South Asia Archive

I’ve long felt that the discussion of the Afghan government’s many shortcomings tends to exagerrate the importance of the corruption factor in driving the insurgency. To the extent that the government is corrupt, that’s more a problem for those funding it — namely, international donors. The problem in Afghanistan is that the government is not just corruptbut also incompetent, leaving service vacuums in terms of security andlaw and order that are filled by the Taliban. But worse still, all thereporting suggests that government officials are also actively engagedin either targeting the population or else complicit with those thatdo. I was […]

TOKYO — Asia may already have an alphabet soup of regional economic and security arrangements, but Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd seems to believe there is room for at least one more. At a gathering of regional ministers, media and think tanks, Rudd argued that the region risked drifting in the face of challenges ahead. “We need to plan — we need to plan with each other, rather than against each other, as has often been the custom in times past,” he said, addressing a two-day conference, “Asia Pacific: A Community for the 21st Century,” held in Sydney beginning last […]

NEW DELHI — After months of vacillation, and relentless pressure from Western nations, India finally announced a unilateral climate mitigation measure to reduce its carbon intensity levels by 20 percent to 25 percent on its 2005 levels over the next 11 years. The decision comes against the looming backdrop of the United Nations Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen, which opened on Dec. 7. The new goals mark an unambiguous departure from New Delhi’s traditional position that rich nations are historically responsible for global warming and should therefore take up the bulk of the responsibility for all reduction efforts. India has […]

A lot has been written, both here on this blog and elsewhere, about COIN being the most significant military transformation to emerge from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But this Small Wars Journal post on a Marine Corps experiment to reduce the smallest independent unit of action from the battalion level to the rifle company level struck me as being potentially more significant. The move grows out of stabilization operations, and so is perfectly consistent with the COIN tactical emphasis on small-unit autonomy to react to the local social terrain. But that kind of transformation, once begun, will probably […]

Afghan women face widespread discrimination with little help from a government that is failing to protect them against a rising tide of violence, Human Rights Watch warns in a new report. “The situation for Afghan women and girls is dire and could deteriorate. While the world focuses on the Obama administration’s new security strategy, it’s critical to make sure that women and girls’ rights don’t just get lip service while being pushed to the bottom of the list by the government and donors,” Rachel Reid, a HRW Afghanistan researcher said in a press release. The report, “We Have the Promises […]

On the first anniversary of the Mumbai attacks, many observers discussed the implications of the events that took place last Nov. 26. But few have commented on the implications of what did not take place: New Delhi did not mobilize its armed forces. It did not retaliate against terrorist safe havens, nor did it go to war with the country — Pakistan — where they were located. Rather, it limited its response to calling upon its neighbor to shut down the terrorist cells and extradite the masterminds and abettors of the Mumbai attackers. Islamabad responded half-heartedly. It failed to bring […]

The current annual summit between the governments of India and Russia, scheduled to last from Dec. 6-8, testifies to the continuing shared interests between both countries. Russian and Indian policymakers still pursue many common objectives while having few divergent ones. Yet, ongoing improvements in India’s relations with Western countries, especially the United States, present challenges to Russian policymakers as they strive to maintain Russia’s position as India’s most important strategic partner. A few days before arriving in Moscow, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh gave a lengthy interview with Russian media outlets in which he lavished praise on Russia. Calling their […]

President Barack Obama’s plan to send 30,000 troops to Afghanistan bymid-2010 — with withdrawal plans for July 2011 — may provide someassurances to Afghanistan’s neighbors. Analysts say that a withdrawaldate is not necessarily the ideal situation, but will help givePakistan some idea of when an end may be in sight. VOA’s Ravi Khannareports on how a withdrawal date may be the key to a risky strategy.

There are a number of revealing aspects to the reactions of various NATO allies to President Barack Obama’s call for more troops for Afghanistan. First, last week’s reported telephone call to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi makes more sense in light of Italy’s initial signals that it will deploy between 500-1,500 additional troops to Afghanistan. The troops will actually be redeployed from other theaters of operation (Kosovo and Lebanon) according to previous drawdown schedules there. So nothing immediate (the second half of 2010), but probably in line with the U.S. deployment schedule. It’s also a bold political move on Berlusconi’s […]

In a nutshell, President Barack Obama delivered a very effective — if imperfect — speech last night, outlining in appropriate detail the reasons for both the war’s ongoing significance and the announced troop increase, the overall objectives and approach, and to a lesser degree the regional context. Most importantly, he embedded the entire discussion into a compelling vision of balancing America’s national security interests with its broader national interests, while placing both in the context of America’s enduring yet changing global role. By appropriate detail, I mean that there wasn’t much, but that’s not what this speech was about. As […]

Despite including what’s expected to be an enormous troop increase — one tied to a dialed-in strategic and tactical approach and accompanied by “exit ramps” — President Barack Obama’s speech tonight outlining his new Afghanistan war plan is widely expected to leave everyone, both war supporters and opponents, at least partially disappointed. As the pre-speech chatter would have it, there are not enough troops or commitment for the former camp, and not enough firm conditionality for the latter. That’s quite a contrast with the initial strategy rollout back in March, which managed to satisfy almost everyone, and represents the delayed […]