Afstan: New British approach

The switch in Taliban tactics (see this nice bit of imagination at Celestial Junk) has resulted in this switch in response (one just hopes there isn't too much "collateral damage"):

British forces in Afghanistan have switched tactics to counter a new wave of Taliban bombings and suicide attacks, a senior commander has said.

The Chief of Joint Operations, Lieutenant General Nick Houghton, said that they were now deliberately targeting key Taliban leaders in an attempt to drive a wedge between them and ordinary Afghans.

Giving evidence to the Commons Defence Committee, he acknowledged that attempts at the wholesale "eradication" of the Taliban and their supporters would simply alienate the local population.

At the same time, Defence Secretary Des Browne indicated that he was preparing to send more helicopters in support of military operations in Helmand province where British forces are concentrated.

Lt Gen Houghton said the Taliban appeared to have abandoned their tactics of last summer when they suffered heavy casualties mounting mass attacks on heavily-defended British positions.

"Increasingly, the switch this year has been towards the Taliban not taking on this tactic of mass attack but adopting a more asymmetric approach - the utilisation of IEDs (improvised explosive devices), suicide bombers, that sort of thing," he said.

"What we are attempting to do is use a far more intelligence-focused approach to the elimination of key Taliban leaders.

"We recognise that the (wholesale) eradication of the Taliban is not a sensible option. That alienates the public, locally and internationally.

"Therefore to attempt to dislocate the key Taliban leadership and attempt to drive a wedge between the irreconcilable, tier one Taliban leadership and the local potential Taliban fighters - that is the nature of the tactic we are following."..