American rhetoric has changed its tune on Afghanistan many times over. In the 80s, Afghanistan was to be saved from the clutches of the Evil Empire so that it could join the comity of free nations. In the 90s Afghanistan was to be liberated from the Godless empire by the people who believed in God. In the 200s Afghanistan had to be liberated from the clutches of the evil ideology, the Evil ones, and from Islamic terrorism. Now the Secretary of Defense says that Afghan cannot be converted into a Norse heaven.
Charles Ferndale poignantly reminds America that Brack Obama's father was not a slve in Kenya. Barack Obama was a free man. However Mr. obama is a slave to the special interests he is beholden to. Mr. Obama paid homage to and kowtowed to the New York bankers, to Wall Street, to the Labor Union and to AIPAC--the biggest lobbies in Washington. However he did not know that the pantheon that he was praying to would lose their deity status and that the new financial God would be sitting in Beijing.
In a sign of the times, we are witnessing a change in the basic laws of finance. Apparently the financial compass got shifted towards Beijing--at least till the tsunami of the present crisis blows over. There are signs that this may be a permanent shift. If so, New York cannot influence US policy to the extent it used to
Obama’s China policy renders obsolete the Indian strategic calculus built around the US containment strategy. Hardly two to three years ago, the Bush administration encouraged India to put faith in a quadrilateral alliance of Asian democracies - the US, Japan, Australia and India - that would strive to set the rules for China’s behavior in the region.
According to reports, State Department officials had originally proposed that India be included in the itinerary of Clinton’s current first official tour abroad, but she struck it out. As things stand, Clinton meant every word of what she wrote last year in her Foreign Affairs article that “our [US] relationship with China will be the most important bilateral relationship in the world in this century”. Asia Times. India grapples with the Obama era By M K Bhadrakumar. M K Bhadrakumar was a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service. His assignments included the Soviet Union, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Germany, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Kuwait and Turkey
Barack Obama's lies about Afghanistan kill the last hope of all those people throughout the world who looked for an honest government in America. Who was it who said an honest person cannot be elected to power in the US?
President Obama said on television just the other day that NATO's ambitions for Afghanistan have become more modest. In this he echoes the sentiments of Secretary of Defence Robert Gates, who said that the US government has neither the time nor the money to create some kind of "Valhalla" in Afghanistan. In Norse mythology, was a great hall to which half of all dead warriors go to live at last in peace. Half of all dead warriors? Most of the dead "warriors" in Afghanistan are civilians. And most of the dead fighters are Muslim Afghans, and I doubt they will want to go to a Nordic hall. If all the money spent on killing Afghans since 1980 had been spent on their welfare, no one in Afghanistan would have had to die like this.
All the hopes desperate Afghans invested in Obama will soon be spilt with their blood on the mountainsides of that tragic country, the people of which our governments are killing for oil and gas in the Caspian Sea.
Obama's statements sound not just hollow but quite absurd to any Afghan, given that the Afghan could even understand them (they are so empty of real meaning). The Obama administration's new, more modest ambitions are these: at least to stamp out Al Qaeda; to stop Afghanistan from becoming a launching pad for attacks on the West; to stop it being an incubator for terrorism; to stop terrorism expanding. Frankly, if the man uttering this rubbish were less good-looking the vacuous dishonesty of his utterances would be immediately obvious even to those with only a passing acquaintance of the troubles in Afghanistan.
The writer has degrees from the Royal College of Art, Oxford University, and the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London. He divides his time between the UK and Pakistan. Email: charlesferndale@yahoo.co.uk. Barack Obama's lies, Wednesday, February 25, 2009, Charles Ferndale
The Algeriafication of Pakistan, the Egyptianization of Bangladesh may will yield Iranian type of revolutions. The unyielding pressure on Pakistan to wage war onits own people, the covert operations against the Pakistanis, the drone bombings and economic screw tightening plus the pressure imposed on Islamabd via Delhi has had a catastrophic affect on US-Pakistani relations. Anti-Americansim which did not exist in Pakistan (1947-2001) is now at an all time high and at fever pitch in FATA and the NWFP.
China has grown to be a new heavyweight player and stepped into the limelight on the world stage. And its role in salvaging the plummeting world economy from hitting bottom looms large and active, as the U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said during her just wrapped-up Asian tour, ‘the U.S. appreciates the continued Chinese confidence in the U.S treasuries.’ If the Cold War was ‘a tug of war’ between East and West, and a showcase of hard power, what we have today, for the first time in history, is a global, multicivilizational and multipolar competition, and a display of smart power. To be the winner, one has to seek more cooperation rather than confrontation. By Li Hongmei People’s Daily Online
The Chinese have their own opinions on solving the Afghan quagmire. Like Pakistanis the Chinese oppose the “military surge”, and want a “civilian surge”. Its position is consistent and mirrors the position of the Pakistani government which has been calling to accommodate the moderate Taliban and bring peace to the region with a massive influx of money which would improve the lives of the ordinary citizens. Fixing “AfPak” expedites the inevitable union between Pakistan and Afghanistan
The review on Afghanistan is not over. However the presence of Pakistanis in defining the new strategy is a good sign. The question is, will the feedback given to them have a deep and profound impact, or will be be "water off a ducks back" typified by the American Tin ear during the Bush Administration. Fixing AfPak expedites the inevitable union between Pakistan and Afghanistan
Afghanistan is a landlocked country. This was the Achilles heal of the USSR. It was unable to send supplies to Kabul without being hindered. This is a lesson learned lost to the Bush policy makers. This is the first war that the US has fought where it does not have access to the occupied country. Washington's slight shift on Afghanistan has been brought about by a series of factors. One is the inability of the USA to secure a supply line to Kabul. Betrayels and Balckmail: Cloaking failure as success, Hiding the defeat, declaring Victory, Withdrawing from Afghanistan within 12 months. The road to Kabul leads through Karachi and Islamabad. The US cannot fight, let alone win the Afghan war without Pakistani cooperation.
Kabul: The Final assault begins. How long can NATO hang on?. The impunity and with the ruthless Taliban have gobbled up 80% of Afghan territory has surprised the most optimistic US analysts and Generals. They thought that the Afghan invasion would be a walk in the park. The US tried to invade Iraq and Afghanistan based on the Israeli model, Formal, informal and independent Israeli advisers were available to help the US plan and execute the invasion. Of course Israel had nothing to do with the invasion, but the advice on dealing with Islamic extremists was eagerly listened to. the analogy between the Middle East and West Asia does not work. Most, though not all of Israel's invasions were a cake walk. The IDF drove at will and went wherever it wanted to go. The US, NATO and ISAF cannot do that. There are too many other factors. Afghanistan is surrounded by various countries that have long term and short term interests in Kabul. The population has seen freedom, is armed to the teeth and is battle hardened. The size of Afghanistan prevents absolute and ruthless occupation as exorcized by Israel over the West Bank and Gaza.
Firstly, since all of Afghanistan's appalling troubles over the last 30 years have been the direct result of America's interference since 1979, one might have thought the American administrations should find the time and money to repair a little of the damage they have so mindlessly done there. In a just world, successive American governments and their allies would now be facing charges for war crimes. Al Qaeda is not a single entity that can be located precisely and stamped out; it can be found anywhere in the world, such as Hamburg, where most of the September 11 bombers spent time. Afghanistan was never any more of a launch pad for terrorism against Western countries than Britain has been.
America's foreign policy throughout the Middle East is what incubates terrorism, and that is not going to change. Afghans are starving by the hundreds of thousands, while 85 percent of the billions of dollars that flow into the region flow straight out again into Western bank accounts. Surely, Osama's "advisors" would not want to kill off so sweet a cash cow. America has the money all right; but it is just not going to the people who need it most. America does not have the time? All the military men I hear say that NATO will be in Afghanistan, killing Afghans, for at least ten years to come. One would have to be a fool not to realise that the whole point of America's policy is to keep Afghanistan in a state of war for decades; and is to destabilise Pakistan.
Barack Obama's lies are all the more repellent for coming from the mouth of one so sweet looking, who the naive young and the weary old had hoped would at last constitute a good authority; an honest, intelligent, brave leader with the welfare of all people in mind. Instead, he turns out to be just another servant of the selfish, powerful groups which are destroying the world. Being a faithful servant of destruction will be his legacy; that, and the final cynicism of us all. Obama's father was not a slave, but he appears to be one. The writer has degrees from the Royal College of Art, Oxford University, and the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London. He divides his time between the UK and Pakistan. Email: charlesferndale@yahoo.co.uk. Barack Obama's lies, Wednesday, February 25, 2009, Charles Ferndale
Noticias de Rupia | Nouvelles de Roupie | Rupiennachrichten | новости рупии | 卢比新闻 | Roepienieuws | Rupi Nyheter | ルピーニュース | Notizie di Rupia | PAKISTAN LEDGER | پاکستاني کھاتا | Moin Ansari | معین آنصآرّی | اخبار روپیہ | Great Bargains in Central Asia: Kyrgyz supply line & Manas base usage for halting NATO expansion to Georgia & Ukraine. We summarize the issues and the problems and then list the solutions. Preparing for a US pullout from Afghanistan in 12 months
In 2001 the US was considered the liberator and was immensely popular in Afghanistan and even though there was a tiff with Islamabad on the Nuclear bomb, America was still popular in Pakistan. The elites in both countries were definitely pro-American--many educated and trained in the USA. There was tremendous goodwill left over from the First Afghan war. President Bush had an opportunity to use the weakened USSR to build bridges and spread American influence from Karachi to Kabul and then spread it to Baku, Samarkhand, Bokhara and right up to the Chinese border and beyond.
How can you convert a population full of American fans into US policy haters? It is a classic test case of lessons learned in a tragedy of errors. What did the Neocons do and how did they do it? Instead of using a covert force of 5000 Navy seal to nab the evil guys, the Bush Neocons waged a global war on terror. They used daisy cutters on Afghanistan, nuclear tipped bombs in Iraq and drones in Pakistan. Abu Graib, Gitmo, renditions and torture have tarnished America and its image as the beacon of freedom. The fire is raging from the Nile to the Euphrates; From the Indus to the Amu Darya. All goodwill is gone.
Vietnam, half a world away, seemed alien to many Americans and to Westerners generally. Afghanistan might as well be the moon. At least Vietnam had been a French colony, albeit a troubled one. Afghanistan resisted colonization, dispatching 19th-century British and 20th-century Russian soldiers with equal efficiency. "Afghanistan is not a nation, it is a collection of tribes," according to a Saudi diplomat who did not wish to publicly disparage a Muslim neighbor. In Vietnam, the Ngo Dinh Diem government was seen as illegitimate because Diem was a Roman Catholic in a mostly Buddhist country and because it was propped up by the United States. In Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai's government was essentially created by the United States after local warlords, backed by American airpower, ousted the Taliban in 2001. (Karzai was elected in his own right in 2004, but at a time when he was clearly favored by America and faced no serious rivals.)
As in Diem's Vietnam, government corruption is epic; even Karzai says so. "The banks of the world are full of the money of our statesmen," he said last November. His former finance minister, Ashraf Ghani, rates his old government as "one of the five most corrupt in the world" and warns that Afghanistan is becoming a "failed, narco-mafia state." In a country where seven out of 10 citizens live on about a dollar a day, the average family each year must pay about $100 in baksheesh, or bribes (in Vietnam, this was known as "tea" or "coffee" money). Foreign aid is, after narcotics, the readiest source of income in Afghanistan. But it has been widely estimated that because of stealing and mismanagement in Kabul, the capital, less than half of the money actually finds its way into projects, and only a quarter of that makes it to the countryside, where 70 percent of the people live. Newsweek, With Ron Moreau and Sami Yousafzai
Today as a result of thee failed policies, 80% of Afghanistan is in the hands of wealthy drug-lords who have money and arms. Pakistan is seething with anger at the loss of civilian casualties in FATA and Swat. The writing on the wall for US policy makers is clear. How do they deal with it? They can continue the flawed policy of covert sabotage, and overt war or they can build a new Central Asia.
According to Bruce Reidel Mullah Omar promised safe passage to the Americans and was interested in joining the government if the foreign troops would leave.Kabul: The Final Spring Offensive? End of NATO?
The 20th anniversary of the defeat of the USSR in Afghanistan is a poignant reminder to occupation armies that the Hindu Kush mountains are the "graveyard of empires". The Khyber for 5000 years has witnessed the hordes of invaders come down to the Indus--but the Khyber Pass is a one way street. No invader has been able to go up the Khyber and occupy Pakhtun lands. The Mongols, Alexander, the British, the Russians all discovered it the hard way.NATO war: UK 1880 defeats in Afghanistan.The rising fire of Anti-Americanism has engulfed the land from the Indus to the Amu Darya.
OTTAWA, Feb 17 (Reuters) - The situation in Afghanistan seems to be getting worse and a solution will require more than just military force, U.S. President Barack Obama said on Tuesday. "There are a lot of concerns about a conflict that has lasted quite a long time now and actually appears to be deteriorating at this point," he told CBC television in an interview ahead of his visit to Canada on Thursday. Obama voiced appreciation for Canada's military engagement in Afghanistan and gave no hint that he would ask Prime Minister Stephen Harper to extend the combat mission there beyond the mid-2011 date agreed by Parliament. "Very soon we will be releasing some initial plans in terms of how we are going to approach the military side of the equation in Afghanistan," he said. "But I'm absolutely convinced that you cannot solve the problem of Afghanistan, the Taliban, the spread of extremism in that region, solely through military means," he added. "We're going to have use diplomacy, we're going to have to use development, and my hope is that in conversations that I have with Prime Minister Harper that he and I end up seeing the importance of a comprehensive strategy." (Reporting by Randall Palmer; Editing by Frank McGurty). Reuters. Obama sees Afghan situation deteriorating. Tue Feb 17, 2009 1:53pm EST
Several tectonic shifts have happened in the land of the Pamirs in the past few weeks. The reverberations from these earthquakes will be felt all the way to Washington and beyond. Facing the Khyber poltergeist & Ganges hobgoblin. The election campaign in Afghanistan has already started. Installing an Anti-Pakistan government in Kabul. Unable to venture beyond the confinement of his own capital, the mercurial Mr. Karzai was seen campaigning in Moscow and Delhi. The last days of the last “emperor”. The “Mayor of Kabul” is being replaced. Mr. Hobrooke rebuffed Mr. Karzai by not meeting him for three days. The snub was very evident by the itinerary of the American envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan ("K" for Kashmir is silent in his portfolio). Mr. Holbrooke like President-Elect Biden (a few weeks ago) mentioned the inefficiency of the government in front of the frustrated host. The Grand Bargains for Kabul
While neighboring Iran is predominantly Shiite, and has traditionally backed the Sunni Taliban's foes in the Northern Alliance, Tehran may also be the source of some of the more sophisticated IEDs turning up on the battlefield in Afghanistan. Certainly Iran has some interest in seeing the American forces on its border bleed a little. At times, though, the United States can seem like its own worst enemy in Afghanistan. Lacking enough troops, forced to cover vast areas, U.S. forces depend far too heavily on strikes by A-10s, F-15s, even B-1 bombers. In 2004, the U.S. Air Force flew 86 strike sorties against targets in Afghanistan. By 2007, the number was up to 2,926—and that doesn't count rocket or cannon fire from helicopters
The American people have had enough of these "perpetual mimetic wars". They want to throw the Orwellian "1984" into the dustbin of history. How do Hillary Clinton, Bruce Reidel and Joseph Biden use Big brother's "War is peace and Peace is War" philosophy to camouflage the campaign rhetoric? The challenge for the architects of the "new" Afghan policy is to place all blame on Karzai's incompetence, NATA recalcitrance, and Pakistan duplicity:-- then cloak failure as success, hide the inevitable defeat, declare victory now and withdraw from Kabul while they can-- with some sense of respectability. Here is the rhetoric that we can expect. Newsweek, With Ron Moreau and Sami Yousafzai
The Grand Bargain? Pakistan key to Afghan Great Game. The secular Pakistani Awami National Party (ANP) which has been missing in action for months, finally stood up to be counted and has arranged a peace deal between the Swati militants and the Pakistani Army. Much to the chagrin of the West, there is celebration in Swat and people across the spectrum wants the fighting to stop.
ISLAMABAD, Feb. 17 (Xinhua) -- Britain said Tuesday that it had concerns over an agreement for the introduction of Islamic courts in parts of Pakistan's northwest."We need to be confident that they will end violence, not create space for further violence," said British High Commission spokesperson Jennifer Wilkes in a statement. "They need to be clear, robust and monitored long-term, and include enforceable measures on cross-border movement to tackle cross-border militancy," he said.
Wilkes said that Britain also recognized the Pakistani government's efforts to restore peace and security to Swat. "Swat's problems require a comprehensive approach, bringing together security measures, development and governance. Any solution should also reflect the will of the people of Swat," he said.Pakistan's provincial government in the northwest and leader of a pro-Taliban banned Islamic group signed a deal Monday, abolishing un-Islamic laws and setting up Islamic courts in Malak and Division in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP). The courts will also be set up in the Swat valley where Pakistani Taliban have been fighting against the security forces over the past two years.
Meanwhile Sufi Muhammad, chief of the banned Tehrik Shariat-e-Nifaza Muhammadi (TSNM), Tuesday led thousands of his followers to Swat to convince the local Taliban to lay down arms and accept the agreement on Islamic laws. Muhammad, father-in-law of Maulana Fazalullah, the chief of Swat Taliban, will meet Fazaullah Wednesday, according to local press reports. Britain expresses concerns on Pakistan's Islamic law agreement, www.chinaview.cn 2009-02-17 23:00:49
The "peace deal" will be sabotaged in due course by "the powers to be" who do not want to see stability in Pakistan. That is inevitable, however it buys the Pakistani government some time to sort our the players and put together a long term strategy on coping with the problems in the restive Malakand Division. Pakistanis see a difference between the insurgents fighting the Americans in Afghanistan and the insurgents within Pakistan. There is no stomach in Pakistan to bomb and kill their own fellow citizens. Much to the chagrin of the West, Pakistan has signed a peace deal with the Swat militants.Obama's advisor predicts focus on talks and reconciliation
Islamabad: Maulana Sufi Mohammad, leader of the Tahreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Mohammadi (TNSM) and spiritual leader of Swat Taliban, has reached Swat valley to persuade his son-in-law and militant leader Maulana Fazlullah to accept the recently signed peace deal with the government.
Sufi Mohammad was warmly welcomed in Swat as he reached there from Timar Garah on Tuesday along with a convoy of supporters which consisted of hundreds of vehicles. Banners and posters by locals on roads and in bazaars welcomed Sufi's convoy and his peace initiative.
Sufi Mohammad will persuade Fazlullah not to challenge the government's writ, lay down arms and restore peace to the restive Swat valley where Taliban fighters have pitched themselves against the military troops for the last several months resulting in dozens of civilian casualities and a loss of billions of rupees to property and business. Leader arrives in Swat valley with message of peace. By Fasihur Rehman Khan, Correspondent Published: February 17, 2009, 23:56
Tough lessons in geography. The US has been thrown out of Kyrgyzstan. Russia promised to pay double the rent of the base and also gave Kyrgyzstan double its national budget--cool cash worth $2 Billion. This creates a huge problem for America. Her supply lines are already been choked at the Kyber and harassed along the way. Russia is asking for its pound of flesh for allowing the supplies through Russian territory. Moscow is asking for an end to NATO expansion which may be a hard bargain for NATO and the US to accept. Kyrgyzstan in a well calculated move throws out the US bases. Anti-Occupation forces choke US Afghan war
Feb. 3 (Bloomberg) -- Kyrgyzstan will close an air base used by the U.S. as a staging point for operations in Afghanistan, potentially undermining President Barack Obama’s planned troop increase aimed at defeating the Taliban. For three years, the Kyrgyz government tried to renegotiate the amount paid by the U.S. to use the base, “but we encountered no understanding from the U.S. side,” Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev told reporters in Moscow today. The decision was made “in the last few days,” he said.
The U.S. Defense department said the base issue is still being discussed with Kyrgyzstan. Before Bakiyev’s announcement, President Dmitry Medvedev said Russia will lend Kyrgyzstan $2 billion and provide another $150 million in economic aid. The two countries reached an agreement on settling Kyrgyzstan’s debt to Russia, part of which will be written off and the rest repaid with assets. Obama plans to boost U.S. forces in Afghanistan under a strategy similar to the troop “surge” ordered by former President George W. Bush in Iraq. There are currently about 36,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Other NATO members have contributed another 32,000 troops to the Afghan mission, according to the alliance.
Base at Manas
The base at Manas Airport near the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek was established in 2001 and serves U.S. and allied troops in Afghanistan. It gained additional strategic importance when Uzbekistan closed a similar base on its territory in 2005. U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates’s spokesman, Geoff Morrell, said today he believed the terms for continued use of Manas were still under negotiation.
“I’ve seen President Bakiyev’s comments, but we have received no formal notification from him or any other Kyrgyz official to close the base,” Morrell said in an interview. “We’ve been in discussions with Kyrgyz authorities for some time now, and we anticipate continuing those discussions to the point where we are able to resolve them to our mutual satisfaction.” Earlier, in a Pentagon briefing, Morrell told reporters that Manas is “a hugely important air base for us” because it provides “a launching-off point to provide supplies to our forces in Afghanistan.” Later, in the interview, he said it wasn’t the only means.
‘Multiple Supply Lines’
“We have multiple supply lines into Afghanistan, both by air and ground,” Morrell said. “While we would much prefer to continue operations in Manas and will work to make sure that’s the case, there are a number of routes by which we can continue to supply our troops and sustain our operations.” The announcement about Manas came on the same day that insurgents attacked and damaged a bridge on the U.S.’s main land supply route into Afghanistan along that country’s border with Pakistan. Insurgents have stepped up attacks on the route in recent months. As a result, Morrell said, the U.S. has sought to open alternatives into Afghanistan from the north. Medvedev said Russia and Kyrgyzstan would combine forces to help provide stability in Central Asia. He also reiterated Russia’s willingness to cooperate with the U.S. to bring order to Afghanistan.
“Our countries will also help operations in the region that are being conducted against terrorism, and we’re prepared for coordinated actions with coalition countries,” he said. Medvedev visited Uzbekistan, which borders Afghanistan, last month on the heels of a tour through the region by Army General David Petraeus, commander of all U.S. forces in the Middle East and Central Asia. Petraeus said on Jan. 20 that the U.S. had secured “additional logistical routes into Afghanistan” through Central Asia as its main supply route through Pakistan becomes increasingly vulnerable to attack by the Taliban. Petraeus visited Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan, skipping Uzbekistan, which in 2005 told U.S. forces to leave a base used as a transit point for supplies, troops and aircraft coming in and out of Afghanistan. Kyrgyzstan to Close U.S. Air Base Used for Afghan War By Lyubov Pronina . To contact the reporter on this story: Lyubov Pronina in Moscow at lpronina@bloomberg.net
US commanders have been contemplating sending up to 30,000 more soldiers to bolster the 33,000 already here, but the new administration is expected to initially approve only a portion of that amount.White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Monday the president would decide soon.
The new unit — the 3rd Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division — moved into Logar and Wardak provinces last month, and the soldiers from Fort Drum, NY, are now stationed in combat outposts throughout the provinces.Several roadside bombs also have exploded next to the unit's MRAPs — mine-resistance patrol vehicles — but caused no casualties, he said.Dawn
The brilliant intellectual and one of the most quoted men on the planet, Noam Chomsky and former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf say that there will be no change in American policy in South and West Asia. The results on the ground certainly do not show any change, however the realities on the ground may force the administration to come out of the thinktank cocoons and not simply react to conditions on the ground. President Barack Obama had a small window of opportunity where he could have made a difference. His silence on Gaza and continuation of drone bombings in Pakistan is fast depleting his capital. All this spells disaster for Obama.
WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama has approved a modest increase in U.S. forces for the flagging war in Afghanistan, administration, defense and congressional officials said Tuesday. The Obama administration was announcing Tuesday that it will send one additional Army brigade and an unknown number of Marines to Afghanistan during the coming six months. Officials speaking on condition of anonymity said the total is about 17,000 troops. About 8,000 U.S. Marines are expected to go in first, followed by about 9,000 Army troops.The new units are a Marine Expeditionary Brigade from North Carolina and an Army Stryker brigade from Fort Lewis in Washington state. International Herald Tribune. Associated Press writers Jennifer Loven, Lolita C. Baldor, Pamela Hess, Anne Flaherty and Lara Jakes contributed to this report.
The lack of troops shows a huge supply and demand problem in the US army and NATO forces. There are no additional troops to spare. So while the thinktanks dictate a continuation of the failed policies, the conditions on the ground dictate a lack of will at implementing the policies. This is a classic setup for failure. The USSR had 250,000troops plus another 150,000 irregulars in Afghanistan. 400,000 troops and a 150,000 strong Afghan Army was unable to keep them from being routed. The NATO troops do not venture out of their comfort zones. It is only the US army that pursues the insurgents. 60,000 soldiers in Afghanistan will be unable to quell the insurgency and reverse the march to Kabul.
Russia has been pressuring Kyrgyzstan amid unease at the US's growing footprint in central Asia. US attempts to supply coalition troops fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan were in danger of suffering a major setback today after Kyrgyzstan signalled it was considering shutting down a key US military base. The central Asian republic is contemplating closing down the US military facility near its capital Bishkek. The Manas airbase - home to 1,000 US army personnel since 2001 - is a key staging post for coalition forces fighting in nearby Afghanistan. Both US and Nato commanders have expressed dismay at the possible closure. It comes at a time when Nato is desperately trying to expand its supply routes to Afghanistan via the northern countries of central Asia following a series of devastating attacks on truck convoys from Pakistan.
Russia has been pressuring Kyrgyzstan to evict the Americans, amid unease in Russia's military at the US's growing footprint in central Asia, an area Moscow regards as its backyard. The Kyrgyz president Kurmanbek Bakiyev was today in Moscow holding talks with Russia's president Dmitry Medvedev. Tonight, Kanat Tursunkulov, an official from Kyrgyzstan's foreign ministry, told the Guardian: "Our president has said the [US] base is very helpful for the stability of the region and Afghanistan." Asked whether that meant the president would now shut it down, he said, "There's no comment on this."
But Kommersant newspaper reported that Bakiyev is seeking a $450m (£312.5m) loan from Russia for his impoverished ex-Soviet republic, and the write-off of $180m in debts. In return, Russia "counts on a favourable decision on the destiny of the US Manas airbase on Kyrgyz territory", the newspaper reported - possibly even tomorrow. Today, however, analysts said that Russia would not want the issue to jeopardise its relationship with the Obama White House. Rather, Moscow wanted to use the Kyrgyzstan base as a bargaining chip in a much wider strategic dialogue - over the future of the US missile defence shield in Europe, for example, and Nato membership for Georgia and Ukraine.
"Russia is inviting the west for a dialogue. At the same time it is showing off some of its trump cards. The Manas base is one of them," Andrei Grozin, a central Asian analyst at the Institute for the Study of Post-Soviet States in Moscow, said. He added, "In effect Russia and China are saying, 'We can get rid of this base. That doesn't mean we want to do it now. We want to cooperate.' But in return Russia wants concessions [from Washington] on missile defence and no invitation from Nato to Georgia or Ukraine."
Yesterday Robert Simmons, the special envoy to Nato's secretary general, visited Kyrgyzstan and urged its government not to shut the base. He described it as a "vital link in our fight against international terrorism", adding, "The presence of the airbase is a large contribution to Nato operations." The US military chief in the region, General David Petraeus, visited Kyrgyzstan last month to explore new transport routes to Afghanistan. He also toured Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. Russia has offered to transport non-military supplies to Afghanistan. But Nato has yet to reach a comprehensive transit deal with Afghanistan's immediate central Asian neighbours.
Since the 2001 war in Afghanistan, central Asia has been at the centre of a strategic competition between the US and Russia. The rivalry is reminiscent of the 19th-century conflict between imperial Britain and tsarist Russia, played out in the velvet mountains of the Hindu Kush, and famously dubbed the Great Game. In a significant victory, the Bush administration persuaded Uzbekistan's authoritarian rulers to allow a US military base on its territory. In 2006, however, the Uzbek regime kicked the Americans out following a secret deal with Moscow. China is also a significant player in the region's complex geo-politics. President Barack Obama has already signalled a shift in foreign policy - with the war in Afghanistan and a new relationship with Iran the two priorities in the new post-Bush era. He plans to build up US troop numbers in Afghanistan, possibly doubling numbers to 60,000 this year. But the traditional supply route via Pakistan's tribal areas and the mountainous Khyber Pass has become increasingly vulnerable to Taliban attack.
Kyrgyzstan, meanwhile, is in deep economic trouble. The small country faces rising unemployment, a growing trade deficit, and is struggling to pay its gas and electricity bills. The normally disunited opposition has got its act together and now threatens President Bakiyev. Closure of US base in Kyrgyzstan could alter Afghanistan strategy. Luke Harding in Moscow , guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 3 February 2009 19.50 GMT
Pakistan & drones. The PPPP controls the Senate, the National Assembly, and has coalition governments in three provinces. The Prime Minister belongs to the PPP and President Zardari essentially has all the powers that General Musharraf used to have. It is amazing the the New York Times calls Mr. Zardari's government weak. "Shoot the drones": Shireen Mazari. Even if the Pakistan Peoples Party government is able to last the firestorm over the drone bombings, it will be under tremendous pressure to withdraw the base facilities that hosts the drones. Halting the suicide bombers needs a holistic strategy and an immediate stopping of drones. If it continues the current policy, it will be thrown out of office in 2012 or before. Pakistan’s legitimate interests?. The "government in waiting" is the irascible Nawaz Sharif whose popularity has soared over this issues. How long can the “wink wink nod nod” farce of Drones go on? Imran Khan has also taken advantage of the confusion and his popularity has increased, specially among the Pakhtuns. Nawaz Sharif aligned with Imran Khan and the Jamat e Islami would not bode well for American interests in Pakistan. Pakistan’s "Do More" list for the USA. The Amir e Jamat e Islami recently visited Beijing and both Imran Khan and Mr. Sharif have been very critical of American policy in the region. Imran Khan in a recent interview saw the US withdraw out of Afghanistan in years time. Sabotaging Obama: CIA provoking Pakistan into shooting the drones
Americans are appropriately skeptical about the chances of success in Afghanistan. A recent NEWSWEEK Poll shows that while 71 percent of the people believe that Obama can turn around the cratering economy, only 48 percent think he can make progress in Afghanistan. Deploying a U.S. force of 60,000 will cost about $70 billion a year. Training and supporting the 130,000 to 200,000 troops required for a proper Afghan Army would take another decade and could cost at least $20 billion. Petraeus has consistently warned that Afghanistan will be "the longest campaign in the long war" against Islamic extremism. But it's far from clear that Americans have the appetite for such a commitment: after the economy, their top priority is health care (36 percent). Only 10 percent put Afghanistan at the top of their list, even fewer than nominate Iraq. If there is no real improvement on the ground, by the 2010 midterm elections, candidates for office may be decrying "Obama's war." Newsweek. With Ron Moreau and Sami Yousafzai
The idea of becoming subservient to India is abhorrent. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. USA has not met with any appreciable success to divide the Taliban by winning over the moderate elements and making them share power. Efforts will be renewed to win over Mullah Omar who has hinted at sharing power provided a firm time-table of foreign troop withdrawal is announced. Two-year timeframe will be offered as in case of Iraq, which will subsequently be dishonoured. Negotiations for power sharing will be undertaken only when the US-Nato military tilts the balance in its favour to be able to bargain from a position of strength. This implies more bloodshed, not realising that more the provocations by US troops, fiercer will be the response from the militant forces. Its oppressive acts will accelerate rather than de-accelerate violence thereby making foreign troops based in Afghanistan that much vulnerable to attacks. Military power can win a war but cannot defeat terrorism, which grows like wild weeds. Terrorism is a product of injustice; without eradicating root causes which breed terrorism, the disease cannot be cured by applying force. Obama and his team must take into account the consensus that has emerged among the western analysts that dialogue based on sincerity of purpose and genuine efforts to remove root causes is the key to settle Afghan imbroglio. The Statesman. US converting defeat into victory in Afghanistan. The writer is a retired Brig and a defence and political analyst based in Rawalpindi. ah.raja@yahoo.com . Asif Haroon Raja: Pakistan first: The devastating effects of appeasing India and kowtowing to the USA
So why not just get out? As always, it's not so simple. If the Americans pull their troops out, the already shaky Afghan Army could collapse. (Once they lost U.S. air support, South Vietnamese troops sometimes refused to take the field and fight.) Afghanistan could well plunge into civil war, just as it did after the Soviets left in 1989. Already, the Pashtuns in the south regard the American-backed Tajiks who dominate Karzai's administration as the enemy. The winning side would likely be the one backed by Pakistan, which may end up being the Taliban—just as it was in the last civil war.
Some argue this wouldn't be such a bad outcome, if the Taliban could be bribed or persuaded to not let Al Qaeda set up terrorist training bases on Afghan territory. According to one senior Taliban leader, a former deputy minister in Mullah Mohammed Omar's government who would only speak anonymously, some Pakistani officials are urging the insurgents to do something like this now—in return for talks with the Americans. On the other hand, Islamabad could be playing with fire. Given the longstanding ties between the Pakistani and Afghan Taliban, a jihadist state on its border is a threat to Pakistan, too. And here, U.S. national-security interests definitely do come into play. Newsweek. With Ron Moreau and Sami Yousafzai
Public opinion in Pakistan wants to halt all supply routes through Pakistan to Afghanistan. The Shylocks of the Kremlin are exacting their pound of flesh for allowing the US supply chain through the arduous roads of the Central Asian Republics as well as Russian territory.
the Obama administration might have to consider alternative routes through Russia or other parts of the former Soviet Union. But the Russians were unhappy about the Bush administration’s willingness to include Ukraine and Georgia in NATO, and they will probably not want to help with American supply lines unless Mr. Obama changes that position.
In addition to our guaranteeing that NATO will not expand further, the Russians seem to want the United States to promise that NATO forces will not be based in the Baltic countries, and that the United States will not try to dominate Central Asia. In other words, Russia wants the United States to pledge that it will respect the Russian sphere of influence in the former Soviet Union. They will probably want this guarantee to be very public, as a signal to the region — and the Europeans — of Russian dominance. This is one guarantee that Mr. Obama will not want to give.
There is also no certainty that countries in the Russian sphere of influence, like Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, would agree to let the United States use these routes without Russian permission. The New York Times. Afghan Supplies, Russian Demands. By GEORGE FRIEDMAN, Published: February 3, 2009
The Russians also have the Europeans by the proverbial "Cahunas".
Here is where Mr. Obama could use some European help. Unfortunately, that’s not likely to come soon. Many Europeans, particularly Germans, rely on Russia’s natural gas. In January, the Russians cut natural gas shipments to Ukraine. As much of the Russian natural gas that goes to Europe runs through Ukraine, the cutoff affected European supplies — in the middle of winter. Europeans can’t really afford to irritate the Russians, and it’s hard to imagine that the Germans will confront them over supply routes to Afghanistan. Pakistan, unfortunately, is hardly a reliable partner either.
So this isn't as simple as finding another road to Kabul. There is really one that works. The other ones runs thorough an antagonistic Iran and an increasingly belligerent Pakistan. To make matters worse, the closure of the American base in Manas Kyrgistan is a major blow to the Supply Chain to Kabul.
Manas is home to a “24-hour operation” supporting the Afghanistan war, said Vikram Singh, a South Asia expert at the Center for a New American Security who served in the Pentagon during the Bush administration, hosting fuel tankers, cargo and attack aircraft and medical evacuation resources, among other materiel. “This is not a small operation,” he said, adding that the loss of Manas could lead to a reduction in the tempo of military operations. “There’s no way to quantify it, but if you’re a commander on the ground, you’ve got to think that there are several things that aren’t available to you.”
Anthony Bowyer, director of the Central Asia program at the International Foundation for Electoral Systems, a nongovernmental organization focusing on strengthening democratic governance, called the possible loss of the base a “diplomatic victory” for the Russians. “There was tremendous political pressure on President Bakiyev by the Russian Federation” to kick the United States out of Manas, as the Russians are wary of long-term U.S. intentions to host large numbers of NATO troops near its southern border. U.S. Could Lose Major Hub for War Efforts By Spencer Ackerman 2/3/09 5:59 PM. The U.S. might lose access to a crucial hub for supporting the war in Afghanistan.
So how can Mr. Obama reconcile the two goals of strengthening the American presence in Afghanistan while curbing Russian expansionism? The answer is to rely less on troops, and more on covert operations like the C.I.A. Covert operators are far more useful for the actual war that we are fighting (and they can carry their supplies on their backs). The primary American interest in Afghanistan, after all, is preventing terrorist groups from using it as a base for training and planning major attacks. Increasing the number of conventional troops will not help with this mission.
What we need in Afghanistan is intelligence, and special operations forces and air power that can take advantage of that intelligence. Fighting terrorists requires identifying and destroying small, dispersed targets. We would need far fewer forces for such a mission than the number that are now deployed. They would make us much less dependent on supply deliveries, which would help solve our Russian problem.
Stratfor analysts who got us in this pickle in the first place are now recommending a return to covert operations in Afghanistan.
Winding down the conventional war while increasing the covert one will demand a cultural change in Washington. The Obama administration seems to prefer the conventional route of putting more troops on the ground. That would be a feasible strategy if supply lines to Afghanistan were secure. The loss of that bridge yesterday demonstrates very clearly that they are not. George Friedman is the chief executive of Stratfor, a global intelligence company, and the author of “The Next 100 Years.” Alex Nabaum. Afghan Supplies, Russian Demands, By GEORGE FRIEDMAN Published: February 3, 2009, Washington
Rummaging through the policy papers, the think tanks and the public statements and the actual situation on the ground one finds that there is absolutely no coherence to President Barack Obama's policy on Afghanistan. It is as chaotic as his nomination process for cabinet positions where Tax cheaters got through the sieve of the so called screening system. He is hamstrung by the failed policies of his predecessor and is confused on what to do to change it. The President is getting advice from the same people that led us into this quagmire.
What he could have done was to put all major decision on drone bombing and ground incursions into a holding pattern and called a conference on Afghanistan and its neighbors. He is wasting valuable time looking at reports that are public knowledge. Mr. Obama's policy on Afghanistan cannot move beyond his line during the presidential debate. "I will go after valuable targets inside Pakistan, if Pakistan does not or cannot go after them".
The voter’s proverbial Damocles sword hangs on the head of the new President. How long will America tolerate another war president? With the memories of 911 fading, most question why American soldiers are dyeing in distant lands. A repetition of history is at hand. A spectacular incident (911 and Gulf of Tonkin) led to two decades of war in Vietnam and Afghanistan.
A flurry of post-inauguration activity -- presidential meetings with top diplomatic and military officials, the appointment of a high-level Afghanistan-Pakistan envoy and the start of a White House-led strategic review -- was designed to show forward motion and resolve, senior administration officials said.
But newly installed officials describe a situation on the ground that is far more precarious than they had anticipated, along with U.S. government departments that are poorly organized to implement the strategic outline that Obama presented last week to his National Security Council and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
With a 60-day deadline, tied to an April 3 NATO summit, Obama has called for a more regional outlook and a more narrowly focused Afghanistan policy that sets priorities among counterinsurgency and development goals. "The president . . . wants to hear from the uniformed leadership and civilian advisers as to what the situation is and their thoughts as to the way forward," a senior administration official said. "But he has also given pretty direct guidance."
The problem confronting the administration is how to fill in Obama's broad strokes while fighting a war that, by all accounts, is going badly. "It could take quite a long time to look at all the various aspects of this," the senior official said. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates predicted last week that the war will be "a long slog" with an uncertain outcome. Richard C. Holbrooke, the new Afghanistan-Pakistan envoy, who left yesterday for his first visit to the region, expects to spend weeks gathering information before he has much advice to give.
Meanwhile, the senior official acknowledged, "the world moves, obviously."Obama Seeks Narrower Focus in Afghan War. By Karen DeYoung, Washington Post Staff Writer, Wednesday, February 4, 2009; A12. Washington Post
The Washington Post has written a very interesting article on South Asia. Though it too suffers from some of the fallacies that are inherent to many US commentators, on the whole it does a good job in identifying the issues and describing the change. Apparently Joseph Biden, Bruce Riedel, Wendy Chamberlin and the other members of the Obama team have been doing their homework. Amazingly the new Barack Obama plan contains many of the elements suggested by Rupee News over the past few years on our pages.
Without a draft, the American can bear the losses to a certain extent, but for how long. The attacks on Afghanistan were as useless as the attack on Iraq. John Wayne’s cowboy Gun Ho aggression filed in Southeast Asia and will fail in South and West Asia. What could have been achieved by a SWAT team of 5000 marines was handed over to 120,000 soldiers who have made a mess of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The two new U.S. brigades are set to arrive in Afghanistan in late April, with another planned to depart in August. But even with what is expected to be more than 30,000 additional U.S. troops this year -- bringing the U.S.-NATO total in Afghanistan to nearly 90,000 -- the international force will be insufficient to secure much of the country.
With the spring combat season near, the Taliban has rapidly increased its sophistication and reach. Neither the money nor the manpower is currently available to train and maintain an Afghan National Army that is expected to begin taking over security missions. Afghan elections are scheduled for summer, but U.S. officials see few viable alternatives to the ineffectual president, Hamid Karzai. Efforts to stem cultivation of opium poppies and the narcotics trade that lines Taliban and government pockets have made little discernible progress.
Nearly $60 billion ($32 billion of it from the United States) has already been spent on reconstruction programs in Afghanistan -- more than during five years of failed reconstruction in Iraq -- but such efforts remain "fragmented" and "lack coherence," according to U.S. government auditors. "I fear there are major weaknesses in strategy," retired Marine Corps Maj. Gen. Arnold Fields, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, said in a report released Friday.Obama Seeks Narrower Focus in Afghan War. By Karen DeYoung, Washington Post Staff Writer, Wednesday, February 4, 2009; A12. Washington Post
As the Supply lines become more and more precarious, NATO is feeling the pinch of the disruptions. After blowing up a crucial bridge on the Khyber Pass, the insurgents also blew up 10 additional trucks after looting them of supplies. There are many lessons to learn from Vietnam and from Afghanistan itself. Kabul bravado exponentially related to Karzai defeats. The ISAF forces face a bad dilemma. NATO Lessons: 1880 Maiwand-Afghans defeats UK: Trained sabateurs may defect! Drones sabotaging peace deals created blowback for Pakistan! The Tet offensive of the Vietcong was a massive attack on American and South Vietnamese men and material. It was daring and brave. It was well coordinated and took advantage of the vulnerabilities of the South and it took advantage of the American weaknesses in Viernam. The Tet offensive was also a massive failure.
Across the border in Pakistan, meanwhile, U.S. military officials are anxiously eyeing a map on which extremist gains are rapidly spreading eastward, toward major population centers, as the Taliban and al-Qaeda solidify their hold on the western frontier and form alliances with domestic terrorists. Islamabad's relations with neighboring India, a fellow nuclear power, remain tense after November's terrorist attacks in Mumbai.
Officials described Obama's overall approach to what the administration calls "Af-Pak" as a refusal to be rushed, using words such as "rigor" and "restraint." "We know we're going to get [criticism] for taking our time," said a senior official, one of several in the administration and the military who would discuss the issue only on the condition of anonymity.
While acknowledging the difficulties that the Bush administration faced, Obama officials dismiss the first seven years of Afghanistan war policy, when that conflict took a back seat to the war in Iraq, as reactive, ad hoc and without what one called "a very keen sense of what the goal was."
Obama has ordered up a plan for diplomatic outreach to Iran and others in the region. Afghanistan and Pakistan are to be treated as a single theater of war and diplomacy, even as stability becomes a higher priority than democracy in Afghanistan and as the U.S. relationship with Pakistan is expanded and deepened.
Dryfuss’ commentary in the liberal “The Nation” and many others like it have the following main themes. Change is in the air.
The Tet offensive however was the begriming of the end of the war in South East Asia. It was during the Tet offensive that the American public and the American soldier got tired of the war and it was during the Tet offensive that the American public decided to get out of the war.The security situation in Afghanistan has reached crisis proportions
Afghanistan Lost? Barnett Rubin & Maleeha Lodhi et al answer at Harvard. It is crystal clear that the US is pursuing a strategically flawed policy and therefore all peace efforts come unstuck at the end of the day. Most of the analysts have consensus on one point: the peace in Pakistan is indispensable for peace in Afghanistan. The support from Pakistan can be secured only when the latter feels secure. In the presence of air strikes on Pakistan’s tribal areas and the increasing clout of India along border of Pakistan, we have legitimate grounds to feel threatened and thus the US risks the alienation of Pakistan’s support. Moreover, the presence of foreign troops on Afghan soil reinforces the impression of puppet government about the Karzai administration and it proves grist to the Taliban. New US strategy in Afghanistan Nauman Asghar
The administration will also seek a new compact with hesitant European and other partners in the war effort, promising new leadership and focus and expecting more resources and commitment. And Obama wants to get beyond the lip service long paid to balance and coordination between the U.S. diplomatic and military services.
Senior administration officials described their approach to Pakistan -- as a major U.S. partner under serious threat of internal collapse -- as fundamentally different from the Bush administration's focus on the country as a Taliban and al-Qaeda "platform" for attacks in Afghanistan and beyond. But the officials acknowledged that a comprehensive Pakistan policy will take time and money. The administration will seek early congressional action on a "rebalanced" assistance program -- introduced in the Senate last summer by then-Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. and co-sponsored by then-Sen. Obama -- that will triple economic aid and condition military assistance with benchmarks for progress in combating extremists.
The president will get little pushback on his broad goals from the military or civilian leaders. A newly completed review by the Joint Chiefs of Staff echoes his call for a broader approach to the region and better-defined objectives in Afghanistan. "We need a comprehensive strategy, not just the military side," Adm. Michael Mullen, the Joint Chiefs chairman, said in an interview Monday. "What has to be different is how we approach the future."
Gen. David H. Petraeus, the U.S. Central Command chief whose military responsibilities stretch from the Mediterranean to Pakistan, is compiling strategic recommendations based on reports from his own team of dozens of military and civilian experts. Although less immediately concerned about the fine points of a comprehensive new strategy than the need to move quickly to secure Afghan population centers, Petraeus has already visited central Asian states bordering Afghanistan and supports more extensive diplomatic outreach. He has ordered the Afghanistan-Pakistan portion of his Centcom review to be completed by next week, when it, too, will be given to the White House.
As the annual Spring offensive comes to fruition, the Obama Administration does not have a clue on what to do in West Asia. General Patraeus playing Secretary of state visited various Central Asian capitals to sign deals with them on the supply lines--to see all of this blown up in his face. Kyrgyzistan has thrown out the American air base in **** and defected to Russia at a ransom price of $2 Billion.
The Taliban’s ability to establish a presence throughout the country is now proven beyond doubt; exclusive research undertaken by Senlis Afghanistan indicates that 54 per cent of Afghanistan’s landmass hosts a permanent Taliban presence, primarily in southern Afghanistan, and is subject to frequent hostile activity by the insurgency.The Taliban are the de facto governing authority in significant portions of territory in the south and east, and are starting to control parts of the local economy and key infrastructure such as roads and energy supply. The insurgency also exercises a significant amount of psychological control, gaining more and more political legitimacy in the minds of the Afghan people who have a long history of shifting alliances and regime change. Putting blame on Pakistan won’t help war on terror
Obama Seeks Narrower Focus in Afghan War. Situation Is Much Worse Than New Administration Realized and Will Take Time to Address. As President Obama prepares to formally authorize the April deployment of two additional combat brigades to Afghanistan, perhaps as early as this week, no issue other than the U.S. economy appears as bleak to his administration as the seven-year Afghan war and the regional challenges that surround it.
Holbrooke, who reports directly to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, was said to be appalled not only at the walls that still separate military and civilian efforts but also at compartmentalization within the department itself, where separate task forces deal with Afghanistan and Pakistan. Provincial Reconstruction Teams that are on the front lines of U.S. assistance in Afghanistan are run and still largely staffed by the military.
Obama's deadline for a new overall strategy, set at a Jan. 23 meeting of the National Security Council, coincides with the NATO summit at which he will "come face to face" with allies "looking at him for his perspective on where he's taking the U.S. effort," a senior official said.
National security adviser James L. Jones is in charge of the effort, aided by Lt. Gen. Douglas E. Lute. Lute has been retained in the post of White House coordinator for Afghanistan and Iraq that he occupied in the Bush administration, to ensure that "we were not going to drop any balls," an official said.
"The policies will change -- that's the purpose of the reviews," he said, "but the mechanisms had to be in place" for ongoing operations. "This wasn't coming into office in 1993, when the world was a much calmer place. We've got two active wars and 200,000 people serving overseas. . . . It's very hard in a transition from the outside to know what is moving."
To keep the balls in play, the official said, "it makes sense to think about tranches of decisions that have to be reached" sooner rather than later on the road toward a comprehensive new strategy.
From Islamabad to Guatemala the world is holding its breath, anxiously awaiting the implementation of “change”.
India is not blameless here. It was pursuing a two-pronged strategy - making the argument that all was well in Kashmir (a blatant lie) and supporting ethnic confrontation in Pakistan. Violent intelligence wars between Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) have become a brutal reality in South Asia. Guatemala Times. South Asia at War. WEDNESDAY, 07 JANUARY 2009 09:39 HASSAN ABBAS
General Patraeus, possibly a presidential candidate in 2012 has had some limited success in Iraq. This success gives him tremendous leverage to deal with Afghanistan and Pakistan. He has been heavily influenced with the facts on the ground as well as the writings of Rashid Ahmed which forcefully calls for a Non-Military and regional solution to the quagmire in Afghanistan.
The administration has already given a green light to continuing CIA-operated attacks by unmanned Predator aircraft against "high-value" al-Qaeda and Taliban targets in western Pakistan. The Pakistani government has agreed to the strikes, despite overwhelming public disapproval. But after the first Obama-authorized Predator attack last week, Pakistani officials said, Islamabad complained in a private diplomatic note that U.S. intelligence was bad and that civilians were the primary casualties.
Officials would not comment on whether Obama has reissued a covert action "finding," signed by President George W. Bush last summer, that authorized ground raids into Pakistan by military Special Operations units working with the CIA. There has been no known ground operation since September, however, and the advisability of such raids is a point of disagreement between Petraeus -- who considers any tactical gain on the ground to be not worth the strategic risk of a massive popular backlash in Pakistan -- and the U.S. Special Operations Command.
Meanwhile, the approach of the warm weather "fighting season" in Afghanistan imposes its own decision deadlines. "I worry a great deal about how much time we have," Mullen said. Additional U.S. and NATO efforts this spring may be able to hold the line against new Taliban advancement, but "if you're just staying flat," he said, "the situation is getting worse."Obama Seeks Narrower Focus in Afghan War. By Karen DeYoung, Washington Post Staff Writer, Wednesday, February 4, 2009; A12. Washington Post
Why Terrorist Hindus in Mumbai targeted Israel centre too? is the intriguing question that is being raised around the world and the answer is not too difficult to find either.
The covert as well as covert ties between India and Israel on the one hand and India and USA on the other have been going on for decades without the world noticing that. The world thought the nations are divided over ideology rather seriously and there cannot be any relationship between former and current adversaries. Even USA and Russia had trade and technological ties for decades in a limited sense. Similarly India has had hidden ties with both USA and Israel and only recently the ties came out so openly to shock the world.
I
Mumbai terrorists on Nov26 did the job meticulously well by provoking every possible ally in the world. By killing foreigners mainly from the West, Indians have enlisted the support of all western terror nations against Islam and Muslims; As a result, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Kashmir and Muslims in India could be target of the entire world, USA, UK, Israel etc being in the lead. Pakistan, as before became panicky thinking that some of the Muslims they are fighting against under Indo-US supervisions would have struck in Mumbai, but they knew these Muslims could not have done that with high precision and that only Indian Hindus have the capacity to do it this way in India.
The Mumbai attackers may have seemed to target whatever came in their way, be it the railway station (the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminal), or luxurious hotels (the Taj and the Oberoi Trident) or any community center (Nariman House), but now reports have revealed that the assault on Nariman House, a Jewish centre was primarily because of India's growing ties with Israel because the terrorists wanted involve Israel also to join Indo-US strategic killing of Muslims in its neighbourhoods.
look at the Indian strategy to woo the Jews to support Indian case every where: According to retired Indian Vice Admiral Das, the aim of the attack on the Jewish centre was to tell India that its growing links with the Israel is not acceptable to the terrorist groups. "Nariman House attack was to tell the Indians clearly that your growing linkage with Israel is not what you should be doing. I think the rest is peripheral". India wants to use terrorism ploy to get military concessions from other
anti-Islamic nations.
II
India for quite some time has been long for relationships with both USA and Israel and it has to some extent succeeded in its efforts, even while without disturbing its economic relations with Islamic world, mainly the Gulf States.
Apart from acquiring military wares from the USA and Europe and Russia, in recent times, India has become one of the largest customers of Israeli military techniques and arms, which are considered one of the most advanced and lethal in the world. India acquires weapons of about 1.5 billion dollars every year from Israel. Only Russia sells more arms to India than Israel. India believes terrorism ploy could help advance its military interests in USA and Israel and obviously it cannot go wrong.
When Israel unleashed holocaust in Palestine India did not even consider necessary to talk about it, let alone condemning this ghastly affair of fascist Israel, because India is also a fascist nation and unleash terror regularly in Jammu Kashmir under its custody. One does not if Indian leaders congratulated the Israeli fascists for their “good work” done in Palestine.
III
India as a policy never finds fault with Hindus, even when there is 100% evidence for their terror attacks in India, but it is keen to paint Muslims in dirty colours, Muslims in India, Kashmir, Pakistan and Bangladesh. That is basis of Indian secular democratic principles.
India seeks advance military equipment and technology at confessional rates by using Russia as bargain chip, but now Mumbai Nov26 has given an extra advantage to New Delhi to obtain more privileges from Tel Aviv. Israel showcased its latest terror methods in Palestine by using cluster bombs killing thousands of innocent Palestinians, including hundreds of children and they have to be tried in special tribunals. But more agreements might be signed in the days to come between Jewish state and Hindustan with blessings form US Christian “democracy” killing Muslims in Arab world and Afghanistan. . . .
India feels it could not take as much mileage as it sought from Nov26 but then it helped gain extra hands from Israel. The ruthlessness of the attack at the Jewish centre indicated how important the location was to the assailants who wanted to enlist the support of a close Indian military ally Israel for Indian terror cause. Israel immediately killed thousands of innocent Palestinians in Gaza. India created a lot of smoke from the Taj building so as to make the vent appear as big as WTO in USA and to compare it with Sept1, but failed to impress the ultimate UNSC authorities for a seat.
Probably, all these anti-Islamic nations, USA, India and Israel view Muslims as useable and throwable items, Arabs as an illusionary cheatable nation and even say that the Arab world is full of fools. Astonishingly, when Palestine was being under terror attacks form fascist Israel, the Islamic world was only watching the shows over TV and news-pictures and enjoying the major news items.
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Yours Sincerely,
DR.ABDUL RUFF Colachal
Columnist & Independent Researcher in World Affairs
Strumenti 
Force is all-conquering, but its victories are short-lived. ~Abraham Lincoln In 1821 
2009-02-17 23:00:49
