Below is a perspective on Taliban and Nato operations viewed through an Afghan's lens. Chuck
Taliban Sense Weakness in NATO
WEST DISPLAYS A LACK OF “BARAKA”
by Matthew Nasuti Kabul Press, 25 February 2010
The real story has been taking place in Afghanistan during the past two months. Last month the Taliban began attacking large Afghan population centers in such locations as Kabul, Lashkar Gah and Khost and this month there were two attacks in Kandahar, the latest on February 7th which blew up a bridge killing four police officers. There have been other attacks which have not been reported in the mainstream media, including the February 11th attack inside a U.S. combat outpost near the Pakistan border in Paktia province which injured five American soldiers from the 48th Brigade of the Georgia National Guard and there was a February 12th suicide bomb attack in Kandahar that wounded six American soldiers. In the January 19, 2010, edition of Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper, British General David Richards announced that:
“The Taliban have given orders to their people to attack in as many different places as they possibly can – in order to reinforce the impression of being everywhere.”
This is the same type of strategy employed by the Viet Cong during the period of Tet, or Vietnamese Lunar New Year, in February 1968. It launched a month-long series of attacks across the length of South Vietnam targeting most of the country’s provincial capitals. The assaults were militarily unsuccessful, but they had a major psychological impact which changed the course of the war and began a slow withdrawal of American forces from that country.
. . . . . . .
Without an elemental change in thinking, which NATO bureaucrats would probably never accept or even understand, NATO will not be able to regain what it has lost. NATO is limited in its ability to launch many more Marjah-style operations. If NATO fails to innovate and reform, the agenda at the next Loya Jirga may be a proposal of amnesty extended to President Hamid Karzai to join the Taliban’s Government.
Phi Beta Iota: Below are some references. Wrong war, wrong force, wrong allies and wrong intentions. The US Government continues to lack a strategic analytic model or the integrity to make global foreign policy and national security decisions on the basis of 360 reality front (future) and back (history). It is equally deficient in making informed domestic decisions. Our newest book, INTELLIGENCE for EARTH: Clarity, Diversity, Integrity, & Sustainability, speaks to this matter. We have no doubt there will be a Voice TO America based in Cuba, within five years if not sooner, very possibly supported by the entire Southern Hemisphere.
General Journal Entries
Journal: Afghanistan = Viet-Nam, National Security Council Remains “Like a Moron”
Absolute Classics
Who the Hell Are We Fighting?: The Story of Sam Adams and the Vietnam Intelligence Wars (Hardcover)
None So Blind: A Personal Account of the Intelligence Failure in Vietnam
Intelligence in Viet-Nam & Laos
Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers
The Tet Offensive–Intelligence Failure in War
