Agriculture Helps in Wardak Counter Insurgency Fight, Afghanistan

[Feroza_Banu]

this is such an awesome news.

Wardag province should be pride of Afghanistan.

[Catya Sher]

Send some of the apricots over here!
I am missing them.
(My tree has not one this year, boo hoo).
Are they organic, though?

[Zarawar]

It's organic enough if you live in the west.
Wardak has worlds' best Apricotes and apples.....I've been to many countries and i've never came across anything close to what we have back in Afghanistan.

[Zarawar]

^^ never heard of it..it might be amongst the youngsters.

[Catya Sher]

By the way, when I finally get my articles somewhere put on this site, my first one was about my trip with Wardak mujahideen.
I did not get all the way to Wardak, though - too bad.
But I managed to get some good publicity into the media for the superb character shown by the Wardak leaders.
But that was at that time. I'm trying to figure out what happened politically in the province since that Soviet occupation time.
Anybody can explain for me?

[Zarawar]

By the way, when I finally get my articles somewhere put on this site, my first one was about my trip with Wardak mujahideen.
I did not get all the way to Wardak, though - too bad.
But I managed to get some good publicity into the media for the superb character shown by the Wardak leaders.
But that was at that time. I'm trying to figure out what happened politically in the province since that Soviet occupation time.
Anybody can explain for me?

Just like any other province, went through heavy fighting during the soviet Jihad. During the civil wars, the province was relatively peaceful, no warlords messing around. The warlords and mujahideen commanders have a good reputation there. Because most of the Mujahideen commanders were educated and some even got their education in West. During the Taliban rule, our governor was Wardak and had no issues with the public.
A lot of Wardaks backed the Taliban during their rule not because they were their biggest fans, but because it was the only pashtun movement gaining ground, like any other province. Later on, thousands of Wardaks joined them in the fight for Bamiyan, Kapisa, and Parwan and hundreds died in a matter of days, the same goes for the fight for Mazar (Dasht-e-laily). The province was very peaceful like any other province during the Taliban era. When the US invaded, majority of the Wardak Taliban either went to Peshawar, Waziristan or Quetta and took part in operation in southern Afghanistan. Until 2004 the province was doing just fine, then all of a sudden majority of the Wardak Taliban from south came and started organizing their movement on village, district and finally provincial level. And here we are.....
Another point to be added, Wardak is one of the few provinces like Kunar,khost and Paktia where both Taliban and Hezb e Islami has a presense and often get into clashes sometimes. The tribal and social system has been destroyed by the West starting 2004. Right when the Taliban attacks started, the west found an opportunity to spread disunity between the public. That's why there is a lot of "Tarbaganai" in Wardak. Majority of the tribal elders were either detained and abused (to ruin their reputation), their houses were raided. While the rest fled to Kabul and other cities of Afghanistan, i.e. Mazar, Herat, Kandahar, Ghazni etc. Speaking at the moment, majority of the well known tribal elders have fled and in the process of leaving Wardak. I'm not sure if you're familiar with the term American-Taliban. Apparently, there are some groups that pose as Taliban but are closely affiliated with the NDS (Afghan government and possibly coalition troops). Those are the ones that have carried out assassinations against the tribal elders and kidnapped wealthy people for ransom. These groups would often bring prisoners captured on the Kabul-Kandahar highway and call their families for ransoms. They would catch anyone that had an ID card or any type (even identity card), and the same goes for the engineers, Doctors and other professionals.
Once case happened last year, a group of American-Taliban had captured two young men (one Hafez-e-Quran) that were carrying two bags of cash (for personal purposes). Both were Pashtuns but not Wardaks, they had executed them later and after their execution dressed them in ANA uniform. Believe it or not, what goes around comes around. The families of those slain victims had found the phone numbers for those who were responsible, through local help probably. I heard they didn't even bother calling the murderers, instead, they called one of their wives and told her to inform her husband that he cannot hide from them and they will deal with him.

[Catya Sher]

Very fascinating, thanks really a lot for the update.
And that amazing story about American Taliban. Glad the perpetrators will not be allowed to get away with this
Others will hear and will refuse to participate in the future.
No I never have heard of that but I figured there was that type of deceptive operations, though I didn't know details.
Who are the people in these units, then, are they mercenaries for hire once in a while or organized into actual units and trained for these attacks aimed at giving a bad reputation to the Taliban?
Neither did I realize Hizb-i-Islami has any presence there. Thought they were up in the north much more. They were always attacking other groups in the old days, splintering the unity which would have been much more successful.

What's Tarbanagai?
I'm upset about the elders being arrested - I heard of one case being taken to Bagram. It was with all of them though? Terrible!

[Zarawar]

Very fascinating, thanks really a lot for the update.
And that amazing story about American Taliban. Glad the perpetrators will not be allowed to get away with this
Others will hear and will refuse to participate in the future.
No I never have heard of that but I figured there was that type of deceptive operations, though I didn't know details.
Who are the people in these units, then, are they mercenaries for hire once in a while or organized into actual units and trained for these attacks aimed at giving a bad reputation to the Taliban?
Neither did I realize Hizb-i-Islami has any presence there. Thought they were up in the north much more. They were always attacking other groups in the old days, splintering the unity which would have been much more successful.

What's Tarbanagai?
I'm upset about the elders being arrested - I heard of one case being taken to Bagram. It was with all of them though? Terrible!

They are just regular civilians, it's a long story.

Yes, Hezb e Islami is very popular in Wardak.

Haqqanis are also active in Shneez, Saedabad, Tangai areas.

[Zarawar]

Tarbaganee is a brother competing to be better than his brother, a cousin wanting to be better than his cousin, a tribe competing with other tribe.
No idea how to explain that in english.

[Catya Sher]

You think Hizbi is more popular than the Taliban? On which basis?
do they like Gulbuddin, or maybe think he will win out later and want to be on his side?
I expect the people of Wardak remember Maulavi Jelaluddin's contributions earlier and must respect him. After all, the Wardak mujahideen supply caravans had to go through his territory and there was a good cooperation it seemed at least at that time before. I saw that myself and I believe it lasted.

[Zarawar]

You think Hizbi is more popular than the Taliban? On which basis?
do they like Gulbuddin, or maybe think he will win out later and want to be on his side?
I expect the people of Wardak remember Maulavi Jelaluddin's contributions earlier and must respect him. After all, the Wardak mujahideen supply caravans had to go through his territory and there was a good cooperation it seemed at least at that time before. I saw that myself and I believe it lasted.

Like I said, it's one of the complicated provinces like Paktia, Khost and Kunar, where both Taliban and Hezb has a heavy presence. Wardak always had a huge presense of Hezb e Islami, specially in Chak, Saedabad, Jalrez, Narkh and Maidan shahr. Obviously the Taliban have the upper hand and more publicity, but people are more happy with Hezb. You have to keep this in mined that when I said Hezb or Talib, I mean the new generation Hezbian and Taliban. The new generation Hezbian are very educated and optimistic people and have specific rules that they follow, unlike Taliban. Taliban movement is not as organized, they will claim responsibility for something and then deny it. Or sometimes they will accidentally kill someone and they will blame coalition troops for it. Whereas the Hezbian have a very firm reputation, their words are always backed with action. They have interesting rules like, their fighters cannot carry weapons when not necessary. They only attack the foreigners and refrain from attacking the local ANA and ANPs.
Yeah there are some crazy Hekmatyar fans in Wardak, specially the high schoolers and university students.
Regarding Mawlawi Jalaldin, Yeah obviously people love him because thousands of Wardaks fought alongside him in Khost and Paktia, my father also participated in some of the operations in Logar, Paktia and khowst. Not only Wardaks passed through Paktia but almost the entire north, north east and central Afghanistan did. Mujahideen back then cooperated with each other, they would travel without any issues. You have to keep in mined that the original Haqqani fame was all connected with Hezb e Islami. He was a part of the Mauwali Younus Khalis faction of Hezb e Islami (that later on divided and formed an indepedent hezb e islami lead by Mawalwi khales)
Taliban is a new movement , while Haqqani, Jihad, Hezb e Islami was famous since the 80s.

[شمله ور خراساني]

this is such an awesome news.

Wardag province should be pride of Afghanistan.

Yes. Wardak is the pride of Afghanistan. Crusaders and the nihilist army of Kharzai are getting a proper wooping by the locals for the past 3 years.

BTW: this news item does not reflect the reality of the situation in Wardak. Most of Wardak is dominated by HIG and Taliban. And vast majority of locals support the AGE's.

[شمله ور خراساني]

Age what's that ?

Its a COIN (counter insurgency) term. It stands for Anti-Government Elements. AGE.

[Zarawar]

the AGE are always going to be there, regardless of the regime....

[Zarawar]

when? the previous Taliban or the new ones?