OEF: a lingering Afghan small war for the West (catch all)

[davidbfpo]

An 'exclusive' from The Cipher Brief after a NYT report (which I have not read). It is added here as some unusual insight is given on the operation of CIA-led and financed Afghan para-military forces.

A paragraph "taster":

In my experience, this contrasts with parts of the Afghan police and military. Generally, they are not as well paid, trained, or led, as their Afghan partners in the intelligence units, and may turn to corruption, extortion, or collusion; often merely to survive. In a case mentioned in the article, a CIA-trained unit allegedly killed the senior law enforcement officer in Kandahar in an effort to free a colleague that had been detained on criminal charges. Another perspective on that story may be that the soldier had been kidnapped by the police for extortion. When the CIA-trained unit arrived to negotiate his release, one of the nervous and poorly-trained police officers fired accidentally. In the exchange that followed, several police were killed and the strike force left without a wounded man. To consider that the cause of the soldier’s arrest may have been corruption, and the deaths of the police may have been the result of extremely poor judgement and marksmanship, even after years of training and investment, is a far greater embarrassment for (nearly) all concerned than a tidy narrative of rogue Afghans trained by knuckle-dragging CIA contractors.

Link:https://www.thecipherbrief.com/exclu...in-afghanistan

[davidbfpo]

An article from mid-December 2018 which was circulated on Twitter today by CCW @ Oxford. I have seen a little of the information before, in places it is shocking. Here are a couple of "tasters":

in the 2010 legislative elections, 664 candidates ran for 33 lower house seats in Kabul Province. ... 21 of 33 candidates were elected with less than 1% of vote. Countrywide only 35% of Afghan voters voted for a winning candidate.
The Afghan government is not perceived as legitimate by the people, does a poor job of service delivery, and cannot close its borders and crack down on dissent and revolt through authoritarian repression. How, then, can it succeed?

Link:https://thestrategybridge.org/the-br...in-afghanistan

[davidbfpo]

Two small, recent threads have been merged in today. Both referred to President Trump's view on Afghanistan and a comment by ret'd General McCrystal. They had just under 1800 views.

[davidbfpo]

I don't check this website often, so the writing style here is different: is he serious? Readers will decide:

You know what they say: If at first you don't succeed, keep plodding on for two decades with no hope for victory. That's the story about the Afghanistan war in a nutshell.....Army Gen. Mark Milley said it is too soon to pull out of Afghanistan.

Link:https://taskandpurpose.com/premature...tan-withdrawal

Not to overlook - as a non-American member - General Miley is likely to be the next Chairman JCS.