Quote Originally Posted by carl View Post
Bob:

Nice stump speechifying. You know what we are all talking about even if you don't approve and want to steer things in another direction.
Carl,

I am not "stumping," rather I am stumped at how you think the current rash of killings are not related to the very similar factors driving the larger insurgency.

There is both Revolution and Resistance in Afghanistan, and what we wage against most internal to Afghanistan is the resistance. This resistance is not ideological and it is largely apolitical. It is a natural human response to perceptions that some foreign presence is unnatural, inappropriate, and must go.

We have pressed our units into their lands and populaces and waged COIN against insurgents with little regard for how those tactical efforts strategically affect the larger insurgency. In recent years we have forced greater integration between Afghan soldiers and Western members of the Coalition. We tell our men that they will keep coming back until the Afghans are prepared to take over. No pressure.

Do personal conflicts occur? Of course. But resistance insurgency is personal. It matters little if the trigger event is an attack helicopter shooting up your little brother while he was repairing a culvert, or if the trigger event is some E4 frustrated with your inability or lack of motivation to do something in a particular manner or degree of priority he thinks you should have leveling some grievous insult upon you. Respect is a major causal factor in resistance, just as revenge is.

Even if our guys were a bunch of cultural geniuses these events would still be going on because it is also the latest tactic from the Revolutionary aspect of the insurgency. Join the security forces, get close, attack the foreigners. Target the trust necessary for this coalition to work effectively.

To attempt to rationalize these events off in personal or ideological terms is a dangerous bit of self-delusion.