AFGHANISTAN: NATO'S GRAVEYARD

"... Most embarrassingly for NATO, a recent surge of alliance troops seems only to have made the Taliban stronger. Nearly eight years of alternating destruction (air bombardment, over 100,000 troops on the ground) and reconstruction ($38 billion in economic assistance appropriated by the U.S. Congress since 2001) have all come up desperately short. A new counterinsurgency campaign doesn't look any more promising. What was once billed as the most powerful military alliance in history has been thwarted by an irregular set of militias and guerrilla groups without the backing of a major power in one of the poorest countries on Earth..."
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175120/john_feffer_will_nato_s_60th_anniversary_be_its_last_

AFGHAN WAR DECISIONS TINGED WITH FEAR OF BLAME FOR DEFEAT

"... President Barack Obama will preside over a series of meetings in the coming weeks that will determine whether the United States will proceed with an escalation of the Afghanistan War or adjust the strategy to reduce the U.S. military commitment there... the decisions that emerge from the coming meetings are more likely to be shaped primarily by the concerns of the military and of the White House about being blamed for a defeat in Afghanistan..."
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=48621

BIN LADEN HAS THE U.S. WHERE HE WANTS IT TO BE

"Osama Bin Laden told me, 'I can’t fight the Americans on the American mainland. It is too far. But if I succeed in bringing the Americans where I can find them, where I can fight them on my own terms, on my turf, this will be the greatest success'."

"... So President Bush fulfilled this wish for Osama bin Laden.... that’s the latest achievement of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, to make the Americans part of the Middle East, instead of far away..."

--Abdel Bari Atwan, editor in chief of Al-Quds Al Arabi, a London-based daily newspaper, remembering his interview with Osama Bin Laden in Tora Bora, Afghanistan in 1996.
http://www.stateofnature.org/abdelBariAtwan.html

MCCHRYSTAL REPORT: IT WILL TAKE 500,000 TROOPS AND FIVE YEARS TO DO JOB

"... Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC's Morning Joe... (said) "embedded in this report by McChrystal, is they would need 500,000 troops - boots on the ground - and five years to do the job". Mitchell got the figure from an independent source. It was not revealed in the redacted version of the once classified report released by the Pentagon earlier this week..."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-andrews/classified-mcchrystal-rep_b_298528.html

CANADIAN PROGRESS IN KANDAHAR

"... Canada's army will be leaving Afghanistan in 2011, but so far only five of the 50 schools in its school-building project have been completed. Just 28 more are "under construction". But of Kandahar province's existing 364 schools, 180 have been forced to close..."
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/robert-fiskrsquos-world-everyone-seems-to-be-agreeing-with-bin-laden-these-days-1790058.html

U.S. GENERAL: NO MAJOR AL-QAIDA PRESENCE IN AFGHANISTAN

"Gen. Stanley McChrystal... top commander of U.S. and international forces in Afghanistan said... he sees no signs of a major al-Qaida presence in the country but says the terror group still maintains close links to insurgents... "
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gOXo7WvE7S3U5zC88Rc6DGBSr9bwD9AL5UVG0

UNRELIABLE AFGHAN ALLIES

"... Four U.S. Marines were killed... assigned as trainers to the Afghan National Army... and the Marine commander's Afghan interpreter also died in the ambush and the subsequent battle... U.S. officers said they suspected that the insurgents had been tipped off by sympathizers in the local Afghan security forces or by the village elders... "Whatever we do always leaks,. You can't trust even some of their soldiers or officers."
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/staff/jonathan_landay/story/75036.html

TALIBAN FIGHT BETTER THAN OUR AFGHAN ARMY

"... "their" Afghans are the fierce fighters of history books and legend and "ours", despite billions of dollars and massive training efforts, are not. This puzzling situation had its parallel in Vietnam decades ago when American military advisors regularly claimed they would give up a division of U.S.-trained South Vietnamese forces for a single battalion of "VC."
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175111

ALCOHOL BANNED AT U.S. HEADQUARTERS AFTER DEADLY AIR STRIKE
( Rest of bases not affected)

"After a Nato airstrike killed as many as 125 people last week, General Stanley McChrystal... tried to contact his underlings to find out what had happened, however, he found, to his fury, that many of them were either drunk or too hungover to respond... The Isaf headquarters is only half a mile square but it has at least seven bars that serve tax-free beer and wine... (now) General McChrystal, head of International Forces in Afghanistan (Isaf), banned alcohol at his headquarters... the civilian staff, who are free to leave the base, were not concerned. “It’s only on HQ that they’ve banned it. All the other bases that served it, still do..."
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/Afghanistan/article6825321.ece

U.S. TROOPS STORM SWEDISH HOSPITAL

"... the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan said the U.S. Army's 10th Mountain Division forced their way into the charity's hospital without permission to look for insurgents in Wardak province, southwest of Kabul... a clear violation of internationally recognized rules and principles... it also went against an agreement between NATO forces and charities working in the area.... The U.S. troops came to the hospital looking for Taliban insurgents late at night... kicked in doors, tied up four hospital guards and two people visiting hospitalized relatives, and forced patients out of beds during their search... also barged into women's wards... strange men entering rooms where women are in beds is a serious insult to the local Pashtun culture and word of it could turn the community against international troops..."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/07/us-troops-stormed-through_0_n_278627.html

TALIBAN ANTI-TANK MINES FROM U.S.

"... evidence from the US Defense Department, Canadian forces in Afghanistan and the Taliban themselves (indicates) that the increased damage to NATO tanks by Taliban forces has come from anti-tank mines provided by the United States to the jihadi movement against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s...

"according to the Pentagon agency responsible for combating roadside bombs in Iraq and Afghanistan ( JIEDDO or Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization, a unit of the US Department of Defense), the increased Taliban threat to US and NATO vehicles comes not from any new technology from Iran but from Italian-made TC-6 mines left over from the US Central Intelligence Agency's military assistance to the anti-Soviet jihadists in the 1980s.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/KI05Ak02.html

NATO AIRSTRIKE KILLS 40 CIVILIANS

"... An Afghan police officer said the 90 dead included about 40 civilians who were siphoning fuel from trucks.... Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said insurgents hijacked the trucks... the vehicles became stuck in the mud and the insurgents opened valves to release fuel and lighten the loads. He said about 500 villagers swarmed the trucks to collect the fuel despite warnings that they might be hit with an airstrike. Mujahid said no Taliban died in the attack...

"Kunduz Gov. Mohammad Omar, who also gave the 90 deaths figure, said a local Taliban commander and four Chechen fighters were among those killed...

"NATO command said a "large number of insurgents" were killed or injured... after determining that there were no civilians in the area..."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/04/AR2009090400543_2.html?hpid=topnews&sid=ST2009090400002