General Myers: We Need To Use All Elements Of National Power

May 22, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan, Afpak, Military, National Security | 3 Comments 

The Former Chairman of The Joint Chiefs of Staff Air Force General Richard B. Myers was at the Nixon Library Wednesday to discuss his new book Eyes On The Horizon: Serving On The Front Lines Of National Security. He also gave us some time for an exclusive interview that TNN readers will find interesting; among other items, the General discusses the “global insurgency” waged against America and its allies, the strategies we need to apply to fight it, and the ethical questions surrounding them, including a take on the current controversy over interrogation and detainment policy:

Zal As Master Of Karzai

May 20, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan, Afpak | Leave a Comment 

M K Bhadrakumar from the Asia Times reports that the Obama administration wants to put former Bush administration official (former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq, and the United Nations) and Afghanistan native Zalmay Khalizad in Kabul’s power structure to bypass Hamid Karzai’s incompetency and get the ball rolling in the ‘graveyard’:

So, the “smart” thing, which is the hallmark of the Obama administration, is to let Karzai be in his presidential robe, to pamper his vanity while neatly sidestepping him, ignore him gradually and eventually transact all real business of state through Zal. Cooper reports, “A plan that puts Khalilzad near the top of a Karzai government would provide the Obama administration with a strong condSuit to push American interests in Afghanistan.”

Obama, Clinton and Holbrooke – they must be holding breath and waiting and watching “whether Karzai remains willing to bring Khalilzad aboard”. The problem is not only that Zal had a bumpy relationship with Karzai when he served in Kabul as the American viceroy. Times have changed.

The old Karzai is no more the current Karzai. Zal cannot ride roughshod over him and expect him to take it in his stride, as he used to. Today, Karzai truly believes he is the leader of the Afghan people. Therefore, Zal must undergo a veritable metamorphosis himself and evolve into an altogether new butterfly. Karzai would like to be certain that Zal doesn’t begin to dictate once he is ensconced in power in Kabul.

Obama, on his part, cannot hold out any assurance to Karzai in this regard, either. It has to be left to Karzai and Zal to work out between then, which they are reportedly doing at the moment in Kabul. Nor can Karzai depend on the Afghan constitution to ensure that Zal will scrupulously function under his supervision.

For, the real catch is that Zal will be an extra-constitutional authority, not accountable to the Afghan constitution or parliament or people or, arguably, even to Karzai himself. Karzai would apprehend that ultimately, Zal is Zal and from the time he hit the ground, he would be sprinting and it would be impossible to match his stamina for outpacing his peer group.

To be sure, Zal will report only to Washington. All the same, Clinton, too, needs to be watchful. To quote Cooper, “While he was working for the Bush administration, Khalilzad often brushed up against other officials, including secretary of state Condoleezza Rice.” Now, that’s formidable dexterity – to bypass Condi and deal directly with Bush.

The “Pope” Is Right For Afpak

May 15, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan, Military | Leave a Comment 

Andew Exum — who’s goes by the psuedonym Abu Muquwama –reveals from an emailer what kind of man the “Pope,” no not that one, but New Afghan Commander General Stanley McCrystal (who is assigned that particular nom de guerre) really is:

I served as a staff officer under McChrystal in the late 90’s before leaving for 1st SFOD-D. My Ranger peers and I had a unique opportunity to see the good and the bad in the 1976 West Point graduate. I think if McChrystal were wounded on the battlefield, he would bleed red, black, and white – the official colors of the 75th Ranger Regiment. He is 110% US Army Ranger, rising to become the 10th Regimental Commander in the late 90’s, and still sports the physique to prove it. Even with a bum back and likely deteriorating knees after a career of road marching and jumping out of planes he doesn’t recognize the human pause button. Maybe by now this is a good thing as the junior officers of today might be able to keep pace with the General.

As the Ranger Regimental commander, McChrystal was considered a Tier II subordinate commander under the Joint Special Operations functioning command structure. The highest level, Tier I, was reserved exclusively for Delta Force and Seal Team 6. This always seemed to bother McChrystal. His nature isn’t to be second fiddle to anyone, nor for his Rangers to be considered second class citizens to the Tier 1 Special Mission Units.

Terms like “kit”, often used by Delta and Seal Team 6 operators to collectively describe the gear, weapons, and equipment an assaulter carries was banned from the Ranger lexicon. The term “assaulter” or “operator” was also verboten speak within the Regiment. The men wearing the red, black, and white scroll were Rangers, not assaulters and not operators. They also didn’t carry kit. They carried standard military issue equipment.

McChrystal also deplored the idea that the Regiment served as an unofficial farm team for Delta Force, or even the US Army Special Forces Green Berets. In his eyes, the Rangers were just as skilled in their primary mission of Airfield Seizures and Raids as Delta was in land based Hostage Rescue or the SEALs were in assaulting a ship underway. All things being equal, McChrystal was right. The Rangers were, and still are, just as skilled in their Mission Essential Tasks as are the Tier I units in theirs. He believed that losing quality officers and non-commissioned officers to what many considered the true tip of the spear outfits – those granted the most funding, most authority, and given the premiere targets – hurt the Regiment.

When The Americans Come, They Just Watch

May 13, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

C.J. Chivers at The New York Times has this interesting narrative on the political and geographical terrain our troops face in Afghanistan.

What Triangular Diplomacy Means

May 13, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

The meaning of triangular diplomacy. WAPO’s David Ignatius has got it:

Petraeus’s plan in Afghanistan is to hit the enemy very hard this year with the additional 21,000 troops President Obama has approved — and then see if the Taliban coalition begins to crack. Much greater violence is ahead initially, as the United States attacks Taliban sanctuaries in the south. But if the strategy succeeds, the “chameleon insurgents,” as Petraeus calls them, will begin to peel away.

As Petraeus envisages reconciliation with the Taliban, it will happen village by village, across Afghanistan’s nearly 400 districts, rather than in a big sit-down with the group’s leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar.

Remember Shinsecki?

May 12, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan, Military | Leave a Comment 

In light of General David McKiernan’s forced resignation from the Army (contrast with General Bob Casey’s promotion as Army Chief of Staff),  Slate’s Fred Kaplan implied yesterday that unlike President Bush, President Obama and Robert Gates — despite his initial appointment as Bush SoD — can’t be accused of extreme loyalties, noting what he believed is the new administration’s take charge strategy when it comes to holding military brass accountable. Max Boot thinks its odd since Donald Rumsfeld was himself incessantly accused of arrogance and creating rifts with senior officers:

Don Rumsfeld fired no senior officers? That seems at odds with his reputation as someone who was a tough, demanding boss not afraid to alienate senior officers. But it’s more or less true, unless you count the failure to reappoint the decision to announce early the replacement for Gen. Eric Shinseki as Army chief of staff as a “firing.” That’s how it was perceived and thereby Rumsfeld widened the rift between himself and the army. It is very much to Gates’s credit that he can actually fire more senior leaders without creating a poisonous climate in the Pentagon.

It’s All About The Population

May 5, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

While President Obama plans to send 17,000 additional troops to Afghanistan over the summer, and an additional 13, 000 by the end of the year,  thousands fleeing from the Swat Valley and the revelation that a bombing run aimed at the Taliban accidentally killed 30 civilians provides appropriate testament that this war requires primarily a ground game. Today’s AP report shows the propaganda fall out of not taking a population-centric approach:

One Afghan official said angry and mournful villagers transported an estimated 30 bodies to a provincial capital to show officials. Other officials estimated the civilian toll to be between 70 and 100.

Civilian deaths have caused increasing friction between the Afghan government and the U.S., and President Hamid Karzai has long pleaded with U.S. officials to reduce the number of civilian casualties in their operations. Mr. Karzai was meeting with President Barack Obama in Washington on Wednesday.

Taliban fighters massed in Farah province in western Afghanistan on Monday, and fighting broke out soon after, said Belqis Roshan, a member of Farah’s provincial council.

Villagers told Afghan officials that they put children, women, and elderly men in several housing compounds away from the fighting to keep them safe. But the villagers said fighter aircraft later targeted those compounds in the village of Gerani, killing a majority of those inside, Roshan and other officials said.

Incidentally, a company of soldiers in the Jalrez Valley — west of Kabul — have taken the proper steps in adopting this approach, pacifying the region from militant violence.

Leadership Petraeus Style

April 24, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | 2 Comments 

The CS Monitor has this report from Gen. David Petraeus’ — a Princeton PHD — visit to Harvard.

Gates Is Right To End The Raptor Program

April 21, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan, Iraq War, National Security | Leave a Comment 

Two weeks ago I was in Torrance, California home to a division of Honeywell International, a multinational supplier of engineering and defense related products. One of their main partners, Lockheed Martin, sent representatives to talk with employees in a rally for the F-22 Raptor, the most sophisticated fighter in the U.S. Air Force and currently on the chopping block for the 2010 Pentagon budget. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has been aiming for a year now to roll back future combat systems (FCS) in order to fight “today’s wars,” marking the first time COIN (Counter-Insurgency) experts “will have a seat at the table” proportional to 10 percent of total spending.  Hence, only 4 more of the $350 million dollar jets will be earmarked for fiscal 2010 with the program completely phased out by 2011.

I don’t believe for a moment that Secretary Gates discounts the capabilities of the F-22. the Raptor is nothing short of a marvel in modern aviation. Sitting in the virtual demo at Honeywell, it was plain to see that U.S. Air Force pilots – in the Raptor — possess unparalleled maneuverability and a field of vision that extends beyond the cockpit window.  In the fifth generation fighter pilots can effectively manage the airfield in a single battlefield display, allowing them to communicate information and grasp the position of wingmen, while absorbing the intent of enemies on the air and ground. It can be armed with internal weapons systems for air to air and air to ground roles, including: two 1,000 pound-class Joint Direct Attack Munitions for “smart” precision guided bombs, six medium range AIM-120C missiles, and two short-range AIM-9 missiles, the close-range M61A2 20mm rotary cannon and a globally positioned GBU-39 Small Diameter Bomb for ground threats.  While frustrating and defeating enemies, the Raptor avoids detection with its reduced sound, heat, turbulence, and radar signatures.

Despite its unsurpassed capacity, air dominance, and the currently volatile global context, Secretary Gates is right when he says the Raptor has got to go. For the United States, “today’s wars” are primarily irregular, and therefore the military needs to meet its objectives with lower cost weapons systems and a population-centric approach.

Critics of the newly proposed Pentagon budget overlook that at $534 billion it is 4 percent more than the $513.3 billion earmarked for 2009. Critics also overlook the fact that the United States still dominates global defense spending. David Kilcullen from The Center For A New American Security (CNAS) notes that total U.S. defense spending comprised 54.5 percent of all nations in 2007 (70 percent including Iraq War funding). It stands to reason that, as in Afghanistan and Iraq, any rational enemy won’t engage American forces with conventional weapons, nonetheless dogfight against a F-22 in open air. It’s no wonder why the F-22 has proven useless in both countries.

What has been proven useful is the agility and the manpower which corresponds with combating the lawlessness of the unconventional battlefield. A reality that many conservative hawks haven’t come to terms with (and one that many liberals won’t stomach). John Nagl, President of CNAS and author of Learning To Eat Soup With Knife: Counter-Insurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam, notes that it’s the industrial will and capacity of the American Army that developed its proclivity towards total annihilation of enemy fighters. Lesser Armies lacking the alternative of overwhelming the enemy such as the British force that successfully fought in Malaya in the mid-20th Century was forced into a more population-centric approach when the “kinetic” approach proved futile. Nagl notes that in 1956 – just as the Vietcong insurgency was beginning in the South of the country – the United States Army devoted none of its study to combating insurgencies or gaining knowledge of irregular warfare. The successful British – in contrast – spent just 51 (albeit well used) out of 1042 hours for the study of combating insurgency. Accordingly, the U.S. Army’s initial strategy – counter-productive and hampered by heavy losses — was based disproportionately on indiscriminate use of firepower: heavy artillery, close air support, and B-52 strikes that ultimately didn’t provide the capacity for overwhelming a very fluid and rational enemy.

It was under General Creighton Abrams (who eventually replaced General William Westmoreland as commander in Vietnam) that Vietnam Strategy began to change.  Commissioned in 1965 to lead The Program for the Pacification and Long Term Development of South Vietnam (POVN), Abrams concluded that the continuation of “search and destroy” operations would not meet the coalitions’ objectives instead favoring a localized low intensity – secure, hold, and rebuild — approach that could win the population to the government’s side.

According to Vietnam War historian Lewis Sorley, the population-centric strategy proved fruitful. American units maintained a persistent presence with the Vietnamese Army and local authorities to secure populations and provide developmental aid at the village level.  By 1968, the Vietcong insurgency was defeated, the numbers of American troops killed in action declined precipitously, and by 1973 the South was ready to defend itself if not for Congress’s decision to cut off operational funding.

Granted, a key element of the Nixon’s Vietnamization strategy was tactical air support for the Southern army against northern invasion. But even if air support were critical to “best efforts” in Afghanistan, Iraq, potentially Iran and more “conventional” enemies (China, and Russia are too prone to asymmetrical behavior), the United States armed forces already demonstrates air dominance with its current fleet. Secretary Gates also plans to increase the amount of F-35s, the capable Joint-Strike Fighter by purchasing 513 over a 5-year plan.

The Vietnam narrative is applicable for obvious reasons. The population-centric strategy led by General Petraeus in Iraq reflected “lessons learned.” Similar to Vietnamization, tribal leaders in 2007 were emboldened to re-take their country when supported by improved U.S. counter-insurgency measures. Especially Baghdad and the once blood-soaked al-Anbar province experienced a precipitous decline in civilian deaths. There has also been a steep drop in U.S. military deaths since 2008.

Afghanistan remains to be seen. But regional developments such as the 2006 Kunar Province road project have shown enormous promise in providing economic progress, unity with Kabul, and security from Taliban and al-Qaeda forces.  Ultimately, $500 million in additional funding to assist foreign militaries for similar stability measures and a 5 percent increase for special operations are a foregone conclusion when compared to what yields from the most sophisticated – in this case futile – aircraft.

Holbrooke’s Way

April 20, 2009 by Joshua Treviño | Filed Under Afghanistan, International Affairs, Obama administration | Leave a Comment 

Last week’s NYT Week in Review sported an article by Dexter Filkins on the putative reassertion of civilian influence in American foreign policy. It’s a bad bit of work, not least because it uses “civilian” where it means “State Department,” and because it’s a transparent puff piece for President Obama’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke. Filkins is no neophyte to reportage on war and peace in present-day American policy — his book “The Forever War” is well regarded — and so he ought to know better. But then, Holbrooke is vastly more experienced at manipulating his public image than Dexter Filkins ever could be at his own chosen profession.

Filkins’s essay begins with a classic Holbrooke vignette: the canny, craggy, competent Ambassador establishing a constructive rapport with an ex-Taliban imam. “It’s difficult to imagine such a conversation” under the George W. Bush team, gushes Filkins. But it’s not, really: not merely because the reported exchange is actually quite banal, but because George W. Bush himself went to Iraq’s Anbar province and met with sheikhs of the former Sunni insurgency. If you watched what actually happened during the previous Administration, though there was much to criticize, the absence of civilian control and a failure to reach out to former enemies were not among them. If you believe what Richard Holbrooke peddles, on the other hand, and not your lying eyes, what he brings to the foreign-policy scene now is something radical and new. The difference between these two is the difference between writing for the New York Times and not.

The truth is that Holbrooke is well known as a preening egotist in DC circles. This is no rarity within those circles. What sets Holbrooke apart is a remarkable ability to feed his ego via media, and actual substantive accomplishments to his credit. You may guess this easily enough when a careful interviewer asks Secretary of State Hillary Clinton about the task of managing a man who “can break a little crockery in the process of doing some very noble things.” And such noble things: chief among them the conclusion of the 1995 Dayton Accords that brought a temporary peace to Bosnia-Hercegovina. Whatever the sort of man Holbrooke is, this is the sort of thing that does him credit in history.

The problem with Richard Holbrooke is that he is quite ready to remind you of the things that do him credit in history — and he is utterly convinced that more credit will be due him if, and only if, he is allowed to speak. I saw the ugly side of this conviction firsthand in late 2003, when I helped advance and then administer HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson’s 100-person delegation to Africa. Holbrooke participated in his capacity as the president of the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria, which we took as his prestigious-office-in-waiting till he became a Democratic President’s Secretary of State in January 2005.

When the delegation hit Rwanda, the security detail received information on a terrorist threat in Kenya, which was to be its next stop. After much discussion, the Secretary gathered the hundred or so persons together in a Kigali hotel ballroom to announce that we’d be skipping Kenya. I was in favor of simply presenting it as a fait accompli — preferably by announcing the new destination of Uganda while in the air — and my preference was justified when one of the business leaders present took the opportunity to announce that he was not afraid of Osama bin Laden. He would fly on his own private jet to Kenya! Predictably, several other persons present seized the moment to declare their own fearlessness, and to attempt to bum a ride off the brave corporate honcho.

Richard Holbrooke asked for an opportunity to address the group, and the Secretary — who had no real choice — agreed. The Ambassador was in fine form. He regaled all present with a harrowing tale involving an overturned armored vehicle, a Serbian minefield, and Ambassador Richard Holbrooke. Suffice it to say that the first was saved in some manner by the third from the second. Holbrooke then called the American chief of security on the carpet before everyone, and demanded details of the terror threat. These details were, quite sensibly, classified, and so the security chief merely affirmed what the Secretary had already said — that the threat was credible, and a change of plans was strongly urged. Here, Holbrooke lost his marbles, and berated the security chief in a thoroughly shameful fashion for his refusal to divulge classified information to a non-governmental civilian in public view. Holbrooke questioned the validity of the information (which he knew nothing about); Holbrooke questioned the professional judgment of the security detail (which he also knew nothing about); and Holbrooke affirmed his own willingness to go in harm’s way (which he knew a great deal about, and was willing to share thereof). The chief, a man whom I knew back in DC as having long experience with blustering civilians, took it with equanimity.

When Richard Holbrooke was done, some few persons rallied to him, and they bravely went to Kenya together — where nothing whatsoever happened to them — and the vast majority spent a few unplanned days unwinding as a lackluster hotel near Entebbe.

Filkins’s hagiographic essay concludes with a strange and revealing anecdote: the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff tells a group of Afghan clerics that he’s “come to the region nine or ten times,” at which Holbrooke quips, “And each time, things have gotten worse.” Filkins writes, “Admiral Mullen, Mr. Holbroooke, and all the clerics laughed,” and it is a ridiculous thing to write, especially as he offers the incident as an example of “the new cooperation between the uniforms and the suits.” This is no more an example of Richard Holbrooke’s new “civilianized” way forward than the earlier vignette was an example of his new touch with former enemies. Instead, it’s just another example of a very old story with the Ambassador: the willingness to ridicule and deride someone unable to fight back, for the benefit of Richard Holbrooke — and journalistic credulity in reporting it Holbrooke’s way.

Neighborhood Watch

April 16, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

Some more interesting innovation in Afpak strategy:

The Afghan government and U.S. military have kicked off an ambitious project to build local opposition to the Taliban, reminiscent of a successful American effort to win over Sunnis in Iraq’s once-turbulent Anbar province. For the elders of the village of Zayawalat, a safe haven for insurgents conducting attacks into Kabul, it’s time to make the call on whether to join. So far, they have balked.

Some villages here in Wardak Province have signed up for the effort, but Zayawalat’s hesitancy indicates the potential hurdles. The U.S. seeks to train and arm locals to form neighborhood-watch forces, about 50 per village, dubbed Guardians. It’s one of a series of moves designed to complement the Obama administration’s troop increase for Afghanistan. While smaller in scale than the Sunni project in Iraq, it’s an indicator of whether the Taliban’s resurgence can be blunted.

“We’re offering these guys an opportunity to be legitimate players in the system,” says Lt. Col. Kimo Gallahue, commander of the 2nd Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, part of a 1,400-strong coalition force that moved into Wardak in February.

Last month, the first class of 243 volunteers came home from training with new olive-drab uniforms, Czech-made assault rifles and white Ford pickup trucks, and began patrolling mosques, schools, bridges and other key sites, for pay of $120 a month.

Each volunteer had to be endorsed by his mullah, village elder and two character witnesses, and was vetted by the Afghan spy service for insurgent sympathies.

Negotiate With Who?

April 15, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

The Pakistani military all but gave the Swat Valley to the Taliban in exchange for anassurance that they would lay down their guns… Fat chance:

Pakistani Taliban will not lay down their arms in a northwestern valley as part of a deal that included the introduction of sharia law but will take their “struggle” to new areas, a militant spokesman said on Wednesday.

President Asif Ali Zardari, under pressure from conservatives, signed a regulation on Monday imposing Islamic sharia law in the Swat valley to end Taliban violence.

The strategy of appeasement has alarmed U.S. officials, while critics say the government has demonstrated a lack of capacity and will to fight the Taliban and al Qaeda.

Details of the deal have not been made public but government officials backing the pact have said part of it was that militants would give up their arms.

But a Pakistani Taliban spokesman in the scenic valley, a one-time tourist destination 125 km (80 miles) northwest of Islamabad, said they would be keeping their guns.

“Sharia doesn’t permit us to lay down arms,” Muslim Khan said by telephone. “If a government, either in Pakistan or Afghanistan, continues anti-Muslim policies, it’s out of the question that Taliban lay down their arms.”

300 (Afghan Women)

April 15, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

Reminds me of the Spartan stand at Thermopylae, Dexter Filkins:

About 300 Afghan women, facing an angry throng three times larger than their own, walked the streets of the capital on Wednesday to demand that Parliament repeal a new law that introduces a range of Taliban-like restrictions on women, and permits, among other things, marital rape.

It was an extraordinary scene. Women are mostly illiterate in this impoverished country, and they do not, generally speaking, enjoy anything near the freedom accorded to men. But there they were, most of them young, many in jeans, defying a threatening crowd and calling out slogans heavy with meaning.

With the Afghan police keeping the mob at bay, the women walked two miles to Parliament, where they delivered a petition calling for the law’s repeal.

“Whenever a man wants sex, we cannot refuse,” said Fatima Husseini, 26, one of the marchers. “It means a woman is a kind of property, to be used by the man in any way that he wants.”

NYT Review: The Unforgiving Minute

April 8, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan, Book Review | Leave a Comment 

Though it is dated for February, Small Wars Journal had this New York Times books feature headlined today. The title is The Unforgiving Minute by Craig Mullaney, a Westpoint grad and Rhodes Scholar, who despite all his experiences, realized his ultimate rite of passage as an Army Captain in Afghanistan:

“The Unforgiving Minute” is former United States Army Capt. Craig M. Mullaney’s brisk, candid memoir about his education as a soldier. He learned different lessons in different places. As a cadet at West Point he learned to be dutiful, punctilious and unerringly accurate, even about the military method of folding underwear. At Ranger School he learned how to navigate difficult physical terrain and endure grueling tests of mettle. At Oxford, as a Rhodes scholar, he had a teacher who advised: “Read and think. Simultaneously if possible.” At home he thought he had learned how to make his father proud — until that father walked out and never came back.

As a reader he learned from writers as diverse as T. E. Lawrence, Rudyard Kipling (from whose poem “If” this book takes its title), Jane Austen and Thucydides. As a traveler he vacationed with buddies, partied heartily and learned that the world is very large. And as an American he was in New Zealand on Sept. 11, 2001, when someone asked if he had seen the news and said, “I’m so sorry.” At that point every lesson absorbed by this soldier in training suddenly took on different meaning.

“The Unforgiving Minute” is Captain Mullaney’s attempt to reconcile the precombat lessons that seemed so clear to him with the exigencies of battlefield experience. He makes it clear that this is no easy process. At one point Captain Mullaney, who led a platoon in Afghanistan and later became a teacher at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., explains how he told his students about the most difficult battlefield experience of his career. To do that, he writes, he had to give two different accounts of the fighting at Losano Ridge, which occurred in Afghanistan in 2003, very close to the Pakistan border.

First he gave his students the straightforward version. He described the basics, like “movement to contact, suppressive fire and medical evacuation.” But that version did not do justice to the “chaos, noise, fear, exhilaration.” So he retold the story from a different perspective. “This time I tried to put them under my helmet,” he writes about trying to convey the full experience of battle. He is honest enough to acknowledge that he cannot be sure that the decisions he made under fire — in that minute to which the book’s title refers — were right.

I Guess Taliban Moderates…

April 3, 2009 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

…just savagely beat children.

Moderate Taliban?

April 2, 2009 by David R. Stokes | Filed Under Afghanistan, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, History, Islam, Obama administration, Richard Nixon, Terrorism, War on Terror | 4 Comments 

He was gearing up for just another day of hard work in a mundane job – but at least it was a job. And it happened to be at one of the most prestigious and famous restaurants in the world. In fact, it was on top of the world. Never mind that he didn’t have regular access to the spectacular views from the establishment that occupied the 106th and 107th floors of the North Tower of the World Trade Center, he could catch a glimpse here and there on his breaks.

On September 11, 2001 the sky was clear and the view was especially breathtaking. But the beauty of that scene would give way to an explosion of horror in a brief and life-shattering moment. Manuel Emilio Mejia – kitchen worker at the Windows on the World restaurant – would become a victim of mind-boggling terror. His friends and family would grieve and the nation would remember.

Then time would go by and, though those closest to him in life would never fade in their passionate memory of him, the nation would move on – not just to life as usual, but even toward an eventual awkward shift as patriotic fervor and a national sense of resolve morphed into ominous forgetfulness. Some even started to want to “reach out” to those who were responsible for Mejia’s tragic death, as well as nearly 2,800 others who died that fateful, but now long-gone-not-likely-to-happen-again-because-better-people-are-in-charge, day.

New York City’s medical examiner has announced that they have positively identified – via DNA technology – the remains of 54-year old Manuel Emilio Mejia. His name will be in the news for a few days as this announcement cycles through the media. But it will quickly fade into a footnote, because – you see – we are moving on, we are reaching out, we are charting a new course, and we are making the age-old mistake of every generation – by willfully forgetting the past.

The Greatest Generation never forgot Pearl Harbor. That’s one of the things that made them great.

These days – as we witness the spectacle of world leaders gathering in London and talking mostly about the economy – the war on terror is over as a nomenclature as if changing terminology can change reality. But there is a gigantic elephant in that G-20 room. So many of the nations represented have a persistent and growing “Muslim” problem. And it seems as if the so-called “best and brightest” of the most “progressive” nations simply insist on ignoring it.

Can anyone imagine any leader in, say, late 2001 or early 2002 talking about rapprochement with the radical Muslim world with political impunity? Yet here we are not even eight years out from unspeakable horror – with so many evidences since of foiled plots and sinister plans – ready to engage the enemy in ways suggesting he’s not so bad, after all.

Is anyone really noticing that President Obama is much more comfortable talking about his bona fides with the Islamic world as someone who seems to instinctively understand – than he was as Candidate Obama? Sometimes it’s subtle – as when he referred to Iran, in a legitimizing manner, as “The Islamic Republic of Iran” on March 19th – a far cry from the “axis of evil” rhetoric of his oft-ridiculed predecessor. Words are always code; listen carefully.

Of course, the most significant shift in body language, not to mention policy, by the new administration is in the idea of reaching out to the moderate Taliban to make some kind of deal. Or as I am tempted to refer to it: Operation Jumbo Shrimp – An Exercise in Oxymoronic Geopolitics.

Moderate Taliban?

Would FDR have reached out to moderate Nazis? Is it possible for a fanatic to be a-little-bit-pregnant with poisonous ideology?

History tells us that fanatical regimes have a field day with naïve adversaries. Neville Chamberlain comes to mind. He thought he could do business with Adolf Hitler and in doing so he gave away much of the European store.

Lyndon Johnson often lamented that if only he could sit down one on one with Ho Chi Minh, they could actualize the president’s favorite Bible passage from Isaiah, “Come now let us reason together.” Never mind that he always took that scripture out of context.

Sure, Richard Nixon used diplomacy and détente in his day, but it is important to understand context and nuance. As Nixon put it in his book, Leaders: Profiles and Reminiscences of Men Who Have Shaped the Modern World:

There are two kinds of détente: hard-headed and soft-headed. Hard-headed détente is based on effective deterrence. This kind of détente encourages the Soviets to negotiate, because it makes the cost of Soviet aggression too high. Soft-headed détente, by contrast, discourages negotiation, because it makes the cost of Soviet expansion so low that the Soviets find the rewards of aggression too tempting.

Hard-headed détente, backed by the force to make deterrence credible, preserves peace. Soft-headed détente invites either war or surrender without war. We need détente, but it must be the right kind of détente.

The idea of dealing with so-called moderate Taliban reminds me of a story from the 1920s in the immediate aftermath of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia. In 1921, the Soviet Cheka (predecessor of the KGB and modern day FSB) created a fictitious movement known as The Trust (or Trest) and for more than half a decade this purported neo-monarchist organization wrought havoc on western intelligence operations.

The Cheka was a powerful weapon in the hands of Lenin and his gang as they imposed their will on the population and the military. Under the leadership of the infamous Felix Dzerzhinski, The Trust became a vital and effective counterintelligence operation. Using the name Monarchist Association of Central Russia, they targeted various “counterrevolutionary” elements inside Russia as well as in other countries, convincing them that their organization was a front for an effort to overthrow the Bolsheviks.

People tend to believe just what they want to believe so this initiative was highly successful. As they drew opponents of the regime into their web of deceit – boatloads of money and all – they had their enemies right in the line of fire.

Those pesky Commies sure didn’t play fair. They even lied. Can you imagine? Lying in the service of fanatical ideology? For some reason, the impressive sounding lies of fanatics seem to resonate with those who tend to underestimate the darker side of human nature. Later, under Stalin, the Soviets created a loose confederation of international groups under the banner of the Popular Front. This effort neutralized much opposition to emerging Soviet influence. It was all proven to be a fraud when the Soviets signed a non-aggression pact with the Nazis in August of 1939. Fanatics have a real problem with the truth and they don’t play fair.

Bummer, huh?

By now, many Americans are somewhat aware of the Islamic doctrine of Taqiyya – the idea that deceit is a legitimate weapon when dealing with infidels (read: “We the People”). Grasping the fact that our determined enemies will at times use monumental deceit to further their cause is vital right now. Yet, too many – especially those in key positions today – are willing to risk our future on better angels that simply don’t exist.

U. S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently offered Taliban fighters an “honorable form of reconciliation” and waxed philosophical about efforts to “separate the extremists of al Qaeda and the Taliban from those who have joined their ranks not out of conviction, but out of depression.” Apparently, their “depression” is now all better.

But what if – maybe, just maybe some of those who respond to the new Obama olive branch do so, say – deceptively (cue the scary music here)? It would be not only naïve to think this couldn’t happen; it would be downright dumb.

During the past 100 years we have lurched from one war to another, one ideological conflict to another, seldom really learning important lessons. The seeds of World War II were in the aftermath of its numerical predecessor. The Cold War grew out of mistakes and miscalculations from its forerunner. And the war we now fight – against a virulent ideology and determined enemy – though involving new weapons, still sees some of the old plays being run effectively by cynical adversaries.

It’s like we are Charlie Brown and our adversaries are Lucy holding the football just begging us to kick it – again.

Should We Still Kill Bin Laden?

March 23, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

Counter-terrorism expert David Kilcullen says no, the Afghanis should do it:

Let me give you two possible scenarios. Scenario one is, American commandos shoot their way into some valley in Pakistan and kill bin Laden. That doesn’t end the war on terror; it makes bin Laden a martyr. But here’s scenario two: Imagine that a tribal raiding party captures bin Laden, puts him on television and says, “You are a traitor to Islam and you have killed more Muslims than you have killed infidels, and we’re now going to deal with you.” They could either then try and execute the guy in accordance with their own laws or hand him over to the International Criminal Court. If that happened, that would be the end of the al-Qaeda myth.

Revisiting Afpak

March 23, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

Special envoy Richard Holbrooke on visiting the border region of Afpak:

Ahead of a key April 2 NATO meeting – and Barack Obama’s first presidential trip outside North America – US special envoy to Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke says that western Pakistan presents the chief problem in resolving an eight-year war that has divided allies and threatens the standing of an alliance ready to mark its 60th anniversary.

The Talibanization of west Pakistan, in the Swat region that borders Afghanistan, was the greatest surprise to envoy Mr. Holbrooke on his first fact-finding mission to the region last month. It was the top issue he relayed to Mr. Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and National Security Adviser Jim Jones, Holbrooke told the Monitor on the sidelines of the Brussels Forum, a security meeting here.

“A year ago, I visited Peshawar [near the Khyber Pass] and I was asked about starting an Asia Society office there,” Holbrooke said. “Last month, people were afraid to go outside after dark and walk their dogs. The change in the situation was stunning. Geopolitically Afghanistan hasn’t changed; Pakistan has.”

The Mental Process Of Beating Insurgents

March 16, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | 1 Comment 

The Afghan police’s failings in the city of Maywand illustrate the psychology of the battle:

In some parts of Afghanistan, police regularly patrol roads and interdict people planting bombs. But in Maywand, the police spend more time in the district capital. Although they have been through a new U.S.-led training program and have been assigned a team of civilian and military mentors, the police officers generally cannot be bothered to walk the beat. And they have little interest in solving crimes. When a man came to police headquarters recently to complain that his motorcycle had been stolen, the police refused to act without a bribe.

“Fine,” he said, according to soldiers who witnessed the encounter. “I’m going to the Taliban. At least they’ll take me seriously.”

Taliban Redux

March 12, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Afghanistan | Leave a Comment 

The karma of releasing GITMO detainees in full swing in Afghanistan:

The Taleban commander responsible for increasingly sophisticated bomb attacks on British soldiers in Afghanistan is a former detainee of Guantánamo Bay released from prison in Kabul last year by Hamid Karzai’s Government, The Times has learnt.

Abdullah Ghulam Rasoul was held in Guantánamo for six years before being released to Afghan authorities in December 2007, after a US military review board decided unanimously that he was no longer a threat.

British and Taleban officials have told The Times that Rasoul has since resurfaced as Mullah Abdullah Zakir, the Taleban’s new operations chief in Helmand and the architect of a new offensive against British troops.

Since he took over, the “asymmetric” threat from the Taleban has risen dramatically, with greater numbers of more sophisticated and powerful roadside bombs used against British troops. “He is a serious player,” one Whitehall official said.

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