation in the Urgun district of Paktika province in eastern Afghanistan.
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Afghanistan strategy must change, US commander McChrystal to tell Obama

Top American commander announces completion of long-awaited review that reports say likens US military to bull charging at matador
guardian.co.uk, Monday 31 August 2009
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The west must change its strategy in order to achieve success in Afghanistan, the top US commander there said today as he announced that his long-awaited review was complete.

"The situation in Afghanistan is serious, but success is achievable and demands a revised implementation strategy, commitment and resolve, and increased unity of effort," General Stanley McChrystal said. His findings will be submitted to President Barack Obama, who faces a public increasingly restive over a war that has lasted eight years.

McChrystal does not ask for more US troops to be sent to Afghanistan, although he is expected to do so in a separate request, according to unnamed Nato officials cited by the Associated Press.

The general has been working on the review since Obama put him in charge of the war in June after firing his predecessor, David McKiernan. The document has been sent to the US military's central command (CentCom), responsible for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to Nato headquarters in Brussels.
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