Taliban eat into Afghanistan's core

[xchrom]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/NB04Df05.html

SLAMABAD - As the United States steps up efforts to engage the Taliban and al-Qaeda in a peace process for Afghanistan, elements of the Taliban have initiated their own plan focusing on regaining the power they lost in 2001 following the US-led invasion.

This involves hijacking the efforts and finances that the US is investing in training and equipping the Afghan National Army (ANA) and the Afghan National Police (ANP).

Well-placed sources in the Taliban who are based in the Pakistan tribal region on the border with Afghanistan have told Asia Times Online on the condition of anonymity that massive numbers from



both the ANA and the ANP will switch and join the Taliban on the eve of the scheduled withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan.
The US and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) set a deadline for all security tasks to be transferred to Afghan forces by the end of 2014. However, this week, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said that US troops would phase out their combat role by mid-2013.

NATO plans to expand the size of Afghanistan's security forces from the current 310,000 to 350,000 soldiers and police while Washington currently has about 90,000 troops in Afghanistan, down from a high of just over 100,000 last summer. It plans to withdraw another 22,000 by the end of this summer. In all, the International Security Assistance Force numbers 130,000 with troops from 50 nations.

"As many as 32 policemen of the puppet Afghan army have already switched sides and joined the mujahideen of the Islamic Emirate in Wardaj, Badakhshan province [in the northeast of Afghanistan], handing their weapons over to the mujahideen and vowing to fight against the invading forces and their minions," a Taliban member told Asia Times Online.

[BlueToTheBone]

1. Sigh.

This is really terrible news. I remember the pickups driving around the stadium shooting women in the head. I somehow don't think their attitudes have changed one iota toward women and our role in the world.

[xchrom]

2. they might be a little better behaved -- for fear of armies coming back.

but it won't be a bed of roses.

regardless -- we need to go.

there was no global commitment to seriously rebuilding afghanistan -- and that that rebuilding would means years.

[unhappycamper]

3. And the Afghanistan adventure continues........

Afghanistanization will end up the same way Vietnamization did.

It will end when our congresscritters grow some balls and stop it. Or we run out of money. Whichever comes first.

[xchrom]

4. you sum it up well.

very sad state of affairs.

[bemildred]

5. I just don't understand, why don't those Taliban people go home where they belong?