Estimates versus Forecasts
Re: Demographics
Demographers clearly distinguish between estimates of population and forecasts of population. This was a serious problem in US undertstanding of Iraqi practices.
A simplistic estimate, or projection, takes two prior data points and carries the line forward.
A forecast takes the projection and adjusts it to account for important factors such as major population relocations, conflict displacement, increased birth, life expectancy or death rates.
Iraq's official figures routinely consisted of projections for each province based on changes shown between the 1988 and 1998 Census, carried forward to 2008. They did, in fact, include some forecast components for a few major displacement areas.
The US never quite got the drift, but, since the 1950's, Iraq had a well-established system of provincial census reporters, all UN and British trained, and highly capable. Most continued to count everything (sheep, citrus groves, tractors, cars, trucks (by type), and people) throughout occupation. They just didn't report it to us. These ministries know far more than they ever shared with us. Why was that?
Steve
Re: War Time data. Pop goes the weasel...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Steve the Planner
In Jan, I heard from lots of top US folks that it was all done, but from folks on the ground in Afghanistan that it is not. One of them was one of the guys in the US that changed his position once he got there. Who you gonna believe?
Neither of the above -- the truth is most likely somewhere in between; to wit: A few folks are probably trying to pull it together but it's very difficult to do due to the environment. Plus, people vary in their ideas on the worth of metrics...
On Kagan and data -- or anyone else and 'data' out of Afghanistan (or Iraq -- or Kentucky, for that matter), I'm not a data wonk and am pretty well convinced that most metrics are meaningless in warfare. Thus any data from a ploicy wonk here in CONUS is sorta suspect to me -- all those pundits have agendas; they can't make policy but they like to think they can affect it.
So data IMO is sort of inconsequential in warfare. It is not in planning, building or reconstruction or even providing aid (though that last is subject to environmental caveats), just in warfare.
I tend to take all demographic data with a grain of salt; I do not believe you can finitely track numbers, categories and 'needs' of people with the degree of accuracy many like to believe. People are too devious, unpredictable and varied to allow true accuracy -- you can get a ball park for most things and that's adequate.
You get in a backward area like parts of rural Kentucky where I'm from and those mountain dwellers won't tell you much, will deceive you if they think it's in their interest, will inflate or deflate figures to improve their situation and more. Much more; they'll lie to you and hassle you just to say they did. There are guys -- and gals -- there that'll cut your throat for a hundred bucks. And they're sort of on your side. Afghans aren't on your side, you're a Kaffir and to be lied to with no penalty, ripped off or killed without a blink (no money involved) and they've been playing both ends against the middle for 3,000 years. No way you're going to get accurate data.
So I do understand your requirements and complaint but I doubt you'll get much accuracy in numbers for a good many reasons. YMMV -- that should be okay with both of us. Is with me.
Chargin' Charlie Beckwith...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
slapout9
...older SF teams had Civil Affairs and PsyOps as part of their organization...then something happened:eek:
happened. Him / that and 'added missions' for budget justification. CA and PsyOps weren't glamorous enough to attract money in the lean 90s...
The Situation in Kandahar
Kandahar has never had much of a coalition force presence and until recently was ignored by ISAF. There is a Canadian PRT camp in the northeastern part of the city, with a mech infantry company as its force protection element, and there is also a SOF compound on the northwest edge of the city, but that is it for coalition forces. The ANP and NDS have had the lead on security and until recently there wasn't even an ANA presence inside the city apart from some headquarters and support units.
Kandahar Air Field (Pogadishu II), the headquarters for RC-South, Task Force Kandahar, and various other units that make up the nearly 20,000 (and rising) bodies behind the wire is actually located twelve miles south of Kandahar City. For those at KAF who travel outside the wire via ground movement Kandahar City has been usually seen as merely a place to transit on the way to somewhere else (typically Helmand or Uruzgan) except by the PRT and SOF personnel who actually live in the city. The city has been a black hole for ISAF as far as understanding what is going on there and there has been little appreciation for Kandahar's significance for the Taliban and for the Pashtun people.
Per the Washington Post and other media articles, people are now paying attention to Kandahar City. The deployment of additional U.S. troops to the RC-Soth AOR played a large part in bringing the city up on the radar screen, and, I suspect, the change of leadership in ISAF headquarters in Kabul also played a part. The issue of security in Kandahar City is now being addressed and I believe that we will see some significant changes.
I read with interest the Kagans' briefing on required reinforcements but I would take the demographic figures with a grain of salt. I don't think that anyone has a good idea of the population of Kandahar City - I've heard estimates ranging from half a million up to one and a half million. I think that figures for districts are not much more than guesses and complicated by the displacement of population that can be temporary, permanent, seasonal, and/or periodic. If I had to guess, I would say that a majority of the population in the south still live in villages. I also got the sense that the culture remains largely rural and is extremely insular - on the latter point, much more so than Helmand Province, for example.
The conventional wisdom is that the Taliban are attempting to take over the districts surrounding Kandahar City with the goal of attacking and occupying the city itself. Leaving the aside the fact that the Taliban are already present in the city - for example, the area of the city north of the Canal is reportedly a Taliban stronghold - I am not convinced that this is the Taliban goal. Rather, I suspect that the Taliban are aiming to demoralize and shatter resistance through the staging of spectacular attacks. This would presumably lead to the melting away of government authority to include the defection of ANSF units to the Taliban side. The June 2008 attack on Sarpoza prison was likely a preview and a real eyeopener for me because the reaction of Kandaharis to this attack demonstrated that support for the Afghan Government was extremely shallow.