CBC: No Congo Mission for CF

This + this = No Congo = Good Idea

Let's see if that's how it unfolds.

Earlier:

CF for Congo: Pressure builds/Gov't Update

Congo no go? But a minor go might just, er, grow

"Out of Afghanistan, Into the Heart of Darkness?"/Agitprop

'“Cautiously Optimistic"- the Pentagon Report'

Conference of Defence Associations' media round-up.

AfPak paranoia (plus India)

More reasons solutions will not be easy.

1) Afstan:

Is the U.S. Airlifting Taliban Troops into Northern Afghanistan?
No. But the question itself poses more questions than you might think.

2) Pakistan:

Indi'a [sic] desire to bifurcate Afghanistan through proxy war ["Bharat" means India; site at link not related to major Pak newspaper Dawn as far as I can tell]

Relevant:

Mumbai’s long shadow finally recedes [Dawn]

At long last, a firm step forward [The Hindu; one hopes]

Why we fought in Afstan/Afghan-Canadian Update [note Indian site in "Comments"]

Tangled Afghan webs

Afstan: Pakistan vs. India

Update thought: There is of course an awful lot to be paranoid about in the area, given the history and recent events.

Upperdate: More on the game at the Baluchistan pitch:

Is Baluchistan more strategically significant than Afghanistan?

Battle of the Atlantic Sunday: May 2, 2010

Information on this year's events in the Halifax area at the blog of David Pugliese of the Ottawa Citizen, and in Victoria from Maritime Forces Pacific.

This Veterans Affairs Canada site marks the 2008 65th anniversary of the Battle's (video here) turning point in 1943;

more on the battle from the Juno Beach Centre here, here and here, and from the Canadian War Museum here.

2010: "65th Anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands"

From Veterans Affairs Canada:

This year we recognize the 65^th anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands. Remembrance events and activities will be held across Canada and in the Netherlands, providing opportunities for Canadians to learn about Canada's role in the liberation of the Netherlands.

Notice - Government of Canada events to commemorate the 65^th Anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands

Air travel restrictions to the Netherlands have now been lifted. As a result, all events planned by the Government of Canada to commemorate the 65th Anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands will be held.

Ceremonies and Events

Canadians are encouraged to participate in local events in honour of our Veterans and those who continue to serve this country today. A calendar of commemorative events in your area and events held overseas can be found in this section.
More »

History

The Liberation of the Netherlands, from September 1944 to April 1945, played a key role in the culmination of the Second World War, as the Allied forces closed in on Germany from all sides. The First Canadian Army played a major role in the liberation of the Dutch people who had suffered terrible hunger and hardship under the increasingly desperate German occupiers.
More »...[and more here]

And a story in the Toronto Sun:

Canadian vets, Dutch bond endures

LONDON, Ont. - Don't make this a war story, says Canadian veteran Pat Reidy.

Canadian veteran Pat Reidy enlisted at age 15. (Mike Hensen, QMI Agency)

No, says Reidy -- who's earned the right to tell battle tales for the rest of his life if he chooses -- it's instead a generations-long tale of romance.

"I think the greatest love story of World War Two was the relationship between the Dutch people and the Canadian soldiers, now veterans. It's endured. It's never ended."

Now, 65 years after the Second World War ended, Reidy is one of few veterans left to bear first-hand testimony to that relationship.

A celebration in London next month -- and a larger one in the Netherlands -- will likely be the last large commemoration of its kind with veterans [emphasis added].

And as Dutch citizens and Dutch-Canadians -- Canada has more than one million people of Dutch origin, with Southwestern Ontario home to the largest population of them -- mark the event, so, too, do veterans...

More on the liberation from the Juno Beach Centre, plus a video and audio clips here, here and here from the CBC Archives. Information on Canadian War Cemeteries in the Netherlands here.

Update: More on events in the Netherlands:

...
The following major events are planned as part of the National Program to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the Liberation of Holland.

May 4, 2010, Holten
Commemoration service at Holten Canadian War Cemetery, 1,393 war graves at 11.00 a.m.
Followed by the opening of the Remembrance Centre by a member of the Dutch Royal Family.

As in others years schoolchildren participate in the Remembrance Ceremony by reciting poems and laying flowers on each grave of the fallen soldiers. The cemetery is located between Holten and Nijverdal, 20 kms east of the town of Deventer.

May 4, 2010 Amsterdam
National Memorial Service in the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam followed by a ceremony at the National Monument on Dam Square at 08.00 p.m.

Remembrance Ceremonies will take place in many cities and villages in Holland.

May 5, 2010, Wageningen
Afternoon Liberation Parade in Wageningen.

May 6, 2010, Bergen op Zoom
Commemoration service at Bergen op Zoom Canadian War Cemetery, 1,118 war graves at 11.00 a.m. Bergen op Zoom is 60 km south of Rotterdam.

May 6, 7 and 8, 2010, Voorthuizen
Voorthuizen Military Tattoo, “Tribute to The Veterans”, with 900 performers from Canada, England, Scotland, USA, Poland, Oman, France and the Netherlands is a tribute to among others, Canadian, English and Polish veterans.Thousands of veterans and accompanying Canadian students are expected to attend one of 5 performances. Voorthuizen is located between Amersfoort and Apeldoorn.

May 9, 2005, Apeldoorn
Afternoon Liberation Parade in Apeldoorn

For a complete listing of events see the web-site of NCTYC, www.TYCAF.com

Liberation Tours
Canadian veterans who participated in the liberation of Holland, travel companions and families are invited to stay with host families or stay in a hotel and take part in the official National Program. Verstraete Travel is again the official Canadian representative for Thank You Canada & Allied Forces and Welcome Again Veterans. Contact Verstraete Travel, phone 416-969-8100 or 1-800-565-9267 or www.verstraetetravel.com for more information...

Prime Minister Harper will be there:

...He will...take part in 65th anniversary ceremonies marking Canada’s participation in the liberation of the Netherlands on May 5, 1945.

The role of Canadian troops and the fact that the city of Ottawa took in Dutch Princess Juliana and her two daughters during the war – a third was born in Ottawa – has led to a strong bond between the two countries...

Update:

BERGEN OP ZOOM, the Netherlands — Prime Minister Stephen Harper paid tribute Thursday [May 6] to soldiers who fought and died to liberate Holland 65 years ago — and called on Canadian youth to think hard about the heavy price paid for freedom.

Under brilliant blue skies and surrounded by neat rows of white grave markers, Harper placed a wreath at a war cemetery where 968 Canadians are buried. He praised the veterans for their sacrifice and spoke directly to students who journeyed from Canada to learn more about the war...

Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said freedom must not be taken for granted and warned that we must be alert to intolerance, discrimination and anarchy that threaten to steal it.

Balkenende thanked Canada for bringing hope and promise to a country filled with despair and oppression, and praised the students for walking in the footsteps of their forebears in 1944 and 1945.

“It is essential that we pass on the torch of history to the next generation, that we continue to tell the story of war and the story of peace, so that every day we feel in the fibres of our very being, how precious freedom is,” he said...

Afghan detainee docs: CDS sticking it to government?

Further to this post,

Afghan detainee docs decision: When the law is no longer applicable‏‏

this certainly seems, er, provocative on the part of General Natynczyk:

Top general OK with releasing Afghan papers
Parties meet to find consensus on issuing uncensored versions of documents

The chief of Canada's defence staff says he's not opposed to the release of hundreds of pages of government documents related to Afghan detainee transfers.

"I'm very proud of what our men and women do. We're not perfect," Gen. Walter Natynczyk told CBC News on Thursday. "But when our men and women do the right things, we're proud. When they don't do the right things, we take action, as is happening with regard to various trials ongoing right now."

Opposition parties have berated the government for months for refusing to issue unredacted versions of the documents, which discuss the transfer of detainees captured by Canadian Forces in Afghanistan to Afghan custody.

The aim of obtaining the uncensored papers was to assist a parliamentary committee's investigation into allegations that Canadian officials knew transferred detainees were being tortured by Afghan officials.

The Conservative government says national security considerations bar it from releasing the material.

CBC News asked Natynczyk on Thursday, "Do you have any fears of people poring over those documents?"

Natynczyk responded: "Not at all, not at all."..

Not the first time the CDS may not have endeared himself to the government--from last November:

CDS serves a hard Afghan ball to the government

Afghan detainees and PowerPoint

Earlier:

“PowerPoint makes us stupid,”/Update: "On PowerPoint rangers"

Quite:

...

A PowerPoint diagram meant to portray the complexity of American strategy in Afghanistan certainly succeeded in that aim.

...

Now:

Via Spotlight on Military News and International Affairs.

Afstan: Looking at the glass

1) Half (?)-full (Washington Post):

Pentagon says instability in Afghanistan has '‘leveled off'

The Afghan government can count on popular support only in a quarter of the main urban areas and other districts that are considered key to winning the war with the Taliban and other insurgents, the Pentagon said in a report delivered to Congress on Wednesday.

In the status report on the war in Afghanistan, the Defense Department said that years of rising instability had "leveled off" since January and that the number of Afghans who see their government heading in the right direction has increased.

The report stops short of declaring that the tide has turned in a nine-year war in which the Taliban has made a strong comeback since it was toppled from power after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks...

A major obstacle facing the U.S. counterinsurgency strategy is persuading skeptical Afghans that the central government deserves their allegiance over the Taliban. In an assessment of 121 Afghan districts that it considers crucial to winning the war, the U.S. military found that only about one-quarter -- or 29 districts -- could be classified as sympathetic to the government.

In comparison, 48 of the districts were classified as supportive of or sympathetic to the Taliban, a proportion basically unchanged since December. The remainder of the districts was rated "neutral," meaning that their sympathies were considered up for grabs.

One bright spot in the report is that a majority of Afghans surveyed in March thought their government was "headed in the right direction," an increase of eight percentage points from September, around the time when national elections were widely criticized by international observers as fraudulent.

Views on government corruption, however, "continue to be decidedly negative," the report found, with 83 percent of Afghans reporting that corruption affected their daily lives -- an increase of four percentage points from September...

2) Half (?)-empty (LA Times):

Afghan Taliban getting stronger, Pentagon says
A Pentagon assessment, while expressing confidence in U.S. strategy, says the movement has flourished despite repeated assaults.

A Pentagon report presented a sobering new assessment Wednesday of the Taliban-led insurgency in Afghanistan, saying that its abilities are expanding and its operations are increasing in sophistication, despite recent major offensives by U.S. forces in the militants' heartland.

The report, requested by Congress, portrays an insurgency with deep roots and broad reach, able to withstand repeated U.S. onslaughts and to reestablish its influence, while discrediting and undermining the country's Western-backed government.

But the Pentagon said it remained optimistic that its counter-insurgency strategy, formed after an Obama administration review last year, and its effort to peel foot soldiers away from the Taliban will show success in months to come...

The new report offers a grim take on the likely difficulty of establishing lasting security, especially in southern Afghanistan, where the insurgency enjoys broad support. The conclusions raise the prospect that the insurgency in the south may never be completely vanquished, but instead must be contained to prevent it from threatening the government of President Hamid Karzai.

The report concludes that Afghan people support or are sympathetic to the insurgency in 92 of 121 districts identified by the U.S. military as key terrain for stabilizing the country. Popular support for Karzai's government is strong in only 29 of those districts, it concludes...

...The official acknowledged the assessment of the insurgency was more pessimistic than in previous assessments. "This is a very serious and sober report," he said...

U.S. and allied officials have stressed the importance of improving the Afghan security forces. But the report notes that efforts to enhance the Afghan national army have made "slow progress" over the last year, due largely to "high attrition and low retention" of recruits.

U.S. commanders said Afghan troops who supported Marines in the battle to end Taliban control of Marja early this year were better than those who fought in similar circumstances last year, but still need much more training.

Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson, the Marine commander in the Marja operation, said he would give some Afghan units an A-minus or B-plus. But others, particularly those with soldiers fresh from basic training, performed much worse [more on training here]...

Now, will any enterprising journalist in Ottawa ask for the government's reaction to this assessment? Will the opposition in Question Period? And will any minister give a substantive reply?

And why has the Commons' Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan not asked for such a report? Just kidding, folks. Not that our government would permit the CF to be anywhere near as frank and detailed as the US military.

Update: Text of the report is here.

Afstan: More on next roto, current operational approach

Further to this post,

CF's COIN reality at Kandahar/Next roto arriving

more details:

Canadian troops rotate in advance of summer offensive

SPERWAN GHAR, Afghanistan — Canada's new command group for the front-line combat base arrived in Afghanistan Wednesday, as troops from the Royal Canadian Regiment of Petawawa, Ont., take over from the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry of Edmonton.

The new rotation of soldiers arrived in advance of NATO's upcoming summer Kandahar province offensive, planned to be the largest-ever in the war.

C Company from the Royal Canadian Regiment (RCR), posted to the fortified hill base here, is expected to be charged with pushing the Taliban from west Panjwaii district, a key insurgent stronghold...

Now, Canadian combat troops are working almost exclusively in Panjwaii [emphasis added], attempting to secure population centres by keeping a solid presence in a more limited area.

[By the way, this is how CP spins US Army units working as part of the CF's Task Force Kandahar (current composition):

U.S. troops take a pounding in Kandahar territory vacated by Canadians

...
Since taking over for Canadian troops, both in this volatile district [Zhari] and in Arghandab to the east, the Americans have suffered serious casualties - 19 dead and 51 wounded since early December. Nine Canadian soldiers and one civilian have died during the same stretch...]

"In 2007, it was all kinetic operations, all disruption — we never held the ground, and we never stayed with the population. We didn't have enough manpower," said Good, originally from Coquitlam, B.C.

Outgoing Princess Patricia's troops engaged in frequent fighting in the first part of their seven-to-eight-month tour, then endured an escalating threat from improvised explosive devices (IEDs)...

Canada's new approach of solidifying a "ring of stability" around Kandahar City made reconnaissance platoon Cpl. Jamie Ward's tour far different from his previous rotation in 2008.

Then, as in previous years, Canadian troops moved against areas where the Taliban were entrenched, killing insurgents and driving them out, then moving to the next hot spot without having secured control.

Under the new strategy, Canada's soldiers operate out of bases located very near village areas, and work closely with the Afghan army and police — as well as Canadian military- and civilian-development teams — to clear out Taliban, solidify control, and begin providing services to villagers [post here on how that's going]...

As members of the RCR arrive, the Princess Patricia's are introducing them to their new operations area, and will soon begin taking them out on patrols. The outgoing troops will leave the country in mid-May [emphasis added].

Ain't easy training the ANA

Much less the ANP, I imagine. From BruceR. at Flit:

Afghan army marksmanship: quality vs quantity

C.J. Chivers:

But it is not unusual to see Afghan troops who seem, on patrol and in firefights, to have a very limited sense of basic fighting skills...

It is extremely difficult to rapidly increase quality and quantity at the same time. But that it is what we've been trying to do with the ANA. People will point to the Canadian army in 1939 or the Indian army in the Raj, and say we're just using the wrong methods, but the simple fact is in those armies the people trying to rapidly improve them had a great deal more control over promotions, dismissals, or discipline in the ranks of the trained than ISAF has had over the ANA (which isn't saying much, as ISAF mentors have have generally ad little significant influence at all over any of those things)...

The result, unfortunately, has been that the drive to produce quality and quantity simultaneously has largely failed to produce either, at a huge cost to the war effort.

As something of an aside, I think a lot of the "arm the tribes" stuff [see Upperdate here] at its heart is really people detecting a problem with the military advisory approach in Afghanistan, and searching for ways to find some Afghans to fight alongside who are more in touch with their own "way of war" than the current ANA are. They evidently feel, not without reason, that we seem to have been very effectively creating a force that has the weaknesses of both our and their ways of fighting, and none of the strengths [emphasis added].

Earlier from Bruce on "militias" and foreigners training locals generally. Meanwhile more on ISAF's training contraints and, er, challenges:

U.S. Troops Fill NATO Training Gap In Afghanistan

The Pentagon is sending 800 more American soldiers to Afghanistan in the coming weeks to help train Afghan security forces. That's because other NATO countries still haven't fulfilled their pledges to send their own troops to train the Afghan army and police.
...
A battalion of the 82nd Airborne Division will be heading to Afghanistan in the coming weeks. The soldiers will work as trainers for at least several months. The unit is beyond the 30,000 additional troops that President Obama already approved [emphasis added] for Afghanistan this year.

At a NATO foreign ministers meeting last week in Estonia, there was a sense of urgency about trainers for the Afghanistan forces...

NATO's commitment to the war has been hampered by dwindling political support throughout Europe. Alliance officials said during the meeting in Estonia that NATO has fallen 450 people short of a goal to supply 2,000 trainers for the Afghan National Police force by October.

But the 450 number is misleading, military officials say. They say that's the number that no NATO country has agreed to supply. The larger number is the 800 trainers that NATO had pledged to send, but are not yet in Afghanistan.

"A pledge is a pledge. It's not a person on the ground yet, performing a mission, making a difference, improving the quality of the police and the army over there," says Lt. Gen. William Caldwell, the top American trainer for the Afghan security forces [and for NATO, see first part of this post.

"The challenge we have in Afghanistan is it's not boots on the ground yet," Caldwell says.

NATO nations have said they will make good on those pledges of 800 trainers sometime this year. But that's not good enough for Caldwell. He has to fill in those gaps now.

The 800 NATO trainers are part of more than 2,000 training slots Caldwell has to fill. He will fill some slots by hiring private contractors.

Contractors -- mostly from the United States, and from companies that include the private security firm DynCorp International -- are doing most of the training in Afghanistan [emphasis added]. There are some 3,000 contract trainers, compared with about 1,000 American military instructors. NATO only has a little more than 300 trainers...

By the way, two battalions from the 82nd Airborne are already serving as part of the CF's Task Force Kandahar:

...
Menard's brigade already includes three U.S. army battalions [more at this post]: the 2nd Battalion, 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment [actually 508th PIR, thanks Gulliver in "Comments"] and the 97th Military Police Battalion, which are both part of the Fort Bragg, Ky. [N.C., see Dave in Pa.s' comment]-based 82nd Airborne Division...

Afghan detainee docs decision: When the law is no longer applicable‏‏

Further to this post,

Afghan detainee docs: Crown privilege rules

well, it doesn't. A key argument in the government's refusal to produce to the Commons unredacted documents on the Afghan detainee matter is that there are statutory provisions against doing so in some circumstances. But Speaker Peter Milliken's has ruled that the House of Commons' right to demand documents is effectively absolute.

To my mind the cornerstone of the ruling is a citation on Australian Senate practice that maintains just one House of Parliament, even one committee, can over-ride a statutory prohibition when demanding the production of documents by the government.

It seems most most odd to me that the Australian citation allows a statutory prohibition--which must be passed by both Houses of Parliament--effectively to be over-ridden by a vote in just one of those houses; indeed it would seem by a vote in just one committee with a relatively small number of members.

I wonder, in that light, whether the Speaker should have placed such importance on the citation:

...
Odgers`Australian Senate Practice, 12th edition, at page 51, states clearly:

―Parliamentary privilege is not affected by provisions in statutes which prohibit in general terms the disclosure of categories of information...Statutory provisions of this type do not prevent the disclosure of information covered by the provisions to a House of the Parliament or to a parliamentary committee in the course of a parliamentary inquiry. They ... do not prevent committees seeking the information covered by such provisions or persons who have that information providing it to committees.‖

In light of these various authorities [others before quote begins], the Chair must conclude that the House does indeed have the right to ask for the documents listed in the Order of December 10, 2009..

The CF and the coming Kandahar offensive

You won't hear much (anything) about it from our government, though the CF will say something.

Some Brits Not Happy with Possible Shift to K'Har?

Remember this?

Afghanistan surge planned as shift to Kandahar proposed for UK soldiers
US commanders draw up strategic plans for what they hope will be a final and conclusive push against Taliban-led insurgents

Now, we see this:

.... The Independent has learned that although the two most senior British commanders in Afghanistan are backing the proposed transfer, the head of the military, Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, believes it will be a mistake. So keen are the Americans for the British force to make the switch that Washington has offered to underwrite a sizeable part of the substantial costs involved.

(....)

The plan to move the 9,500-strong British contingency has been necessitated by the refusal of the Canadian government to extend the mandate of its 3,000 troops in Afghanistan when it runs out next year. The Dutch force in Uruzgan is also expected to leave, creating yet another "hole" that Nato has to fill at a critical juncture in the war.

(....)

Although there will be targeted operations in Kandahar City, the main thrust of military action would be into outlying areas which have slipped back to insurgent control. Any UK force sent to the area would have the job of holding that cleared ground.

Proponents of the move say that taking on the Kandahar challenge will help heal the fractures in US-UK relations that date back to 2007, when British forces began drawing down from Basra, ultimately refusing American requests to stay on.

Opponents of the redeployment say it will mean abandoning the "blood and treasure" – military parlance for combat and financial investment – made by the UK in Helmand. Out of 281 British fatalities in the Afghan war to date, 250 have been in Helmand.

Sceptics of the switch, especially in the Foreign Office, also stress that valuable experience and knowledge of tribal and political complexities in Helmand would be lost at a time when some progress has been made.

Kandahar, they also warn, is unlikely to be a short-term commitment, which could be problematic at a time when the British public are increasingly questioning how long the deployment will last.

A diplomatic source said: "The military always felt unhappy about the justifications given for the Iraq war. They don't feel the same way about Afghanistan and some of them are quite Messianic. This is a lot to do with that. But many of us feel that we should stick to what we have in Helmand and not be over-ambitious." ....

Earlier:

Afstan: Two new commands likely to replace RC South

Why we fought in Afstan/Afghan-Canadian Update

To enable Pakistan effectively to return as the predominant power, as it was when the Talibs were in power? Lovely prospect. But with our 2011 military pull-out in view Canada will have about zero influence regarding future geopolitical developments (not that the government would have much idea what to do with any such influence). From Ahmed Rashid (links in original):

...The issue is complicated by the Pakistani military's determination to guide or even dominate the peace process rather than leave it to the Afghans.

Pakistan holds many of the cards: Taliban leaders and their families live in Pakistan and are in close touch with the military and its Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI). Some Taliban allies, such as the network led by Jalaluddin Haqqani, are even closer to the ISI. Although the military is finally hunting down the Pakistani Taliban in the Northwest tribal areas, the Afghan Taliban and Pakistani extremists in Punjab province are being left alone.

The January arrest of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the No. 2 Taliban leader, in Karachi and the unexplained arrests and subsequent freeing of several other leading Taliban figures have demonstrated to Kabul and Washington the Pakistani military's clout.

Karzai and most Afghans fear that if Washington waits too long to decide about talking to the Taliban, control will fall to the ISI as happened in the 1980s and 1990s -- when Washington abandoned Afghanistan to Russia and Pakistan but the ISI played favorites and was unable to end the civil war among Afghan factions.

Almost all Afghans, including Karzai's Pashtun supporters, the non-Pashtun Northern Alliance and even the Taliban oppose any major role for the ISI, as do most regional powers, particularly India, Iran, Russia and the five Central Asian republics.

When Karzai visited Islamabad on March 10 to find out why his interlocutor Mullah Baradar was arrested, he was, according to Afghan officials, bluntly told by Pakistan's generals that the Americans are bound to leave and that if he wanted Pakistani help resolving issues with the Taliban, he would first have to close Indian consulates in Kandahar and Jalalabad. Pakistani officials deny threatening Karzai and insist that they want a peaceful and stable Afghanistan once the Americans leave. But other sources have confirmed that such ultimatums were delivered.

Pakistan is convinced that Karzai is allowing India to undermine Pakistan's western border regions [including Baluchistan, see a typical paranoid Pak view here--though India is an enemy adversary] through its four consulates in Afghanistan and has demanded that Afghanistan close the consulates.

For a sovereign Afghanistan, this is an impossible request, but it is just the opening gambit in a looming test of wills. Pakistan's maneuvers have prompted India to try reactivating its 1990s alliance with Iran, Russia and Central Asia, which supported the former Northern Alliance in a civil war against the Pakistan-backed Taliban regime.

Pakistan's military has virtually taken control of foreign policy and strategic decision making from the civilian government. Thus Pakistan's foreign policy reflects the military's obsession with India...

Ahmed Rashid, a Pakistani journalist, is most recently the author of "Descent Into Chaos: The U.S. and the Disaster in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia." His book "Taliban" was updated and reissued this month.

It is worth keeping in mind that Mr Rashid is in the end Pakistani, with all that implies regarding attitudes towards India--from last September:

Some AfPak constraints, or, the Indian elephant in the room

Also related, from Foreign Policy's "AfPak Daily brief":

...
Afghan President Hamid Karzai is in India today meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other Indian officials to discuss a host of issues including the security of Indian workers in Afghanistan, talks with the Taliban, and Indian aid to Afghanistan (Guardian, Pajhwok, AFP). The AP describes India and Pakistan's competition over influence in Afghanistan, and a senior adviser to the Afghan Foreign Ministry commented wearily, "We don't want to be forced to choose between India and Pakistan" (AP). Al-Jazeera reports that a Pakistani army officer was among 16 people arrested recently in Kabul on suspicion of planning suicide attacks, which Pakistan denied (AJE)...

And the Paks surely are not happy about the presence of the paramilitary Indo-Tibetan Border Police in Afstan, see penultimate para here:

AfPak--and India: New great games

Update: Whilst at home our political game ain't very great:

Ending Afghanistan's Agony: "Our Afghan Comrades Speak Out."

...our Afghan comrades are clearly annoyed with the 'Never you mind, dears, we bigshots have everything under control" approach to the question of Canada and Afghanistan Post-2011. It was a bit peculiar for Bob Rae to leave the impression that he was leaping to the defence of what Afghan-Canadians consider to be the worst aspects of the Conservative government's handling of the Afghanistan file - its opacity, its equivocation, its timidity and its ambiguity. Rae is as decent and competent a Liberal as you'll find in Ottawa. He should know that nudge-and-wink assurances of backroom horsetrading aren't going to mollify Afghanistan's friends. This is vital public policy. It goes straight to the matter of what kind of country Canada is. It's an issue that demands open public debate, and political leadership...

Per ardua ad Guyana, or, it is cricket

Last year:

Afghan cricket: Good news and bad (sort of) news

This year (who says Afghan liberation hasn't achieved something?):

Cricket's most heart-warming story

At one level, the ICC World Twenty20, which begins in Guyana on Friday, is just another opportunity for cricket's 10 elite Test nations to squabble over yet another trophy.

Out of dozens of associate and affiliate nations keen for a crack at the big time, there is room for just two additional qualifiers. But one of them, remarkably, is war-torn Afghanistan. The ultimate underdogs, in sport as in any walk of life, they only became recognised as a cricketing nation in 2001.

The 11 men who will take on millionaire Indian superstars like Mahendra Dhoni and Harbhajan Singh on 1 May in the idyllic tourist haven of St Lucia grew up in the bleak surroundings of the refugee camps in Pakistan, following the Soviet invasion of their homeland in 1979.

The journey from there to cricket's top table is one of the most heartening stories in sport, and one of the most unlikely.

The success of the national team has inspired many Afghans to take up cricket...

“PowerPoint makes us stupid,”/Update: "On PowerPoint rangers"

Quite:

...

A PowerPoint diagram meant to portray the complexity of American strategy in Afghanistan certainly succeeded in that aim.

...

I'm sure the CF are just about as PP-addicted. When I was in the federal bureaucracy I was utterly unable to cope with PP despite a couple of quick courses. Not sure if I should be stupidly proud or something. By the way, federal cabinet briefings are largely PP "decks", a certain path to better governance, eh?

Update: BruceR. at Flit:

...
Another leader, a previous commander of Task Force Kandahar, had a habit of putting scans of his own hand-drawn back-of-an-envelope schematics, clear, well-drawn and content-rich, as the lead graphics in written documents outlining the way ahead in much greater detail. Comprehension benefited from the graphic, but didn't depend on it. The method underscored his own clarity of thought and purpose quite effectively, I thought, combining the intimacy of someone explaining his plan to you on a napkin one-on-one with the power of electronic mass transmission.

I guess what I'm saying is brilliant communicators are brilliant because they don't let the technology or others' expectations get in the way of their thoughts or their message...

...if you go straight to the slide deck without having done the analytical work up front, yes, odds are whatever you present will be junk: good presentation skills can prevent you degrading whatever clarity of thought you possess, but they can't augment it. I think T.X. Hammes' summary is dead-on: "PowerPoint [used alone] can be highly effective if used purely to convey information — as in a classroom or general background brief. It is particularly good if strong pictures or charts accompany the discussion of the material. But it is poorly suited to be an effective decision aid."

Army's Close Combat Vehicle (CCV) project moving forward/Tactical Armoured Patrol Vehicle (TAPV)

I haven't really been on top of this. A post from January this year:

New armoured vehicles and the sound of budget crunching

Then in March from David Pugliese of the Ottawa Citizen:

Plans for new fleet of armoured combat vehicles back on track

Now from milnews.ca at Milnet.ca:

This from MERX - highlights mine:

Quote

The Department of National Defence (DND) has a requirement for the provision of up to 138 Close Combat Vehicles (CCV) in various configurations, which includes an optional quantity of up to thirty (30) vehicles. The CCV will provide a high level of crew protection, incorporating mine blast resistance and protection against both Improvised Explosive Devices (IED) and ballistic threats. The CCV will incorporate a protected main weapon station to engage and defeat the enemy.

The initial series of deliveries will include a minimum quantity of eight ( 8 ) CCV with the initial Integrated Logistic Support (ILS) package, required within twenty-four (24) months after contract award. The delivery of the remaining 100 vehicles must be completed within forty-eight (48) months after contract award. Along with the initial eight ( 8 ) vehicles, the contractor will be required to provide interim support including repair and overhaul and deployed technical support. The option to procure an additional quantity of up to thirty (30) CCV may be exercised at the sole discretion of Canada within four (4) years after contract award. Further, the contractor will be required to provide long-term In-Service Support (ISS) services for approximately twenty-five (25) years to commence after the interim support period.

The CCV must be an integrated, supportable, existing or upgraded version of a Military Off-the-Shelf (MOTS) BASE VEHICLE and MOTS TURRET, each of which is in production for and/or in service with another military recognized by DND as of the closing date of this Solicitation of Interest and Qualification (SOIQ) .... Closing: 2010-06-10 02:00 PM Eastern Daylight Saving Time EDT ....

Reference Number PW-$CCV-002-19968
Solicitation Number W6508-10CC01/D

As for the TAPV, two posts here to recap, plus one from Mr Pugliese:

More on new armoured vehicles

Wanted (by 2015): As Many as 600 Tactical Armoured Patrol Vehicles for CF

IS GENERAL DYNAMICS AND THE OSHKOSH MRAP THE TEAM TO BEAT ON THE CANADIAN FORCES TACTICAL ARMORED PATROL VEHICLE?

Joint Oshkosh/GDLS-Canada news release here. Given the GDLS-Canada (London, Ont.) role, does anyone really think any contract won't be effectively (the supposedly dreaded) sole-source?

Canada-Afghanistan Solidarity Committee meetings: Edmonton, April 27; Calgary, April 28

Details:

CASC Event in Edmonton on April 27

Date & Time:
Tuesday April 27thTime: 7-9pm

Location:
Telus Centre on the University of Alberta campus (87 Avenue NW & 112 St NW, Edmonton)

Presenting:
H.E. Jawed Ludin, Afghanistan's Ambassador to Canada
Terry Glavin, award-winning writer, journalist and founding member of CASC
Najia Haneefi, Founder of the Women's Political Participation Committee (Afghanistan)
Lauryn Oates, Canadian human rights and education activist

Refreshments served

There is no cost for this event, but seating is limited. RSVP by email at info@afghanistan-canada-solidarity.org or message by phone (604) 754-2413 (leave your phone number, name and number of seats to be held).

CASC Event in Calgary on April 28

A Panel Responding to the Question: What Should Canada Do in Afghanistan Post-2011?

Date and Time
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
6:30-9 pm (Panel begins at 7 pm)

Location
Kahanoff Conference Centre
200-1202 Volunteer Way (Centre Street) S.E., Calgary, AB

Presenting:
H.E. Jawed Ludin, Afghanistan's Ambassador to Canada
Terry Glavin, award-winning writer, journalist and founding member of CASC
Najia Haneefi, Founder of the Women's Political Participation Committee (Afghanistan)
Lauryn Oates, Canadian human rights and education activist

There is no cost for this event, but seating is limited. RSVP by email at Calgary@CW4WAfghan.ca before April 20 or message by phone 1-403-244-5625 (leave your phone number, name and number of seats to be held).

Co-hosted by Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan www.cw4wafghan.ca Canada-Afghanistan Solidarity Committee www.afghanistan-canada-solidarity.org

Earlier:

"Keeping our Promises--Canada in Afghanistan Post-2011: The Way Forward"

Afstan: Interesting public meeting in Toronto, Saturday, April 17

"A tale of two villages: Stark differences between neighbouring Afghan towns."

Terry Glavin calls this Canwest News story "[p]roper journalism":

WEST TEYMURIAN, Afghanistan - Violence, greed and poverty: the trio of ills hampering development efforts in Afghanistan confronted a Canadian Forces patrol this week in two villages that sit beside each other but remain worlds apart.

For these soldiers from the military's construction, civilian-co-operation and combat groups, the journey through West Teymurian and Angurian, 10 kilometres southwest of Kandahar City, is an exercise in frustration, a struggle for compassion and further evidence that success here is measured in tiny steps...

More on journalism here.

JTF 2 ops in Afstan, 2001-2/Today? Allied SOF

Finally some people in the CF (government/public service too?) are talking a bit; pity they won't say anything about the present--see below. Two pieces by Allan Woods of the Toronto Star:

1) Forged in the fire of Afghanistan

...
That hard drive was the ultimate quarry of the Canadian mission, part of Task Force K-Bar, the name given the unit of special forces soldiers which arrived in Afghanistan from seven countries. It included Canada’s JTF2.

[More on JTF 2 and Canadian special forces here and here; plus on Task Force K-BAR:

Enduring Freedom Task Force Earns Presidential Unit Citation

...The Task Force was comprised of U.S. Navy SEALs (Sea, Air, Land), Special Warfare Combatant-craft crewmen, U.S. Army Special Forces, U.S. Air Force Combat Controllers, and Coalition special operations forces from Canada, Norway, Denmark, Germany, Australia, New Zealand and Turkey...]

The inside story of that mission can now be told for the first time following a Toronto Star investigation into the top-secret operations that would cement Canada's reputation as one of the top special forces teams in the world.

The international task force has been credited with killing more than 100 top level Taliban and al Qaeda leaders and the JTF2 stalks the enemy in Afghanistan to this day. But the distance of time has now shed light on that initial six-month deployment of Canada’s most secretive soldiers...

Until now, none of the behind-the-scenes details were known of Canadian operations in southern and eastern Afghanistan in the first months of what has stretched into a nine-year war.

“It gave us credibility around the world,” recalled one of the 40 Canadian commandos involved in the mission...

It was December 5, 2001 before JTF2 touched ground at a Kandahar airstrip...

Art Eggleton, the Liberal defence minister at the time, confirmed that the government was dispatching 40 members of the elite unit to Kandahar, but even Canadian military commanders with the 750 regular force soldiers that arrived on the battlefield in January 2002 were not privy to JTF2’s operations...

...the government seemed to enjoy the political boost it got out of telling Canadians that its crack counter-terrorist team was on the frontline of the war on terror without having to disclose some of the more uncomfortable details to the House of Commons or the country.

The Afghan chaos caught up with Eggleton, though, on January 22, 2002, when the Globe and Mail newspaper published a photograph on its front page showing three special forces troops in green camouflage uniforms – incorrectly identified as American soldiers – leading detainees out of an aircraft at Kandahar Airfield.

Members of Canada’s secretive JTF2 unit escort three detainees across the tarmac at the airport in Kandahar, Afghanistan, on Jan. 21, 2002.
DARIO LOPEZ-MILLS/AP FILE PHOTO

It later emerged that the soldiers were in fact members of JTF2 and that the detainees were handed over to their American counterparts. The admission by Eggleton prompted political and legal concerns both in Canada and within Prime Minister Jean Chretien’s Liberal caucus that Canadian soldiers were helping capture detainees that were bound for the Guantanamo Bay military prison in Cuba, a legal no-man’s land that became a focus of anti-war critics and human rights groups.

Eggleton weathered that political storm [what, no judicial enquiry? meanwhile on the UK Afghan detainee front: "Afghan spy chief: 'I told MI5 that prisoners were being tortured' UK forces are accused of handing over Taliban detainees to Kandahar interrogators despite claims of ill-treatment"]...

2) Friends and foes in an Afghan shooting gallery

It was easy to see the enemy everywhere in the wild west, early days of the Afghanistan invasion.

The country, some military officials later recalled, was a commando “shooting gallery” and the top secret missions amounted to little more than man-hunting.

But the soldiers of JTF2 are trained just as much in the art of restraining their lethal force as in dishing it out to an unsuspecting enemy. That training was put to good use one day for the members of Canada’s premier counterterrorist unit.

The details of JTF2’s participation in the initial invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002 were shared with the Toronto Star by key actors involved in the mission, giving a rare behind-the-scenes look at Canada’s top secret special operations force.

They were dispatched high into the rugged mountains of Afghanistan early in 2002 on a reconnaisance mission as part of Task Force K-Bar, a team made up of coalition special operations forces from around the world...

The soldiers of JTF2 were expertly camouflaged to avoid detection, but the surveillance squad was nevertheless discovered by a small group of Afghan men who stumbled over the commandos while on a mountain excursion. Apparently they were hunting birds.

In special forces parlance, they had been compromised. But now the snap decision-making of the elite soldiers came into play. If the hunters were actually enemy fighters, then it was a “hard compromise” and they would sanitized, eliminated, killed.

A “soft compromise” would result in the innocents being captured nonetheless, though their lives would be spared.

The Canadians lay in wait and prepared for the worst, stealthily slipping silencers onto their weapons if the need arose.

It did not. Capturing the unsuspecting hunters was effortless. Carrying out the rest of their mission, for which they had a “no fail” mandate, was the challenge.

They forced the birders to their knees at gunpoint and bound their hands behind their backs, striking mortal fear into the captives who apparently expected the same type of summary execution for which Afghanistan’s Soviet invaders two decades earlier had become notorious...

As the helicopter arrived at the landing zone that day, the JTF2 commandos quickly and quietly clipped the cuffs off their Afghan helpers, allowing them to slip away as they boarded the aircraft and lifted off into the sky.

As for other special forces in Afstan:

US Special Forces and the coming Kandahar offensive

UK SAS to Afstan [plus info on Aussie SOF]/Blackout on our special forces

NZ to deploy SAS to Afghanistan

Update:

Elite U.S. Units Step Up Effort in Afghan City Before Attack

Small bands of elite American Special Operations forces have been operating with increased intensity for several weeks in Kandahar, southern Afghanistan’s largest city, picking up or picking off insurgent leaders to weaken the Taliban in advance of major operations, senior administration and military officials say...

Instead of the quick punch that opened the Marja offensive, the operation in Kandahar, a sprawling urban area, is designed to be a slowly rising tide of military action. That is why the opening salvos of the offensive are being carried out in the shadows by Special Operations forces.

“Large numbers of insurgent leadership based in and around Kandahar have been captured or killed,” said one senior American military officer directly involved in planning the Kandahar offensive. But, he acknowledged, “it’s still a contested battle space.”

Senior American and allied commanders say the goal is to have very little visible American presence inside Kandahar city itself, with that effort carried by Afghan Army and police units [emphasis added]...

...while allied officials say they will be relying heavily on Afghan forces to take the lead in securing the city, that same tactic has so far produced mixed success in Marja, where Marine Corps officers said they ended up doing much of the hard fighting...

To shape the arrangement of allied forces ahead of the fight, conventional troops have begun operations outside of Kandahar, in a series of provincial districts that ring the city. American and allied officers predict heavy pockets of fighting in those belts. Kandahar, according to a senior military officer, is “infested” with insurgents, but not overrun as was Marja [see this post and end of this post]...

Upperdate: US SOF also working on local "militias"--with pushback from State Dept.:

U.S. training Afghan villagers to fight the Taliban

Meanwhile ISAF/CF seem to be developing another track:

NATO looks for a few good militiamen in Kandahar; hoping to convert to cops

"More Reason for Optimism"

Conference of Defence Associations' media round-up (lots more than Afstan--Congo, Iran).

CF's COIN reality at Kandahar/Next roto arriving

The new face of--not often--battle (nice reporting by Murray Brewster of CP):

Bombs, bullets and boredom: Charlie Company saw it all
Halifax corporal: 'I thought it would be a lot different'

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Many of them came charging into Kandahar last fall with visions in their minds of gun battles and light armoured vehicles laying down cannon fire across the desert [full roto listed here].

But for members of Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, theirs turned out to be a very different war.

The battle group's commanding officer, Lt.-Col. Jerry Walsh, seemed fond of quoting some his soldiers who described their tour as ``living like rats'' in the tiny, spartan patrol bases that dot the Panjwaii district outside Kandahar city.

Even for the veterans of Charlie Company, the last six months have seemed a little bit unreal.

The unit, among the most storied in today's Canadian army, has seen two tours of this region. It was among the first companies to be bloodied by the Taliban as violence spiralled out of control in the spring of 2006 [more on that here].

There are many fresh faces in the ranks, some of them young kids who joined up in 2007 watching the images of Charlie Company's battles on the television news.

But that was then. That was back in a time when Canada was defending virtually the entire province and soldiers were running between battles.

``We were firefighters back then,'' the veterans like to say.

The influx of thousands of U.S. troops, as marked the other day by the handover of Canada's so-called model village project in Deh-e-Bagh, in nearby Dand district [more here], has radically changed the face of this conflict.

So has the strategy of western soldiers living in communities with their Afghan counterparts at combat outposts, instead of fortified bases.

The Patricias were there first battle group to do so.

There are still enormous risks, but instead of wild firefights, there is a steady stream of homemade bombs and roadside explosions. Eleven soldiers died and an untold number of wounded went home during PPCLI's latest tour.

But when they patrol, it is in support of the Afghan army and on Afghan time, which is decidedly more relaxed than what Canadian troops are familiar with.

And for many of these guys, Kandahar has slipped into the old adage: War is 95 per cent boredom and five per cent sheer terror...

Troops from the Ontario-based 1st Battalion of the Royal Canadian Regiment, another battle-hardened unit that fought the landmark Operation Medusa in 2006, have started to slip in to the lines to replace the Patricias [part of Task Force 1-10, more here, here and here]...

Who's running development policy at Kandahar? The US

Not us any more it would seem--and the US military and civilians have disagreements:

U.S. military, diplomats at odds over how to resolve Kandahar's electricity woes

Development/reconstruction at Kandahar would seem less and less a "joint venture", eh? Whilst in the field.

Afghan detainees: Keeping them ourselves?

Conclusion of a post by BruceR. at Flit that, after a compliment, disputes the Globe and Mail's Doug Saunders:

...

Doug's article on the same topic, however, baffled me in its last sentence: Documents released in the Canadian detainee case have shown that Canada repeatedly avoided building a detention facility, despite requests from several countries and branches of the Afghan government.

I have seen nothing in any record that indicates Afghans ever having interest in having anyone but Afghans take on the Afghan prisoner responsibility. Other than strongly encouraging us to build them new facilities, give them new computers (in the original boxes if possible) etc., sure... but I don't believe the sentence's implication that Afghans would have readily consented to a Canadian-run long-term detention facility in Kandahar is remotely supportable.

More on Mr Saunders:

Globeite Doug Saunders still can't tell a US Marine from a soldier

US in Afstan: Why Helmand before Kandahar? Logistics

Joe Klein of Time magazine thinks the Americans have goofed by going on the offensive in Helmand first:

...yet, the COIN effort in Kandahar has been halfhearted at best.

Part of the problem is a strategic blunder the U.S. military has made: it diverted crucial resources from Kandahar to a peripheral battle in neighboring Helmand province. McChrystal questioned the Helmand effort when he took charge a year ago, but he then — inexplicably — doubled down on it by ordering the attack on the Taliban stronghold of Marjah in February. Marjah was taken, but most of the Taliban slipped away and have now reconstituted themselves in the countryside; a game of whack-a-mole seems likely to ensue. Meanwhile, the counterinsurgency effort in Kandahar was crippled by the diversion of Afghan troops and police (and also of U.S. civilian aid efforts) to Helmand: an entire Afghan regiment that was supposed to partner with U.S. troops in the crucial Zhari district — where Senjaray is located [more here] — was sent to Marjah. There are also 600 of Afghanistan's best-trained police officers (ANCOPs) in Marjah, while the police presence in Zhari is negligible. The fabled U.S. civilian surge is, well, a fable in the district. U.S. forces will triple in Zhari during the next few months, but that won't make much of a difference if the Afghan security and governmental presence remains as pathetic as it now is...

But there were likely practical reasons for the rapid US Marine build-up at Helmand--and thus the early Marjah operation--while a slower US Army increase at Kandahar has been taking place. See last three paras here, 2) here, and this post. Sometimes war is mainly about logistics after all.

Afstan: Dutch withdrawal planning--but maybe not completely/Canada?

Any lessons for the CF here (at least we won't face the long road trip)?

Afghanistan mission prepares for retreat
The Dutch military will retreat from Afghanistan this summer. Soldiers are rehearsing the withdrawal already.
...
The soldiers of the Redeployment Task Force in Schaarsbergen are only conducting drills this week, but come summer these convoys will ferry troops and equipment from the Dutch base Camp Holland to the city Kandahar in southern Afghanistan. From here, the soldiers and most of their gear will return to the Netherlands by air. Some equipment will be shipped to Pakistan by civilian contractors...

The Dutch will be handing over command in Uruzgan province on August 1. By then, the Redeployment Task Force will have arrived. Approximately 1,300 soldiers will be in charge of clearing the remains of the Dutch mission.

Nobody knows the exact number of soldiers required for the withdrawal, mainly because it is now uncertain how much equipment will have to be carried back. A team is currently drawing up an inventory of supplies that remain in Uruzgan.

General Jan Broeks, who is in charge of the Redeployment Task Force, summed up the equipment that would have to be moved back to the Netherlands no matter what: 4,000 containers and some 600 vehicles. Because the air strip at Camp Holland is being refurbished this summer, large cargo carriers will be unable to land there. All equipment will therefore have to be brought to Kandahar by road. The 180-kilometre road connecting the airport to Camp Holland is in poor repair and the frequent target of Taliban ambushes. Last year, supply convoys travelling the road came under attack. "That road is dangerous," said Broeks. "Also because we will be pretty predictable with such a large convoy."..

To reduce the size of the transport convoy, the Dutch military will try to sell as much of its materials to the allied troops remaining in Afghanistan. The Dutch command hopes to make some extra money by selling its armoured quarters to its successor. The problem is that Nato has yet to announce which nation will operate from Camp Holland. Until May, when the decision is expected [emphasis added, Brits maybe? see last para here], the soldiers rehearse the retreat without knowing whether they will be required in Uruzgan. "It is almost surprising how positive my men remain under these uncertain conditions," Broeks said...

Info on Canadian pullout planning at this post.

But the Dutch (unlike Canada as things now stand) may not bug out completely
militarily:

Parliament backs Afghanistan police mission, Labour still opposed

A majority of 80 MPs backs a compromise proposal by the left wing greens GroenLinks and D66 Liberals to send a 'sizeable' police mission to Afghanistan to train local officers, the Volkskrant reports on Thursday.

And the police trainers would be accompanied by soldiers to protect them, foreign minister Maxime Verhagen said, during Wednesday's debate on the plan.

D66 leader Alexander Pechtold said the proposal should bring an end to the 'deafening silence' about Afghanistan since the cabinet fell over the issue in February [more here]...

It is not clear how many police officers and soldiers would make up the mission. Earlier drafts of the proposal spoke of 50 trainers and 200 soldiers, but last night's motion did not include any figures.

It is now up to the cabinet to draw up a formal motion, but it is not sure this can be achieved before the June 9 general election, the Volkskrant said...

Our government has said it is sending 90 more CF trainers to Afstan--but presumably they will be withdrawn in 2011 when our military mission is to end. So it looks like we won't be able to help in the following regard for very long:

...
One of the problems being faced by Nato's Isaf (International Security and Assistance Force) in Afghanistan is a shortage of up to 450 trainers. Mr Rasmussen [NATO Secretary General] said yesterday that a number of countries, including Canada [emphasis added, the 90 mentioned above?], have made offers of personnel and insisted that "progress was being made"...

Well, our contribution to that need for trainers looks disgracefully short-term to me. And we may keep civilian police trainers on--without any military support for their security, unlike the Dutch plan:

Afstan and the government: Politically craven and immorally audacious

Indeed. And the Germans look like they're actually going to do a bigger bit while we're leaving.

Afstan: US troops to be under German command/Bundeswehr to mentor ANA in field

A bit more clarity. From Spiegel Online:

Partnering in Afghanistan
New McChrystal Approach Means Greater Danger for German Forces

During his much-anticipated visit to Berlin, US General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan, refrained from making any demands for additional German troops. But McChrystal's new "partnering" strategy means the Bundeswehr will have to get involved in highly dangerous operations...

McChrystal wants to explain what he has in mind. He believes that NATO can succeed in Afghanistan, he says. And no matter how hard the journalists press him, he does not mention a single demand. "I am not asking for more troops," McChrystal said. Instead, he said, he is putting the 5,000 additional American troops that are being deployed to northern Afghanistan unconditionally under German command.

With his comments, the general revealed a refreshingly realistic view of the Afghanistan conflict. His message: We can win the mission, but that's not a given...

With his mild words, McChrystal was trying to accommodate the German government. Some three hours after the event at the Ritz-Carlton, McChrystal, dressed in an immaculate dark green dress uniform with sparkling medals, was standing next to Defense Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg. Guttenberg didn't need to explain to him how difficult it is to sell the Afghanistan mission politically in Germany, where a majority of Germans oppose the Bundeswehr deployment...

Exit Strategy

In their discussions, the two officials paid particular attention to McChrystal's exit strategy. That strategy envisions training as quickly as possible tens of thousands of Afghan soldiers who will then be responsible for the security of their country. It is supposed to happen quickly: US President Barack Obama wants to start withdrawing the first US soldiers as early as 2011. To make that happen, McChrystal has developed a new approach. Speaking in Berlin, McChrystal became enthusiastic when he talked about so-called "partnering," in which international soldiers train Afghans more or less by fighting together at the front.

From McChrystal's perspective, the new approach represents the key to success. "The international forces have better weapons and more fighting techniques," he said. "The Afghans speak the language, know the customs and have much better access to information." The best approach, therefore, is for units to fight, eat and live together, he said, explaining that that is the way camaraderie is built.

These are the moments in which the soldier in McChrystal can be heard. It's clear that he would like to be taking part in the training himself...

For the Germans, the new strategy involves far greater risks than before, as the deaths of the four soldiers last week made clear. Although the operation "Taohid II" that the soldiers were participating in did not make any real use of partnering, it was intended as a kind of blueprint for how the Bundeswehr can give practical training to Afghan soldiers. The aim was to drive the Taliban out of the Baghlani-jadid area with 3,000 Afghan soldiers using concentrated force. The Germans were to support the operation with logistics and technology. In last week's attack, three soldiers were killed by a booby trap and a doctor died when the armored ambulance he was traveling in came under fire.

Guttenberg assured McChrystal that the Bundeswehr would also train the Afghan National Army (ANA) in combat operations beginning at the start of 2011 [emphasis added]. The defense minister is speaking these days in increasingly realistic terms about the new approach. The partnering strategy conceals "new and greater risks" than current Bundeswehr activities, he said Wednesday. The situation in the north will become "dangerous, in parts even very dangerous," he said, adding that there was no point in "beating around the bush" when discussing the issue...

German forces will be increasingly dependent on US help in the coming months. The Bundeswehr has long suffered from significant gaps when it comes to the air transport of troops and special forces. The US Army is now moving quickly to fill these gaps. McChrystal will redeploy at least 56 US helicopters to Kunduz and Mazar-e-Sharif in the coming weeks [emphasis added, how can such a large military as the German have such a shortfall?].

This massive aid will also, however, make it harder for the Germans to resist the new, at times very robust, American strategy -- including the relentless pursuit of the Taliban.

Update: More from The Economist, with a useful chart:

What is this thing called war?
Slowly and painfully Germany’s leaders and voters are coming to terms with being at war in Afghanistan
...

Congo no go? But a minor go might just, er, grow

Further to this post,

CF for Congo: Pressure builds/Gov't Update

here's hoping:

Canadian deployment to Congo unlikely, observers say

Canada is likely to ignore a request for a major deployment of Canadian soldiers to a peacekeeping mission in the Congo, military observers say.

That’s because of concerns around the United Nations mandate for the operation, the ambivalence of authorities in the Democratic Republic of Congo, who have called for foreign troops to leave the country, and the chronic funding and manpower problems the 20,000-soldier mission has experienced since it began in 1999.

“My information tells me that the prime minister is not very keen on contributing troops to a mission in the Congo under the UN,” said Alain Pellerin, a retired Canadian Forces colonel who heads the Conference of Defence Associations, a military advocacy group.

The UN has issued a request for a Canadian general to command the African mission, and the Conservative government is expected to respond to the request any day now.

“Canada is one of the countries asked by the UN secretariat to consider providing a candidate for the position,” Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon told the House of Commons Wednesday. “We are currently considering that request.”

The expectation is that Lt.-Gen. Andrew Leslie, the outgoing head of the army, would fill that role for Canada.

If Leslie goes, he will likely be accompanied by a contingent of personal staff, bodyguards and a communications team to keep in contact with his military and political masters in Ottawa. But don’t expect a wholesale shift of Canadian soldiers from Afghanistan, where the mission ends in 2011, to the Congo, Pellerin said.

“We’re talking about dozens (of soldiers), not hundreds.”..

Note the story does not rule out Gen. Leslie's appoinment, If he is sent, and if the UN mission is extended beyond next year, I would think there would be a lot of pressure (and temptation in certain quarters) seriously to expand the Canadian troop commitment in 2011.

Update: More:

If Canada’s military is itching for a fight, it won’t be in the Congo

What a stupid, sophomoric, Globeite headline. The whole point of a Congo mission--whatever its eventual size and composition over time--would be a return to UN "peacekeeping" in place of Afghan combat (for which our politicians, most pundits, and much of the people no longer appear to have any stomach).

Karzais' control of Kandahar/Brit shift there?

Note the placement of the apostrophe; sticky situation, eh? BruceR. provides the link, and a key point, at Flit:

Carl Forsberg has an excellent "White SA" roundup of the power-political dynamics in Kandahar out today. It's a must-read for understanding the local situation. From the executive summary:

Ahmed Wali Karzai’s influence over Kandahar is the central obstacle to any of ISAF’s governance objectives...

On the NDS, Forsberg makes an observation largely absent in current Canadian reportage:

"In contrast to the police force, the Karzai family has installed close allies into the NDS in southern Afghanistan, and the Kandahar NDS is a vibrant and strong organization loyal to Karzai family interests... The NDS in Kabul is directed by Amrullah Saleh, a Tajik and former deputy to Massoud. But Saleh has limited influence over his organization and is kept in power mostly because of American backing. His influence over the organization does not extend to Kandahar. Several close Karzai allies and even family members in NDS Headquarters in Kabul ensure Karzai influence in parts of the NDS bureaucracy. This shadow ownership enables regional branches of the NDS in areas like Kandahar to be dominated by strong Karzai allies... There are few additional details in the open source on the leadership of the Kandahar NDS or on its leaders’ political affiliations, but there is common recognition that the Kandahar NDS is strongly loyal to the Karzai family."..

Meanwhile, a wholesale shift of UK forces from Helmand to Kandahar might make sense since as of this fall the Brits will no longer be in charge at Helmand if US plans for changing the ISAF command structure go through :

Afghanistan surge planned as shift to Kandahar proposed for UK soldiers
US commanders draw up strategic plans for what they hope will be a final and conclusive push against Taliban-led insurgents

Indeed the Brits would seem prime candidates to send forces to replace us at Kandahar when the CF pull out in 2011--and the Dutch when they leave Uruzgan this year. After all there will be plenty of US Marines at Helmand.