of years. It's been covered pretty well in the Canadian papers and on web sites there. Since it was in Canada's AO and as the US media had poor to no coverage in Afghanistan, it just fell of the radar here unless you ranged out a bit. I check most English language papers around the world instead of paying much attention to our frivolous excuses for news so the fact that Kandahar is still a problem is no surprise.

There's also the fact that Kandahar -- the province as opposed to Kandahar city -- is the Al Anbar of Afghanistan and the city is the Fallujah and Ar Ranadi combined. It's always been the problem child. As it was the initial Taliban stronghold obviously they're pretty well embedded in the region. I suspect Canada was asked to take over there not because it was a hotbed but to try a different approach. The TF they relieved from the 82d kept a lid on it but cleanup was not directed so did not occur. The Canadians did a great job but you can only do so much in an area only slightly smaller than West Virginia with one lonely little under resourced Battalion Combat Team -- even those as good as the Canadians are and with the other elements (all fairly small and mostly specialized or base security) working the area.

I suspect that your desire to cover the cities will be what we do. I also suspect that Jahangir and the boys will just go to the Hills for a bit. They will lose an urban battle; in the hills -- maybe, maybe not...

I suspect they know that.