14 April The Australian - Digging in All Over Again by Patrick Walters.

Australia is being slowly yet inexorably being drawn into a novel 21st-century version of the "great game" in Afghanistan as our military prepares for its most sustained fighting since Vietnam.

The upgraded Afghanistan mission promises to be long and hazardous, and Australia's defence chiefs know there is no guarantee of victory.

Our overall troop commitment is much likelier to rise than fall in the next two years as the battle intensifies to stabilise Afghanistan. But, unlike Australia's two most recent wars, in Vietnam and Iraq, the war in Afghanistan is a full bipartisan commitment from the Government and the ALP.

John Howard this week warned that Australia's national interests were involved in Afghanistan. He said the war could not be won without "renewed and increased effort" by the US and its allies. Describing Afghanistan as being at a crucial stage in its history, the Prime Minister warned of a deteriorating environment in southern Afghanistan and the threat of a resurgent Taliban and al-Qa'ida.

"But while I am very conscious of the history of Afghanistan, you can't see what is occurring there just as part of the historical continuity. There is another element and a very real element to the sort of world in which we now live," he said.

For Howard the new player in the near 200-year-old great game is al-Qa'ida and the fanatical Taliban. The risk for Australia is that Afghanistan will once again become a safe haven for terrorists as it was in the late 1990s when it was the global headquarters for al-Qa'ida and Osama bin Laden...
14 April The Australian - Rules of War by Greg Sheridan.

Prime Minister John Howard wrote to Pakistan's military dictator, President Pervez Musharraf, in February. The tone of the letter was emollient and friendly, but it bore a heavy message. Howard likes Musharraf. They talk about cricket and the Commonwealth. There is a kind of Sam Browne belt quality to their relationship.

Howard admires the way Musharraf turned Pakistan around after the 9/11 al-Qa'ida terror attacks and made it into an ally of the West in the war on terror.

But if that Howard-Musharraf relationship was worth anything, it needed to be put to use now. This week Howard announced the effective doubling of Australia's military commitment to Afghanistan. This will reach 1000 Diggers by next year. It is one of the most dangerous and militarily important troop commitments Australia has made in decades...
14 April The Australian - PM Asks Pakistan to Curb Taliban by Greg Sheridan and Bruce Loudon.

John Howard has written to Pakistan's military dictator, imploring him to do more to stop the flow of Taliban forces into southern Afghanistan in an effort to reduce the threat to Australian troops being sent to the region.

As Australia was preparing to double its troop commitment in Afghanistan, the Prime Minister told Pakistani leader General Pervez Musharraf in a personal letter sent in February, that the Taliban flow from Pakistan threatened the lives of Australian troops sent to Oruzgan province.

But General Musharraf yesterday lashed out at Western critics of his attitude to the Taliban and al-Qa'ida, bluntly threatening to quit the war on terror unless criticism of him abated.

US President George W.Bush, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other Western leaders have put pressure on General Musharraf to crack down on terrorist activities along the border between his country and Afghanistan.

Western military analysts believe Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence agency is continuing some level of co-operation with the Taliban - a claim General Musharraf attacked this week...