Britain Foreign Secretary Says NATO Stuck in 'Stalemate' in Afghanistan

[bigtree]

February 9, 2009

Britain and her Nato allies in Afghanistan are stuck in a stalemate with the Taleban, David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, admitted today.


Painting a grim picture of the security environment in Afghanistan, Mr Miliband told BBC Radio 4’s The World at One that the Taleban had managed to create “a strategic stalemate in parts of the country through their use of improvised explosive devices”.

The Foreign Secretary was echoing the warnings of military commanders who have privately admitted that the campaign in Afghanistan was facing a stalemate. While political leaders have tried to be upbeat about progress in Afghanistan, Mr Miliband appeared to be projecting a greater degree of realism about the way the campaign is going.

“In military terms, if there wasn’t an international force there, the Taleban forces could overwhelm the Afghan security forces,” the Foreign Secretary said.

Britain is understood to be pushing for the “Afghanisation” of the Afghan war and is seeking to persuade Washington to drop the original aim of creating a fully-fledged democracy in Afghanistan and instead to embrace “a reasonable objective, in a reasonable time-frame, with a reasonable prospect of success," as one senior British official put it.

The proposed policy would focus on bolstering Afghan institutions in Kabul, the capital, and in the provinces and strengthening the Afghan army and police to create a “system of government that can be sustained by the Afghans with Afghans clearly in the lead” . . .


read: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article5695658.ece

[arcadian]

1. Time to bomb them into the stone age!!!

Wait... what? They're already in the stone age? Time to bomb them into the Pre-Cambrian! :sarcasm:

[izquierdista]

2. Can't accuse the Brits of one thing

Being quick on the uptake. They've been trying to get the upper hand there going on what, 200 years (off and on, give or take)?

[bigtree]

3. heh. good point

. . . but let's give Miliband his due if he's offering Britain the feet they need to move away from America's paternalistic influence.