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'US blames others for failures in Afghanistan'
Associated Press May 9, 2012
PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN - American efforts to engage in peace talks with insurgents in Afghanistan mean Washington can no longer expect Pakistan to attack all the militant factions on its side of the border, some of whom Islamabad is also reaching out to, said the commander of Pakistan's forces along the frontier.
In a sign of the bad blood between Washington and Islamabad, Lt Gen Khalid Rabbani also accused the US of seeking to make Pakistan a scapegoat for its failure to beat the insurgency in Afghanistan.
US and Nato officials say Pakistani tolerance of - or support for - Afghan factions operating on its soil is hobbling efforts to end the resistance to the foreign military presence in Afghanistan. The US wants Pakistan to launch an offensive or otherwise disrupt militant groups in North Waziristan, the stronghold for multiple insurgent networks on the border.
"Why do they raise their fingers toward Pakistan? It is shifting the blame to others," Gen Rabbani said in his offices in a highly secure section of the main northwestern city of Peshawar.
"Is Afghanistan free of Taliban? It has hundreds of thousands of them."
Gen Rabbani was interviewed yesterday, two days after militants in North Waziristan beheaded 13 Pakistani soldiers, including four that it captured when Pakistani troops raided a militant hideout.
The killings highlighted the military's dilemma in dealing with an area used by both the country's fiercest enemies, the Pakistani Taliban and Al Qaeda, and Afghan and Pakistani militants who are battling US-led forces in Afghanistan, but who the army believes do not pose a direct threat to Islamabad.
One powerful faction in North Waziristan is led by Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who is believed to have signed a non-aggression pact with the government but still funnels fighters into Afghanistan. Gen Rabbani defended the government's dealings with Mr Bahadur, saying "at the moment he seems to be trying to keep himself out of the trouble".
Washington has urged Pakistan to attack all the militants along the border, because it believes they are all equally dangerous.
Gen Rabbani said US and Nato were in contact with insurgents in Afghanistan to try to "co-opt them into the peace process".
"Similar things are true on this side of the border as well," he said. "Is it forbidden for us to do the same?"
The Pakistani army has launched anti-militant operations in six of the seven tribal regions along the Afghanistan border since 2004, retaking parts of the mountainous area and losing hundreds of soldiers in the attacks. But like the US-led forces, Pakistani forces have had trouble holding on the territory and attacks continue to roil the region.
Privately, some US officials agree with Pakistan's stated reason that it lacks the soldiers to move into North Waziristan and defeat the around 8,000 militants. But others in Congress and the army accuse Pakistan of keeping the insurgents as proxies to influence events in Afghanistan, especially the Haqqani network whose leadership is believed to be based in North Waziristan.
Repeating assurances by other top army officers, Gen Rabbani said several times that the army would launch operations in North Waziristan. But he did not say when this would happen, nor whether it would target all factions there.
"Something has to be done, and it's in the offing," said Gen Rabbani, who commands more than 150,000 soldiers and paramilitary forces in the rugged north-west.
"North Waziristan is the only region we haven't cleared. It should be done as early as possible."
US officials have been hoping to see the army move into North Waziristan since 2010, but now believe it is unlikely before 2014, when Washington is committed to bringing most of its soldiers home.
The unilateral American raid that killed Osama bin Laden last year hurt the relationship between the two countries. US air strikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers along the Afghanistan border in November effectively ended cooperation between the two forces. Islamabad ordered the closure of US and Nato supply lines.
Washington wants to rebuild ties with the country, but has had little success so far.
Afghan opium price hike to stir violence: minister
Reuters By Jack Kimball May 8, 2012
KABUL - The price of opium cultivated in Afghanistan is set to rise as the security forces step up their eradication efforts and a fungus ravages the poppies that yield it, squeezing supply and stirring violence, the country's drug chief said on Tuesday.
Zarar Ahmad Muqbel Osmani, the Minister of Counter Narcotics, said the expected price rise coupled with increasing demand from regional nations would make poppy cultivation more attractive to cash-strapped farmers, forcing the government to intensify its fight against the trade.
"The price hike will definitely pressure us a lot," Osmani told Reuters through an official translator inside his heavily-barricaded ministry, the walls of which were decorated with posters of eradication efforts across the country.
"The tendency towards cultivation will grow, it will create resistance, law and order issues, and it will raise the casualty rate (for the Afghan security forces)," he said.
Afghanistan supplies about 90 percent of the world's opium, from which heroin is made, and its poppy-driven economy helps fuel the decade-long war, lining insurgents' pockets with more than $100 million annually and earning traffickers billions more.
Eradication efforts - favored by top opium consumer Russia but condemned by the United States - and a fungus that leaves the poppy bulb without the liquid form of raw opium are now threatening to give insurgents even more cash by cutting output and driving up the price, Osmani said.
The fungus is hitting the poppy crop in the top producing provinces of Farah, Helmand and Kandahar, he added.
RISING VALUE
Osmani said low seizure rates of opium abroad posed a major problem to controlling production, with drug barons and insurgents in land-locked Afghanistan shipping tonnes of drugs annually through Iran, Pakistan and former Soviet central Asia.
The seizure rate in central Asia is only 4 percent while it is 3.5 percent in Pakistan and 9 percent in Iran, he said.
There is a foreign-funded push to wean farmers off poppy, a hardy crop that needs relatively little water, by offering incentives - such as subsidized seed and fertilizer - to grow legal crops, though the lure of poppy is proving hard to break.
In 2011, the farm-gate value of opium production more than doubled from the previous year to $1.4 billion and now accounts for 15 percent of the economy, the United Nations said.
With foreign combat forces leaving by the end of 2014, and with much of their cash and air power expected to go with them, the Afghan government will need more help fighting poppy cultivation, experts say.
According to the United Nations, opium is emerging as a new gold standard in Afghanistan, where traders and farmers are hoarding the drug as a source of ready cash to hedge against the risk of a power vacuum when foreign troops leave.
(Reporting by Jack Kimball; Editing by Amie Ferris-Rotman and Andrew Osborn)
The Taliban are divided and in retreat, insist top US officials
The Independent By Kim Sengupta Wednesday 09 May 2012
Tarin Kot, Afghanistan - Two of the most powerful American officials in Afghanistan have insisted that the Taliban are in retreat with its leadership divided, contradicting claims by senior figures in Washington that the insurgency has actually grown stronger since Barack Obama authorised the surge of forces two years ago.
The remarkably confident assessment by the two officials – General John Allen, the head of international forces in the country, and the US ambassador, Ryan Crocker – comes weeks ahead of a crucial summit in Chicago to set up the blueprint for Nato's exit path from the long and costly war and organise a support system for Afghanistan after the 2014 withdrawal.
Senator Dianne Feinstein and Representative Mike Rogers, the chairs respectively of the Senate and House intelligence committees, recently visited Afghanistan and said on Sunday that the Taliban still controlled swathes of the country and could be in a position to attempt to seize back power in the future. But Mr Crocker and General Allen insisted that the real risk to a stable post-conflict landscape would come if the international community failed to provide the necessary funding for the Afghan military and the country's infrastructure.
"There is pretty clear evidence that the surge has accomplished a great deal," Gen Allen told The Independent during a visit to Uruzgan province. "It has not been just a surge of military, but a surge of capacity building. The Afghan security forces have made tremendous progress and they are moving into the lead very effectively. They are having tremendous success in the battlefield and this will continue."
Gen Allen held that many in the insurgent ranks are seeking peace. "They see their leaders safe in Pakistan while they are doing the fighting. We have seen how the process of reintegration is progressing," he said. "This time last year we had 600 to 700 going home, now this is more than 4,000."
The current focus is on Chicago, where one of the main aims will be to work out the future strength of the Afghan security forces. It is due to reach 352,000 by the autumn, with plans to reduce them to about 230,000 after Nato leaves, primarily for cost reasons. A smaller force would mean a reduction of the budget from $6bn (£3.7bn) to $4.2bn.
Mr Crocker said the numbers of Afghan forces should be kept to the higher limit until the security situation allowed a cutback, and stressed that a premature reduction would risk losing what had been gained by the "sacrifice of blood and treasure". He said funding of the final total should continue as long as necessary.
"Because if we decide that we're done, it's taking too long, and costs too much, and we're tired and don't want to do it anymore and back out of this before we give the Afghans the means ... then we have set the stage for the next 9/11," he said in Kabul. "So a little bit of reinvestment that can assure us all that Afghanistan will be able to secure its own future is, I think, not too much to ask."
There was agreement between Mr Crocker and the Congressional leaders about the threat posed to Afghanistan by insurgents based in Pakistan. Ms Feinstein and Mr Rogers want the Haqqani Network – which the Pakistani spy agency, the ISI, has been accused of backing – to be prescribed as a terrorist organisation.
And the US ambassador, who said the Pakistani safe havens remained "the single biggest obstacle to peace", rejected calls from Islamabad for an American apology over an air strike following a cross-border shooting in which 22 Pakistani soldiers were killed.
"I would have to tell you, having had my embassy in Kabul attacked twice by Pakistan-based insurgents – and this is American soil – I'm not really much inclined toward an apology." He added: "I have also been to Miranshah [in Pakistan] and seen just how close geographically the Haqqani base is to ISI headquarters in the area."
The apprehension caused by a drawdown of Afghan forces with the renewed attacks by insurgents was forcefully pointed out to Gen Allen by the head of the Uruzgan elders council, Haji Saktar Mohammed Shah at a meeting.
"Our village was in such a dangerous area that neither the army nor the police dared to go there," he said. "But now things are so much better that even one policeman can go there by walking. But now we are told the police taksil (numbers) are to be cut. This will put us back in danger, please don't let this happen."
48 Afghan army personnel killed within 20 days: official
KABUL, May 9 (Xinhua) -- A total of 48 personnel of Afghan army have been killed in the last 20 days in the militancy-hit country, a spokesman for Defense Ministry said on Wednesday.
"As many as 48 Afghan National Army (ANA) personnel lost their lives during military operations and security incidents across the country over the past 20 days," General Zahir Azimi told reporters in weekly press briefing here.
He said 71 more soldiers and officers had been injured at the same period of time.
Taliban insurgents, whose regime was toppled in a U.S.-led incursion in late 2001, have intensified activities since the militant group announced on May 2 to launch a spring rebel offensive against Afghan security forces and NATO-led troops stationed in Afghanistan form May 3.
"As we speak here right now, a total of 27 military operations are going on across the country to ensure security and protect the people from insurgent attacks," Azimi further said.
He also added that the army soldiers had detected and defused 192 roadside bombs and Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) at the same period of time, besides seizing 91 rounds of weapons and discovering 1,652 kg of explosive materials.
The Afghan army also seized five vehicles and 42 motorbikes used by insurgents and found 847 km of illicit drugs, he said.
Without disclosing the exact date, Azimi said that Afghan army and police will soon start the third phase of security transition and will take over security responsibility of more cities and districts from the NATO and U.S. forces.
Transition of security responsibilities from NATO forces to Afghan army and police begun in July, 2011 and runs through 2014 when Afghanistan is due to take over the full leadership of its own security duties from U.S. and NATO forces.
The Afghan forces and NATO troops have completed transition in the first two of five tranches of provinces and districts across the country where about half of the Afghan population now lives.
According to U.S. President Barack Obama's withdrawal plan, 10, 000 U.S. troops already pulled out from Afghanistan last year and another 23,000 will return home by September this year.
Iran Seeks to Scuttle U.S. Pact With Kabul
Wall Street Journal By NATHAN HODGE and HABIB KHAN TOTAKHIL May 8, 2012
KABUL - Iran is raising pressure on Afghanistan to scuttle a newly signed security accord with the U.S., threatening to deport Afghan refugees and migrant workers if Afghanistan's parliament ratifies the deal.
Fazal Hadi Muslimyar, the speaker of Afghanistan's upper house of parliament, told The Wall Street Journal that Tehran's newly appointed ambassador to Kabul told Afghan lawmakers last week that they should not ratify the U.S.-Afghan Strategic Partnership Agreement.
Signed by Presidents Barack Obama and Hamid Karzai in Kabul last week, the deal outlines what military and political role the U.S. will play in Afghanistan after most foreign forces withdraw in 2014.
Tehran has made no secret of its displeasure with the accord. Ramin Mehmanparast, the spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry, said Sunday that the presence of U.S. forces was destabilizing the region, and that peace could be achieved in Afghanistan only by the complete withdrawal of foreign troops.
Iran's large Afghan refugee population gives Tehran leverage over Afghanistan's cash-strapped government.
Abdul Samad Hami, Afghanistan's deputy minister of refugees and repatriation, said Iran is home to around one million registered Afghan refugees, and a "moving number" of undocumented migrants.
Hundreds of thousands of Afghans go to Iran to seek work as manual laborers, often in construction, agriculture and other low-wage jobs.
Mr. Hami said both Iran and Pakistan have used the presence of Afghan migrants and refugees as a "political vehicle" to pressure Kabul.
Mr. Muslimyar, the parliamentarian, said he rebuffed the request made by the Iranian ambassador, Abolfazl Zohrehvand. "I told him that we are an independent country, and it's up to us with whom we want an agreement and with whom we don't," Mr. Muslimyar said he told Mr. Zohrehvand.
Other Afghan lawmakers voiced similar sentiments. Khalid Pashtoon, a parliamentarian from Kandahar, called the Iranian demand a "very clear interference" in the internal affairs of Afghanistan.
Pressure from Iran, Mr. Pashtoon added, would ensure the accord's ratification. "Now it'll be 100% endorsement," he said.
Mr. Karzai accepted Mr. Zohrehvand's credentials just last month. The Iranian Embassy in Kabul and Iran's foreign ministry didn't respond to requests to comment.
At a briefing on Tuesday, State Department Spokesman Mark Toner said he wasn't aware of the situation but that the U.S. urged "Iran to play a constructive role."
Iran and Afghanistan have a close but complicated relationship. A dialect of Iran's Farsi language is one of Afghanistan's two official languages, and the two countries are proud of their shared cultural and historical heritage. Afghanistan's Shiite minority is also bonded with Iran by common faith.
As recently as in late 2010, Mr. Karzai was regularly receiving funds from the Iranian government to help pay for his office expenses. The relationship worsened since then, however, especially after Iran briefly shut its border with Afghanistan to the country's vital fuel supplies.
The latest diplomatic spat has touched off intense media scrutiny in Afghanistan, particularly after Afghan authorities arrested the Kabul correspondent for an Iranian news agency, claiming the man was spying for Tehran.
Iran's semi-official Fars News Agency said Sunday its correspondent in Kabul, Abdulvahed Hakimi, had been arrested by Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security.
An Afghan official said Mr. Hakimi had been detained on suspicion of passing classified documents to Iran. The official said Afghan authorities recently arrested two other Afghan nationals on suspicion of spying for Tehran.
Adding to the controversy were reports in the Afghan media that Afghanistan's diplomatic mission in Iran was recently harassed. Some employees at the Afghan Embassy in Tehran had recently been roughed up in the Iranian capital, according to a Western official and media reports.
The confrontation flared up as Western powers prepare for a second round of talks on Iran's controversial nuclear-enrichment program, which has brought Iran into open conflict with the West.
Heather Barr, the Human Rights Watch researcher in Afghanistan, said Iran had a pattern of using Afghanistan's vulnerable refugee population as a "political football" both in disputes with Afghanistan, as well as in response to pressure from the U.S.
"This is just the most recent of what's been a longstanding tendency by the Iranian government to use the presence of migrants and refugees as leverage in their dealings with Afghanistan," she said.
For Afghan Soldiers, A Battle For Respect
NPR By Quil Lawrence May 8, 2012
Last month, the Taliban carried out their largest coordinated attack across Afghanistan, including three sites inside the capital Kabul. It took an 18-hour gunfight to end the assault.
But even as they took cover, Kabul residents saw something new: their own soldiers taking the lead, with limited help from NATO. Television footage showed Afghan soldiers moving confidently into the building where the militants were holed up, avoiding reckless gunfire that might have endangered civilians in the crowded city.
Afghan troops appear to be slowly winning the respect of their population, as they take a more prominent role in security operations. At the same time, Afghan soldiers say they are not getting the same respect from the government they're fighting for.
Untold Stories Of Valor
One Afghan feeling new pride in his country's forces is Taj Mohammad Jabar Khel.
"If we don't send our sons to be police officers and soldiers, then who should protect our land and our honor?" asks Jabar Khel. "Should we depend on the Americans? No."
But a steely sadness tempers Jabar Khel's pride. His 28-year-old son, Zamman, died in the building as part of an Afghan SWAT team. Two years ago he lost another son — an army colonel — to a Taliban ambush.
If all my boys are killed serving God and country, so be it, says Jabar Khel, who has three more sons in the military.
Afghan commanders say their soldiers and police don't always win medals, and stories of valor don't always make the paper. But there are plenty of stories.
Abdul Rizaq, 22, says he joined the police to serve his country -– but mostly to support his family with the $240 monthly salary. Two years into his work in Paktika province, he joined Afghan soldiers on a mission to capture a Taliban commander in the town of Yahya Khel. The attack ended with Rizaq kicking a grenade out of the enemy commander's hand before the man could pull out the pin.
Rizaq says he threw himself on top of the insurgent, and his partner helped cuff him. He did get a commendation for the arrest, but Rizaq and his comrades are under no illusions -– they say there is little compensation for what they do — and plenty of risk.
Jobless And Lacking Benefits
Amanullah Ahmadzai, a 27-year-old Afghan army veteran, is also from Paktika. On his very first mission, his convoy hit a roadside bomb.
Ahmadzai had one eye to his gun sight; the shrapnel hit his other eye. There was no ambulance with the Afghan convoy. The Americans eventually helped get him to a hospital, but it was Kabul's then-notorious military hospital. In years past, patients there brought their own food or faced starvation. They paid bribes to get medical treatment.
Doctors operated on Ahmadzai's eye — without anesthetic. He eventually spent twice his military severance pay to get treated in neighboring Pakistan.
But now, Ahmadzai says, he can't get a job and his disability pension doesn't always arrive.
These kinds of stories abound. Benefits getting skimmed off by commanders. Soldiers have to chip in to buy coffins for their slain comrades. Soldiers get stuck on the front line year after year because it takes a bribe to get sent to a safer place. Soldiers are killed in action, and their children end up begging in the street.
"I don't want anything special from the government," says Ahmadzai. "All I want is some respect not only for me, but also for all disabled veterans."
As The Clock Ticks, Americans Train Afghan Troops
NPR By Tom Bowman May 8, 2012
Just outside Kandahar, the main city in southern Afghanistan, the U.S. military is starting a new program it hopes will wean Afghan troops off American assistance.
A dozen or so American soldiers make up one of the Security Force Assistance Teams, and the goal is to help the Afghan army plan for operations and supply itself in the field.
But the mission is still a work in progress.
A massive white generator, the size of a garden shed, sits in the dusty heat, giving off a constant hum. It powers the lights, computers and air conditioners for the Afghan army battalion in the Panjwei District. More than 500 Afghan soldiers are housed in a collection of old tents and wooden buildings on one side of this American outpost.
The problem is, the Afghans still get fuel for their generator from the Americans, and the Americans have had enough of that. They say it's time for Afghans to get the fuel from their own government.
The dispute is one of Lt. Adam Mancini's greatest headaches.
"Today they came by at 11 o'clock and it's like that every day," he says. "They expect me to be there like a gas station and give them gas whenever they need it."
Getting Their Own Fuel
Mancini is a burly, easygoing officer from Framingham, Mass., and he just started on this training team three weeks ago. But he already knows that unless the Afghans learn to requisition fuel from their government, he will be stuck as their gas station attendant.
Sure enough, Afghan soldiers come and pick up fuel, strapping the cans to their back.
Mancini says his commander has threatened to cut them off.
"You know, they're gonna have to learn," Mancini says. "So once we leave they can stand up on their own, fight the Taliban and create more stability on their own."
The fuel is just one problem. This American training team also is trying to wean the Afghans off American bottled water, get them to fix their own radios, and plan their own missions.
The Americans hope to create more than 100 of these training teams in Afghanistan in the coming months.
Taking Responsibility In Two Years
It's all part of an effort to get the Afghans to become self-sufficient before the Americans hand over responsibility in two years.
As the Afghan soldiers fill the gas cans, one of their officers, Sgt. Maj. Jalaka Hasar, wanders over. He has a trim beard, deep lines in his face, and the swagger of command. He insists the Afghan army can now defend its own soil.
"They can help us to fight; they can give us training courses," he says of the American forces.
Meanwhile, Mancini finishes filling all the fuel cans and heads over to the Afghan battalion headquarters to get signatures for the fuel.
He greets the battalion's logistics officer.
"Can you put in a request for the amount of fuel we are giving you daily?" Mancini asks.
But the Afghan lieutenant has a stack of papers, and a stack of excuses, for why he can't supply diesel fuel for his soldiers.
"I will talk to each company; I want from them serial numbers from each generator. So can we put a request in for them for fuel," Mancini explains. "OK, now how long is it going to take?"
The Afghan says it will be "one month or maybe less than one month."
Mancini shrugs.
"So in the meantime, we have to give you fuel daily? Cause I'm not sure how long Col. Rutherford is going to go along with that," Mancini says, referring to Col. Wilson Rutherford, the tough-love officer who commands the U.S. battalion.
A Tense Exchange
The Afghan lieutenant suddenly jumps up, slams his chair back, and storms out of the meeting. He returns a few minutes later and signs for the fuel his men took.
Mancini collects the papers and heads outside.
"It's just frustrating cause the system doesn't make sense to me. The colonel may cut them off in a week or so," says Mancini. "It's one way they get to learn something."
We ask Rutherford, the battalion commander, whether he would cut off fuel to the Afghans?
"At least not in the near term," he says.
Still, he adds, the Afghans have to do more for themselves.
"I'm going to give them some things, but not everything," he says.
Mancini, meanwhile, has eight more months for his team to coax the Afghans to take care of themselves.
Bruce Hoffman: What Osama Was Thinking at the End
Bin Laden was more fearful that his men might be affected by the weather than by any effort of the Pakistani government to apprehend them.
Wall Street Journal By BRUCE HOFFMAN May 8, 2012
By releasing 17 documents seized last year from Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, the U.S. government has supplied a needed corrective to the bunkum that has passed for analysis throughout the war on terrorism's first decade. For too long, government officials and pundits alike have made extravagant and incorrect claims about the weakness of al Qaeda and the irrelevance of its founding leader.
Americans were repeatedly told that al Qaeda had ceased to exist as an organizational entity, that it had become nothing more than a hollow shell, a leaderless group of disparate individuals unconnected to any central authority. Bin Laden was said to be completely estranged from the movement he created: living in a remote cave, isolated from his fighters, sympathizers and supporters, unable to exercise any meaningful role in the movement's operations and future trajectory.
The picture that emerges from the seized Arabic-language documents is of a leader involved in both al Qaeda's day-to-day operations and long-term strategy. Ever the policy wonk, opining on topics as diverse as the "Arab Spring" and the declining U.S. economy, bin Laden also retained his penchant for attempting to micromanage—however unresponsive his franchises and affiliates may have been beyond the villa.
Given the severe limitations imposed on bin Laden by the U.S. intelligence and military operations, it is striking how far his movement has been able to expand beyond South Asia. The documents indisputably depict an al Qaeda that in 2011 had an active presence in more places than it did on Sept. 11, 2001. Bin Laden himself is seen as struggling to control this now geographically far-flung organization, determined to try to shape events in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia and Iraq, among other places.
That he may have been "out of sync" or had fraught relations with the affiliates is therefore not surprising. This was the trade-off he accepted after 2001 to ensure the movement's survival by devolving power to the local franchises. Nonetheless, he remained both determined and able to communicate his wishes to al Qaeda's growing stable of associates. Getting them to listen was of course a problem familiar to any manager coping with rapid expansion.
Much has already been made in previous document leaks of bin Laden's musings about the need to rebrand al Qaeda in light of its waning influence and tarnished image in the Muslim world, a result of its affiliates killing more of their coreligionists than their declared enemies. But a careful reading of the declassified documents (made available through the U.S. Military Academy's Combating Terrorism Center) presents a more nuanced understanding of bin Laden's preoccupation with this issue.
His concerns in fact centered on his belief that Western media and al Qaeda's enemies were misportraying the movement by focusing only on its violent side and ignoring its political aims and aspirations. Bin Laden thus sought a new name for the movement that would more accurately reflect its ideological pretensions and self-appointed role as defender of Muslims everywhere.
Perhaps the most notable communication, however, is one dated Aug. 27, 2010. In it, bin Laden fears for the safety of his fighters and followers in Pakistan—not because they might be arrested or detained by the authorities, but because torrential rains and flooding were then afflicting that country.
This is astonishing. Bin Laden was more fearful that his men might be affected by the weather than by any effort of the Pakistani government to apprehend them. This assertion alone speaks volumes about how comfortable he and his minions found their refuge there.
There is little in the documents that suggests it was terribly difficult for al Qaeda fighters to travel from Iran to Pakistan—or, for that matter, between Afghanistan and Pakistan. And there's no indication that, once in Pakistan, they had any trouble traversing Baluchistan en route to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas or North-West Frontier Province, two of the movement's favorite haunts.
All this information is so illuminating that one wonders why the White House announced last Thursday that it has no plans to release any more of the material gathered at Abbottabad. Usually documents are classified to protect intelligence sources and methods. In this case, however, everyone knows the source of these documents and the method by which they were obtained.
Those with whom bin Laden was in communication also already know that the U.S. government has possessed these communications for more than a year. They presumably changed their security procedures long ago.
Why, then, are there no plans to release any more documents? Given that there reportedly are several thousand more, what logic is there to release so few but refuse to declassify so many others? How and why were the 17 documents released last week selected?
What do the other documents tell us about al Qaeda's relationship with Afghan and Pakistani militant groups—or with elements of the Pakistani government and other countries, including Iran? What were al Qaeda's relations with other extremist groups across the globe—especially in North and West Africa, the Levant and Southeast Asia?
After the thousands of American lives that have been lost thus far in the war on terrorism, and the billions of dollars consumed by this monumental struggle, the American public surely deserves to be afforded the fullest possible picture of the person and the movement that so irrevocably changed our lives.
Mr. Hoffman, a distinguished scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, is director of Georgetown University's Center for Security Studies and a senior fellow at the U.S. Military Academy's Combating Terrorism Center.
Tortured Afghan teen on attackers: 'The same should be done to them'
CNN By Nick Paton Walsh and Ashley Fantz May 9, 2012
Editor's note: CNN does not usually reveal the identities of women and girls who allege they have been raped, but this young woman wanted to be seen and tell her story.
Last year, people around the world were outraged when they heard the story of Sahar Gul.
The Afghan teen was married off at 13. She said her husband, a member of the Afghan Army, raped her. Enraged because she didn't immediately get pregnant, her in-laws locked her in a basement for months, torturing her with hot pokers and ripping out her nails. Ultimately, she said, they wanted to force her into prostitution as punishment for failing her obligation as a woman.
"They told me to go to the basement because there were some guests coming to the house," she told CNN. "When I went there they came in and tied my hands and feet and pulled me upwards from above. They brought very little food for me.
"While going to the bathroom they used to beat me a lot. I was crying all this time," she said. "When they put electric shocks on my feet, I felt like I was going to die at that moment. I screamed and that's how our neighbors realized there was something happening. For one day and night I was unconscious, feeling dead."
Neighbors heard her cries and called authorities, who rescued the teenager in December.
Last weekend, Gul, now 14, trembled as she stood in court and listened to a Kabul judge hand down sentences to three of her attackers.
They each got 10 years. Her husband is still being sought.
"Ten years is not enough. They should have been given 50 years," the teenager told CNN journalists, who visited her recently in an Afghanistan safe house where more than a dozen other women are being counseled after experiencing horrific treatment.
"They should be punished in the prison. They hurt my eyes and pulled out my nail and hair, and the same should be done to them. whatever they did to me, the same should be done to them," she said.
Gul has become an international symbol of the struggle for women's rights in Afghanistan. The outcome of the case against her relatives has inevitably posed a larger question.
More than a decade since Western forces invaded Afghanistan, have there been enough real and meaningful advances in women's rights there?
If so, will that progress erode after the United States pulls out of the country in 2014 or be diminished while the United States continues to pursue a negotiated peace with the Taliban?
Under Taliban rule from 1996 to 2001, women were banned from classrooms, politics or employment. Women who wanted to leave home had to be escorted by a male relative and were forced to wear burqas. Those who disobeyed were publicly beaten. In some parts of Afghanistan in the late 1990s, locals were encouraged to blacken the windows on their homes so women inside could not be seen.
Rights groups have cited advances since then. In 2004, girls were formally guaranteed a right to an education under the Afghan constitution.
Human Rights Watch reports that nearly 2 million Afghan girls are enrolled in school (though only a small number advance past elementary school, rights groups have reported).
Literacy rates are up for girls between 12 and 16, according to a 2011 Oxfam report.
Across Afghanistan, infant mortality rates have dropped and life expectancy has risen, according to Unicef.
Women who once had to quit their jobs have gone back to work as doctors, lawyers and police officers, Oxfam said.
But stories of honor killings, poisoned wells at girls schools and disfigurements persist.
President Hamid Karzai enacted the 2009 Elimination of Violence Against Women law, intended to help reduce violence against women committed through practices deemed traditional, such as so-called honor killings.
But the United Nations reported in June 2011 that the violence against women law was being enforced in only 10 of 34 provinces.
Also, from March 2010 to a year later, the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission registered 2,299 cases of violence against women that, according to the law, would be considered crimes.
Gul said she not only has to think about the trauma she's endured, but also she is still technically married to her attacker, and she fears it may not be safe to carry on living in Afghanistan.
"I think the punishment given by the court to these people worries me. The government is trying its best to find [my husband, convicted but on the run]," she said. "But if tomorrow he finds me, it's possible he could kill me.
"I want to go abroad," she continued. "If I sit here, they will find me. I want to go to school and study, to become a doctor or a prosecutor, so I can give punishment by myself to these sort of people. "
www.afghanistannewscentero.com
Associated Press May 9, 2012
PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN - American efforts to engage in peace talks with insurgents in Afghanistan mean Washington can no longer expect Pakistan to attack all the militant factions on its side of the border, some of whom Islamabad is also reaching out to, said the commander of Pakistan's forces along the frontier.
In a sign of the bad blood between Washington and Islamabad, Lt Gen Khalid Rabbani also accused the US of seeking to make Pakistan a scapegoat for its failure to beat the insurgency in Afghanistan.
US and Nato officials say Pakistani tolerance of - or support for - Afghan factions operating on its soil is hobbling efforts to end the resistance to the foreign military presence in Afghanistan. The US wants Pakistan to launch an offensive or otherwise disrupt militant groups in North Waziristan, the stronghold for multiple insurgent networks on the border.
"Why do they raise their fingers toward Pakistan? It is shifting the blame to others," Gen Rabbani said in his offices in a highly secure section of the main northwestern city of Peshawar.
"Is Afghanistan free of Taliban? It has hundreds of thousands of them."
Gen Rabbani was interviewed yesterday, two days after militants in North Waziristan beheaded 13 Pakistani soldiers, including four that it captured when Pakistani troops raided a militant hideout.
The killings highlighted the military's dilemma in dealing with an area used by both the country's fiercest enemies, the Pakistani Taliban and Al Qaeda, and Afghan and Pakistani militants who are battling US-led forces in Afghanistan, but who the army believes do not pose a direct threat to Islamabad.
One powerful faction in North Waziristan is led by Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who is believed to have signed a non-aggression pact with the government but still funnels fighters into Afghanistan. Gen Rabbani defended the government's dealings with Mr Bahadur, saying "at the moment he seems to be trying to keep himself out of the trouble".
Washington has urged Pakistan to attack all the militants along the border, because it believes they are all equally dangerous.
Gen Rabbani said US and Nato were in contact with insurgents in Afghanistan to try to "co-opt them into the peace process".
"Similar things are true on this side of the border as well," he said. "Is it forbidden for us to do the same?"
The Pakistani army has launched anti-militant operations in six of the seven tribal regions along the Afghanistan border since 2004, retaking parts of the mountainous area and losing hundreds of soldiers in the attacks. But like the US-led forces, Pakistani forces have had trouble holding on the territory and attacks continue to roil the region.
Privately, some US officials agree with Pakistan's stated reason that it lacks the soldiers to move into North Waziristan and defeat the around 8,000 militants. But others in Congress and the army accuse Pakistan of keeping the insurgents as proxies to influence events in Afghanistan, especially the Haqqani network whose leadership is believed to be based in North Waziristan.
Repeating assurances by other top army officers, Gen Rabbani said several times that the army would launch operations in North Waziristan. But he did not say when this would happen, nor whether it would target all factions there.
"Something has to be done, and it's in the offing," said Gen Rabbani, who commands more than 150,000 soldiers and paramilitary forces in the rugged north-west.
"North Waziristan is the only region we haven't cleared. It should be done as early as possible."
US officials have been hoping to see the army move into North Waziristan since 2010, but now believe it is unlikely before 2014, when Washington is committed to bringing most of its soldiers home.
The unilateral American raid that killed Osama bin Laden last year hurt the relationship between the two countries. US air strikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers along the Afghanistan border in November effectively ended cooperation between the two forces. Islamabad ordered the closure of US and Nato supply lines.
Washington wants to rebuild ties with the country, but has had little success so far.
Afghan opium price hike to stir violence: minister
Reuters By Jack Kimball May 8, 2012
KABUL - The price of opium cultivated in Afghanistan is set to rise as the security forces step up their eradication efforts and a fungus ravages the poppies that yield it, squeezing supply and stirring violence, the country's drug chief said on Tuesday.
Zarar Ahmad Muqbel Osmani, the Minister of Counter Narcotics, said the expected price rise coupled with increasing demand from regional nations would make poppy cultivation more attractive to cash-strapped farmers, forcing the government to intensify its fight against the trade.
"The price hike will definitely pressure us a lot," Osmani told Reuters through an official translator inside his heavily-barricaded ministry, the walls of which were decorated with posters of eradication efforts across the country.
"The tendency towards cultivation will grow, it will create resistance, law and order issues, and it will raise the casualty rate (for the Afghan security forces)," he said.
Afghanistan supplies about 90 percent of the world's opium, from which heroin is made, and its poppy-driven economy helps fuel the decade-long war, lining insurgents' pockets with more than $100 million annually and earning traffickers billions more.
Eradication efforts - favored by top opium consumer Russia but condemned by the United States - and a fungus that leaves the poppy bulb without the liquid form of raw opium are now threatening to give insurgents even more cash by cutting output and driving up the price, Osmani said.
The fungus is hitting the poppy crop in the top producing provinces of Farah, Helmand and Kandahar, he added.
RISING VALUE
Osmani said low seizure rates of opium abroad posed a major problem to controlling production, with drug barons and insurgents in land-locked Afghanistan shipping tonnes of drugs annually through Iran, Pakistan and former Soviet central Asia.
The seizure rate in central Asia is only 4 percent while it is 3.5 percent in Pakistan and 9 percent in Iran, he said.
There is a foreign-funded push to wean farmers off poppy, a hardy crop that needs relatively little water, by offering incentives - such as subsidized seed and fertilizer - to grow legal crops, though the lure of poppy is proving hard to break.
In 2011, the farm-gate value of opium production more than doubled from the previous year to $1.4 billion and now accounts for 15 percent of the economy, the United Nations said.
With foreign combat forces leaving by the end of 2014, and with much of their cash and air power expected to go with them, the Afghan government will need more help fighting poppy cultivation, experts say.
According to the United Nations, opium is emerging as a new gold standard in Afghanistan, where traders and farmers are hoarding the drug as a source of ready cash to hedge against the risk of a power vacuum when foreign troops leave.
(Reporting by Jack Kimball; Editing by Amie Ferris-Rotman and Andrew Osborn)
The Taliban are divided and in retreat, insist top US officials
The Independent By Kim Sengupta Wednesday 09 May 2012
Tarin Kot, Afghanistan - Two of the most powerful American officials in Afghanistan have insisted that the Taliban are in retreat with its leadership divided, contradicting claims by senior figures in Washington that the insurgency has actually grown stronger since Barack Obama authorised the surge of forces two years ago.
The remarkably confident assessment by the two officials – General John Allen, the head of international forces in the country, and the US ambassador, Ryan Crocker – comes weeks ahead of a crucial summit in Chicago to set up the blueprint for Nato's exit path from the long and costly war and organise a support system for Afghanistan after the 2014 withdrawal.
Senator Dianne Feinstein and Representative Mike Rogers, the chairs respectively of the Senate and House intelligence committees, recently visited Afghanistan and said on Sunday that the Taliban still controlled swathes of the country and could be in a position to attempt to seize back power in the future. But Mr Crocker and General Allen insisted that the real risk to a stable post-conflict landscape would come if the international community failed to provide the necessary funding for the Afghan military and the country's infrastructure.
"There is pretty clear evidence that the surge has accomplished a great deal," Gen Allen told The Independent during a visit to Uruzgan province. "It has not been just a surge of military, but a surge of capacity building. The Afghan security forces have made tremendous progress and they are moving into the lead very effectively. They are having tremendous success in the battlefield and this will continue."
Gen Allen held that many in the insurgent ranks are seeking peace. "They see their leaders safe in Pakistan while they are doing the fighting. We have seen how the process of reintegration is progressing," he said. "This time last year we had 600 to 700 going home, now this is more than 4,000."
The current focus is on Chicago, where one of the main aims will be to work out the future strength of the Afghan security forces. It is due to reach 352,000 by the autumn, with plans to reduce them to about 230,000 after Nato leaves, primarily for cost reasons. A smaller force would mean a reduction of the budget from $6bn (£3.7bn) to $4.2bn.
Mr Crocker said the numbers of Afghan forces should be kept to the higher limit until the security situation allowed a cutback, and stressed that a premature reduction would risk losing what had been gained by the "sacrifice of blood and treasure". He said funding of the final total should continue as long as necessary.
"Because if we decide that we're done, it's taking too long, and costs too much, and we're tired and don't want to do it anymore and back out of this before we give the Afghans the means ... then we have set the stage for the next 9/11," he said in Kabul. "So a little bit of reinvestment that can assure us all that Afghanistan will be able to secure its own future is, I think, not too much to ask."
There was agreement between Mr Crocker and the Congressional leaders about the threat posed to Afghanistan by insurgents based in Pakistan. Ms Feinstein and Mr Rogers want the Haqqani Network – which the Pakistani spy agency, the ISI, has been accused of backing – to be prescribed as a terrorist organisation.
And the US ambassador, who said the Pakistani safe havens remained "the single biggest obstacle to peace", rejected calls from Islamabad for an American apology over an air strike following a cross-border shooting in which 22 Pakistani soldiers were killed.
"I would have to tell you, having had my embassy in Kabul attacked twice by Pakistan-based insurgents – and this is American soil – I'm not really much inclined toward an apology." He added: "I have also been to Miranshah [in Pakistan] and seen just how close geographically the Haqqani base is to ISI headquarters in the area."
The apprehension caused by a drawdown of Afghan forces with the renewed attacks by insurgents was forcefully pointed out to Gen Allen by the head of the Uruzgan elders council, Haji Saktar Mohammed Shah at a meeting.
"Our village was in such a dangerous area that neither the army nor the police dared to go there," he said. "But now things are so much better that even one policeman can go there by walking. But now we are told the police taksil (numbers) are to be cut. This will put us back in danger, please don't let this happen."
48 Afghan army personnel killed within 20 days: official
KABUL, May 9 (Xinhua) -- A total of 48 personnel of Afghan army have been killed in the last 20 days in the militancy-hit country, a spokesman for Defense Ministry said on Wednesday.
"As many as 48 Afghan National Army (ANA) personnel lost their lives during military operations and security incidents across the country over the past 20 days," General Zahir Azimi told reporters in weekly press briefing here.
He said 71 more soldiers and officers had been injured at the same period of time.
Taliban insurgents, whose regime was toppled in a U.S.-led incursion in late 2001, have intensified activities since the militant group announced on May 2 to launch a spring rebel offensive against Afghan security forces and NATO-led troops stationed in Afghanistan form May 3.
"As we speak here right now, a total of 27 military operations are going on across the country to ensure security and protect the people from insurgent attacks," Azimi further said.
He also added that the army soldiers had detected and defused 192 roadside bombs and Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) at the same period of time, besides seizing 91 rounds of weapons and discovering 1,652 kg of explosive materials.
The Afghan army also seized five vehicles and 42 motorbikes used by insurgents and found 847 km of illicit drugs, he said.
Without disclosing the exact date, Azimi said that Afghan army and police will soon start the third phase of security transition and will take over security responsibility of more cities and districts from the NATO and U.S. forces.
Transition of security responsibilities from NATO forces to Afghan army and police begun in July, 2011 and runs through 2014 when Afghanistan is due to take over the full leadership of its own security duties from U.S. and NATO forces.
The Afghan forces and NATO troops have completed transition in the first two of five tranches of provinces and districts across the country where about half of the Afghan population now lives.
According to U.S. President Barack Obama's withdrawal plan, 10, 000 U.S. troops already pulled out from Afghanistan last year and another 23,000 will return home by September this year.
Iran Seeks to Scuttle U.S. Pact With Kabul
Wall Street Journal By NATHAN HODGE and HABIB KHAN TOTAKHIL May 8, 2012
KABUL - Iran is raising pressure on Afghanistan to scuttle a newly signed security accord with the U.S., threatening to deport Afghan refugees and migrant workers if Afghanistan's parliament ratifies the deal.
Fazal Hadi Muslimyar, the speaker of Afghanistan's upper house of parliament, told The Wall Street Journal that Tehran's newly appointed ambassador to Kabul told Afghan lawmakers last week that they should not ratify the U.S.-Afghan Strategic Partnership Agreement.
Signed by Presidents Barack Obama and Hamid Karzai in Kabul last week, the deal outlines what military and political role the U.S. will play in Afghanistan after most foreign forces withdraw in 2014.
Tehran has made no secret of its displeasure with the accord. Ramin Mehmanparast, the spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry, said Sunday that the presence of U.S. forces was destabilizing the region, and that peace could be achieved in Afghanistan only by the complete withdrawal of foreign troops.
Iran's large Afghan refugee population gives Tehran leverage over Afghanistan's cash-strapped government.
Abdul Samad Hami, Afghanistan's deputy minister of refugees and repatriation, said Iran is home to around one million registered Afghan refugees, and a "moving number" of undocumented migrants.
Hundreds of thousands of Afghans go to Iran to seek work as manual laborers, often in construction, agriculture and other low-wage jobs.
Mr. Hami said both Iran and Pakistan have used the presence of Afghan migrants and refugees as a "political vehicle" to pressure Kabul.
Mr. Muslimyar, the parliamentarian, said he rebuffed the request made by the Iranian ambassador, Abolfazl Zohrehvand. "I told him that we are an independent country, and it's up to us with whom we want an agreement and with whom we don't," Mr. Muslimyar said he told Mr. Zohrehvand.
Other Afghan lawmakers voiced similar sentiments. Khalid Pashtoon, a parliamentarian from Kandahar, called the Iranian demand a "very clear interference" in the internal affairs of Afghanistan.
Pressure from Iran, Mr. Pashtoon added, would ensure the accord's ratification. "Now it'll be 100% endorsement," he said.
Mr. Karzai accepted Mr. Zohrehvand's credentials just last month. The Iranian Embassy in Kabul and Iran's foreign ministry didn't respond to requests to comment.
At a briefing on Tuesday, State Department Spokesman Mark Toner said he wasn't aware of the situation but that the U.S. urged "Iran to play a constructive role."
Iran and Afghanistan have a close but complicated relationship. A dialect of Iran's Farsi language is one of Afghanistan's two official languages, and the two countries are proud of their shared cultural and historical heritage. Afghanistan's Shiite minority is also bonded with Iran by common faith.
As recently as in late 2010, Mr. Karzai was regularly receiving funds from the Iranian government to help pay for his office expenses. The relationship worsened since then, however, especially after Iran briefly shut its border with Afghanistan to the country's vital fuel supplies.
The latest diplomatic spat has touched off intense media scrutiny in Afghanistan, particularly after Afghan authorities arrested the Kabul correspondent for an Iranian news agency, claiming the man was spying for Tehran.
Iran's semi-official Fars News Agency said Sunday its correspondent in Kabul, Abdulvahed Hakimi, had been arrested by Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security.
An Afghan official said Mr. Hakimi had been detained on suspicion of passing classified documents to Iran. The official said Afghan authorities recently arrested two other Afghan nationals on suspicion of spying for Tehran.
Adding to the controversy were reports in the Afghan media that Afghanistan's diplomatic mission in Iran was recently harassed. Some employees at the Afghan Embassy in Tehran had recently been roughed up in the Iranian capital, according to a Western official and media reports.
The confrontation flared up as Western powers prepare for a second round of talks on Iran's controversial nuclear-enrichment program, which has brought Iran into open conflict with the West.
Heather Barr, the Human Rights Watch researcher in Afghanistan, said Iran had a pattern of using Afghanistan's vulnerable refugee population as a "political football" both in disputes with Afghanistan, as well as in response to pressure from the U.S.
"This is just the most recent of what's been a longstanding tendency by the Iranian government to use the presence of migrants and refugees as leverage in their dealings with Afghanistan," she said.
For Afghan Soldiers, A Battle For Respect
NPR By Quil Lawrence May 8, 2012
Last month, the Taliban carried out their largest coordinated attack across Afghanistan, including three sites inside the capital Kabul. It took an 18-hour gunfight to end the assault.
But even as they took cover, Kabul residents saw something new: their own soldiers taking the lead, with limited help from NATO. Television footage showed Afghan soldiers moving confidently into the building where the militants were holed up, avoiding reckless gunfire that might have endangered civilians in the crowded city.
Afghan troops appear to be slowly winning the respect of their population, as they take a more prominent role in security operations. At the same time, Afghan soldiers say they are not getting the same respect from the government they're fighting for.
Untold Stories Of Valor
One Afghan feeling new pride in his country's forces is Taj Mohammad Jabar Khel.
"If we don't send our sons to be police officers and soldiers, then who should protect our land and our honor?" asks Jabar Khel. "Should we depend on the Americans? No."
But a steely sadness tempers Jabar Khel's pride. His 28-year-old son, Zamman, died in the building as part of an Afghan SWAT team. Two years ago he lost another son — an army colonel — to a Taliban ambush.
If all my boys are killed serving God and country, so be it, says Jabar Khel, who has three more sons in the military.
Afghan commanders say their soldiers and police don't always win medals, and stories of valor don't always make the paper. But there are plenty of stories.
Abdul Rizaq, 22, says he joined the police to serve his country -– but mostly to support his family with the $240 monthly salary. Two years into his work in Paktika province, he joined Afghan soldiers on a mission to capture a Taliban commander in the town of Yahya Khel. The attack ended with Rizaq kicking a grenade out of the enemy commander's hand before the man could pull out the pin.
Rizaq says he threw himself on top of the insurgent, and his partner helped cuff him. He did get a commendation for the arrest, but Rizaq and his comrades are under no illusions -– they say there is little compensation for what they do — and plenty of risk.
Jobless And Lacking Benefits
Amanullah Ahmadzai, a 27-year-old Afghan army veteran, is also from Paktika. On his very first mission, his convoy hit a roadside bomb.
Ahmadzai had one eye to his gun sight; the shrapnel hit his other eye. There was no ambulance with the Afghan convoy. The Americans eventually helped get him to a hospital, but it was Kabul's then-notorious military hospital. In years past, patients there brought their own food or faced starvation. They paid bribes to get medical treatment.
Doctors operated on Ahmadzai's eye — without anesthetic. He eventually spent twice his military severance pay to get treated in neighboring Pakistan.
But now, Ahmadzai says, he can't get a job and his disability pension doesn't always arrive.
These kinds of stories abound. Benefits getting skimmed off by commanders. Soldiers have to chip in to buy coffins for their slain comrades. Soldiers get stuck on the front line year after year because it takes a bribe to get sent to a safer place. Soldiers are killed in action, and their children end up begging in the street.
"I don't want anything special from the government," says Ahmadzai. "All I want is some respect not only for me, but also for all disabled veterans."
As The Clock Ticks, Americans Train Afghan Troops
NPR By Tom Bowman May 8, 2012
Just outside Kandahar, the main city in southern Afghanistan, the U.S. military is starting a new program it hopes will wean Afghan troops off American assistance.
A dozen or so American soldiers make up one of the Security Force Assistance Teams, and the goal is to help the Afghan army plan for operations and supply itself in the field.
But the mission is still a work in progress.
A massive white generator, the size of a garden shed, sits in the dusty heat, giving off a constant hum. It powers the lights, computers and air conditioners for the Afghan army battalion in the Panjwei District. More than 500 Afghan soldiers are housed in a collection of old tents and wooden buildings on one side of this American outpost.
The problem is, the Afghans still get fuel for their generator from the Americans, and the Americans have had enough of that. They say it's time for Afghans to get the fuel from their own government.
The dispute is one of Lt. Adam Mancini's greatest headaches.
"Today they came by at 11 o'clock and it's like that every day," he says. "They expect me to be there like a gas station and give them gas whenever they need it."
Getting Their Own Fuel
Mancini is a burly, easygoing officer from Framingham, Mass., and he just started on this training team three weeks ago. But he already knows that unless the Afghans learn to requisition fuel from their government, he will be stuck as their gas station attendant.
Sure enough, Afghan soldiers come and pick up fuel, strapping the cans to their back.
Mancini says his commander has threatened to cut them off.
"You know, they're gonna have to learn," Mancini says. "So once we leave they can stand up on their own, fight the Taliban and create more stability on their own."
The fuel is just one problem. This American training team also is trying to wean the Afghans off American bottled water, get them to fix their own radios, and plan their own missions.
The Americans hope to create more than 100 of these training teams in Afghanistan in the coming months.
Taking Responsibility In Two Years
It's all part of an effort to get the Afghans to become self-sufficient before the Americans hand over responsibility in two years.
As the Afghan soldiers fill the gas cans, one of their officers, Sgt. Maj. Jalaka Hasar, wanders over. He has a trim beard, deep lines in his face, and the swagger of command. He insists the Afghan army can now defend its own soil.
"They can help us to fight; they can give us training courses," he says of the American forces.
Meanwhile, Mancini finishes filling all the fuel cans and heads over to the Afghan battalion headquarters to get signatures for the fuel.
He greets the battalion's logistics officer.
"Can you put in a request for the amount of fuel we are giving you daily?" Mancini asks.
But the Afghan lieutenant has a stack of papers, and a stack of excuses, for why he can't supply diesel fuel for his soldiers.
"I will talk to each company; I want from them serial numbers from each generator. So can we put a request in for them for fuel," Mancini explains. "OK, now how long is it going to take?"
The Afghan says it will be "one month or maybe less than one month."
Mancini shrugs.
"So in the meantime, we have to give you fuel daily? Cause I'm not sure how long Col. Rutherford is going to go along with that," Mancini says, referring to Col. Wilson Rutherford, the tough-love officer who commands the U.S. battalion.
A Tense Exchange
The Afghan lieutenant suddenly jumps up, slams his chair back, and storms out of the meeting. He returns a few minutes later and signs for the fuel his men took.
Mancini collects the papers and heads outside.
"It's just frustrating cause the system doesn't make sense to me. The colonel may cut them off in a week or so," says Mancini. "It's one way they get to learn something."
We ask Rutherford, the battalion commander, whether he would cut off fuel to the Afghans?
"At least not in the near term," he says.
Still, he adds, the Afghans have to do more for themselves.
"I'm going to give them some things, but not everything," he says.
Mancini, meanwhile, has eight more months for his team to coax the Afghans to take care of themselves.
Bruce Hoffman: What Osama Was Thinking at the End
Bin Laden was more fearful that his men might be affected by the weather than by any effort of the Pakistani government to apprehend them.
Wall Street Journal By BRUCE HOFFMAN May 8, 2012
By releasing 17 documents seized last year from Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, the U.S. government has supplied a needed corrective to the bunkum that has passed for analysis throughout the war on terrorism's first decade. For too long, government officials and pundits alike have made extravagant and incorrect claims about the weakness of al Qaeda and the irrelevance of its founding leader.
Americans were repeatedly told that al Qaeda had ceased to exist as an organizational entity, that it had become nothing more than a hollow shell, a leaderless group of disparate individuals unconnected to any central authority. Bin Laden was said to be completely estranged from the movement he created: living in a remote cave, isolated from his fighters, sympathizers and supporters, unable to exercise any meaningful role in the movement's operations and future trajectory.
The picture that emerges from the seized Arabic-language documents is of a leader involved in both al Qaeda's day-to-day operations and long-term strategy. Ever the policy wonk, opining on topics as diverse as the "Arab Spring" and the declining U.S. economy, bin Laden also retained his penchant for attempting to micromanage—however unresponsive his franchises and affiliates may have been beyond the villa.
Given the severe limitations imposed on bin Laden by the U.S. intelligence and military operations, it is striking how far his movement has been able to expand beyond South Asia. The documents indisputably depict an al Qaeda that in 2011 had an active presence in more places than it did on Sept. 11, 2001. Bin Laden himself is seen as struggling to control this now geographically far-flung organization, determined to try to shape events in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia and Iraq, among other places.
That he may have been "out of sync" or had fraught relations with the affiliates is therefore not surprising. This was the trade-off he accepted after 2001 to ensure the movement's survival by devolving power to the local franchises. Nonetheless, he remained both determined and able to communicate his wishes to al Qaeda's growing stable of associates. Getting them to listen was of course a problem familiar to any manager coping with rapid expansion.
Much has already been made in previous document leaks of bin Laden's musings about the need to rebrand al Qaeda in light of its waning influence and tarnished image in the Muslim world, a result of its affiliates killing more of their coreligionists than their declared enemies. But a careful reading of the declassified documents (made available through the U.S. Military Academy's Combating Terrorism Center) presents a more nuanced understanding of bin Laden's preoccupation with this issue.
His concerns in fact centered on his belief that Western media and al Qaeda's enemies were misportraying the movement by focusing only on its violent side and ignoring its political aims and aspirations. Bin Laden thus sought a new name for the movement that would more accurately reflect its ideological pretensions and self-appointed role as defender of Muslims everywhere.
Perhaps the most notable communication, however, is one dated Aug. 27, 2010. In it, bin Laden fears for the safety of his fighters and followers in Pakistan—not because they might be arrested or detained by the authorities, but because torrential rains and flooding were then afflicting that country.
This is astonishing. Bin Laden was more fearful that his men might be affected by the weather than by any effort of the Pakistani government to apprehend them. This assertion alone speaks volumes about how comfortable he and his minions found their refuge there.
There is little in the documents that suggests it was terribly difficult for al Qaeda fighters to travel from Iran to Pakistan—or, for that matter, between Afghanistan and Pakistan. And there's no indication that, once in Pakistan, they had any trouble traversing Baluchistan en route to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas or North-West Frontier Province, two of the movement's favorite haunts.
All this information is so illuminating that one wonders why the White House announced last Thursday that it has no plans to release any more of the material gathered at Abbottabad. Usually documents are classified to protect intelligence sources and methods. In this case, however, everyone knows the source of these documents and the method by which they were obtained.
Those with whom bin Laden was in communication also already know that the U.S. government has possessed these communications for more than a year. They presumably changed their security procedures long ago.
Why, then, are there no plans to release any more documents? Given that there reportedly are several thousand more, what logic is there to release so few but refuse to declassify so many others? How and why were the 17 documents released last week selected?
What do the other documents tell us about al Qaeda's relationship with Afghan and Pakistani militant groups—or with elements of the Pakistani government and other countries, including Iran? What were al Qaeda's relations with other extremist groups across the globe—especially in North and West Africa, the Levant and Southeast Asia?
After the thousands of American lives that have been lost thus far in the war on terrorism, and the billions of dollars consumed by this monumental struggle, the American public surely deserves to be afforded the fullest possible picture of the person and the movement that so irrevocably changed our lives.
Mr. Hoffman, a distinguished scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, is director of Georgetown University's Center for Security Studies and a senior fellow at the U.S. Military Academy's Combating Terrorism Center.
Tortured Afghan teen on attackers: 'The same should be done to them'
CNN By Nick Paton Walsh and Ashley Fantz May 9, 2012
Editor's note: CNN does not usually reveal the identities of women and girls who allege they have been raped, but this young woman wanted to be seen and tell her story.
Last year, people around the world were outraged when they heard the story of Sahar Gul.
The Afghan teen was married off at 13. She said her husband, a member of the Afghan Army, raped her. Enraged because she didn't immediately get pregnant, her in-laws locked her in a basement for months, torturing her with hot pokers and ripping out her nails. Ultimately, she said, they wanted to force her into prostitution as punishment for failing her obligation as a woman.
"They told me to go to the basement because there were some guests coming to the house," she told CNN. "When I went there they came in and tied my hands and feet and pulled me upwards from above. They brought very little food for me.
"While going to the bathroom they used to beat me a lot. I was crying all this time," she said. "When they put electric shocks on my feet, I felt like I was going to die at that moment. I screamed and that's how our neighbors realized there was something happening. For one day and night I was unconscious, feeling dead."
Neighbors heard her cries and called authorities, who rescued the teenager in December.
Last weekend, Gul, now 14, trembled as she stood in court and listened to a Kabul judge hand down sentences to three of her attackers.
They each got 10 years. Her husband is still being sought.
"Ten years is not enough. They should have been given 50 years," the teenager told CNN journalists, who visited her recently in an Afghanistan safe house where more than a dozen other women are being counseled after experiencing horrific treatment.
"They should be punished in the prison. They hurt my eyes and pulled out my nail and hair, and the same should be done to them. whatever they did to me, the same should be done to them," she said.
Gul has become an international symbol of the struggle for women's rights in Afghanistan. The outcome of the case against her relatives has inevitably posed a larger question.
More than a decade since Western forces invaded Afghanistan, have there been enough real and meaningful advances in women's rights there?
If so, will that progress erode after the United States pulls out of the country in 2014 or be diminished while the United States continues to pursue a negotiated peace with the Taliban?
Under Taliban rule from 1996 to 2001, women were banned from classrooms, politics or employment. Women who wanted to leave home had to be escorted by a male relative and were forced to wear burqas. Those who disobeyed were publicly beaten. In some parts of Afghanistan in the late 1990s, locals were encouraged to blacken the windows on their homes so women inside could not be seen.
Rights groups have cited advances since then. In 2004, girls were formally guaranteed a right to an education under the Afghan constitution.
Human Rights Watch reports that nearly 2 million Afghan girls are enrolled in school (though only a small number advance past elementary school, rights groups have reported).
Literacy rates are up for girls between 12 and 16, according to a 2011 Oxfam report.
Across Afghanistan, infant mortality rates have dropped and life expectancy has risen, according to Unicef.
Women who once had to quit their jobs have gone back to work as doctors, lawyers and police officers, Oxfam said.
But stories of honor killings, poisoned wells at girls schools and disfigurements persist.
President Hamid Karzai enacted the 2009 Elimination of Violence Against Women law, intended to help reduce violence against women committed through practices deemed traditional, such as so-called honor killings.
But the United Nations reported in June 2011 that the violence against women law was being enforced in only 10 of 34 provinces.
Also, from March 2010 to a year later, the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission registered 2,299 cases of violence against women that, according to the law, would be considered crimes.
Gul said she not only has to think about the trauma she's endured, but also she is still technically married to her attacker, and she fears it may not be safe to carry on living in Afghanistan.
"I think the punishment given by the court to these people worries me. The government is trying its best to find [my husband, convicted but on the run]," she said. "But if tomorrow he finds me, it's possible he could kill me.
"I want to go abroad," she continued. "If I sit here, they will find me. I want to go to school and study, to become a doctor or a prosecutor, so I can give punishment by myself to these sort of people. "
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