progress and hope

[unhappycamper]

Battle for Kandahar will be non-traditional
By Anne Gearan - The Associated Press
Posted : Saturday May 29, 2010 10:33:38 EDT

WASHINGTON — In the make-or-break struggle for Kandahar, birthplace of Afghanistan’s Taliban insurgency, U.S. commanders will try to pull off the military equivalent of brain surgery: defeating the militants with minimal use of force.

The goal of U.S.-led NATO forces will be to avoid inspiring support for the Taliban even as the coalition tries to root them out when the Kandahar operation begins in earnest next month.

The ancient silk road city — a dust-covered, impoverished jumble of one- and two-story concrete and mud brick — may not look like much of a prize.

But Kandahar, with a population of more than a million, was once the Taliban’s informal capital and an al-Qaida stronghold. It has served for centuries as a smuggler’s crossroads and trading hub linking southern Afghanistan to the Indian subcontinent.

President Obama’s counterinsurgency strategy focuses on protecting population centers such as Kandahar from Taliban predation, with the hope of building support for the center government in Kabul.



unhappycamper comment: Great. Now the Afghans are gonna get some Obama 'hope'. For this, we are paying $200,000 a minute in the sandbox. :grr: