NATO seeks reinforcements in Afghanistan

[maddezmom]

CASTEAU, Belgium - NATO's top commander, Gen. James L. Jones, on Thursday called for allied nations to send reinforcements to southern Afghanistan, saying the coming weeks could be decisive in the fight against the Taliban.

Jones will meet top generals from the 26 NATO nations Friday and Saturday in Warsaw, Poland, in an attempt to generate troops, planes and helicopters needed for the mission in southern Afghanistan.

Jones acknowledged that NATO had been surprised by the "level of intensity" of Taliban attacks since the alliance moved into the southern region in July and by the fact that the insurgents were prepared to stand and fight rather than deploy their usual hit-and-run tactics.

However, he was confident that NATO troops could win the battle.

more:http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060907/ap_on_re_as/nato_afghanistan

I thought we freed them from the Taliban :eyes: At least NATO understands the battle hasn't been won yet, too bad George doesn't.

[Robbien]

1. Does any country have any troops available to give?

One would expect the request for 12,000 troops for the Lebanon/Israel border would have exhausted all available troops.

[Sherman A1]

2. Exactly

No other country has near the military establishment of ours and we are stretched beyond belief, so do they call up reserves as we have done or do we start a draft?

[hogwyld]

3. It just goes to show

A modern military is no match for a determined homegrown insurgency. Hisory does in fact repeat itself.

[moondust]

4. NATO should be home in bed.

Afghanistan should be all mopped up. The fighting there should be a distant memory.

Somebody goofed. BIG TIME!

[TheLastMohican]

5. North Atlantic Treaty Organisation

was organised to defend the western hemisphere of Europe from the spread of communism. Gee, let me check the map. What is NATO doing in Asia? Who are they defending there? Why is a purely aggresive action by the NATO block is treated as "defensive" in nature?


And btw, you forgot Poland, they have the fresh meat for this thing.

[Igel]

6. The Disciples result from the seminaries and mosques.

That's where they're recruited, that's where they're trained. Taliban just means "Disciple". Or "student". The word's ambiguous between the pretty much religion-centered and secular (mostly because the distinction is so recent).

It's absolutely forbidden to actually deal with the seminaries and mosques; Musharraf found this out the hard way. So you can get practitioners of peace even in Kabul saying it's a Muslims duty to kill Westerners, and nobody can say a bad thing about it. The best they can do is report what's said, and find some Muslims somewhere to say it doesn't reflect his understanding of the one, monolithic Islam.

Of course, I'm using "seminaries" as the term of art from the Pakistani press to refer to the madaris. Madaris are we Anglophones call madrassehs. (Danged Arabic broken plurals.)

Until that species of Islam is discredited and depoliticized, the problem will not go away; it could be diminished were the recruiters and trainers locked up or killed, but while that's traditional in many areas that's just not going to happen. We're intent on winning the battle by killing the ground-pounders on the front lines and mounting an argument based on tolerance and consisting of, what we like to think as absolutely morally superior silence.

[Yupster]

7. Agree igil

Pretty classic guerrilla war that as long as the guerrillas have a sanctuary t retreat to, they'll never be defeated.

Funny how this war has changed.

The original thinking was the last thing you want to do is have lots of foreign troops occupying Afghanistan. A foreign footprint would unite all Afghans to throw the foreigners out. Now a few years later we're looking for thousands of foreign troops to send in.

[saigon68]

11. Eventually this will result

[daleo]

8. Escalation and hubris

They need more troops to throw into the meat grinder - same as Viet Nam. It beats me how anyone thought NATO could prevail with a few thousand troops anyway. Are we arrogant enough to think we are that much better than the Russians (militarily or politcally)?

[Yupster]

9. The idea was

that it was better to keep as little a foreign presence as possible and keep it away from population centers. The Afghans would run their own country and the Taliban had no popular support once they were gone.

This is now Plan B.

Wonder what plan C will be?

[daleo]

10. Perhaps "declare victory and leave"

It worked in Viet Nam for Nixon and in Afghanistan for Gorby - well, sort of.

[VolcanoJen]

12. How are those reinforcements coming?

Because things are heating up in Afghanistan, and I wonder if Dear Leader will be able to stop posturing and preening about how he's winning the War on Terror long enough to actually begin fighting it, in light of news reports like this:

Blast by U.S. Kabul Embassy Kills 16 - Reuters

[maddezmom]

13. Turkey's not sending anyone

Not a single soldier from the Turkish armed forces will go to Afghanistan for the fight against terrorism. There is no need for such a thing and it is out of the question," General Yasar Buyukanit was quoted by the station's website as saying.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060908/wl_asia_afp/natoafghanistantroopsturkey_060908083642;_


An Afghan policeman secures the site of a suicide car bomb blast, about 100 metres from the US embassy in Kabul. Two US soldiers and eight Afghans were killed in the blast, police said.(AFP/Farzana Wahidy)