Voice of America’s Ravi Khanna reports on the miscommunication betweenIslamabad and Washington. As Washington is coming closer to adefinitive strategy in Afghanistan, foreign policy experts look at someof the fundamental differences between the Pakistani and United Statesgovernments’ view of their enemy. While the United States sees theirenemy in the Taliban, Pakistan continues to view India as the majorthreat.
Ambassador Robert O. Blake, recently appointed to his new role as assistant secretary for South and Central Asian affairs, spoke to a room teeming with India experts yesterday at the Asia Society in New York. Though Blake has been a career diplomat, spending 2003-2006 as deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Mission in New Delhi, his message was clear — the future of U.S.-India relations rests on the shoulders of the private sector. In advance of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s upcoming visit to the White House, Singh’s first state visit since President Barack Obama has been in office, […]
In an interview with Charlie Rose, Secretary of State Hillary RodhamClinton says that nation-building in Afghanistan is not the goal, butrather a possible byproduct of fighting terrorism in the region. Shealso explains, what she feels to be, is the difference betweenappropriate uses for counter-insurgency versus counter-terrorismtactics.
World Politics Review Contributing Editor David Axe provides this footage of U.S. Air Force mentors and Afghan airmen based at Kandahar in southern Afghanistan. The group is flying a mission on AfghanNational Army Air Corps Mi-17 helicopters. The footage provides a look into the mentor programs that are helping to create an independent Afghan military force.
LOGAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan — When the gate opened at the U.S. Army outpost in Baraki Barak district on the morning of Oct. 25, it seemed the Army’s long-planned strategy to win over local farmers might fail. For weeks, Able Troop, an element of 3rd Squadron, 71st Cavalry, had prepared to provide free veterinary services to potentially hundreds of local farmers — coordinating with the local government, hiring vets, stockpiling medicine, and spreading word of the event. The idea was to win the farmers’ allegiance, and create what 3rd Squadron commander Lt. Col. Thomas Gukeisen called “dislocated envy.” That would, in […]
ISLAMABAD — With Pakistani security forces taking over several Taliban and al-Qaida strongholds in South Waziristan, thousands of militants have apparently fled to other parts of the country — raising fears that militancy will spread and escalate. On Nov. 5, Pakistani military and paramilitary security forces reclaimed Laddah, an important Taliban stronghold in South Waziristan, leaving only Makeen in the hands of the Pakistani Taliban movement called TTP. However, tribal leaders and local observers from South Waziristan have confirmed that thousands of TTP, Arab al-Qaida and other foreign militants — including Uzbeks and Chechens — have escaped to other areas […]
Vineet Nayar the CEO of HCL Technologies, discusses challenges and triumphs of the relatively new Indian government with the Wall Street Journal’s Niraj Sheth.
A paper by Maj. Jim Gant, titled, “One Tribe at a Time” (.pdf), has been getting all sorts of attention since it ran on Steven Pressman’s site a few weeks back. I finally got down to reading it last night after Andrew Exum flagged it as an alternative to COIN in Afghanistan. Where to begin? The paper is a collection of nativist mythologies that have run as a theme throughout the West’s imperial age. Last of the Mohicans? Lawrence of Arabia? Dances with Wolves? They’re in there. So is an element of Stockholm Syndrome, for that matter. The problem arises […]
One of the ironies of human thought is the way in which a new conceptual paradigm initially empowers effective action by challenging outmoded assumptions, only to later become hardened and resistant to empirical challenges itself. At that point, the once-revolutionary system of thought often does little more than empower the stubborn preference for theory over reality. That process used to take generations, but with the advent of modern communications, the pace has accelerated. I think it’s possible to argue that in the case of the U.S. Army’s COIN doctrine, we now have an example of it happening over the course […]
Margaret Warner of PBS’ Newshour interviewed Secretary of State Hilary Rodham Clinton in Islamabad at the end of her trip to Pakistan. “I knew before I came that we had our work cut out for us,” Clinton said. Clinton said that she focused her trip on trying to create a good dialogue while listening to the concerns of various groups within Pakistan that harbor animosity and suspicion toward the United States.
If you’re interested in a political scorecard for Afghanistan — post-election fiasco — from a non-Coalition perspective, MK Bhadrakumar has a pretty sobering assessment at Asia Times Online. The essential takeaway is that in going after Afghan President Hamid Karzai but failing to either effectively sideline him or force him to accept an acceptable power-sharing arrangement, the Obama administration — and Western governments in general — emerge dramatically weakened. The irony, according to Bhadrakumar, is that in emphasizing legitimacy as the election’s litmus test, the West burned its bridges with a Karzai team that is actually well-positioned to deal with […]