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"I'm not in the business of turning down jobs I haven't been offered."
  - Paddy Ashdown

"I can put a guy out on a ridge with an AK-47 and have him take a couple of shots. The Americans will shoot back with their big guns and disrupt the whole valley...Being an insurgent would be so easy."
  - Sgt. Jacob Stockdill

"All you have to do is not screw up, and, even if you do, you just blame it on the Americans."
  - Capt. Chris Rowe
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"If you're coming as our friends, don't. If you're coming as our enemies, we will fight you."
     - Zmarai, Arghandab district police chief, in response to Taliban threats.
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“There is a question why the provincial officials were not with their parliamentarian guests. And it is a question why there was shooting after the explosion.”

- Burhanuddin Rabbani,  leader of the United National Front.

“This time there should be consequences. We should stop delivery of any further F-16s to Pakistan and cut off all other U.S. assistance until the state of emergency is lifted.”

- Gary L. Ackerman (D-NY), member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

“It is dangerous to stand up to a military dictatorship, but more dangerous not to.”

- Benazir Bhutto, former Pakistan Prime Minister

“This is going to be a very short-lived emergency,”

- Tariq Azim Khan, Pakistani deputy information minister

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“That two weeks later they were in there on roofs dancing — and inside his house — is devastating psychologically…It’s like a psychological operation on the part of the Taliban, and I think it’s a very effective one.”

- Sarah Chayes, on the Taliban takeover of Arghandab after Mullah Naqibullah’s death.

“I am not satisfied that an alliance whose members have over 2 million soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen cannot find the modest additional resources that have been committed for Afghanistan,”

            - U.S. Def. Sec. Robert Gates, in Kiev, Oct 22.

“It is very crowded up there in the north…Everyone wants to be up there handing out oranges and school books, but it is empty in the south.”

            - Major-General Frankl van Kappen (Ret.), Hague Centre for Strategic Studies.

Karzai's primetime appeal: curtail the airstrikes

President Karzai made a primetime appearance on CBS's 60 Minutes this Sunday to call for a rollback of airstrikes in Afghanistan.

When 60 Minutes asked whether Karzai had directly requested that President George W. Bush end the airstrikes he said "Absolutely. Oh, yes, in clear words."  He implied that his appearance on 60 Minutes was part of an attempt to go public now that direct conversations have failed to get results: "I want to repeat that, alternatives to the use of air force. And I will speak for it again through your media."

"You're demanding that?" - Pelley (in reference to a rollback of airstrikes)
"Absolutely," - Karzai.

• Watch the video

The rest of the piece is worth watching, if only because it is the first time a camera team was permitted into the Combined Air Operations Center, America's high-tech command post situated in an undisclosed Persian Gulf country (Qatar?) It is a scene that is both surreal and yet somehow mundane: walls lined with massive monitors, people seated at rows of desks with computers. It is here that decisions are made on each airstrike in Afghanistan and Iraq -- decisions that will mean life or death for people hundreds or thousands of miles away. MORE

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"Over the course of the last year, we have begun inflicting costs on Iran by targeting its assets and networks inside Iraq. At the same time, I would not exclude talking with Iran and trying to reach some sort of understanding with them, much as we engaged with them earlier on the issue of Afghanistan."

-Amb. Zalmay Khalilzad

Oh, you thought I meant unconditional talks?

From the AP:

Qari Yousef Ahmadi appeared to step back from a statement to The Associated Press on Monday that the Taliban would consider negotiations if the Afghan government made a formal offer. He also said other media outlets who reported that he said the Taliban was willing to hold talks now had misquoted him.

"The Taliban will not be ready for negotiations until the U.S. and its allies leave our country," Ahmadi told the AP by satellite phone from an undisclosed location. "We will pursue our jihad against America and its allies until they leave our country. After that ... then the Taliban will be ready for negotiations."

On Sunday, Karzai repeated his previous stance: the government is ready to hold talks with militants.  Ahmadi replied the next day to the AP that the Taliban would consider talks if an offer were made. So much for that approach...But stay tuned.

Harper: No extension without evolution

Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in an interview with a Calgary radio show:

"I think Canadians are expecting that if we're in Afghanistan after 2009, it would be a new mission...Canadians have been fairly clear that if we were to be in after 2009, that they would expect our participation to evolve in some way."...

"The truth of the matter is NATO still is not putting in near the amount of forces that are necessary to really bring permanent stability to Afghanistan. Canadians have been clear they want to see a more equitable burden-sharing in Afghanistan."

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"If today the foreigners desert Afghanistan... then it will be seen for how many days the national army of Mr. Karzai will resist?...Nothing will remain stable even for a week."
                                          - Mohammad Qasim Fahim, June 3 (Reuters)

''There have been indications over the past few months of weapons coming in from Iran. We do not have any information about whether the government of Iran is supporting this, is behind it, or whether it's smuggling...But there clearly is evidence that some weapons are coming into Afghanistan destined for the Taliban, but perhaps also for criminal elements involved in the drug trafficking coming from Iran."
                                         -U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates

"They don't want to be used by us for our purposes and then not be given any assistance with their challenges...There is a massive potential for us to have a good relationship with Pakistan, but there is a trust issue."
                                    - U.S. Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.)

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Made in Iran

The US announced today that a shipment of Iranian-made arms (mortars and plastic explosives) were seized near Kandahar. It is unknown (or unstated) whether the shipment was officially authorized. A Guardian story notes that a senior Afghan general also claims his forces seized Iranian-made weapons. He says they were captured from insurgents last month in Farah province, and were channeled through drug smugglers in Iranian Baluchistan.

One note regarding the timing; the U.S. waited a year after its discover of Iranian weapons in Iraq and announcing them (see photo); this time it waited less than a month (the exact period was undisclosed). These announcements are typically timed strategically--but what's the strategy here? The language has been cautiously calibrated thus far, but the confrontation could reach an elevated pitch as each side toes the red line.

Some relevant quotes: MORE...