September 30, 2015

Special forces from the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan fought Taliban militants early Wednesday after being dispatched to the northern city of Kunduz to help Afghan forces re-take it from insurgents who seized it earlier this week, a coalition spokesman said.

The forces were on a mission near Kunduz airport where hundreds of Afghan forces based themselves after retreating from the city, the spokesman told the Reuters news agency.

And note this:

Some coalition troops assigned to conventional military units are also in Kunduz to support the Afghan army.

You can bet your ass that those conventional forces at a minimum are providing transportation and logistics support, the kind of support that might have kept the Iraqi army together if Obama had not so foolishly tossed away the hard fought victory in Iraq.

I read last week that the Pentagon will be laying out the options for American/Coalition involvement in Afghanistan going forward. They supposedly will range from indefinitely delaying any further drawdown of support to essentially leaving Afghanistan by the beginning of 2017 as planned. There is no doubt in my mind that if we fail to keep a significant support capability in Afghanistan until the ANSF can support themselves in the field, which could take years more, the country will quickly revert to the chaos of the 1990s.

February 05, 2015

U.S. and allied aircraft struck Taliban forces in eastern Afghanistan last month, according to a coalition spokesman, in the first confirmed airstrikes in support of Afghan forces since the end of the international combat mission.

The mid-January attacks were not announced by U.S. forces at the time but were confirmed when asked about them by Stars and Stripes.

...

Afghan security forces backed by international air support launched an offensive Jan. 16, or about two weeks after the end of the NATO combat mission, that broke the back of the Taliban push, Muzamel said.

The most transparent administration in history now has the US military hiding that combat operations in Afghanistan have actually continued. There will be more as the main fighting season ramps up again and they will not all be rather sanitary air strikes. And almost certainly, Americans will continue to be wounded and killed as they support the ASF in combat situations this year.

The Afghan Security Forces face many of the same problems the Iraqi Security Forces faced when the US walked out at the end of 2011. The army /police numbers and equipment are mostly in place, but the critical elements needed to sustain and support those forces in the field are tenuous at best.

When put under stress last summer, the Iraqi supply system failed in spectacular fashion. Even US military units, denied bullets, food and water, and equipment repair and replacement like the Iraqi troops were, would have been unable to hold hold their ground. There are strong doubts about ASF capabilities to provide that kind of support to their forces in the field. The further from major population centers, the bigger the doubt. If the ASF logistics system starts to fail this year, US aviation units will probably try to patch it up. That means fixed wing and rotary aviation units doing resupply in combat conditions as they try to prevent the collapse of ASF units. I have little doubt that will happen and some of our forces will be wounded or killed in the process. I just hope the sacrifices will not be in vain.

Combat support from jets, attack helicopters, and artillery assets are all critical force enablers where the ASF is still lacking. Skilled forward observers embedded in ground units and trainers embedded with artillery units in the FOBs might be the only way that US forces can bring to bear the force necessary to repel Taliban attacks this summer. Will Obama allow that? He may not have a choice if he wants to avoid a repeat of his Iraq disaster.

Just like in Iraq, wishing the war over in Afghanistan will not make it go away, in fact it will make it worse. It probably already has, we simply have not seen it rise above the surface.

June 19, 2014

Q: Just very quickly, do you wish you had left a residual force in Iraq? Any regrets about that decision in 2011?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, keep in mind that wasn’t a decision made by me. That was a decision made by the Iraqi government.

The truth of the matter is that Obama and the drooling idiot of a vice-president that he put in charge of the negotiations with Iraq in 2011 kinda sorta wanted some advisers to stay, but completely botched it.

The Obungler then proceeded to prattle on about how Americans needed immunity from Iraqi prosecution, and they truly did, but the Iraqis wouldn't grant it. What he didn't talk about is how the Bush administration finessed the same issue in the 2008 SOFA.

Nobody seems to remember it now, but in that agreement American troops actually were subject to Iraqi prosecution. The catch was the Iraqis could only prosecute US servicemembers for crimes committed while they were "off duty" and "off base." I know this is a difficult question for the Think Progress crowd, but from 2008 through 2011, how many American servicemembers were ever both off duty and outside the wire?

And the trees whisper a gentle..."none." I have seen no evidence that the same sort of deal could not have been negotiated again with Iraq.

The administration lead was Vice-President Biden, a person of considerable stature, but who had to overcome an especially high hurdle before he could win the trust of the Iraqis because of his earlier proposal to divide up Iraq.

Obama's initial country team in Iraq never achieved the unity of effort of the Petraeus-Crocker team.

Once a competent negotiating team was assembled, the administration appeared to undercut it with deliberate leaks about the likely failure of negotiations.

The theory that convincing Iraqis we would leave would elicit cooperative behavior proved flawed. Prime Minister Maliki was even less cooperative with the Obama Administration than he had been with Bush.

The State Department never adequately resourced nor planned for the daunting post-war mission its own strategy required.

The sdministration talked only of ending the Iraq war, and made little effort to mobilize political support at home or abroad for any follow-on policy to secure the gains that we and the Iraqis had together won at great cost.

Finally, some would argue that the president did not really want to leave meaningful numbers of troops in Iraq and so the administration never seriously pursued a SOFA, only going through the motions.

Dexter Filkins, no fan of the war or Bush, recently wrote in The New Yorker:

By 2011, by any reasonable measure, the Americans had made a lot of headway but were not finished with the job. For many months, the Obama and Maliki governments talked about keeping a residual force of American troops in Iraq, which would act largely to train Iraq’s Army and to provide intelligence against Sunni insurgents. (It would almost certainly have been barred from fighting.) Those were important reasons to stay, but the most important went largely unstated: it was to continue to act as a restraint on Maliki’s sectarian impulses, at least until the Iraqi political system was strong enough to contain him on its own. The negotiations between Obama and Maliki fell apart, in no small measure because of a lack of engagement by the White House. Today, many Iraqis, including some close to Maliki, say that a small force of American soldiers—working in non-combat roles—would have provided a crucial stabilizing factor that is now missing from Iraq. Sami al-Askari, a Maliki confidant, told me for my article this spring, “If you had a few hundred here, not even a few thousand, they would be coöperating with you, and they would become your partners.” President Obama wanted the Americans to come home, and Maliki didn’t particularly want them to stay.

Dealing with Maliki in Iraq was and is no doubt every bit as difficult, distasteful, and disgusting as dealing with Karzai in Afghanistan. It was the same for the Bush administration. The difference between Bush and Obama however, is Bush kept his eye on what was important, commonly known as America's interests, and President Petulant Pants focused on what was important to him, namely him.

July 24, 2011

I'll echo Rob and for now simply express my condolences to the people of Norway regarding Friday's terrible events. There will be time to analyze and argue in a few days after the police establish more facts about what happened and Norway has had its time of grief and mourning.

The Long Recall has turned out to not be all that long after all. They are pulling the plug just after the 150th anniversary of the first major engagement. Obviously a lot of effort was going into what they were putting out each day and apparently it was too much. I'm very disappointed, but it's their call to make. I appreciated everything that they did post and I'll look for other sources and go from there.

Congratulations to Bert Blyleven on his induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame today. I was just a little boy the first time he pitched for the Twins, and I guess from today's perspective, so was he at the age of 19. Bert's mouth and ego have got him into trouble over the years and I didn't like the guy by the time he was traded in 1976. But he came back and was part of the 1987 World Champions and that means most Twins fans will always have a soft spot for him. Way to go, Bert.

The Twins are only seven games out of first in the American League Central, but today I'm going to officially say stick a fork in them for this year. The first reason is they are 22-17 within the Central, but 1-7 now against the division leading Tigers after a 1-3 home stand against them. They just can't hang with the Tigers this year. On top of that is their 8-19 record against the AL East. Even if by some miracle they win the division they will go nowhere in the playoffs again. Nowhere.

An 8 year-old boy was hanged by militants in Afghanistan's Helmand province after the boy's father -- a police officer in the southern city of Gereshk -- refused to comply with militants' demands to provide them with a police vehicle, officials said.

Can you imagine negotiating a truce with such people and then expecting them to leave you in peace afterward? I can't.

November 10, 2010

The United States is open to the idea of keeping troops in Iraq past a deadline to leave next year if Iraq asks for it, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday.

"We'll stand by," Gates said. "We're ready to have that discussion if and when they want to raise it with us."

Gates urged Iraq's squabbling political groups to reconcile after eight months of deadlock. Any request to extend the U.S. military presence in Iraq would have to come from a functioning Iraqi government. It would amend the current agreement under which U.S. troops must leave by the end of 2011.

The Obama administration has decided to begin publicly walking away from what it once touted as key deadlines in the war in Afghanistan in an effort to de-emphasize President Barack Obama's pledge that he'd begin withdrawing U.S. forces in July 2011, administration and military officials have told McClatchy.

At the end of the Iraq story there is this paragraph:

Although the 2011 deadline was a point of pride for Iraq after years of U.S. military occupation, it does not leave much time for the U.S. to train Iraq's fledgling air force. Iraq also wants more U.S. help to protect its borders.

That first sentence is a joke. Much time? Try no time, and it has been known for years that Iraq would need training, support, and America's protective umbrella for maybe a decade to come. Not just because of the Iraqi Air Force either, though that is by far the component with the longest time frame.

This is a good thing so long as Iraqis continue to handle internal security and remain committed to democracy. Strong defense ties and a strategic relationship with Iraq will cement stability between Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia and counter the natural influence that Iran has in Iraq. Yes, Iraqis are struggling to form a government again, but be wary of those who moan about Iranian influence while ignoring the ethnic and nationalist sentiments among Iraqis. Those are significant limiters as is American influence as Iraq's partner and protector.

On Afghanistan, I said last year after the surge there was announced that Obama made the right decision but then botched it with his half-assed withdrawal time line. It was the triumph of the wishful thinking of Obama's academic mind over the practical reality that the people of the region would read his words through their own goals and fears. It was a massive fuckup and if President Obama is finally realizing it, that's good. What he needs to do next is fire every last advisor who thought it would be a good idea. I understood back then the need to pressure Karzai, but it was obvious that using a time line to do that was a cure worse than the disease.

Speaking of Karzai, what good has the withdrawal time line done in that regard? Nothing. I think the blame for that part resides almost entirely with the civilian side of the US government effort. Karzai is absolutely a very difficult and problematic partner, but guess what? That's a very difficult and problematic part of the world. The culture of the US military is that failure is not an option. I don't see that same attitude coming from the US State Department or US aid organizations. I'm sure there are individuals who are performing heroically, but overall the civilian side is failing. That's reality. President Obama needs to use the upcoming review to reinvigorate the civilian side of the US effort and if necessary, clean house.

October 15, 2010

It's a bit of a long read, but here's an intense, if not brutal, embedded report from Afghanistan about the last patrol a group of US soldiers took to finish familiarizing their replacements with the battlespace.

I don't know anything about the writer so I'm not vouching that the report is fair, or not. If you won't or can't read it all, do read the end where an update on the replacements is given.

April 10, 2010

President Barack Obama's rows with Afghan President Hamid Karzai may not put you in mind of de Gaulle or the passing of the British Empire, but there is a troubling analogy, to wit, the Kennedys' treatment of the president of South Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem. It did not end prettily. In the early days of the Vietnam conflict, President John F. Kennedy was increasingly critical of Diem for his apparent ineptitude, corruption and brutality. Our ambassador to Saigon, Henry Cabot Lodge, snubbed the South Vietnamese president. When word reached Washington that officers in the South Vietnamese army were going to overthrow Diem, the Kennedys pointedly looked the other way. The coup took place, and to the administration's embarrassment, President Diem was not left an exile, but a well-photographed corpse. His was to be the last stable South Vietnamese government. Sometimes foreigners know more about the governance of their own countries than Americans do.

I would like to think that President Obama is too smart to engineer or encourage a coup against Karzai, but he and some in his administration have that "Best and Brightest" arrogance that does seem reminiscent of the Kennedy and Johnson era. If I were in Karzai's shoes, I'd be a little nervous right now.

March 08, 2010

Only his hairdresser knows for sure: I was happy to hear that Pakistan had captured Adam Gadahn, but I've learned to take any news from that murky part of the world with a grain of salt. Too many supposedly dead or captured Taliban have later shown up very much alive and free. Bill Roggio is the go to guy on this sort of stuff as he is very careful to confirm any news with his own sources before buying into the latest claims.

A bill sponsored by Democratic Sen. Tarryl Clark of St. Cloud could
prohibit spending public dollars at in-state hotels or meeting
facilities that provide their customers with pornographic materials
that link sex with violence. Nonviolent adult movies would be OK.

I haven't stayed in hotels much lately and I'm not up on porn industry trends, but is this really an issue? What other types of movies should the state pressure hotels not to show? How about prohibiting state money from going to hotels that show movies that glorify motorcycle-riding, murderous, communist scumbags? I'm not defending violent porn, I'm not even sure exactly what they are talking about, but what business does the state have trying to censor through other means what is apparently legal behavior by adults?

These free agent rules are harder to figure out than a Lady Gaga song.

Always look on the dark side of life. Peter Beinart thinks that US troops will need to stay to keep Iraq from falling into civil war. Just look at all of the fundamental issues that have not been addressed! Well, there's truth there, and the formation of the next government will likely be fraught with drama and frustration. However, beware those who say that because of that messy process it means Iraq is falling apart. There is and has been a huge center mass of Iraqis that goes across sectarian and ethnic lines and that does not want to see that happen, and they will rise up against those who go down that path. As the rending of garments and gnashing of teeth commences in the media, have faith in those Iraqis and be patient. I think we're staying, but not because we are needed to deal with any internal threats.

Interesting. The link is to a blog/vlog of two USAF journalists who are traveling across Afghanistan and visiting every Regional Command in 30 days. They are almost done, but you can go back to the first entries and follow along. I'm doing that now. It's a perspective from two US military guys who support the mission, but it looks pretty straightforward to me and not just propaganda. It seems like a genuine effort to help people understand what is going on there and just how complex Afghanistan really is.

December 07, 2009

Fred Hiatt tries to weave similarities between how Bush announced his surge in Iraq in 2007 and how Obama announced his surge for Afghanistan last week:

No wonder conservatives are unhappy with the president. Imagine
undermining an announced escalation of troops by simultaneously laying
out a schedule for them to step back -- and suggesting that the mission
will end if the government that America is trying to help doesn't shape
up.

But wait -- it wasn't only President Obama who did those things but
also President George W. Bush, in announcing his Iraq surge in January
2007. Those who say that Obama doomed his Afghan strategy with his
promise to begin withdrawing in 18 months -- and who remember Bush's
strategy as nothing but a clarion call for unambiguous victory --
should go back and read the speech.

By all means, go back and read Bush's speech. The tone was somber compared to Obama's pissed off, petulant, and petty attitude. It was also remarkable in its specificity and consistency compared to the sometimes contradictory generalities that President Obama gave us last week. But you don't need a detailed comparison to comprehend the differences in the way that Bush and Obama presented their surge strategies. All you need to do is look at the different effects.

After President Bush spoke in 2007, the Sunni and Shiite extremists blustered and took hope from Bush's domestic political opponents, but friend and foe alike in Iraq understood the President's resolve. After President Obama spoke, we got this:

The announcement of the July 2011 benchmark was also greeted with
concern during private conversations among American officials and their
counterparts in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and administration officials
in recent days have acknowledged that they were surprised by the
intensity of the anxiety among Afghan and Pakistani officials that the
United States would beat a hasty retreat from the region.

In response, the last week has seen a major attempt to reemphasize the "conditions" that Obama briefly mentioned in his speech and we will see more of that this week. Which pretty much confirms the foolishness of setting a date in the first place. President Bush faced much of the same recalcitrance and corruption with Maliki that President Obama is seeing with Karzai, but he deftly managed to put pressure on Maliki through subtle public language and most likely very strong private language and behind the scenes engagement.

President Obama and his team, in their arrogance, had a model they could have worked with but they tossed it aside. Now they are scrambling to repair the damage that anybody not blinded by BDS would have avoided in the first place. Hiatt and friends do Obama no favors by trying to hide this incompetence, they simply enable more of the same.

It's going to be a long and painful 3 years if Obama doesn't get his shit together and people like Hiatt keep spinning his failures.

More: Perhaps Steve Den Beste has the explanation. That would account for Obama's cluelessness when it comes to the economy also. I buy it.

December 06, 2009

Something that Thomas Friedman notes in his latest column on Afghanistan has me wondering how well Afghan President Hamid Karzai knows American history. Friedman recalls this exchange between President Kennedy and Walter Cronkite on Sept. 2, 1963:

Cronkite: “Mr. President, the only hot war
we’ve got running at the moment is, of course, the one in Vietnam, and
we have our difficulties there.”

Kennedy:
“I don’t think that unless a greater effort is made by the [Vietnamese]
government to win popular support that the war can be won out there. In
the final analysis, it is their war. They are the ones who have to win
it or lose it. We can help them; we can give them equipment; we can
send our men out there as advisers. But they have to win it, the people
of Vietnam, against the Communists. We are prepared to continue to
assist them, but I don’t think that the war can be won unless the
people support the effort and, in my opinion, in the last two months,
the [Vietnamese] government has gotten out of touch with the people.
...”

Cronkite: “Do you think this government still has time to regain the support of the people?”

Kennedy:
“I do. With changes in policy and perhaps with personnel I think it
can. If it doesn’t make those changes, the chances of winning it would
not be very good.”

Unknown to Cronkite at the time, and unremarked on by Friedman in his column today, is that "cable 243" had been sent out a week earlier and had already set in motion what would eventually be the overthrow and murder of the then-President of South Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem(Kennedy absolutely was aware of it though). That cable in part read:

....US would find it impossible to continue support GVN militarily and
economically unless above steps are taken immediately which we
recognize requires removal of Nhus from the scene. We wish give Diem
reasonable opportunity to remove Nhus, but if he remains obdurate, then
we are prepared to accept the obvious implication that we can no longer
support Diem. You may also tell appropriate military commanders we will
give them direct support in any interim period of breakdown central
government mechanism.

Exactly two months after that interview, Diem lay dead in the back of a rebel APC. Fast forward 46 years and we once again have the United States, with a young president in office, involved in a war and grumbling about corruption and incompetence in the government it is supporting. And note the coincidence that the Nhu(Nhus?) referenced above was Diem's brother and that Karzai's own brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, has been sharply criticized recently for ties to the drug trade.

The parallel is certainly not perfect or exact and times have changed; administrations don't have the same ability to do things quietly that they once had. I just think it's interesting that Friedman used that example today when we have an administration openly griping about corruption and incompetence in Afghanistan.

I mean, it would take a particularly arrogant and inexperienced administration to attempt to pull off a coup in Afghanistan, right?