Pakistani Taliban on the ropes?

I know it has been a while since I posted, but since the crazy Veterans Day weekend in Las Vegas I have been swamped with things on my plate and just physically unable to sit down and write. But now I am able to get back to some blogging and would like to start with this one.

It seems from some recent stories coming out of overseas news outlets that the Taliban in Pakistan are starting to feel the pressure of US drone and Pakistan Army attacks.

Peshawar, Pakistan – After a deadly campaign of attacks, the Pakistani Taliban are weakened and exploring peace talks with authorities perceived as increasingly at odds with the United States, observers say.
Taliban commanders now say they have started initial talks with Islamabad, mediated by former army officials, in a move that could end years of “holy war” that saw 500 attacks killing more than 4 700 people, according to an AFP tally.
The army and the spokesman for the main umbrella Tehreek-e-Taliban faction, allied to al-Qaeda, strongly denied the claims and low-level violence continues on a near daily basis, as do clashes between troops and militants.
Any negotiations underway need to be taken with a large pinch of salt. Rebel factions are eclectic and nebulous and it remains unclear whether they are united enough to clinch a deal or how long any such deal would last.
Nevertheless, the rhythm of attacks has changed dramatically in Pakistan, with the death toll steadily diminishing in a pattern that continued after US Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden in the garrison city of Abbottabad on May 2.
Significantly, there has been no major Islamist militant attack in Pakistan since a suicide bomber killed 46 people at a funeral in the northwestern district of Lower Dir on September 15.
According to an AFP tally, around 800 people have been killed in bomb attacks so far this year, significantly fewer than the 1 360
killed in 2010.
About 556 people died in attacks in the six months before bin Laden was killed and 412 in the six months afterwards.
“TTP was at its peak in 2007-2008. But it has since been weakened and is divided,” said Saifullah Khan Mehsud, an analyst at the FATA Research Centre, a think tank dedicated to the Afghan border areas where Taliban are based.
In 2009, the Taliban marched to within 100 kilometres of the capital Islamabad, sending Western allies into a tailspin of panic, worried that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons could fall into rebel hands.
The army went on the offensive, local anti-Taliban militias proliferated and the rebels were pushed back into the mountains on the Afghan border. TTP founder Baitullah Mehsud was killed in a US drone strike in August 2009.
Islamist militants’ main base, the tribal district of North Waziristan, has been targeted for three years by US drone strikes which “kill TTP militants for the most part”, according to one frequent visitor to the district.
The army has also stepped up searches and checkpoints on the roads linking the semi-autonomous tribal zone to the rest of the country. More and more rebels are also reported to have fled into Afghanistan.
“It is much more difficult for militants to move around. Overall, their network has been disrupted,” said the frequent visitor to North Waziristan.
A number of observers also say the TTP is short of money. Two of its main sources of income – kidnappings for ransom and donations from local traders – have dried up.
Potential kidnapping victims are taking more precautions and people are less inclined to cough up cash when civilians are so often killed in their attacks. …

Continue reading →

Additional Campaign Phase Identified for Afghanistan Campaign Medal

The Department of Defense announced today that an additional campaign phase has been approved for the Afghanistan Campaign Medal (ACM). Accordingly, an additional campaign star corresponding to the campaign phase is now authorized for wear on the ACM.

     ACM campaign stars recognize a service member’s participation in DoD-designated military campaigns in the Afghanistan Campaign Medal’s area of eligibility.

     Service members who have qualified for the ACM may display a bronze campaign star on their medal for each designated campaign phase in which they participated. The stars are worn on the suspension and campaign ribbon of the campaign medal.

     The additional ACM campaign phase and associated dates are:

Transition I July 1, 2011 through a date to be determined.

     The four previously approved ACM campaign phases are:

Liberation of Afghanistan – Sept. 11, 2001 to Nov. 30, 2001

Consolidation I – Dec. 1, 2001 to Sept. 30, 2006

Consolidation II – Oct. 1, 2006 to Nov. 30, 2009

Consolidation III – Dec. 1, 2009 through June 30, 2011.

      Service members should contact their respective military departments for specific implementation guidance.

Another very sad day in Afghanistan

It looks like Saturday has turned into another sad day for Coalition and our Afghan partners in Afghanistan.

Two suicide bombers, one of them a woman, blew themselves up, claiming at least four lives while an Afghan soldier shot dead four people, including three NATO soldiers, in Afghanistan Saturday, officials said.

A woman suicide bomber blew herself up next to the department of National Directorate for Security in Kunar province capital Assadabad, killing one person and injuring five others, including three policemen, an official told Xinhua.

The second suicide bomber blew up his explosives-laden car around 11.30 a.m. near a NATO convoy in Darul Aman road in the western part of Kabul Saturday morning, police spokesman Hashmat Stanikezy told Xinhua.

Meanwhile, an Afghan soldier opened fire and killed four people, including three NATO soldiers, and their local interpreter in Uruzgan province, said General Abdul Hamid Wardak, Afghan army commander in the southern region.

Reports are now coming out saying the VBIED (car-bomb) in Kabul killed 13 American service-members. When I first heard that I wondered “why 13?”, as it seemed like a weird number. You really can’t cram 13 in a HUMVEE or MRAP and since it was a convoy I doubt they could blow up three MRAPs from one VBIED. However I am now hearing it was an attack on a bus.

It was one of the Armored buses called a RHINO.

In Kabul, the suicide bomber targeted an armored bus that was part of a convoy of mine-resistant armored military vehicles traveling on a road in the southwest end of the city. NATO said there were “several” causalities among its forces and Afghan civilians, but did not provide details.

The Afghan Ministry of Interior said three Afghan civilians and one policeman died in the Kabul attack. Eight other Afghans — two members of the Afghan security forces and six civilians, including two children — were wounded, said Kabir Amiri, head of Kabul hospitals.

The attack occurred near the ladmark Darulaman Palace, the bombed-out seat of former Afghan kings. Continue reading →

Too long in coming

Army Capt. Will Swenson has been recommended by the top U.S. general in Afghanistan for the Medal of Honor after widespread speculation about why his heroism had gone unrecognized, according to a published report.

Swenson braved enemy fire on Sept. 8, 2009, with Marine Cpl. Dakota Meyer, who will receive the nation’s top valor award Thursday at the White House. Meyer, now a sergeant in the Individual Ready Reserve, told Marine Corps Times recently that it was “ridiculous” Swenson already hadn’t received some form of valor award.

“I’ll put it this way,” the outspoken Meyer said in an interview. “If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t be alive today.”

Marine Gen. John Allen, the top commander in Afghanistan, took a personal interest in the fierce firefight in Ganjgal, Afghanistan, that led to Meyer’s award, according to a report published on The Wall Street Journal’s website Wednesday night. The record of the battle was reopened last month, and “given the four-star general’s personal interest, sworn statements attesting to Capt. Swenson’s valor were quickly found.”

“Gen. Allen has since forwarded a Medal of Honor recommendation, saying it was the right thing to do despite a lapse of two years,” the report said.

As the story says (www.navytimes.com/news/2011/09/military-medal-of-honor-william-swenson-report-ganjgal-hero-recommended-091411w/) this has taken too long to make happen and I along with many others are highly suspicious why it took so long for this recommendation to go forward.

This delayed recommendation has several scandalous facets to it. First and foremost is that even thought Dakota Meyer was nominated for and received the Medal of Honor, CPT Swenson was not even put in for an Army Commendation Medal, much less anything near MoH or the MoH itself. As documented in multiple sworn statements, CPT Swenson was side by side, performing the same heroic actions as Dakota Meyer. Continue reading →

Karzai has officially gone crazy

I am convinced that Karzai has officially lost his ever-loving mind and gone crazy…

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said if the United States and Pakistan ever went to war, his country would back Islamabad, drawing a sharp rebuke Sunday from Afghan lawmakers who claimed the country’s top officials were adopting hypocritical positions.

Read more: www.foxnews.com/world/2011/10/23/karzai-says-afghanistan-would-back-pakistan-if-us-attacks/#ixzz1bfX2PDiM

This guy has repeatedly opened his cake-hole and spouted some really stupid things. At a time when more and more Americans are starting to question our involvement and continued presence in Afghanistan, this was a dumbass thing to say.

It looks like some the members of the Afghan Parliament feel the same way.

The comments set off a firestorm of criticism in the country. Afghan lawmakers argued they were particularly hypocritical coming just weeks after the assassination of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani by a suicide bomber.

I almost want to see us go to war with Pakistan so we can see if he is talking B.S. or if he would really try to commit the fledging Afghan forces we are training, against us. That would be about the most destructive thing that Karzai could do for Afghanistan. The last ten years of progress would be wiped out almost instantly if he tried to turn the Afghan Army against US Forces. Of course I doubt the Army commanders would listen to him since he is nothing more than the Mayor of Kabul anyway.

I have said in the last couple of blog posts about him that I think he is crazy or drunk with power or something. The guy really needs to be removed and replaced. If he keeps up stuff like this, that may just happen.

Harboring the enemy makes you the enemy

I saw a story with a disturbing headline yesterday and I have to admit after reading it, I don’t seem to find anything wrong with this if it happened.

Villagers in Afghanistan say they were forced to walk ahead of Afghan and U.S. Soldiers along roads in areas believed to be mined by the Taliban.

National Public Radio reports villagers said the Afghan and U.S. troops pulled them from their homes one evening in early September and forced them to walk in front of the troops for more than a mile in the Panjwai district, southwest of Kandahar city.

No one was injured, but if the incident happened, it would appear to violate the Geneva Conventions governing treatment of civilians, NPR said.

Sure that may initially sound bad to the casual and ignorant observer, but the reality is that most of these people (especially those in places like Panjwaj district) are harboring and allowing Taliban and enemy fighters to operate there.

Regardless if it was Afghan soldiers or US soldiers who came up with this idea and executed it, the reality is that for a area to be a Taliban stronghold means the local populace supports them, which in turn makes them the enemy for the time-being.

The Panjwai district had been a Taliban stronghold until the U.S. troop surge in 2010 started to displace insurgents, NPR said. The Taliban now use roadside bombs and suicide bombers to fight there, said Faizal Mahmud, the deputy head of Panjwai’s council of elders. Continue reading →

If Iraq wants our troops to stay, it is on our terms

It seems that leaders in Iraq do want the USA’s help with troops beyond December 31st, but they don’t want to meet our requirements for protecting our troops.

Iraqi leaders have said they need U.S. military trainers to stay beyond a year-end deadline for American forces to leave but that the troops should not be granted immunity from prosecution.

The late Tuesday evening announcement was significant in that the Iraqi leaders were clear on the need for further help. But it raised questions about the feasibility of ironing out an agreement when the immunity of American troops remains such a contentious issue.

I sure hope our military and civilian leadership does not give in on this. They need us, we don’t need them. If they want our help then it should be our way or no way. I am assuming we are not asking them to pay for our troops presence after the 31st so since they are getting it for free they must meet our demands.

Read the whole story at www.military.com/news/article/iraqi-leaders-want-us-troops-but-reject-immunity.html