US 'needs fresh Afghan strategy'

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
US 'needs fresh Afghan strategy'
Tue, 09-01-2009 - 9:20am

The USSR were in Afghanistan for 10 years & couldn't "win" therefore I seriously doubt the USA/NATO can drive out the Talban.


Should we withdraw? Keep adding more troops & pouring in more money?


This is a tribal country can democracy suceed?


Complete article at link........


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8230017.stm


A top US general in Afghanistan has called for a revised military strategy, suggesting the current one is failing.


In a strategic assessment, Gen Stanley McChrystal said that, while the Afghan situation was serious, success was still achievable.


The report has not yet been published, but sources say Gen McChrystal sees protecting the Afghan people against the Taliban as the top priority.


The report does not carry a direct call for increasing troop numbers.


"The situation in Afghanistan is serious, but success is achievable and demands a revised implementation strategy, commitment and resolve, and increased unity of effort," Gen McChrystal said in the assessment.


Copies of the document have been sent to Nato Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and US Defence Secretary Robert Gates.


Turning Point Looms for the U.S. in Afghanistan


Complete article & more links to stories....


http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1919545,00.html


Monday marks the end of August, a month with both good and bad news out of Afghanistan — and the approach of a key turning point. Civilian casualties caused by Western attacks have fallen dramatically under a new edict from General Stanley McChrystal barring air strikes that risk innocent deaths (19 killed since July 1, down from 151 in the same period of 2008). That's designed to show the Afghan people that the U.S. military is a force for good in their country. But at the same time, U.S. troop deaths reached 45 in August, making it the deadliest month for American military personnel since the war began 94 months ago. That's due to U.S. forces challenging the Taliban more directly, and the Taliban's stepped-up use of roadside bombs to kill as many Western troops as possible.



"President Obama inherited a disaster, a war which had been under-resourced horribly for at least six of the last seven and a half years," former CIA official Bruce Riedel, who was tapped by the White House to review Afghan policy, said last week. Even if McChrystal gets whatever forces he feels he needs, the best one can hope for is that the situation may be stabilized in 12 to 18 months. "Anyone who thinks that in 12 to 18 months we're going to be anywhere near victory is living in a fantasyland," Riedel said.



This is a very informative eye-opening article.....


How the Taliban Thrives


Complete article see link.....


http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1919154,00.html


To understand why America and its allies are losing the war in Afghanistan, consider the story behind one deadly attack. On July 6, in the northern Afghan province of Kunduz, a powerful improvised explosive device, or IED, detonated under the wheels of a U.S. humvee. Four soldiers died, as did their translator and a bystander. The makeshift bomb was assembled with goods from the local bazaar. The man who placed it was probably paid the going rate of $750, according to government officials, or more if he captured video proof of dead soldiers. And though the local Taliban covered his expenses and fees, the cash very likely came from money donated by the international community to rebuild Afghanistan's roads, bridges, clinics and schools.


Just a week before the explosion, Hajji Lala Jan, a local businessman subcontracted by a local firm working for the German government — aid agency GTZ to build a road in Kunduz, handed some $15,000 in cash to a Taliban middleman to ensure that his project wouldn't be attacked, according to local officials — though Jan himself denies it. The Taliban cash flow has many sources, and it's impossible to say if German taxpayer dollars directly paid for that IED. Andreas Clausing, country director for GTZ, says such payoffs are "impossible. It is forbidden in our contracts, and we have very strict monitoring." Nevertheless, it is likely that a substantial amount of aid money from many countries — including the U.S. — has made its way, directly or indirectly, into the Taliban's coffers. "Here we have internationals and Afghans turning a blind eye to the fact that we are paying off the very Taliban that we claim to be fighting," says an adviser to the Afghan Ministry of Interior. "It becomes a self-sustaining war, a self-licking ice cream.


Lots more see link.

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