Posted on 07/13/2010 2:39:10 PM PDT by Eyes Unclouded
LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan—The U.S. has poured more than $100 million into upgrading the Kajaki hydropower plant, the biggest source of electricity in south Afghanistan. And it plans on spending much more, in an effort to woo local sympathies away from the Taliban insurgency.
Yet, one of the biggest beneficiaries of this American-taxpayer-financed project are the Taliban themselves.
Since U.S.-funded repairs of a turbine at the Kajaki plant doubled its capacity in October, nearly half of the total electrical output has flowed to districts in Helmand province where the Taliban administer the grid, Afghan officials say. In those districts, residents pay their monthly electricity bills directly to the insurgents, who use the proceeds to fund their war with American and British troops.
"The more electricity there is, the more money the Taliban make," says Hajji Gul Mohammad Khan, tribal-affairs adviser to the government of Helmand.
Helmand is at the center of the war: It is the Afghan province where massive allied operations, such as the push into the area of Marjah earlier this year, have taken place since President Barack Obama ordered a troop surge in December, aiming to reverse Taliban gains. Helmand is by far the deadliest province for U.S.-led coalition troops, accounting for more than a quarter of total fatalities in the nine years of the war.
The Taliban's continuing stranglehold over wide swathes of Helmand means that the provincial government here must seek an informal accommodation with the insurgents on sharing Kajaki's juice. A large part of this insurgent electricity network is used for irrigation, Helmand officials say, boosting the area's main crop—opium poppies.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
You go to the substation that serves that part of the grid. You throw a breaker. You lock it out. And then you let the Taliban take the heat.
Parking lot A
The Taliban areas are a patchwork overlapping the government areas and all are filled with the “hearts and minds” we are supposed to be winning over. Cutting power isn’t a way to make friends.
We are not going to win the hearts and minds of the Islamic world either way. They will take what we give them, and continue on with their pro-Islamic agenda.
Since U.S.-funded repairs of a turbine at the Kajaki plant doubled its capacity in October, nearly half of the total electrical output has flowed to districts in Helmand province where the Taliban administer the grid, Afghan officials say. In those districts, residents pay their monthly electricity bills directly to the insurgents, who use the proceeds to fund their war with American and British troops.I think the Taliban runs most electric companies, and something very much like the Taliban is running the White House.
....also the cell phone towers...
They probably cannot begin construction of the TAPI pipeline without it.
“...in an effort to woo local sympathies away from the Taliban insurgency.”
.
A bunch of Christians trying to woo away muslim sympathies from the Taliban.
Some people never learn. It’s like the idiots that are surprised that ‘American’ muslims want to build a mosque near Ground Zero.
Hey you guys, there is not a muslim in the world that will side with you against the Taliban.
Long before Peter Sellers starred in the hit film “The Mouse That Roared,” America’s enemies have known that waging war on the US could become an extremely profitable undertaking.
Don’t even get me started on the gas company...
As crazy as Obama is, I had to make sure it was not nuclear.
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