After eight years of a White House that often seemed blinkered by the threats posed by Pakistan, the Obama administration seems to grasp the severity of the myriad crises affecting the South Asian state. The media has followed suit and increased its presence and reporting, a trend confirmed by CNN’s decision to set up a bureau in Islamabad last year.
And yet, the uptick in coverage hasn’t necessarily clarified the who’s-doing-what-to-whom confusion in Pakistan. Some commentators continue to confuse the tribal areas with the North-West Frontier Province. And the word lashkars is used to describe all kinds of otherwise cross-purposed groups, some fighting the Taliban, some fighting India, and some fighting Shiites.
I admit, it’s not easy. I lived in Pakistan throughout all of 2006 and 2007 and only came to understand, say, the tribal breakdown in South Waziristan during my final days. So to save you the trouble of having to live in Pakistan for two years to differentiate between the Wazirs and the Mehsuds, the Frontier Corps and the Rangers, I’ve written an “idiot’s guide” that will hopefully clear some things up...
... SPIEGEL: Your biggest worry is currently the planned A400M military transport aircraft, which has been in the news for months. Which countries could cancel as buyers in the future?
AP. The Airbus A400M military transport plane has still not taken flight.
Enders: Up until now, none have canceled. The A400M customers are currently examining the program, though. We'll see how it goes when this process is completed.
SPIEGEL: Germany is threatening to completely withdraw and France is considering reducing its order. It doesn't exactly look like a promising future ...
Enders: Objection! If we can manage to get the program back on course now, the A400M will be a success story. That is what we want -- but not at any price. In any case, we cannot build the plane under the conditions that we've had up to date.
SPIEGEL: Your company is also partly to blame for this development.
Enders: True. EADS should never have signed this contract. [emphasis added] Our American competitors would never have accepted such conditions. We've made big mistakes, and errors have also been made on the customer side. We should now rectify these together.
SPIEGEL: What are your demands on the governments? More money? More time?
Enders: We submitted a few proposals back in December. This basically concerns three issues. First, the A400M should be technically and economically organized like any other defense project, where the risks and opportunities are appropriately shared by the customer and the industry. This means, for example, that Airbus will no longer carry the risks alone of engineering the engine, because that is neither our job nor did we want things this way. In all other military programs, the engines are also handled separately.
SPIEGEL: And second?
Enders: Engineering, flight tests and the start of production have to be optimized chronologically in order to minimize the risks of series production. And third, studies need to be conducted to assess whether the A400M, which is designed to be more or less an all-rounder, really has to be able to do everything right from the start [emphasis added]. It could save everyone a great deal of time if some of the things this multi-talented aircraft is supposed to be able to do were only introduced step by step.
SPIEGEL: If no agreement can be reached, you will have to pay back billions of euros to your customers.
Enders: I assume that we'll find a solution with the governments. If not, then it would be a case of "better to make a painful break than to draw out the pain [emphasis added]," as the Germans say. In any case, I'm not going to traipse off to Berlin or Paris to ask for a continuation of the program under conditions that are unacceptable for us [emphasis added]...
EADS is prepared to accept a limited cut in orders for the A400M military transport plane, in a bid to keep Europe’s biggest defence contract alive as government clients grow restless over rising costs and long delays.
Louis Gallois, EADS chief executive [Airbus is part of EADS], said for the first time that a limited reduction in orders would be “manageable” for the Franco-German aerospace group [emphasis added].
However, he said any significant cut would have “an impact on the price of the planes” – a clear signal to the seven governments that launched the troublesome €20bn project in 2003 that they should not push too hard for concessions.
Mr Gallois’ comments came as EADS sought to reassure customers and the market that it remained committed to the A400M programme, already €2bn over budget and three years late.
Doubts over EADS’s determination to continue with the programme were raised at the weekend by Tom Enders, head of the group’s aircraft arm Airbus, who suggested in an interview with Der Spiegel magazine that he would rather scrap the programme than continue under the current contract...
This month, the governments agreed to a three-month moratorium on cancellations from today to allow the talks to go on.
But talks come as the enthusiasm of some of the original customers – notably Germany and the UK – for the aircraft may be waning.
Mr Gallois said on Monday he was confident a solution would be found. The EADS chief appears to be betting that politicians will put pressure on defence ministries to resolve the disagreements over penalties to preserve jobs in a highly sensitive sector.
“This programme is going to fly because the defence and industrial challenges are considerable,” he said. “They need this plane and it is also about 40,000 highly qualified jobs in Europe. We have to find a solution together.”
Nonetheless, the UK government, which ordered 25 aircraft and urgently needs a new transport aircraft for operations in Afghanistan, increased pressure on EADS on Monday, warning it would “not be content with a gap in capability”.
John Hutton, secretary of state for defence, told MPs the delays were a “matter of extreme regret” that posed “very serious questions” about the future of the UK’s military logistics capabilities.
He said the government would decide whether to go ahead with the programme at the beginning of July but warned: “We will not be content with a gap in capability.” The UK is considering options to bridge the delivery gap, including extending the out-of-service dates of the ageing C-130 Hercules aircraft, and buying more C-17s from Boeing, the US jetmaker.
Mr Gallois said he expected Airbus to deliver a new timetable to customers after agreeing a delivery date for the propulsion system software, known as Fadec.
This will provide a considerable boost to surveillance capabilities, both of the CF and the government as a whole:
Ottawa to build Arctic monitoring stations
The federal government on Monday said two satellite surveillance stations will be set up to monitor activities in the Arctic, with one on the West Coast, the other on the East Coast.
One satellite reception ground station for the Polar Epsilon project will be set up in Aldergrove, B.C., while the other will be in Masstown, N.S., said Defence Minister Peter MacKay in a news release Monday.
Polar Epsilon is a $60-million project for space-based, day and night surveillance of Canada's Arctic and its ocean approaches.
Mr. MacKay said the stations will enhance surveillance and security capabilities in the Arctic and enable Canada to receive and exploit space-based data for defence, as well as monitor the environment.
"These ground stations will help Canada to exercise our sovereignty in the Arctic," said Mr. MacKay.
The design and construction of the ground stations will start immediately, and is expected to be completed by late 2010, said Mr. MacKay.
Masstown is about one hour north of Halifax. Aldergrove is about 60 kilometres east of Vancouver.
The Polar Epsilon project provides enhanced surveillance capabilities for the Department of National Defence/Canadian Forces (DND/CF), which will improve their ability to act quickly in the event of a crisis at home and overseas.
Polar Epsilon was initially developed to address the need of the CF to improve surveillance capabilities over the Arctic and other large areas of responsibility. Polar Epsilon is a space-based wide area surveillance and support capability that is owned and run by DND. The project, valued at approximately $64.5 million, was approved on May 30, 2005.
The Polar Epsilon project involves using information from RADARSAT-2 to produce imagery for military commanders in their areas of responsibility during the conduct of operations. This includes the surveillance of Canada’s Arctic region, including its ocean approaches, the detection and tracking of foreign vessels, and support to CF operations globally. Polar Epsilon’s capability to enhance CF situational awareness is due to its ability to provide all-weather day/night surveillance in areas where other sensors are limited or unable to operate.
Polar Epsilon has completed its definition phases and is now in implementation for all capabilities including Arctic Surveillance, Environmental Sensing and Maritime Surveillance. These enhanced capabilities will help Canada exercise our sovereignty in the North and protect our environmental heritage [emphasis added].
The implementation phase of Polar Epsilon will begin immediately, and includes the design and construction of two new RADARSAT-2 ground stations, one on the east coast in Masstown, Nova Scotia, and the other on the west coast in Aldergrove, British Columbia. The definition phase for the ground stations was completed by MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates (MDA) [remember this great hoo-hah about MDA and the satellite?].
The ground stations will be wholly owned and operated by the Government of Canada and are expected to be operational by late 2010.
The advantage of Polar Epsilon is that its imagery can be used for precise cueing and location of activities, which allows for a more efficient and cost-effective use of other Canadian military assets, such as patrol aircraft and ships. Polar Epsilon can also be used to survey for oil or water pollution, aircraft or satellite crash sites [emphasis added]. The project however, does not have the capability to detect ballistic missiles, nor can it track small vessels or individuals. The data provided by Polar Epsilon is used primarily to support military operations, but will provide significant information to several departments and agencies to support their daily operations [emphasis added--such as the Canadian Coast Guard].
RADARSAT-2, the satellite from which Polar Epsilon draws its information, is a world leading commercially available radar satellite. The Government of Canada, through the Canadian Space Agency, has invested $445 million in the RADARSAT-2 program. RADARSAT-2 is commercially owned and operated by MDA, a Canadian company headquartered in Richmond, British Columbia. RADARSAT-2 was launched in mid-December 2007.
Completion of the Polar Epsilon project is expected by March 2011.
Brigadier-General Denis Thompson was commander of Canadian and NATO forces in Kandahar province up until last month, and we spoke with him from Kandahar on our show just before Christmas. Thompson joins us in studio to talk about the nine months he spent with the mission.
As I wrote in an earlier post with video of an interview with the brigadier-general:
Afstan: Letting the CF go public ... Meanwhile, maybe the government (read PMO)--whose public information on Afstan has been pretty dismal--has realized that it might be helpful to let the CF take a greater part in the TV discussion...
More from the Globe and Mail after Brig.-Gen. Thompson spoke to their editorial board (with audio, online only):
...I think mirrors the Canadian government's position, frankly mirrors the great work done by John Manley and his counterparts [sic], I think it mirrors it just about as closely as it possibly could and we were a couple of years ahead of the curve.
What self-serving tripe. Moreover, since the Manley report was issued just some fourteen months ago, and since the House of Commons' resolution extending our mission until 2011 only passed just over one year ago, we certainly have not been "a couple of years ahead of the curve."
As for 2011, the prime minister was very clear indeed:
...we are planning for the end of the military mission at the end of 2011.
So far as I can see from everything he's been saying there is no inclination to change that planning.
Update: Further misleading political spin from Mr Harper. In response to a question about the effect the American troop increase (one doesn't say "surge" in polite company) will have on Canadian operations at Kandahar, he responded:
...this is very good news. One of the conditions of the extension of our mission in Kandahar was getting a military partner in Kandahar province. Obviously the Americans are that partner and the Americans, quite frankly, are bringing in far more troops than we had initially believed we needed, or hoped for.
What a load of codswallop. The prime minister is implying that only now are we finally receiving a military "partner" at Kandahar. Somehow he's overlooked the US Army battalion that has been an operational part of the CF's Task Force Kandahar since last August. That unit was the "partner" the Manley panel said was needed.
That a US Army brigade combat team, plus a US Army aviation combat brigade, are to be deployed in addition, largely to the Kandahar region, in fact demonstrates how seriously the Manley panel underestimated the need for additional forces.
Pity the interviewer, Craig Oliver, didn't know enough to bring to the prime minister's attention that the "partner" had already been provided, and that the new troops are something quite different. Typical of our media. Moreover, I can't remember any example of a government minister stating that the 2-2 Ramrods (more here) are that partner. MND MacKay provided an egregious example last November.
Upperdate:From the transcript of the prime minister on Fox News Sunday, March 29:
... WALLACE: ... Prime Minister, does that mean that we're going to have to learn to live with Al Qaeda and the Taliban in that part of the world?
HARPER: No, I wouldn't — I wouldn't put it that way. I think what Secretary Gates said is correct, that first of all, we absolutely have to see the elimination of any kind of threat to the wider world, to North America.
Obviously, the Al Qaeda insurgency and the Al Qaeda element of this has to be — has to be eliminated. I think we agree with that...
Funny, I don't recall Mr Harper ever telling a Canadian audience that al Qaeda must be "eliminated", or that "elimination of any kind of threat" is a goal of his government's policy. In fact, this is what he said in an interview with Canwest News the same day:
...You may notice the (Obama) administration is much more clear on eliminating al-Qaida than eliminating the Taliban...
Rather a different emphasis, wouldn't you say? And nothing about his government's interest in "eliminating" al Qaeda. Different strokes for different folks. Hmmm.
Message to all parent soldiers: You do not have the right to leave your kids without a mother or a father. Think about this and make the toughest decision you will ever make in your life. Do whatever it takes and go home to your families.
I am sick of seeing picture after picture of slain Canadian and American soldiers and hearing their loved ones talk about how much these soldiers loved their kids. If you really love your kids, be there to teach them how to ride their bikes, be there when they’re sick, be there to read them books before they go to bed, be there to celebrate their successes, be there to help them cope with their failures, be there to see them graduate and be there to see them get married.
I repeat - you do not have the right to leave your kids without a mother or a father. Do you really think that your presence is essential to the effort in Afghanistan? Of course, it’s not. If EVERY parent soldier reported to their superiors tomorrow and conscientiously objected to any further participation (on the grounds that it would be immoral to leave their kids without a parent), do you know what would happen? The Canadian and American governments would have to entice more soldiers without children and probably pay more than they currently pay in order to keep the ranks properly bolstered. Of course, you know that every parent soldier won’t heed this call. In fact, you might be the only one … and the fact that you make this decision might be the difference between your kids growing up with you or not.
This post actually interested me a great deal because in some ways I feel a lot like the writer. I have two children that I feel I could never leave behind either. I work construction, which is dangerous in it’s own way, and during this week I went to the edge of the building, 450 feet in the air, forgetting I was not tied to my harness. If I had fallen, while pretty unlikely, my children would have been orphaned of a father. I was thinking about it while lying awake at night. Having children is a reason I know I couldn’t be a soldier.
But that’s my decision, and that’s my choice. The Canadian military is a volunteer Army that is has soldiers of all ages and status. Some were married when they joined, and some had kids. Others met their wives after being soldiers for a long time, and had children with the full knowledge that their careers could bring them into harms way for their country. Many families prepare for this, and they discuss it, and they accept the responsibilities of their duties. Ultimately, however, it is the choice of every soldier to decide to put their lives on the line for their country, but also for their children. Many parents are in Afghanistan not just because it’s a job, but because they feel their service is a service to their children’s future.
In our family, we are now the surviving 4th generation of CF children. My dad was the son of a Royal Marine who during the war, was a POW in Burma. My dad didn’t hear from his father from 1941 until 1945 when the camps were liberated. Before my grampa left for the far east, he told my dad to look for pennies on the street and when he saw one, he was to pick it up and know that was a signal that his dad was thinking about him. By the time my grampa got home, my dad had a whole jar of pennies near his bed and when he missed his father, he’d just look at all the pennies and know his dad was thinking about them. (my grandma told me years later that with all the shortages during the war, that sometimes she’d have to resort to dropping a penny or two outside the close so my dad would find them.) My mom’s dad was an RCHA who also was gone during the war and it was just expected back then for the kids to deal with it.
When my dad joined the Navy, he used to sail from Jan until Nov every year. Back in those days, all we had were letters, a monthly telegram and the odd phone call when they hit port. My dad introduced the penny to his children and we each have a jar of pennies and coins by the time he got back. Once I found a ten dollar bill on my birthday and boy, did that make me feel special! (mom carefully placed it for me to find - but hey I was 8.) My dad would also speak to my teachers before he left and he’d get copies of all our school assignments to take with him. When he did call, my mom would be waiting patiently to speak to her husband as he went through each of his children’s homework questions with each child. Sometimes my mom would only get a few seconds to speak to dad before the call was over but for us kids, the call meant everything. When I was very little, I used to think my dad was magical as he always knew what we were doing in school before we told him. We would never see the ship, plane or train leave, but we’d always be there to welcome my dad home. My mom felt that the goodbyes were too hard on the kids and I tend to agree with her. The welcome homes were always such fun. We’d make cakes, and cook like it was Christmas, all the relatives would come over (they’d end up taking us kids home with them so my parents could have their own time alone).
When it came to my own kid, there was a service couple in the works now instead of just one parent. We had to work extra hard at smoothing things for the kid. I introduced the penny idea as well, and once again there were always jars of pennies when we each got home. I did the homework calls just as my dad did, we went armed with lots of story time stories to read over the phone (in our case it was recite). When hubs was away, we’d always pick one spectacular place to visit once a week whether it be the shoreline at sunset, a forest, a farm, castles, or chalk drawing. We felt it was important for the kid to experience good stuff during a deployment or overseas posting. It also gave the kid something to be excited about when she got her phone call or wrote her letter. If you task the kid now what they remember about deployments, they remember the trips and outings.
Now we have grandchildren who have just said goodbye to dad as his prepares to do a NATO sail. Mom is also a CF member. Before dad left, we made a special jar to collect the pennies. So far, they have found a penny for every day daddy has been gone. They know that dad was thinking about them and while finding the penny, they stopped and thought about daddy.
Wizards and Merlins: Restoration of a Canadian classic powered by volunteers
It was with the Royal Canadian Air Force that the Canadair North Star etched her place in history. They carried Canuck soldiers, airmen, wounded, VIPs, diplomats and cargo to our far-flung commitments, outposts, airfields and battlefields. There are no airmen of 1950s and 60s RCAF pedigree who do not have a North Star story to tell.
Canadair built 71 North Star airframes under various designations - North Star, C54GM, DC4M and C5. Here a "Canadair Four" promo-aircraft in factory sales-tour paint scheme poses for a camera ship. Credit: Canadair via Jean-Francois Mongeau...
Air force fires back at critics Says choice of new search-and-rescue plane must be based on aircraft's speed, not where it is made
It's a "buy Canadian" feud with a life-or-death twist.
The head of the air force is lashing out at critics who say the military's plan to buy search-and-rescue planes is tailored to a foreign firm when there are suffering Canadian firms that can handle the job.
Lt.-Gen. Angus Watt sat down with select reporters to explain his pitch to the government to purchase 15 new aircraft that can fly from Winnipeg to the North Pole or from Nova Scotia to Shannon, Ireland, in under 15 hours in search of stranded sailors and adventurers.
The search-and-rescue squadron currently flies 42-year-old Buffalo and up to 34-year-old Hercules aircraft that must be replaced by 2015.
The range and speed requirements for the new planes fit the capabilities of Alena's Spartan C-27J of Italy, but would likely disqualify B.C.'s Viking Air, Airbus and several other interested firms.
"We did not design these ... capabilities to match a specific airplane. We designed it for the mission," Watt said. "Speed is life in this case."
Defence Minister Peter MacKay and Chief of Defence Staff Gen. Walt Natynczyk authorized Watt to show the Star and CanWest News Service the air force's official presentation to the government, an extremely rare occurrence.
"It isn't yet at an approved stage, but we need to start to tell our story, because everybody else has had a free rein to pitch their view of what Canada's needs are," Watt said.
Officials in some government departments want the $3 billion contract to be spent in Canada.
Robert Mauracher, Viking Air's vice-president of business development, says his firm can produce new Buffalo planes 40 per cent cheaper than the Spartans with regional employment benefits in several provinces, including Ontario.
The government was criticized earlier this year when it gave a military truck contract to U.S. firm Navistar after it had laid off 500 workers at its Chatham, Ont., plant.
"We believe this is a `buy Canadian' decision because there are products in Canada that can meet their needs," Mauracher said.
Watt said he's not after the perfect aircraft, just a "basic minimum standard" of plane that can do the tough job search-and-rescue technicians are called upon to do thousands of times each year.
"Many (firms) challenge our specifications because their particular aircraft don't meet the specification," he said. "I'm open to any aircraft manufacturer that comes to me with an aircraft that meets that specification."
One industry source said the government and military were sold on the Spartan in 2004 because it could perform double duty as a transport plane [see below]. That was long before the military's recent purchase of C-17s that can fly supplies across the country or to Afghanistan [there is no way the C-27J and the very much larger C-17 can be compared - MC].
"Things have changed completely, and other than that they've dug themselves into such a deep hole, I'm not sure why they're still so adamant that they want a transport aircraft because they have lots of other means now of providing that service."
...The EADS CASA C-295 has been offered against the Alenia C-27J; the former is a decent enough aircraft and, one would think, should have a chance fairly to compete against the requirements set by the Air Force. And an oddity: neither the CF nor our media ever mention that the new FWSAR aircraft also almost certainly needs a decent capability as a regular transport. I am sure the Air Force sees the C-27J as [end at link]...
...the plane it clearly wants (with the most useful secondary transport capability to supplement within Canada--and maybe the hemisphere--our C-130J Hercules, once all our Es and Hs are gone to the boneyard)...
But there is no reason that role should not be included in a real competition. If, finally, the C-295 simply will not do (too slow, say, in the SAR role) the government should forthrightly say why. Otherwise it would be something of a scandal.
I can't see the Air Force going for this. They want one plane for fixed-wing SAR across the country (instead of now the six Buffalos in B.C. and our remaining C-130Es in the rest of the country--I'm pretty sure nineteen are not still flying). I think they also want a plane that can double effectively as a tactical transport within Canada [and maybe the hemisphere] to supplement our C-130Js when the C-130Hs are retired. And I don't think the Buffalo, old or new-build, fits that role...
... Some aerospace industry insiders question whether the ACAN procurement method will survive cabinet scrutiny. There is bound to be objections raised by firms such as Bombardier, which had previously proposed the Canadian-built Dash-8 [now Q Series] for the search-and-rescue program [emphasis added].
The potential horrors of military procurement: for some strange reason the current issue of Ottawa Life magazine (Vol. 9, Number 3) has a full page ad from Bombardier promoting a military version of the Dash-8 (actually now called the "Q series") for "Search and Rescue". "A Canadian made solution..." blah, blah, blah.
A Dash-8 derivative would not have a ramp, considered important for SAR mission, and does not have the fuselage configuration usefully to double as a light tactical transport...
When will our blinking journalists learn something about aircraft rather than simply parroting what their sources say to them? David Pugliese of the Ottawa Citizen, to his credit, does some aircraft comparison--based on his sources--at his blog, and with a certain, er, attitude.
DND leaves Canadian firms in cold by opting to rebuild tanks in Europe ... The memorandum to Cabinet requests that 20 Leopard 2 tanks now in Europe be refurbished in Germany and then sent as quickly as possible to Afghanistan...
There is something rather scandalous in the Leopard 2 saga; getting operationally necessary work done, wherever, is not.
In most of the country the SAR and transport roles have been combined for years.
Upperdate: Take a look at Alex's informative comment about the considerable advantages a squadron enjoys using one type of aircraft for both SAR and transport roles.
A Canadian gunner [Gatlinged] takes his position in a Griffon helicopter over Kandahar province on Friday. With the U.S. poised to send 4,000 more troops, the NATO-led mission in Afghanistan is becoming increasingly Americanized. By the end of the summer, four out of five soldiers outside the wire will be American. Photograph by: Stefano Rellandini, Reuters
... The Americanization of the war in Afghanistan was inevitable once the conflict in Iraq began to wind down, because NATO countries in Europe -- with the exception of Britain, Denmark and the Dutch -- refused constant demands to send forces to the only places in Afghanistan that really matter: the east and south of the country.
The increase in activity is already breathtaking.
The most obvious evidence is the vast swath of real estate being claimed by American forces at the already overcrowded Kandahar Airfield, which is the logistical hub for the war in the south.
Every few minutes, giant transport aircraft disgorge troops, combat gear or supplies. There are new landing pads for more than 100 helicopters from the 82nd Aviation Combat Brigade. Seabees from the U.S. navy are frantically erecting scores of barracks and other buildings. Every road on the base is being torn up as plumbing and electricity systems are installed.
Outside the airfield, Canadian troops in Kandahar still outnumber Americans; but, by the end of the summer, four of every five soldiers outside the wire in Kandahar will wear a Stars and Stripes shoulder patch [emphasis added].
This dramatic move doesn't diminish Canada's key role in the volatile south. The Canadians will remain in the same numbers precisely where they are now: in one of the deadliest parts of the country, an area about the size of New Brunswick [i.e. the heavily populated districts around Kandahar City--Arghandab, Zhari and Panjwayi--where most of the province's people outside the city itself live]. In most places, it's less than 100 kilometres from Pakistan, where Taliban leader Mullah Omar is said to direct the insurgency from the city of Quetta.
What has changed is that the Americans are going to blanket much of the rest of Kandahar. They are to provide what a diplomat here has called "a protective crust" to the north and east of Kandahar City [emphasis added--including southeast of Kandahar, e.g. Spin Boldak, the crossing point for the main road from Quetta to Kandahar].
As a result, Canadian troops hope insurgents and their weapons will have a harder time getting through from safe havens in Pakistan...
Obama Sets Plan to Boost Afghan Stability, Confront Taliban and Al-Qaida
President Obama's new strategy for the Afghanistan war includes 4,000 more troops and assistance to Pakistan in its fight against militants. Special envoy to the region, Richard Holbrooke, and Central Command chief Gen. David Petraeus explain the plan. ... AMBASSADOR HOLBROOKE: It is an integrated policy. It's going to have far more resources, the president today announced hundreds of additional civilians. He mentioned agronomists and economists, were going to increase the agricultural effort. This is a rural country, but right now the U.S. mission in Kabul does not even have a really coherent, integrated agricultural-assistance program. We're going to make a much stronger effort to counter the propaganda of the Taliban and al-Qaida in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. The Kerry-Lugar bill is going to ask for much more money. We have way under-resourced this effort, and as you know, additional troops are on their way.
MARGARET WARNER: Now, let me just ask you about the security situation in Pakistan. The Times today has a story that runs as a companion to the piece about President Obama's new policy, which says that the Taliban in both Afghanistan and Pakistan are joining forces and they're going to launch an offensive against the stepped-up U.S. forces in Afghanistan. How do you combat that without going to the heart of the problem in Pakistan?
GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS: Well, first of all, first of all of course, the additional forces that are going into Afghanistan will help with this considerably. As you know, Margaret, in response to requests by General McKiernan, by the end of the late summer or so, we will have more than doubled the U.S. force component that was on the ground, say, in December.
So that will help a considerable amount there, and then of course there has to be the component that President Obama explained today of working with our Pakistani partners. This is their territory, they have existing organizations, an army that they're very proud of, other elements that in some areas have already been on the offensive. In Bajaur, in Mohmand, two of the areas in the so-called Federally Administered Tribal Areas in which they had made inroads against the syndicate, really, of all of these different elements -- not just the Pakistani Taliban, but also the other extremist elements that are allied with al Qaida in that area.
MARGARET WARNER: But as I think even President Obama said, the heart of the Afghan Taliban is believed to be operating out of Quetta, which is in -- not in the tribal areas but in Pakistan proper, one of the provinces. Can you ensure the security of Afghanistan without going after them there?
GENERAL PETRAEUS: Well, that's why this has to be -- this is why it's an Af-Pak strategy, if you can -- this is why it has to be a comprehensive approach with both countries and, in fact, beyond that. It's not an accident that Richard went to India after visiting Afghanistan and Pakistan during the recent swing through the region. And beyond that, the central Asian states, the other neighbors -- he mentioned Russia, China, even Iran, as the president mentioned today. But certainly, the Afghan Taliban, if you will, leadership is concentrated arguably in the Quetta area of Balochistan province, just south of the border of Afghanistan, and again, that's where our Pakistani partners, with our assistance, as was announced, the additional contributions that will be made to their capability and capacity...
AMBASSADOR HOLBROOKE: It is an integrated policy. It's going to have far more resources, the president today announced hundreds of additional civilians. He mentioned agronomists and economists, were going to increase the agricultural effort. This is a rural country, but right now the U.S. mission in Kabul does not even have a really coherent, integrated agricultural-assistance program. We're going to make a much stronger effort to counter the propaganda of the Taliban and al-Qaida in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. The Kerry-Lugar bill is going to ask for much more money. We have way under-resourced this effort, and as you know, additional troops are on their way.
MARGARET WARNER: Now, let me just ask you about the security situation in Pakistan. The Times today has a story that runs as a companion to the piece about President Obama's new policy, which says that the Taliban in both Afghanistan and Pakistan are joining forces and they're going to launch an offensive against the stepped-up U.S. forces in Afghanistan. How do you combat that without going to the heart of the problem in Pakistan?
GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS: Well, first of all, first of all of course, the additional forces that are going into Afghanistan will help with this considerably. As you know, Margaret, in response to requests by General McKiernan, by the end of the late summer or so, we will have more than doubled the U.S. force component that was on the ground, say, in December [emphasis added].
So that will help a considerable amount there, and then of course there has to be the component that President Obama explained today of working with our Pakistani partners. This is their territory, they have existing organizations, an army that they're very proud of, other elements that in some areas have already been on the offensive. In Bajaur, in Mohmand, two of the areas in the so-called Federally Administered Tribal Areas in which they had made inroads against the syndicate, really, of all of these different elements -- not just the Pakistani Taliban, but also the other extremist elements that are allied with al Qaida in that area.
MARGARET WARNER: But as I think even President Obama said, the heart of the Afghan Taliban is believed to be operating out of Quetta, which is in -- not in the tribal areas but in Pakistan proper, one of the provinces. Can you ensure the security of Afghanistan without going after them there?
GENERAL PETRAEUS: Well, that's why this has to be -- this is why it's an Af-Pak strategy, if you can -- this is why it has to be a comprehensive approach with both countries and, in fact, beyond that. It's not an accident that Richard went to India after visiting Afghanistan and Pakistan during the recent swing through the region. And beyond that, the central Asian states, the other neighbors -- he mentioned Russia, China, even Iran, as the president mentioned today. But certainly, the Afghan Taliban, if you will, leadership is concentrated arguably in the Quetta area of Balochistan province, just south of the border of Afghanistan, and again, that's where our Pakistani partners, with our assistance, as was announced, the additional contributions that will be made to their capability and capacity...
Talking to the Taliban ... GENERAL PETREAUS: There's actually something, which you know, I'm sure, in their constitution about the reintegration and reconciliation, if you will. Our sense is that it is most profitable, at this time, to pursue that at the lower, middle levels in local areas where, for a variety of different reasons, the Taliban has been able to muscle in, to buy their way in or to bring people to their side for ills against, perhaps, the local governance, even.
But in all those cases, there is an opportunity, we think, to split off the more hardcore and then to try to bring back, if you will, to the new Afghanistan, those others. Whether that's possible at the top, I think, is a bigger question indeed. And I think President Obama's description today was revealing.
AMBASSADOR HOLBROOKE: Margaret, the majority of people fighting for the Taliban are not fighting for the precepts of returning to a 14th century caliphate or for Mullah Omar's precepts. They're fighting either because it's a gun culture and they -- and it's a long-standing thing, or because they've been misguided to thinking we're the latest round of foreign invaders rather than coming in to liberate them from the Taliban.
We think that's probably over 70 percent, according to polling. We have to find ways to give these people alternatives -- jobs in the agricultural sector. Make them understand that they've been misled by Mullah Omar and his core leadership.
GENERAL PETREAUS: I think it's very important, in fact, to stress that the Taliban brand, if you will, is still very damaged, as I'm sure you found in your several weeks in Afghanistan recently. But this also highlights the importance of not just more forces, but also the proper employment of those forces.
General McKiernan, for example, just issued counterinsurgency guidance to the ISAF U.S. forces in Afghanistan. That should govern the way our forces operate. We have to be seen as, actually, good guests [emphasis added]. We have to be seen as, not conquerors, but as friends -- as there to help secure and to actually serve the people. And that is paramount as this goes forward...
MARGARET WARNER: And brief final question to you: This announcement today really only has 4,000 additional troops, all trainers; are there enough combat forces for this program going forward? Are you going to need more?
GENERAL PETRAEUS: Well, I think right now what we need to do is deploy the substantial number that has already been ordered. That's going to take us all the way out through the end of the summer and into the fall. As was mentioned, there will be assessments along the way, and certainly among the assessments will be the need, possibly or not, for additional coalition forces and, possibly, for additional Afghan national security forces above the level that President Obama mentioned...
Her Majesty’s Canadian Ship (HMCS) Protecteur departs on March 31 for a three month deployment to the western Pacific Ocean. A highlight of the deployment will be a port-visit in Qingdao, China, to participate in International Fleet Review from April 19 to 23. The International Fleet Review [amongst others the Indian Navy will be there] provides an opportunity for interaction among navies of the Pacific region, to foster bonds of friendship and share views on common maritime issues.
On completion of the International Fleet Review, Protecteur will proceed to sea and provide oiler services for replenishment at sea (RAS) of allied navy warships in the western Pacific operating area, before returning to Esquimalt in early summer.
Carrying out this mission in support of allied navies wouldn’t be possible without professional and well-trained personnel. “The crew has undergone a long program to prepare for the deployment,” saidCmdr. Ian Wood, HMCS Protecteur’s Commanding Officer. “Sea Training staff will sail with us for the first week and conduct work-ups, which will be the final step in bringing the ship and crew to the highest level of readiness."
“The Pacific Ocean is a vast area and warships need tanker support to extend their range and stay at sea,” said Cmdr. Wood. “Ships need good quality fuel that meets stringent military standards. Quality fuel is not necessarily available at every port, while any ship re-supplied by Protecteur is guaranteed clean fuel.”
In addition to fuel, Protecteur carries medical supplies, spare parts and food; all are available from this naval supply “one-stop shop.” Protecteur has four warehouse decks loaded with pallets of stores, carrying everything from canned peaches to printer paper. Each pallet is strategically placed to ensure an efficient RAS. “The idea is for Protecteur to go out full and come back empty,” said Cmdr. Frederick Caron, HMCS Protecteur’s Executive Officer.
The head of the Army is ready to send up to 2,000 extra troops to Afghanistan amid fears that the US-led mission will struggle without significant reinforcements.
General Sir Richard Dannatt told The Times yesterday that elements of 12 Mechanised Brigade — which had been training for deployment to Iraq but were later stood down — had been “earmarked for Afghanistan”.
Downing Street is involved in discussions about a surge. An increase of about 2,000 would take Britain’s troop strength to 10,000 [emphasis added]. Any decision would require Cabinet approval...
General Dannatt, the Chief of the General Staff, said that there were no plans to send the whole brigade of about 4,000 troops, which would take the British presence to more than 12,000. He indicated that the increase, subject to political approval, could take the total to “somewhere in between” that figure and the present troop strength of 8,300. Defence sources said that a rise of 1,700 to 2,000 troops was viewed as “the uppermost ceiling”...
He added: “Improving security in Afghanistan will be dictated by having more boots on the ground. I don’t mind whether the boots will be American, British or Afghan.”
Afghanistan was going to be “a marathon campaign, not a sprint” and the members of the Armed Forces needed time off [emphasis added] after serving in two campaigns simultaneously, General Dannatt said. “They and their families must have a bit of a life [see this post of Babbling's].”
Mr Hutton [the Defence Secretary] also gave a broad hint in a speech yesterday that Britain was considering sending more troops. “We remain, as we have been on many occasions in this past century, grateful to the United States for the leadership that she has shown time and again since 2001 in rooting out extremism and terrorism in Afghanistan,” he said. “But Europe must do more, and it is in our interest to do more.”
A Ministry of Defence source said any decision would be based on advice from the military. “If the clear advice . . . is that we need more people to keep our troops safe, we will make a judgment based on this.”
... Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff praised Obama's strategy but then said that he doesn't want Canada's strategy in Afghanistan "to be defined by Washington."..
Numbers do count, Mr Ignatieff. Not that Mr Igantieff would advocate a greater Canadian military contribution, if that were even possible. And not that the Prime Minister's (so far) fairly firm commitment to ending our military mission in 2011 helps.
The Canadian military is prepared to help Winnipeg battle the rising Red once again.
Public Safety Minister Peter Van Loan said today [March 26] the military is "on standby ready to provide resources if need be."
During the 1997 flood, the Canadian military sent more than 8,500 personnel to Manitoba to help with everything from sandbagging and diking to evacuations and medical assistance. It was the largest deployment of Canadian troops since the Korean War.
Van Loan said the federal government is in constant contact with Manitoba emergency officials and is ready with any kind of help that might be needed.
"There’s not a need for a declaration of a natural disaster in advance or anything like that that you see in the United States on television," he said.
Ottawa is exploring what assistance can be provided through emergency preparedness programs, he said, adding that disaster financial assistance will kick in automatically as per the existing agreement.
Federal disaster money becomes available once damage costs exceed about $1.2 million in Manitoba. Disaster costs include evacuation operations, restoring public works and infrastructure and replacing or repairing basic, essential personal property of individuals, small businesses and farmsteads.
Van Loan said Manitoba Senior Minister Vic Toews will meet with Premier Gary Doer Friday.
The title of this post answers the question posed at this one. The president certainly seems resolute and convinced that Al Qaeda and the Taliban must be defeated. It was the kind of speech I wish Prime Minister Harper would make just once:
White Paper of the Interagency Policy Group's Report on U.S. Policy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan
The president put the US's goals forcefully:
... For the Afghan people, a return to Taliban rule would condemn their country to brutal governance, international isolation, a paralyzed economy, and the denial of basic human rights to the Afghan people -- especially women and girls. The return in force of al Qaeda terrorists who would accompany the core Taliban leadership would cast Afghanistan under the shadow of perpetual violence...
So I want the American people to understand that we have a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and to prevent their return to either country in the future. That's the goal that must be achieved. That is a cause that could not be more just. And to the terrorists who oppose us, my message is the same: We will defeat you [i.e. win ]...
There is an uncompromising core of the Taliban. They must be met with force, and they must be defeated [emphasis added]. But there are also those who've taken up arms because of coercion, or simply for a price. These Afghans must have the option to choose a different course. And that's why we will work with local leaders, the Afghan government, and international partners to have a reconciliation process in every province. As their ranks dwindle, an enemy that has nothing to offer the Afghan people but terror and repression must be further isolated. And we will continue to support the basic human rights of all Afghans -- including women and girls...
...The world cannot afford the price that will come due if Afghanistan slides back into chaos or al Qaeda operates unchecked. We have a shared responsibility to act -- not because we seek to project power for its own sake, but because our own peace and security depends on it. And what’s at stake at this time is not just our own security -- it's the very idea that free nations can come together on behalf of our common security. That was the founding cause of NATO six decades ago, and that must be our common purpose today...
So understand, the road ahead will be long and there will be difficult days ahead. But we will seek lasting partnerships with Afghanistan and Pakistan that promise a new day for their people. And we will use all elements of our national power to defeat al Qaeda, and to defend America, our allies, and all who seek a better future...
Note the use of the word "defeat" with respect to both al Qaeda and the Taliban. The stronger emphasis on al Qaeda was clearly aimed at Americans' memory and fears in order to win their continuing support for the mission (as an aside, al Qaeda is not much of a factor in the south, more so in the east--a US region under ISAF--across the border from sanctuaries in the Pakistani frontier). The stress on al Qaeda was also obviously aimed at trying to regenerate Western public support generally for the effort. Here's a comprehensive story from the Washington Post to look at.
In terms of the substance of the strategy, I thought the speech said little--other than the strong pressure on Pakistan and the proposed aid to that country--beyond what US officials have been saying over the last several weeks. The president essentially tied all the threads together.
It was very striking that there was no "exit strategy" (I await the reaction of Obama Jack and of the increasingly Doubting Thomases in our media).
On a point of detail, the 4,000 trainers for Afstan announced by the president are indeed in addition to the two National Guard brigades already committed; that's a hell of lot of trainers, esp. as the US manoeuvre units also do some mentoring:
4,000 4th BCT, 82nd Airborne paratroopers going to Afghanistan to train security forces
President Barack Obama announced Friday [March 27] that 4,000 paratroopers with the 82nd Airborne Division will head to Afghanistan this fall to train Afghan security forces.
“For the first time, this will fully resource our effort to train and support the Afghan Army and Police,” Obama said.
The 4th Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, which is currently slated to deploy to Iraq, will likely be sent to Afghanistan instead to fulfill the training mission, Defense officials said Friday [March 27].
The deployment will fill the request by Gen. David McKiernan, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, for a brigade of trainers, the official said.
The need for trainers goes back to March 2007, when commanders first requested 3,400 trainers, mostly for the Afghan police.
Initially, Afghan police were trained by private contractors, but the efforts floundered and the Afghan police lagged far behind the Afghan army.
The need for trainers went largely unfilled throughout 2007 because most of the U.S. military’s trainers were in Iraq.
Since early 2008, a growing number of Marines have been used to train Afghan security forces.
The senior administration official said Thursday that the training mission in Afghanistan had been under-resourced for the past few years, and that the president wants to fix that.
Ultimately, the goal is to train an Afghan Army of 134,000 and a police force of 82,000, he said.
General McKiernan has got just about everything he asked for last summer, first from President Bush and now from President Obama.
Other new steps by the president--one trusts Canada will be part of the rather large "Contact Group" for AfPak the president proposes. And then there's this more, er, unilateral (and certainly more important) move:
...we will launch a standing, trilateral dialogue among the United States, Afghanistan and Pakistan. Our nations will meet regularly, with Secretaries Clinton and Secretary Gates leading our effort...
After agreeing to bury their differences and unite forces, Taliban leaders based in Pakistan have closed ranks with their Afghan comrades to ready a new offensive in Afghanistan as the United States prepares to send 17,000 more troops there this year...
Afghan population needs to feel secure, former forces commander says
When Canadian troops started their first major offensive against the Taliban in 2006 in Kandahar province, they drove the insurgents out with their military superiority.
So the Taliban changed strategies, using improvised explosive devices to kill soldiers and terrorizing the locals by beheading religious leaders and throwing acid in the faces of schoolgirls.
They, too, have been largely successful. Surveys show that residents’ sense of security in Kandahar fell from around 55 on a scale of 100 in 2007 to 30 today [more here].
Fear is an especially efficient weapon, said Brigadier-General Denis Thompson, who was commander of Canadian and NATO forces in Kandahar province up until last month. International and local forces depend on residents for intelligence – approximately 80 per cent of hidden explosive devices are uncovered through tips from locals in heavily policed Kandahar City. In the less secure countryside, the number is closer to 60 per cent.
The key to overcoming fear, winning the war and withdrawing our troops, Thompson said, is to train local police forces and soldiers who are more efficient at sniffing out insurgents.
“For the populace to stand up, they need to feel confident and secure,” said Thompson, who is touring the country speaking about the military’s role in Afghanistan.
Residents who feel protected will no longer be cowed into giving the Taliban food or sanctuary. Local forces can secure the territory, which will allow the rebuilding of roads, schools and hospitals, and eventually the withdrawal of foreign troops.
International military teams are training professional police forces in two-month camps. Canadian troops are especially popular as teachers, Thompson said, because they treat trainees as equals.
Kandahar has about 1,000 professionally trained police who are guaranteed a paycheque, but needs 4,000 to be able to ensure security, Thompson said. The Afghan military needs 132,000 trained soldiers, but has only half that so far.
The lack of training that has prolonged the war is caused by too few resources, Thompson said, a casualty of U.S. Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld’s 2001 doctrine of sending in light forces to elicit regime change.
“That was clearly erroneous,” he said, as evidenced by how the influx of troops into Iraq helped turn the tide in that war. Thompson is heartened by the fact the U.S. has pledged an extra 17,000 troops to bolster the 58,000 international troops currently stationed in Afghanistan, half of them American soldiers.
“(The war) has been underresourced and now the penny has dropped and people are starting to put their backs into it,” Thompson said.
Canadians, Thompson said, have every right to question our country’s involvement in the war effort in a volatile region of the country, and its death toll – 116 Canadian soldiers have died there, 25 of them under Thompson’s nine-month watch.
But Canada is a democratic nation whose government chose to send in the troops, “and we had a good idea it wouldn’t be a cakewalk,” Thompson said...
Dave Perry, formerly of the Dalhousie Centre for Foreign Policy Studies and the Broadsides website listed in our sidebar links, is now at Carleton University. I know this because his work was recently quoted in an article in The Tyee:
"An estimated 20,000 Canadian Forces members served in the Afghan theatre of operations between 2002 and 31 December 2007, and seven additional six-month rotations will be required between February 2008 and July 2011. Recognizing that 3000 personnel are really required to staff each rotation, by July 2011 there will be approximately 41,000 Canadian military veterans of Afghanistan."
Perry also cites an estimate that "27 per cent of Kandahar veterans will experience mental health problems, including post-traumatic stress disorder, significant depressive issues, and hazardous drinking behaviour. With a total of 11 rotations or 33,000 troops required to fulfill our combat role in Kandahar, this suggests almost 9000 forces personnel may experience some form of mental health problems."
This is disappointing.
The math only works if the CF is sending new people in each rotation. But we all know that's not the case - there are many soldiers serving their second, third, even a few fourth tours in Afghanistan right now. So Perry's 41,000 number is inflated. How much, I don't know. But I suspect by a five-digit margin.
Of course, that's just a guess on my part. But at least I'll tell you I can't vouch for the accuracy of my guess. One would hope you'd get better from an academic writing in "Canada's pre-eminent scholarly publication on international relations." Let alone from an "independent daily online magazine" which one would hope would apply a modicum of common sense to the material it reports.
First, so far as I know of, no estimate has been released publically that estimates the number of actual Afghan vets (versus individual deployments) so arriving at an actual number is guesswork unless DND a) knows the real number, and b) will release it.
I suspect they don't even know, but that’s a guess.
That goes for the research I was doing, as well as the PBO report, which was similarly unable to obtain real data from DND.
Second, despite what I just wrote, a year ago, Gen Gauthier, I think it was, testified before one of the defence committees that as of Feb 2009, Canada would have 30,000 Afghan vets. He didn't specify if he meant total rotations, or individual veterans, so I didn't use that figure.
However, for the sake of argument, if we take those numbers...
I don't know how many guys are on more than their first tour, but the five rotos after Feb 2009, (until July 2010, ignoring however many stay past then) will require at least 15,000 individual-soldier-deployments.
So, even if only 2/3 of them are on their first deployment, when added to the estimate of 30,000 vets by Feb 2009, a total estimate of 41,000 is reasonably close.
Third, the 3,000 per rotation number is now too low because our "official" number of deployed has gone up to 2,830, so I'd guess that the numbers required to staff that have increased to something like 3200-3300, but that's a guess.
Fourth, although the 41k estimate may be off, the long term costs of care figures actually start getting worse when you apply them to guys with multiple tours. All the US data shows marked increases in rates of PTSD and other stress injuries as the number of multiple tours goes up.
The 27% incidence rate of operational stress injuries were taken from a post-op analysis of the first battlegroup that went to Kandahar - ie guys on their first tour (in Kandahar). I suspect that rates are going to be much higher for Warrant Officers coming back from their 5th tour.
In any event, at the time I was writing this, no one had done any significant work on this topic, so my goal was to get something out in the public domain, about be as transparent as possible about my methodology, so people could do exactly what you did, and take a look for themselves, and see if it made sense.
I replied that starting with Gauthier's 30,000 comment was iffy, especially if you don't know what it refers to. And that anecdotally at least, more than a third of those in Kandahar have had a tour in Afghanistan before. And that anything higher than the authorized strength is filled with TAV's which aren't as long as a full tour. And that if the 27% figure for OSI is taken from TF Orion and Ian Hope's BG, then you really can't extrapolate from that for a few reasons: the Kabul rotos won't be comparable to Kandahar rotos, the Battle Group figures will be higher than the figures for the entire rotation including all those who go to Kandahar and rarely if ever step outside the wire, and TF Orion involved a different type of combat than subsequent rotos (Medusa was different, as was every other rotation from the next - each had its own patterns of operations).
I told Perry I wish that his speculative numbers had been expressed as speculative, and he responded with a couple of defensible points. First, he was trying to "get something out in the public domain" and provoke some discussion. I'm not a fan of putting out speculation just to provoke a response, but I can see what he's driving at. The fact that we can't get this information directly from government itself, but rather have to piece it together ourselves with limited resources is a problem. Second, he already had to cut about 3,000 words and 30 footnotes out of the piece at the request of the International Journal, his publisher. How can you tell a guy to cut footnotes? The legitimacy of the source data and information is just as important in assessing the veracity of the conclusions drawn as the logic of the reasoning is. So cutting footnotes is simply counterproductive, but not Perry's fault.
I don't know about the rest of the figures in the piece, but the numbers on OSI still seem flimsy to me. That The Tyee didn't contact Perry before writing the article seems flimsy as well, since their piece lacked any additional context he could have provided.
The big problem is that the government isn't providing anything more solid, so flimsy speculation is all we get.
"It's about time someone is pushing back against the Defence Department," said Roland Kiehne, president of the Canadian Autoworkers Local 112, which represents 3,300 workers at four major aerospace firms in the Toronto area. "We've seen absolutely no work, no industrial benefits from the money spent so far."
Generally when I'm that upset, it's best to just hold my tongue. In this case, I'm really glad I did, because MCG at Army.ca shut down that line of attack far more eloquently and politely than I would have:
...this issue in particular is not about the needs of the military taking precedence. This is Search and Rescue. It is the safety of the Canadian Public which we are suggesting should take precedence. We should not take risks with the lives of Canadian citizens by accepting an inadequate aircraft for the sake of appeasing Canadian industry.
DND is not “looking to make sure a foreign-built plane wins this contract." DND does want to ensure the aircraft meets Canada’s Search and Rescue requirements across the country. I don’t think we should be sacrificing Canadian lives to create Canadian jobs. The lives are so much more valuable. [Babbler's emphasis]
Brilliant. I quite literally could not have said it any better.
Ian Elliot of the Kingston Whig-Standard provides that view from Omar Samad, the outgoing Afghan ambassador to Canada, who was in Kingston to speak to a group at Queen's University. I found this part of the article especially compelling:
He said one of the biggest oversights, and one that led to the Taliban taking over the country, was that during the 1980s and the 1990s, the fight to drive the Soviets out of the country was the only goal.
Large numbers of Western supported and armed zealots, largely foreign born and schooled in religious madrassas, became the Taliban and went on to support and shelter al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups when they ran the country.
"Nobody thought about a post-Soviet era in Afghanistan -- everyone was concentrating on defeating the Soviets and no one thought about what would happen after that."
Afghanistan remains a messy regional problem, but Samad said there has been progress in rebuilding schools, establishing a constitution and an elected national government, starting to eliminate the opium trade that became established in the country during Soviet occupation and setting up a professional Afghan police force and national army.
He asked the students to think about how long it would take to rebuild Queen's if the university was bombed and looted, the staff and students scattered and then equate that example to an entire country, to get some perspective on how large the job was in Afghanistan. [Babbler's bold]
The question's not a new one, but I wonder if we in the West have the patience for this task...
In Afghan War, U.S. Dominance Increasing With More American Troops and Civilians On the Way, NATO Is Likely to Lose Clout
After years of often testy cooperation with NATO and resentment over unequal burden-sharing, the United States is taking unabashed ownership of the Afghan war.
President Obama's decision to deploy an additional 17,000 troops to Afghanistan this year will bring the number of foreign troops there to nearly 90,000, more than two-thirds of them Americans. Although many will technically report to NATO commanders, the U.S. force will increasingly be in charge.
Even as the U.S. military expands its control over the battlefield, the number of American civilian officials will also grow by at least 50 percent -- to more than 900 -- under the new Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy Obama will announce as early as tomorrow, according to administration officials. American diplomats and development experts plan to spread into relatively peaceful western and northern regions of Afghanistan that until now were left to other NATO governments. New U.S. resources and leadership also will be brought to bear over critical issues such as counter-narcotics efforts and strengthening local government institutions.
U.S. policy in Pakistan, a major component of the new strategy, is largely unilateral. The European Union has an aid and trade relationship with the country, but few European governments outside of Britain have strong involvement there.
In Afghanistan, the administration "will continue to characterize the effort as multinational. There will continue to be thousands of troops and people" from NATO and elsewhere, said a former senior Defense Department official with a lot of experience there. "But the center of gravity is going to shift toward the Americans."
Obama's national security team has taken pains to consult with allies as it has put the new strategy together. The Washington announcement, and the presentation Obama will make at an April 3-4 NATO summit in Europe, will emphasize shared threats and common purpose, officials said.
But the increasing U.S. dominance is both by default and by design. The United States has far more troops, equipment and money -- and more willingness to use them -- than the rest of NATO. Even before Obama took office, his holdover defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, had largely given up pressing the allies for more combat forces, with fewer restrictions on their activities.
Although European governments have been asked to send up to four additional battalions of 800 to 1,000 troops each to boost security for Afghan elections in August, they will be temporary additions. Britain, whose 8,000 combat troops make it the second-largest NATO contributor, is considering whether it can send more after its withdrawal from Iraq this year. Germany, the third largest, has authorized 4,500, although they are restricted from certain combat areas and duties; France fields nearly 3,000 unrestricted troops [emphasis added].
The Netherlands plans to end its 1,700-troop combat mission in Afghanistan next year; Canada will bring its 2,800 troops home in 2011. With the arrival of new forces this year, U.S. troops will number more than 55,000...
Rather than expecting more combat forces, the U.S. administration has asked the allies to tell it what more they can contribute in terms of financing, training for Afghan forces, and civilian experts in every sector, from agriculture to governance [emphasis added]-- "essentially whatever you can give us to free up an American to do something else," the former official said.
The results of those entreaties remain to be seen. A NATO trust fund established last year to pay for equipment and transportation for Afghan security forces set a goal of about $1.5 billion; contributions to date total less than $25 million, Supreme Allied Commander Gen. Bantz J. Craddock told the Senate Armed Services Committee this week. Plans to double the size of the Afghan army to 134,000 by 2011 will require an additional 29 NATO training teams. "The U.S. provides them when NATO doesn't," Craddock said. American trainers outnumber their NATO counterparts three to one.
Because some NATO members restrict their troops to certain areas of the country, trainers often cannot move with redeployed Afghan forces, leaving U.S. forces to "pick up the responsibility" to transport the Afghans and their equipment from one region to another, Craddock said.
The Americanization of the war is visible in the turbulent south, where the regional NATO command, led by a Dutch general, with Dutch, British, Danish and U.S. troops, faces the primary Taliban threat. Most of the additional U.S. troops will deploy there, and dozens of C-130 transport aircraft land at the Kandahar air field every day with pallets of supplies. In a dusty parking lot not far from the main runway, more than 200 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, or MRAPs, await the supplementary U.S. troops. When they arrive, there will be more American personnel at the Kandahar base than at the current largest U.S. facility -- at Bagram, north of Kabul, the capital.
A British general will take over the southern command this fall, but U.S. and NATO military officials said they expect the No. 2 commander, U.S. Brig. Gen. John Nicholson, to be the real decision-maker [emphasis added--more here, here and here].
"This will become an American headquarters," one non-U.S. military officer in southern Afghanistan said of Kandahar [I've heard from someone knowledgable that the US will set up a divisional HQ - MC]. "They're going to have almost three times as many troops as any other NATO member here. And that's going to mean they'll be in charge."
Afghan Strikes by Taliban Get Pakistan Help, U.S. Aides Say
The Taliban’s widening campaign in southern Afghanistan is made possible in part by direct support from operatives in Pakistan’s military intelligence agency, despite Pakistani government promises to sever ties to militant groups fighting in Afghanistan, according to American government officials.
The support consists of money, military supplies and strategic planning guidance to Taliban commanders who are gearing up to confront the international force in Afghanistan that will soon include some 17,000 American reinforcements.
Support for the Taliban, as well as other militant groups, is coordinated by operatives inside the shadowy S Wing of Pakistan’s spy service, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, the officials said. There is even evidence that ISI operatives meet regularly with Taliban commanders to discuss whether to intensify or scale back violence before the Afghan elections.
Details of the ISI’s continuing ties to militant groups were described by a half-dozen American, Pakistani and other security officials during recent interviews in Washington and the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. All requested anonymity because they were discussing classified and sensitive intelligence information.
The American officials said proof of the ties between the Taliban and Pakistani spies came from electronic surveillance and trusted informants. The Pakistani officials interviewed said that they had firsthand knowledge of the connections, though they denied that the ties were strengthening the insurgency...
Pakistan’s military and civilian leaders publicly deny any government ties to militant groups, and American officials say it is unlikely that top officials in Islamabad are directly coordinating the clandestine efforts. American officials have also said that midlevel ISI operatives occasionally cultivate relationships that are not approved by their bosses.
In a sign of just how resigned Western officials are to the ties, the British government has sent several dispatches to Islamabad in recent months asking that the ISI use its strategy meetings with the Taliban to persuade its commanders to scale back violence in Afghanistan before the August presidential election there, according to one official
But the inability, or unwillingness, of the embattled civilian government, led by President Asif Ali Zardari, to break the ties that bind the ISI to the militants illustrates the complexities of a region of shifting alliances. Obama administration officials admit that they are struggling to understand these allegiances as they try to forge a strategy to quell violence in Afghanistan, which has intensified because of a resurgent Taliban. Fighting this insurgency is difficult enough, officials said, without having to worry about an allied spy service’s supporting the enemy...
One wonders how much success the Brits had. What a tangled web the region is. Meanwhile, a leader in The Economist:
Say you're staying, Mr President Barack Obama needs to act fast to dispel the idea that he is giving up on his “good war”
Update: As a very acute observer of events wrote me in an e-mail:
...we don’t really know his character and the stuff he’s made of. His position on Afghanistan during the primaries and campaign was purely political. We’ll soon see how tough he is.
Canada's area of responsibility in the Taliban heartland will be cut by nearly half this summer as part of U.S. President Barack Obama's new Afghan strategy, to be unveiled today.
But Canada's combat mission in Afghanistan is to retain control of some of Kandahar's most violent areas: Kandahar City and the farming districts to the west of the provincial capital where three-quarters of Kandaharis live [emphasis added].
"Canada will be more focused on major population centres in and around Kandahar City, which is exactly where we want to have an impact with our priorities," David Mulroney, the Privy Council Office deputy minister who heads the government's Afghanistan Task Force [the official webpage, updated Dec. 1, 2008, hasn't noticed that the "additional battle group" wanted for Kandahar had actually been operational some three months earlier] , told an all-party committee of MPs on Thursday...
"The most important factor is increasing the Afghan military presence," said Mulroney, who added the growing strength of the Afghan National Army was proven last summer after the Taliban reclaimed parts of the Arghandab northwest of Kandahar City, because they led the mission that drove the insurgents out.
About one-third of the 17,000 additional U.S. troops ordered to Afghanistan are to be based in Kandahar.
American marines are headed to the deserts west of there [see near end here], while a smaller number of U.S. army troops are to provide combat help to U.S. units already deployed south of Kandahar in areas near the Pakistan border [e.g. Spin Boldak]...
Mulroney deflected concerns by opposition members of the Commons foreign affairs committee that the increased U.S. presence would dwarf Canada's contributions in southern Afghanistan.
He said Canada welcomes the extra U.S. help. "They will be able to be present in some parts of Kandahar where we have not been present."
While these American troops will not be under Canadian command [emphasis added--but the US battalion already assigned to Task Force Kandahar will remain under its Canadian commander], their presence could greatly benefit Canada's 2,800 troops. Canadian officers have long believed that four out of every five insurgents their forces face have come from safe havens within Pakistan.
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