Karzai to Citgo: Don't watch CNN...

Karzai Courts Chevron, Dole

Sept. 26 (Bloomberg)    By Mark Drajem-- Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who is weathering criticism amid renewed attacks by the Taliban, sought to persuade U.S. companies such as Chevron Corp. and Dole Food Co. to invest in Afghanistan...

"The sooner you come, the better will be your reward,'' Karzai told business groups at George Washington University today. "Are security threats a factor? No. You won't even know about them until you turn on CNN.''...

Late Night with Pervez Musharraf

You've got to give it to the General: he hired himself a bold publicist. Folks in the White House must sure wish that Musharraf would just head on home already--especially after he made some frank comments on Iraq and an appearance on The Daily Show (apparently he asked Stewart if he could come on...) 

Check the video (it takes a second to load):

Pervez Musharraf Pt. 1 -- Jon pours some tea for Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and asks him where Osama bin Laden is.

Pervez Musharraf Pt. 2 -- Unlike Jon, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf doesn't see the need to change his work itinerary.

A picture worth a thousand words...

Quoteboard

President Karzai comparing Pakistan's cooperation with terrorists with "trying to train a snake against somebody else":

"You cannot train a snake. It will come and bite you."

and on Mullah Omar (AP):

[Omar] is "for sure" in Pakistan. Musharraf "knows it and I know it," Karzai said. "He's truly there."

President Musharraf, responding to President Bush's CNN comments that he would kill or capture Osama bin Laden if he had intelligence that he was in Pakistan:

"No. We wouldn't like to allow that at all...We would like to do it ourselves."

Source: Associated Press

...and Musharraf's claim (to be aired on 60 Minutes this Sunday) that the US threatened to bomb Pakistan "to the Stone Age" if it did not receive cooperation in the War on Terror:

"The intelligence director told me that (Armitage) said, 'Be prepared to be bombed. Be prepared to go back to the stone age'," Musharraf said.  "I think it was a very rude remark," Musharraf says in the interview. "One has to think and take actions in the interests of the nation, and that's what I did."

 Source: AFP

With lives threatened, livelihoods wither

In his NYT op-ed, Joel Hafvenstein, who worked on an alternative livelihoods program in Helmand, offers a vivid account of how our counternarcotics strategy (and our development strategy in general) has collapsed in the absence of security:

Afghanistan’s Drug Habit
Sept 20 (NYT):

... By May 2005, we had paid out millions of dollars and had some 14,000 men on the payroll simultaneously. The program buoyed the provincial economy, and would have made a fine launching pad for long-term alternatives to poppy.

Security was our Achilles’ heel. There was a new American military base by the graveyard on the edge of town, but the few score Iowa National Guard members there lacked the manpower and the local knowledge to protect us. We could not afford the professional security companies in Kabul, most run by brash veterans of Western militaries. Then, just before Christmas, some of our engineers were carjacked. We resorted to the only remaining source of protection: the provincial police.

Rumsfeld and Afghanistan

Here's an op-ed I wrote the appears in today's Christian Science Monitor. (Please click the link to bring up the entire article.)

Failings of the Rumsfeld doctrine
Intense air power and small groups of troops didn't win in Iraq or Afghanistan.
NEW YORK, By Carl Robichaud: This month's devastating wave of suicide attacks in Afghanistan (including three attacks on Monday, which brought the total number to 69 since 2005) is a grim reminder that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, under fire for his role in Iraq, has been the architect of not one but two failing wars - and of a dangerous vision for how to apply American power.

Peter Bergen: Why the Taliban is back

Lt. Col. Frank Sturek: "You can win every firefight you want, but the battle is in these villages.''

The story mentions the ABC News poll, taken in December 2005, which shows 77 percent of Afghans said their country is headed in the right direction. ABC will be releasing this years poll results in December--the results will say a lot about where we're headed.

America's juggling act
KABUL San Jose Mercury News

By Peter Bergen -...When I traveled in Afghanistan in 2002 and 2003, the Taliban threat had receded into little more than a nuisance. But now the movement has regrouped and rearmed. Bolstered by a compliant Pakistani government, hefty cash inflow from the drug trade and a population disillusioned by battered infrastructure and lackluster reconstruction efforts, the Taliban is back -- as is Afghanistan's once forgotten war...

I recently traveled to Afghanistan for three weeks, meeting with government officials, embedding with U.S. soldiers from the 2-4 Infantry and interviewing senior American military officers. I found that while the Taliban may not constitute a major strategic threat to President Hamid Karzai's government, they have become a serious tactical challenge for U.S. and NATO troops, as the war here intensifies. And their threat is only amplified by their ubiquity and invisibility.

Why France needs NATO to succed in Afghanistan

The Financial Times on Britain, France, and NATO:

Transatlantic tensions 

...So the prospect of a Prime Minister Cameron in Britain and a President Sarkozy in France holds out the possibility of some European convergence on policy towards the US and a steadier transatlantic relationship, particularly with a post-Bush White House. Yet this could be entirely upset if a resurgent Taliban were to force Nato to retreat from Afghanistan. For Nato's credibility rides on success there. Should the alliance fail, the US is likely to turn instead to coalitions of the willing for future endeavours. Any French gloating at the US abandoning Nato would also be misplaced. For failure in Afghanistan would largely stem from Nato's European members not pulling together equally to provide sufficient troops. This is causing rising tension, not just between Europe and the US, but between Europeans themselves.

That would be a lousy foundation even for the sort of post-Nato security organisation in Europe that Paris long advocated.

NATO: no answer on reinforcements

Discussions continue tomorrow...

NATO's Troop Appeal Goes Unanswered
Sept. 14 (Bloomberg) By Ed Johnson-- The North Atlantic Treaty Organization's plea for troop reinforcements in Afghanistan went unanswered...Member states gave ``positive indications'' about providing further troops in the future...NATO ambassadors will meet tomorrow to discuss the issue. A meeting of alliance foreign ministers next week in New York will be followed by a conference of defense ministers in Slovenia the following week, Appathurai added.

Meahwhile, a candid statement by Annan on shortages of competent international forces for stability operations:

"We are competing for the same troops,'' -Secretary General Kofi Annan, on how both NATO and the UN struggle to find enough troops for their missions worldwide.

Crisis Group: Pakistan should change tracks in Balochistan

The latest report from the International Crisis Group on Balochistan:

Crisis Group: Pakistan: The Worsening Conflict in Balochistan
President Pervez Musharraf and the military are responsible for the worsening of the conflict in Balochistan. Tensions between the government and its Baloch opposition have grown because of Islamabad’s heavy-handed armed response to Baloch militancy and its refusal to negotiate demands for political and economic autonomy. The killing of Baloch leader Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti in August 2006 sparked riots and will likely lead to more confrontation. The conflict could escalate if the government insists on seeking a military solution to what is a political problem and the international community, especially the U.S., fails to recognise the price that is involved for security in neighbouring Afghanistan.

"Although regional parties still seek provincial autonomy within a federal parliamentary democratic framework, and there is, as yet, little support for secession, militant sentiments could grow if Islamabad does not reverse ill-advised policies" that include economic exclusion and military operations. "The only one way out," argues the report, "is to end all military action, release political prisoners and respect constitutionally guaranteed political freedoms."