Posted on 01/05/2007 8:52:13 AM PST by Man of the Right
January 5, 2007: NATO commanders believe that the Taliban are planning a more aggressive operation in the Spring, using groups of up to a hundred men to attack small towns, especially local government headquarters. These towns often have only a dozen or so policemen, and some armed locals. Coming in at night, the Taliban can take over, get some propaganda videos, and have a chance of getting away before government or NATO reinforcements show up. The Taliban are fighting a media war, as they have no chance of winning a military victory at this point. The Taliban believe that, in the long run (years, a decade or more) they will win. After all, God is on their side. But in the meantime, the Taliban use terror to eliminate those who oppose them, or scare their Afghan opponents into silence. Thus when the Taliban temporarily take over a town, they can round up their local opponents, threaten them and, in some cases, murder a few. Schools and government buildings are burnt down. All this sends a message, even if the Taliban then must flee from approaching army or NATO forces. The Taliban will also make greater use of civilians as human shields, as dead civilians make great anti-NATO propaganda. While only a few dozen Afghan civilians were killed in this way, the local and foreign media was all over it. Much more so than the hundreds of Afghan civilians the Taliban killed or murdered
The real method of curtailing this activity is to take the fight to the terrorists' sanctuary. Until that is done this sort of strategy will be slow, expensive, and frustrating to try to combat.
Time and again, we've chosen the Paks over the Indians. Because Pakistan is supposed to be an ally, the Taliban and Al Qaeda have a safe-haven in the tribal areas and cities.
This essentially makes two points, both of which are entirely correct: (1) The Taliban is cowardly (why "stand and fight" in vain, when there is always the alternative of terrorizing unarmed civilians?), and (2) the media are complicit, as it suits their pacifist agenda to imply that the American "invasion" of Afghanistan is the proximate cause of the violence against civilians. (Of course, in order for this second point to work, it is first necessary to believe that the Taliban has historically been a very tolerant, peaceful group--something on the order of, say, the Kiwanis Club--until the US came along in late 2001, and tried to bully them. But there is almost certainly no paucity of Americans--some of them hard leftists, but many more politically unengaged--who believe something close to that.)
As yes.....another dreaded Spring attack by the Taliban...
Spring is the season for planting...
These bastards will all be planted for their long dirt nap..
Afghanistan and Iraq have been marvelous "death traps" and "shit magnets" -- attracting Jihadists from around the world to their suicide by coalition forces.
Semper Fi
I think we're in for a rough spring. This may allow troops a little more latitude at least in hot pursuit, depending on how the rules of engagement are now set. If we learned nothing else from the Vietnam war we at least learned that sanctuaries kill.
The tragedy is that our special ops people could run down the Al-Qaeda and Taliban leadership if permittedd to operate in the tribal areas. As you point out, fortunately Musharraf has a don't ask-don't tell policy regarding hot pursuit.
May all our enemies be as unskilled as the Taliban.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.