Afpak strategy: build and defend supply lines to and through Afghanistan

[Peter Dow]

Afpak strategy: land & air supply to Afghanistan. Bombing the Taliban in Pakistan

Later posts in this topic thread propose further bombing raids against the Taliban in Pakistan and confronting Pakistan's likely objections.

Supply

OK as every good general can tell you, poorly defended supply lines are a problem in any war.

House subcommittee on National Security and Foreign affairs chairman, Rep. John F. Tierney, D-Mass -

[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbqAampl5pA"]U.S. funds our enemy Taliban's Afghan war - YouTube[/nomedia]

U.S. Tax Dollars Fueling Afghan Insurgency

House Investigation: Private Contractors Paying Warlords, Criminals to Get Supplies to U.S. and NATO Bases

Lara Logan reports for CBS Evening News
U.S. Tax Dollars Fueling Afghan Insurgency - CBS News

(CBS) Billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars are fuelling corruption in Afghanistan and funding the insurgency, according to a six-month investigation by the House subcommittee on National Security and Foreign affairs.

The committee's chairman, Rep. John F. Tierney, D-Mass., told CBS News: "the business is war and the war is business and you've got 'Warlord Inc.' going on over there."

Committee investigators found that private contractors in Afghanistan have been paying local warlords, criminals, government officials and a list of others for security on Afghanistan's roads, to get much needed supplies to U.S and NATO bases. But even worse, anecdotal evidence indicates that U.S. tax dollars are also going into the hands of the Taliban, who own many of the roads and areas through which the trucking convoys have to pass, reports CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan.

That would mean that the U.S. is literally funding the enemy, as violence escalates daily in Afghanistan and more U.S soldiers and Marines are dying than ever before in this war.

"This is the tip of the iceberg," Tierney said in an interview with CBS News. "There are other contracts over there, whether they are cell phone contracts or base security, and if you're paying the wrong people to do that and fuelling corruption, then it's not really going to speak well for the reason we sent our men and women there and the reason they're sacrificing their lives".

It also means that while the U.S. has been publicly pointing fingers at the Afghan government and President Hamid Karzai for not cleaning up corruption in his government, in fact the U.S. is a huge part of the corruption problem - and until now, has done nothing about it or even acknowledged that fact.

"We can't be putting that kind of money into a situation where it's going to be corruptive ... we have to get rules in place, implement them, oversee them, get it done right, and then we can demand with much more authority and credibility that the Afghan government do the same," Tierney said.

The committee investigators focused on one contract - the Host Nation Trucking contract or HNT - that is worth $2.16 billion U.S. dollars and divided between just eight companies - three of them American, three from the Middle East and two from Afghanistan. Over six months, they conducted dozens of formal interviews, dozens more informal interviews and ploughed through more than 20,000 documents.

They discovered damning evidence of the complete lack of oversight from the U.S. military and other agencies at the sub-contractor level of those contracts - and anecdotal evidence from the eight contracting companies that payoffs were being made to the Taliban to keep the convoys on the roads.

"What shocked me is the constant call of the contractors to bring it to the attention of the Department of Defense," Tierney said.

The response from the U.S.: turn a blind eye, as long as the goods get where they need to go.

But the reality of Afghanistan is that the Department of Defense has been following a policy endorsed by the U.S. government from the very beginning of this war: to use various warlords, criminals, corrupt powerbrokers etc where the U.S. deems it necessary.

From 2001, when the CIA carried in suitcases of cash to pay off tribal leaders, the U.S. strategy has included relying on "bad guys - as long as they are 'our' bad guys."

This is part of what made U.S. allegations of corruption in Afghanistan appear so hollow to many Afghan people. It is widely known and accepted amongst Afghans that Western aid money flooding into the country has created an alternative, more lucrative economy where it's rarely the "nice guys" who are coming out on top.

It's also widely known and accepted in many areas, that to carry out any reconstruction projects or U.S. funded counter-insurgency efforts requires large payoffs to the Taliban.

Download Warlord, Inc. Extortion and Corruption Along the U.S. Supply Chain in Afghanistan - Right-click, Save Target As ...

[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nbs-hZ8xl_0"]Despite terrorists, Asia's trains do the locomotion with Condoleezza Rice. - YouTube[/nomedia]

Afghanistan to complete first railway by end of year Telegraph.co.uk

Afghanistan will complete its first ever railway by the end of the year, providing a potential new supply route for Nato forces whose convoys are being harried in Pakistan.

The 47-mile route will link the trading city of Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan to Asia's extensive rail network.

The £110 million railway project funded by the Asian Development Bank has already laid 20 miles of track through desert from Hairatan on the Uzbek border the deputy minister for public works said.

Developing a railway network for Afghanistan is an obvious move to develop and to secure the less mountainous areas of the country in the first place anyway. Trains are ideal on the flat - not so good in mountains though where they need expensive tunnels and vulnerable bridges.

So it is excellent to see a start has finally been made to Afghanistan's first 75-km stretch of commercial railway.

Al Qaeda hate trains and have attacked trains often - the London Underground on 7/7 in 2005 and the Mumbai train station in 2008 to name just two examples. So I hope NATO/ISAF are prepared to defend the trains, right?

Tierney's report shows how vulnerable our military supply routes are to and in Afghanistan and whether it is road or rail we need our supply lines properly defended by loyal troops and/or transport police otherwise our source of strength becomes a source of weakness.

 

[Peter Dow]

Secure supply route border defences plan diagram

I have revised this plan to defend against anticipated indirect fire as well. This has involved widening the security border either side of the supply route to keep enemy mortar and rocket launcher teams out of range of the supply line.

Apparently, the Taliban are being supplied indirect fire weapons from Iran so defenders need to be prepared to expect attacks using weapons such as 120 mm heavy mortars, with a range of 6200 metres and 107 mm rocket launchers with a range of 8500 metres.

Iranian weapons getting through to Taliban

Heavy weapons are continuing to stream across the Afghan border from Iran despite Barack Obama's attempts to enlist Tehran's help in fighting the insurgency, officials have said.

So regretfully there is no avoiding the requirement for compulsory purchase of land and eviction of occupiers along a 19 kilometre or 12 mile wide corridor, the whole length of the supply route.

More aggressively NATO might like to consider long-range missile attacks against Iranian weapons productions facilities in Iran to dissuade the Iranians from supplying the Taliban.

Secure border for a supply route - 19 kilometres or 12 miles wide

Secure supply route border defences plan diagram (large - 960 x 1374 pixels)

As can be seen in the diagram, the border perimeter defences are much the same whether you are securing a railway or a road.

Diagram features. Explained for secure Afghanistan supply routes.

• Dangerous ground Enemy forces such as the Taliban, Afghan warlords or Iranian proxies may be attacking the supply route from here
• Vehicle barrier - deep trench / giant boulders / steep slope - so that truck bombs cannot be driven onto the route
• STOP - Police check-point - police check civilians are unarmed and those in police or military uniform are genuine. Needs to be very robust so as to survive an enemy truck bomb.
• Barbed wire - enough to keep out people and larger animals - so more than a horse can jump or cattle can trample over
• No Pedestrians! Cleared ground Target zone for the machine gunners. A hostile intent should be assumed if an intruder is seen here and the intruder should be shot. The ground needs to be cleared of cover so that intruders can be easily spotted and cannot sneak their way past the machine gunners.
• GUN - Fortified machine gun nests / pillboxes 3 man crew. Armour should be able to withstand an RPG hit and contains one machine gun with an effective range to 1000 metres, such as PKM or better. One every 1000 metres on both borders should be manned 24/7. Binoculars, automatic rifles such as AK47 and night vision for 3. Two or more other gun positions per 1000 m on each border are normally unmanned and don't need the expense of real guns sitting there all the time. Such extra positions confuse attackers and serve as firing positions for mobile reaction teams to occupy in emergencies and who can bring additional weapons with them.
  

  For the on-duty-shift manned pillboxes, I suppose the better (longer effective range, heavier the bullet) a machine gun the better. At a minimum the plan needs a machine gun with a 1000 metre effective range to keep Taliban RPG out of range of the pillbox.
  
  Ideally I suppose a heavy machine gun (say 12.7 mm ammo, 1800 metres effective range) with its longer range would be best for stopping an advance of the enemy and would give enemy snipers and heavy machine guns at long ranges something to worry about though I think the plan would work well with a medium machine gun (say 7.6 mm ammo, 1500 metres effective range).
  
  The disadvantage about the heavy machine gun is it is a more difficult 2-man carry when the team decide to move it to another pillbox to confuse the enemy but the extra range and fire-power of a heavy machine gun may well be worth the carry.
  
  I am very keen to suggest armoured sights which allow the machine-gunner to fire accurately despite incoming sniper or machine gun fire intended to suppress the pillbox.
  
  If a tank-crew machine-gunner can fire from inside his tank by virtue of armoured sights, without being suppressed, so should a well designed pillbox, in my opinion.
  
  Squad automatic weapons or light machine guns (say, 5.56 mm ammo, 900 metres effective range) would be better stored in the APC to be quickly carried into the empty pillboxes to defend an emergency attack and such lighter machine guns are also useful in the APC for responding to an attack anywhere in the secure corridor.

• Access road Where authorised traffic and people can access or leave the supply route.
• Mortar teams' ground Defender mortar teams arriving from mobile response depots should set up somewhere here to fire at the enemy in the dangerous ground. The mortar teams' ground should have features to help to win mortar duels with the enemy such as observation points on higher ground or tall structures to serve as observation towers.
• Safe building ground Somewhere relatively safe to build a heliport, runway, supply store or other facility or base.
• Supply route The road and / or railway we are defending
• Crossing Where the access road crosses a supply route railway
• Station - Railway station to load and unload supplies and people onto and off the supply trains.
• Cross-roads - A four-way junction where the access road crosses the supply road.
• Mobile reaction depot - contains single armoured fighting vehicle. This is also where the off-duty mess is so that soldiers are available to react to sustained attacks anywhere along the supply route. One every 2km. Contains additional infantry weapons and ammunition such as additional machine guns, automatic rifles, rocket propelled grenade launchers, mortars and the rest.
• Armoured personnel carrier Such as an up-armoured humvee. Most mobile reaction depots have one of those. To transport soldiers to the proximity of the enemy attack where soldiers dismount to fight.
• Infantry fighting vehicle or armoured combat vehicle. With stronger armour and able to fire on the enemy from enhanced weapons mounted to the vehicle, as well as able to perform the soldier transport role of the APC. Ideally the defenders would prefer the more powerful IFVs to the battle taxi APCs but fewer mobile reaction depots house IFVs because IFVs cost more and so fewer are available to the defenders than the lower performing APCs.

Railway plan for Afghanistan

Right, I knocked this railway map up in 20 minutes so don't think I am making any pretensions to be the new Isambard Kingdom Brunel but here it is anyway - see what you think. Just a suggestion - open to amendment or your better plans if you have any.

Map of proposed new railways in Afghanistan (large 1378 x 1480 pixels)

So that is a plan for about 1500 miles or 2400 km of new railway.

To secure this railway from attack by Taliban, warlord, terrorist or insurgent attack, fortified defensive machine gun nests or pillboxes would be needed every 1000 metres on each of the two borders along the railway route, closer than 1000 m where the terrain makes it easier for the enemy to sneak up close - bridges and cuttings or other cover - where you need more defensive firing angles to spot and then to stop an advance.

I propose using a dedicated Afghan railway & road supply route protection force to man the defensive machine gun positions which force would be part of the Afghan army.

I have figures for the number of Afghan army to staff the railway & road supply route protection force for a 2400km railway.

At 2 defensive positions - fortified machine gun nests or pillboxes - per kilometre - this would be a total of 4,800 defensive positions to man.

For additional security, additional fortified machine gun nests or pillboxes can be constructed which are normally unmanned. The purpose of empty defensive positions is to confuse an attacker who then may be firing at an unmanned position.

For example, if additional defensive positions are constructed, say every 200 metres, yet only 1 in 5 positions are manned then an attacker only has a 1 in 5 chance of firing at a manned position first of all.

Then 4 out 5 first attacks would miss the defenders altogether yet alert the defenders in the nearby manned positions which negates any advantage of surprise the attacker has initially.

Such additional security measures can be implemented at locations along the route where it is considered that attacks are more likely.

Such extra defensive positions can also be occupied when mobile forces arrive to respond to a sustained attack at that location.

I am assuming a 3 man team to man a defensive machine gun position at any time and to serve as lookouts.

So 3 x 4,800 = a staff of 14,400 to man the guns. Including officers to supervise, I estimate a total of 16,000 army staff on duty manning the guns at any one time.

At 3 x 8 hour shifts that is a total force of 48,000 army to defend the railway for 24 hours, 7 days a week. The off-duty staff would form a mobile reserve to respond to any sustained attacks at any point on the route and they would be best equipped with armoured vehicles to bring more fire-power to particular points on demand.

There should be enforced an exclusion border either side of the supply route which prevents anyone getting close enough to fire a rocket propelled grenade at the defensive machine gun positions. Some claim the range of an RPG can be as far as 1000 metres in the hands of a trained person, though sources vary on this question it would be cautious design to assume the need for a wider exclusion border, say 1100m on either side of the railway.

Barbed wire can help to remind civilians where not to go unless they wish to risk being shot.

For public crossing points, to cross from one side of the supply route to the other or to use a railway station, we would need to build fortified police check-points where those wanting to cross get permission from the police which is radioed to the army in the machine-gun nests when an authorised party has permission to cross.

For the crossing points, and railway stations, the police check-points would be manned by a reliable Afghan police force.

I have not calculated the numbers of Afghan police required. That depends on how many stations and crossing points you have and how busy they are, how many people need to be screened and so on and I don't have an estimate of those numbers as yet.

Now that is a lot of work for the Afghans to get busy on but better doing that than growing poppies or serving with the Taliban or warlords, demanding pay-offs to allow our supplies through, planting IEDs or becoming suicide bombers.

This is war and in war conscription is allowed. In WW2 the British men had the choice of armed service or work down the mines. The Afghan government at our demand needs to give the Afghans, especially in poppy-growing and strong Taliban-recruiting areas, where the insurgency is strong, similar war-time choices.

All with the agreement of the Afghan president of course. So we would need a Afghan president who would agree to those kind of tough measures to fix Afghanistan and if not and he was happy with poppies, IEDs, suicide bombers, civilian and military casualties then obviously such an Afghan president is siding with the Taliban enemy is violating constitutional understandings about what NATO-ISAF are demanding from Afghanistan and such an enemy president needs arresting, impeachment, removal by NATO-ISAF and there would have to be a new election for president. Hopefully it won't come to that and agreements can be reached to end this drift and chaos of supply attempted across ground controlled by the warlords and the Taliban.

After 9 years of being in Afghanistan, the US-British-led coalition, NATO-ISAF instead of having a railway and roads and secure supply routes constructed, we have 300 British dead and 1000 American dead and not much to show for it.

I prefer a more purposeful plan such as this compared to the drift we have been getting so far from the Afghan government. It seems to me we need NATO-ISAF vision and purpose and a coherent military plan to save this Afghanistan intervention from disaster.

 

[Peter Dow]

Secure supply route protection force

I am proposing a dedicated force within the Afghan army to secure main supply routes through Afghanistan.

Organisation.

Ranks in increasing order of seniority -

1. Gunner
2. Master Gunner
3. Team Leader
4. Shift Officer
5. Depot Commander
6. Reaction Captain

There will be higher officer ranks yet to be specified.

Duties of the ranks.

1. Gunner - infantry soldier, serves as a member of a 3-man team which serves on one GUN - Fortified machine gun nests / pillboxes position normally for an 8-hour shift.

A Gunner performs other routine duties for an hour or two each day in addition to his 8-hour shift at the gun position at the nearest Mobile reaction depot under the supervision of his Team Leader, Shift Officer and Depot Commander at which location he has quarters in the depot mess.

A Gunner can also be called to emergency duty when required.

Gunners must be able to

• see well
• operate the machine gun
• fire accurately
• reload the machine gun,
• change the barrel on the machine gun
• use the guns' optical sights and night sights
• use the binoculars and night-vision equipment
• be comfortable in a GUN - Fortified machine gun nests / pillboxes position,
• point out where the No Pedestrians! Cleared ground is and where it ends and where allowed ground behind the gun positions is,
• understand that he is forbidden to enter onto the No Pedestrians! Cleared ground on or off duty, even if ordered to do so by anyone in his team because he may be shot if he does so,
• understand that he is ordered on and off his duty shift at the GUN - Fortified machine gun nests / pillboxes position only by his own Shift Officer and own Depot Commander and he cannot be relieved of duty by his Team Leader nor by a more senior ranking Master Gunner, nor by any other Shift Officer nor Depot Commander nor by any more senior officer whom he does not know.
• understand that while on duty he is not to surrender his personal assault rifle (such as an AK47) to any person, even to someone in his own team. Therefore his Team Leader cannot relieve him of duty nor demand that any Gunner surrender his personal weapon,
• understand that it is the Gunner's job when on duty, his job, to shoot on sight anyone on the No Pedestrians! Cleared ground coming or going, even someone dressed in Afghan army uniform, of whatever rank who could be an intruder dressed in disguise or even be a colleague who is deserting in that direction. If he is not manning the machine gun at the time he is to use his personal assault rifle to shoot the person on the No Pedestrians! Cleared ground if they are in range, but he is not to follow in hot pursuit anyone onto the No Pedestrians! Cleared ground because again he may be shot.
• understand pillbox defensive tactics as follows.
  

  Sadly, the Taliban are not so obliging as to try to rush a machine gun position since one machine gun could probably take them all out if they were all to charge it clambering through barbed wire over open ground.
  
  The pillbox machine guns would not be used for suppressing the enemy and therefore blasting away at where you thought an enemy was to keep his head down is just a waste of ammunition and overheats the guns to no good purpose.
  
  The tactics to be employed for the pillboxes are different from a fight on a random battlefield where both sides are evenly vulnerable to fire and so suppressive fire make some sense.
  
  Suppressive fire is of use on a random battlefield to keep the enemy's head down while other comrades move to get a better attacking position. Well the defenders won't be changing position. They will keep their positions in the pillbox so suppressive fire make less sense here.
  
  Our machine gunners should have armoured telescopic sights and therefore only bother actually firing if you have the enemy clearly in your sights and then the first shot is the one that counts.
  
  Some machine guns have a single-shot fire mode with telescopic sights and those are the machine guns we need. Single-shot will most likely be the mode used most often when you spot someone trying to sneak their way past the guns or if you can see a sniper or heavy machine gunner at an effective range, say 1800 metres or less for a heavy machine gun with telescopic sights, less for a lighter machine gun.
  
  I seriously doubt that the enemy would ever do a mass charge across open barbed wire ground which would necessitate firing on full-auto and changing barrels but if they do then fine it is their funeral.
  
  So yes, the gunners would need to know how to change a barrel but if they ever do, I will be questioning their tactics.
  
  If an enemy is blasting away from a machine gun at extreme ineffective range - 2000 metres or more at the pillbox and only the occasional round is even hitting the pillbox then even though it is tempting to return fire blasting back at the position I would not even bother returning fire because that simply gives away your position and may not hit him at extreme range anyway.
  
  Such distant firing is probably to lure the defender to return fire and identify which pillbox is manned, so as to know which pillbox to target with RPGs, recoilless rifles or guided missiles or distant fire could be to distract your attention and rather than fire back, grab your binoculars or night vision and see who is trying to sneak up on the position or past the guns. When you spot them and have an easy kill - then open fire, but in single-shot mode because that is all you will need.
  
  The tactics change if you have a well-armoured position that cannot be suppressed.
  
  I repeat the pillbox machine-gun is not to suppress the enemy. We want the enemy to stick their heads up and get closer to shoot at the pillbox, so the defenders can carefully target them and kill them on single-shot mode. We want the enemy to think they can sneak past the guns so we wait until they are an easy kill and only then take them out.

• perform other duties as supervised by the higher ranks.

2. Master Gunner - skills-based promoted ranks for Gunners with additional specialist skills such as

• weapons maintenance,
• binocular and night-vision maintenance,
• vehicle driving and basic maintenance - checking and maintaining tyre pressure, fuel and oil levels, etc.
• infantry fighting vehicle specialist
• mortar team skills,
• first aid,
• communications - operating telephone (landline and mobile / cell ) and radio.

Master Gunners get an appropriately and differently designed skills badge and salary increment for each specialist skill learned. So typically that would be a badge with a machine-gun icon for weapons' maintenance, a badge with an APC-icon for vehicle driving and basic maintenance and so on. A Master Gunner with more badges and skills outranks a Master Gunner with fewer badges and skills.

3. Team leader A promoted post. The most experienced and able Gunner in each team of 3 on a GUN - Fortified machine gun nests / pillboxes position.

Team leaders should have multiple specialist skills and in particular the communications specialist skills is one of the required skills to be eligible to become a Team Leader. Team leaders are always the senior ranking members in every 3-man team irrespective of badges and skills. So a Master Gunner with, say, 5 skill badges does not outrank a Team Leader with, say, only 4 skills badges.

4. Shift officer - normally on duty back at the Mobile reaction depot and in command and in radio, mobile (cell) or land-line telephone contact with 4 teams, which is 12 men, on duty for an 8-hour shift. The shift officer acts as a deputy commander for the shift for 4 GUN - Fortified machine gun nests / pillboxes and for the Mobile Reaction Depot.

The Shift Officer is also in radio, mobile (cell) or land-line telephone contact with Shift Officers in neighbouring Mobile reaction depots. The Shift Officer decides whether or not to consult the Depot commander in response to a request for assistance from any of the 4 teams under his command or to a request for assistance from a Shift Officer in a neighbouring Mobile Reaction Depot.

5. Depot commander - in command of one Mobile reaction depot , the vehicle, weapons and everything therein. Commands the 3 Shift officers and 12 teams which totals 39 men under his command. He can declare a depot emergency, and call the off-duty shifts in the mess back on emergency duty.

The Depot Commander can order the depot's vehicle and men to attend and to defend the GUN - Fortified machine gun nests / pillboxes under attack or order mortar teams into action from the Mortar teams' ground.

In an emergency, the Depot Commander notifies his immediate superior officers, the Reaction Captains who are the reaction director and deputy reaction director assigned command responsibility for his Mobile Reaction Depot.

6. Reaction Captain

• has some command responsibility for the reactions of 8 neighbouring Mobile Reaction Depots
• is the reaction director for the central 4 depots of these 8 neighbouring depots
• is the deputy reaction director for the peripheral 4 depots of these 8 neighbouring depots.

Reaction Captains direct Mobile Reaction Depots

The diagram illustrates how the command responsibility of neighbouring Reaction Captains is organised.

Mobile Reaction Depots 1 & 2
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain C
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain A

Mobile Reaction Depots 3 & 4
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain A
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain C

Mobile Reaction Depots 5 & 6
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain A
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain D

Mobile Reaction Depots 7 & 8
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain D
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain A

Mobile Reaction Depots 9 & 10
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain D
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain B

Mobile Reaction Depots 11 & 12
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain B
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain D

Mobile Reaction Depots 13 & 14
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain B
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain E

Mobile Reaction Depots 15 & 16
- the reaction director is Reaction Captain E
- the deputy reaction director is Reaction Captain B

This overlapping organisation ensures that emergencies which are declared at any Mobile Reaction Depot can be supported if needs be by Reaction Captains with responsibility for the depot under attack ordering neighbouring depots on either side to react to the emergency.

A vehicle is assigned to each Reaction Captain who routinely drives to visit the 8 Mobile Reaction Depots for which he has command responsibility for daily meetings with the Depot Commanders and with the other 2 Reaction Captains he shares depot command responsibility with.

The Reaction Captains can arrange to receive a salute at attention from each off-duty shift twice a week with an opportunity for the Reaction Captains to boost morale by reminding the Gunners that every Reaction Captain has 8 Mobile Reaction Depots and 320 soldiers under his command and that the 2 Reaction Captains with command responsibility for a particular depot have between them 480 soldiers under their command.

So in emergencies the Secure Supply Route Protection Force is well organised to defeat any attack the enemy dares to try against any part of the supply route. They shall not pass! (No passeran!)

The Reaction Captain has a captain's office and quarters adjacent to one of the 4 Mobile Reaction Depots for which he is the reaction director and the Depot Commander of that particular Mobile Reaction Depot also serves as the Reaction Captain's secretary to take telephone calls to the Reaction Captain's Office if he is out of his office and quarters at the time.

Being so mobile in his daily routine, the Reaction Captain must be contactable via radio or mobile (cell) telephone when he is out of his office.

In the event of a major attack, the Reaction Captain will set up a tactical command headquarters at his office to direct the battle and call for further reinforcements from neighbouring Reaction Captain's offices if required.

 

[Dannavy85]

Time to bring back the idea of the Vietnam era guntruck concept.

 

[deepsight]

It’s the time to take out from endless war not to prolong there. More delay will cause more difficulties & losses.

 

[Peter Dow]

Time to bring back the idea of the Vietnam era guntruck concept.

Hmm that looks like a giant leap backwards.

There looks to be very little armour on the back of that "guntruck". It reminds me somewhat of the "technical" vehicles popular with poor warlord armies in Africa - "great" for attacking rival warlord armies armed with only AK47s but not much use otherwise.

Whatever the vehicle and its armour there is a bigger problem in the Afghanistan war of trying to patrol over insecured roads through bandit territory and however much armour you use it is poor tactics - no way to fight a war.

Instead important supply routes need to be secured by establishing a secure perimeter and controlling the ground as I have described. To get the numbers of troops necessary to control enough ground this would need to be done by the Afghan army.

Unfortunately, my posts above don't contain all the details I need to show you because as a new member I am not allowed to post images and links here yet.

 

[kato]

Do you realize (in the above convoluted stuff somewhere) that the Mazar-i-Sharif railway line is in the German sector? Or that ISAF and ANSF don't have 4800 spare men just to protect a single supply line that's unnecessarily crossing across all of Afghanistan? Or that supply from the North through Central Asia is an extremely sore subject since Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have sort of in a trade war over railway cars the past year or so?

 

[Feanor]

Do you realize (in the above convoluted stuff somewhere) that the Mazar-i-Sharif railway line is in the German sector? Or that ISAF and ANSF don't have 4800 spare men just to protect a single supply line that's unnecessarily crossing across all of Afghanistan? Or that supply from the North through Central Asia is an extremely sore subject since Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have sort of in a trade war over railway cars the past year or so?

Well no his argument makes some sense. It's nothing new or terribly clever. He's simply arguing that the US and NATO member states should cough up several hundred thousand troops to properly secure Afghan. At least that's what I'm getting from his argument. I personally find no flaw with it, other then political realities.

The North route through the CARs could be a reality, if Russia would get on board. Within the CSTO, they can practically guarantee uninterrupted transportation. Naturally issues between Uzbeks and Tadjiks would have to get resolved somehow, but I strongly suspect that if instead of approaching this issue on a bilateral basis, the way the US and NATO have been with Russia and the individual CARs, they approached the CSTO as a whole it would be far more productive.

With Belarus currently holding the CSTO presidency, they're very interested in making things happen. So if they had Russia on board, it would more then feasible.

 

[Peter Dow]

Do you realize (in the above convoluted stuff somewhere) that the Mazar-i-Sharif railway line is in the German sector?

Well since you are the long established member and allowed to post images whereas I can't, why don't you post an image, a map showing the various areas of responsibility for different national contingents within ISAF?

Or that ISAF and ANSF don't have 4800 spare men just to protect a single supply line that's unnecessarily crossing across all of Afghanistan?

The figure was 48,000 not including reserves for 2400 km or 1500 miles of route forming a dedicated supply route protection force within the Afghan national army,

]In October 2010 the ANA is 138,000 strong with the intent for it to grow to 172,000 by October 2011.
In October 2010 the ANP is 120,000 strong with the intent for it to grow to 134,000 by October 2011.

Or that supply from the North through Central Asia is an extremely sore subject since Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have sort of in a trade war over railway cars the past year or so?

Trade war with whom, each other? Since both have borders with Afghanistan then they can both supply into Afghanistan independently of each other. A bit of competition between them to keep down through-transportation taxes is no bad thing.

 

[Peter Dow]

Well no his argument makes some sense. It's nothing new or terribly clever.

I am terribly clever and it would be new to have someone terribly clever organising the military. I am available for the post of commander in chief of the Scottish, British or NATO military.

He's simply arguing that the US and NATO member states should cough up several hundred thousand troops to properly secure Afghan. At least that's what I'm getting from his argument. I personally find no flaw with it, other then political realities.

No I am not arguing that. It is less than 100,000 troops and they are to be Afghans.

The North route through the CARs could be a reality, if Russia would get on board. Within the CSTO, they can practically guarantee uninterrupted transportation. Naturally issues between Uzbeks and Tadjiks would have to get resolved somehow, but I strongly suspect that if instead of approaching this issue on a bilateral basis, the way the US and NATO have been with Russia and the individual CARs, they approached the CSTO as a whole it would be far more productive.

With Belarus currently holding the CSTO presidency, they're very interested in making things happen. So if they had Russia on board, it would more then feasible.

Belarus has suffered under a military dictatorship since 1994.

Under Lukashenko's totalitarian rule, Belarus has emerged to be viewed as a rogue state by the United States and European democracies, i.e., the one whose conduct is out of line with international norms of behavior and whose regime is considered to grossly violate human rights. Belarus has been called “the last true remaining dictatorship in the heart of Europe” by the U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. [5] Belarus is “republic in name, although in fact a dictatorship”[6], whose political system was dubbed as “incompatible with the concept of human rights” by the U.N. Human Rights Council. [7] (See main article Human Rights in Belarus) Belarus is subject of U.S. sanctions for “undermining democratic process and constitut[ing] an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”[8] It is also subject of the sanctions imposed by the European Union for egregious human rights violations. [9] Recently, Lukashenko's relationship with Russia, once his powerful ally and vocal supporter, significantly deteriarated.

We should not touch Lukashenko with a barge pole.

 

[kato]

Since both have borders with Afghanistan then they can both supply into Afghanistan independently of each other.

The railroad lines from Russia go through both countries before entering Afghanistan (passing from Kazakhstan through Uzbekistan through Tajikistan to Afghanistan). The railway line to Mazar-i-Sharif will come in from Uzbekistan.

There are two parallel supply routes being used by NATO, one coming in through Termez in Uzbekistan, the other further east passing through Tajikistan; the latter route is for some reason apparently a preferred one, probably because trucks going down that route pass through less volatile provinces.

Tajikistan Railways has a backlog of transit fees to pay to Uzbekistan that stands at somewhere around $30 million now, while Tajikistan is currently mulling how to get compensation for delayed freight from Uzbekistan. Over the past 24 months, these and other mostly political things happening between the two countries have led to railway freight transport being delayed for months at times (usually in Uzbekistan), e.g. in February, May and August this year - and each time there's several thousand tons of cargo for NATO troops in Afghanistan involved.

It should be noted that the railroad network in Central Asia isn't exactly in peak state, and runs at capacity quite often already.

Germany is the only country actively engaged militarily in (and sending military freight through) Uzbekistan down that route, with its base and a civilian logistics terminal in Termez, supplying German and other troops in RC N from there. All other cargo for Afghanistan coming down that route is non-military.

 

[Feanor]

Belarus has suffered under a military dictatorship since 1994.



We should not touch Lukashenko with a barge pole.

Silly. Lukashenko is not a silovik. He's a populist with party roots, and a political career. Touching or not touching Lukashenko in this case is not even an issue. Negotiations should be held bilaterally with Russia, and on a NATO-CSTO level.

 

[Peter Dow]

10th post!

Hi. Sorry I have been away so long. Maybe something to do with not being allowed to post links and images here. Anyway, here's an update of some of my posts on this topic, or as much of them as I'm allowed to post anyway.

Gosh. I've just noticed that I am nearly up to 10 posts here. After this, there might be freedom here - and perhaps therefore victory against the Taliban!

 

[Peter Dow]

Afghan secure supply routes and new airport infrastructure

Download Warlord, Inc. Extortion and Corruption Along the U.S. Supply Chain in Afghanistan - Right-click, Save Target As ...

In Afghanistan, the U.S. military faces one of the most complicated and difficult supply chains in the history of warfare. The task of feeding, fueling, and arming American troops at over 200 forward operating bases and combat outposts sprinkled across a difficult and hostile terrain with only minimal road infrastructure is nothing short of herculean. In order to accomplish this mission, the Department of Defense employs a hitherto unprecedented logistics model: responsibility for the supply chain is almost entirely outsourced to local truckers and Afghan private security providers.
...
Transporting valuable and sensitive supplies in highly remote and insecure locations requires extraordinary levels of security.
...
RECOMMENDATION 3

Consider the Role of Afghan National Security Forces in Highway Security.

In the future, Afghan security forces will have a role to play in road security. Proposals to reform the convoy security scheme ought to take a medium- to long-term view of the role of Afghan security forces, while developing credible security alternatives that address the immediate U.S. military logistics needs.

RECOMMENDATION 6

Oversee Contracts to Ensure Contract Transparency and Performance.

The Department of Defense needs to provide the personnel and resources required to manage and oversee its trucking and security contracts in Afghanistan. Contracts of this magnitude and of this consequence require travel ‘outside the wire.’ For convoys, that means having the force protection resources necessary for mobility of military logistics personnel to conduct periodic unannounced inspections and ride-alongs.

My plan can achieve the "Warlord, Inc." recommendations 3 and 6, not merely to stop extortion and corruption along the supply chain but to gain a further significant advance to NATO-ISAF mission goals.

I propose secure supply route border defences and a dedicated Afghan protection force to man those defences which would achieve all along the main supply routes a level of security which is similar to the security inside a military base or fort.

"Warlord, Inc." uses the NATO-ISAF parlance of "inside the wire" to refer to the security achieved within their own NATO-ISAF bases but to virtually nowhere else in Afghanistan.

It is about time NATO-ISAF and the Afghan government and military were extending that true security "inside the wire" to more of Afghanistan. My secure supply route plan would bring more of Afghanistan "inside the wire" so to speak.

The secure supply route border defences require only authorised persons living inside the secure defences.

The general population sadly may harbour enemy agents and so must be required to live outside the border defences.

Where isolated houses and small villages can be relocated to use a suitable existing supply road then that should be done with compensation for the relocated residents and landowners.

Where the settlements along the old supply route are too big to move then new roads should be built for a new supply route, by-passing those bigger settlements by at least 6 miles.

II. BACKGROUND

Supplying the Troops

Afghanistan … is a landlocked country whose neighbors range from uneasy U.S. allies, such as Pakistan and Uzbekistan, to outright adversaries, such as Iran.
...
The fastest route to Afghanistan is by air. However, the lack of airport infrastructure places significant constraints on the military’s ability to rely on air transport to supply the troops. Afghanistan has only 16 airports with paved runways, and of those, only four are accessible to non-military aircraft (including contractor-operated cargo planes). Air transport is also the most costly shipping option. Thus, while air transport is available, it is limited to personnel and high-priority cargo. Only about 20 percent of cargo reaches Afghanistan by air.

Then let NATO-ISAF supply fully 100 percent of its cargo by air by increasing by 5-fold the airport infrastructure and capacity of Afghanistan, building perhaps one or two more big hub airports around the country or a few more long runways and additional cargo handling facilities at existing airports like Bagram or Kandahar - to accept the incoming international flights, such as Hercules C-130s, then from those large hub airports transfer the cargo into smaller planes to fly from new short runways at those few hub airports on to dozens of new smaller airports all around Afghanistan.

To pay for this, money can be reallocated to airport construction by rationalising some of the 200 most expensive and remote forward operating bases and combat outposts. Close those which cost more than they are worth.

Retreat to the really important bases, build airfields for them and build secure supply route defences to and from them and that's a very strong defensive position from which to launch offensive operations against the enemy.

No longer will the legitimate military and civilian traffic require the permission of warlords to travel along Afghanistan's highways.

 

[Peter Dow]

Bastion Airfield Afghanistan for a secure supply hub

[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1MZ5g6rkQY"]Bastion Airport - YouTube[/nomedia]

Camp Bastion is the main British military base in Afghanistan. It is situated northwest of Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand Province.

It is the largest British overseas military camp built since World War II.

Built in early 2006, the camp is situated in a remote desert area, far from population centres. Four miles long by two miles wide, it has an airstrip and a field hospital and full accommodation for the 2000 men and women stationed there. The base is divided into 2 main parts, Bastion 1 and Bastion 2. Bastion 2 includes two tenant camps, Camp Barber (US) and Camp Viking (DK). Bastion also adjoins Camp Leatherneck (US) and the Afghan National Army (ANA) Camp Shorabak. Bastion's airstrip can handle C-17s; C-130 transport aircraft; Apache and Chinook helicopters are forward-deployed at the Heliport.

Camp Bastion doubles in size

Camp Bastion, the lynchpin of British, and increasingly American, operations in Helmand, is a desert metropolis, complete with airport, that is expanding at a remarkable pace. Report by Sharon Kean.

Bastion exists for one reason: to be the logistics hub for operations in Helmand. Supply convoys and armoured patrols regularly leave its heavily-defended gates. They support the military forward operating bases, patrol bases and checkpoints spread across Helmand province.

Well here's another reason for Bastion to exist - to become a logistics hub for operations across Afghanistan, well beyond Helmand province.

The biggest project is the airfield, a new runway and air traffic control tower. When it's finished we'll be able to put our TriStar airliners straight in here instead of going to Kandahar, allowing us to get strategic air traffic into Bastion. That will be a big development for us.

More ...

With strategic airlift capacity, think strategically. A few more runways like the new longer runway at Bastion and Afghanistan's airfield infrastructure would be sufficient for all of NATO-ISAF force supplies to reach Afghanistan by air - removing dependence and vulnerability on Pakistan's land routes and eliminating the extortion and corruption along the Afghanistan ground supply chain, as detailed in Warlord, Inc..

After supplies are landed at the few huge hub airports - Bagram, Kandahar and Bastion - cargo could be transferred into smaller airplanes using adjacent smaller runways for connecting flights out to smaller airfields associated with NATO-ISAF forward operating bases.

Whether by luck or by design Bastion is well chosen in being far from a population centre which makes it politically feasible to impose a rigorous security exclusion zone on the ground for many miles around the airport.

Controlling the ground far around a military airport is very necessary to defend the incoming aircraft against missile attack by ensuring no enemy can get close enough to launch a missile anywhere near below where the planes descend to land.

Landing at night is not a sufficient defence. Aircraft engines and their exhaust jets are very hot and infra-red shines just as brightly at night for missiles to lock on to.

We cannot assume that the Taliban will be unable to source the most advanced ground-to-air missiles. We should assume they will source such missiles and take the necessary security precautions.

So at Bastion NATO-ISAF must control the ground in a vast security perimeter out to the horizon and beyond which means closing the nearby road to Afghan traffic and providing an alternative circuitous route for civilian traffic.

I need hardly mention the military, economic and political disaster of allowing the enemy to bring down one of our big aircraft. So this must not be allowed to happen. Therefore a very wide secure ground exclusion zone around Bastion should be imposed.

In addition, I need hardly remind people of Al Qaeda's willingness to use aircraft themselves as weapons and therefore airport air defences need to be operational and alert at all times, not just when scheduled aircraft are landing.

The progress at Bastion is very promising for the whole Afghanistan mission. It shows the way ahead.

We can contemplate one day removing the constraints limiting NATO-ISAF supplies reaching Afghanistan by air. From a limit of about 20 percent now, I foresee a 100 percent supply-into-Afghanistan-by-air strategy as both feasible and desirable.

 

[Peter Dow]

No surrender to the Taliban. Afpak strategy for victory.

[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXMHnu-7ZZk"]Peter Dow's "no" to Taliban's surrender terms. Afpak strategy for victory in war on terror. - YouTube[/nomedia]

CBS News: Divisions within Taliban make peace elusive

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta made news Wednesday when he said the combat role for U.S. troops in Afghanistan could end next year instead of 2014. On Thursday, he took a step back -- insisting U.S. forces will remain combat ready -- even as they transition into their new role of training Afghan troops.

Another part of the U.S. strategy involves getting the Taliban to hold peace talks with the Afghan government. CBS News correspondent Clarissa Ward spoke with some top Taliban representatives where they live in Pakistan.

They call Sami ul Haq the "Father of the Taliban," one of Pakistan's most well-known and hard-line Islamists.

Ward visited ul Haq at his religious school near the Afghan border. Many Afghan Taliban leaders and fighters studied there, earning it the nickname the "University of Jihad."

Ul Haq said that top Taliban figures are receptive to the idea of peace talks, but that three key conditions must be met first: The Americans must leave Afghanistan, he told Ward. Secondly, Taliban leaders should be released from Guantonamo. The third demand is there should be no outside interference in Afghanistan.

It's unlikely that American negotiators will accept these terms, though a release of some prisoners from Guantanamo Bay has been discussed.

While some elements of the Taliban's leadership may be supportive of peace talks, there are clear signs that divisions exist within the group. Many of the younger, more militant foot soldiers insisting that they are not ready to stop fighting.

At a small guesthouse on the outskirts of Islamabad, CBS News had the rare chance to sit down with a young Taliban commander from Helmand province. For security reasons, he asked that his face be not shown.

"If these talks in Doha are successful and Taliban leaders tell you and your fighters to put down your arms, will you do it?" asked Ward.

"No, it will not happen," he said. "And those who are talking to the political wing of the Taliban should understand that real peace is only possible by talking to the ground fighters."

"So the bottom line is you're not willing to compromise, you're not willing to collaborate? Is there any chance of peace?"

"If the Afghan government announced tomorrow that strict Islamic law would be reinstated, we would accept that," he said, "but those in power now will never go along with that."

For the moment, there is a huge gulf between what the Taliban and their backers want and what America would be willing to accept.

So the Deans of Jihad have dictated terms to the West, the terms they propose of the West's surrender to the Jihadis in the war on terror.

So what should the response of the West be? Should we surrender to the Jihadis, or should we fight to win?

This guy Sami ul Haq should be a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp along with his University of Jihad colleagues, his controllers from the Pakistani ISI and his financial backers from Saudi Arabia.

The US and Western allies ought to name Pakistan and Saudi Arabia as "state sponsors of terrorism".

There ought to be drone strikes on the University of Jihad. ([ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darul_Uloom_Haqqania"]Darul Uloom Haqqania - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame], [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akora_Khattak"]Akora Khattak - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame])

We ought to seize control of Pakistani and Saudi TV satellites and use them to broadcast propaganda calling for the arrest of all involved in waging terrorist war against the West.

It just seems very poor tactics for our military to be risking life and limb in the minefields of Afghanistan yet at the strategic level our governments and businesses are still "trading with the enemy".

As the Star Trek character Commander Scott might have said -

"It's war, Captain but not as we know it."

 

[Peter Dow]

Securing the land around Camp Bastion

RAF protecting Camp Bastion, June 27, 2012

Personnel from Number 5 RAF Force Protection Wing, based at RAF Lossiemouth, have now been deployed at Camp Bastion for two months where they have responsibility for providing security at the main British base in Helmand province.

51 Squadron RAF Regiment personnel on patrol.

Number 5 RAF Force Protection Wing, comprising members of the Wing Headquarters, 51 Squadron RAF Regiment and 2622 (Highland) Squadron Royal Auxiliary Air Force Regiment, left RAF Lossiemouth on 16 April 2012 and the personnel are now two months into their deployment to Afghanistan.

They are serving with members of No 2 (Tactical) Police Squadron from RAF Henlow in Bedfordshire, soldiers from the Tonga Defence Services and elements of 16th Regiment Royal Artillery, which together form the Bastion Force Protection Wing.

Since their arrival they have taken responsibility for the security of the Camp Bastion complex, one of the busiest airfields in the world with over 28,000 people working on-site. They are also responsible for patrolling the surrounding area, covering over 600 square kilometres, to prevent insurgent attacks against the airfield and its personnel.

So it matters that Camp Bastion is well defended and I want to make sure we are using the correct tactics to secure the land around any airfield camp we are defending.

So I have some new comments to make which occurred to me after seeing that photograph of our soldiers patrolling through poppy fields. I am wondering if there are poppy fields in that 600 square kilometres around Camp Bastion?

Anyway, we don't want or need any high vegetation around the air field which would allow insurgents cover to sneak close to the base, either to launch missile attacks or to plant anti-personnel mines, I.E.D.s or anything else.

Much better if the land is cleared of all tall vegetation so that it is much easier to keep clear of threats. Short grass is good.

That may mean buying out farmers who are growing crops, buying their land around the camp, compensating them but only if they are growing worthwhile crops.

If they are growing poppy fields then they don't deserve compensation in my book.

Either way there is a big job for our engineers to clear the land all around the camp of all cover useful to an enemy. So that's clearing all the 600 square kilometres which was mentioned as being patrolled by our forces.

It is a big job to keep such a large area of land free of cover and yes it is OK to hire local Afghan labour to help with keeping the vegetation down. After all, we will have put some local farmers out of living so they'll be looking for employment.

It might be an idea to have grazing animals on the land to keep the vegetation down but I would not be surprised if the Taliban shoot grazing animals if they can but if they do that's a reminder to us that the Taliban are still out there if a reminder is ever needed.

I assume in a dry land like Afghanistan that burning vegetation is easily done and that'll be the easiest way to clear the land I suspect. So I approve a "scorched earth" policy.

At night when it is not so easy to distinguish between a farmer tending his grazing animals and an insurgent pretending to be that, I suggest that the 600 square kilometres should be an exclusion zone for everyone except Camp Bastion personnel. So all local Afghan workers who clear vegetation during the day need to go back to homes outside the 600 square kilometres every night.

This is the attitude NATO - ISAF and our base security forces need to take. We need to take ownership of all the 600 square kilometres of land which we are patrolling around Camp Bastion and optimise it for security.

It would be the same outrage if the Afghan government dares to suggest that we don't take ownership of the surrounding land, don't clear the land, and should instead allow existing cover for insurgents in land surrounding Camp Bastion as it would be if the Afghan government dared to suggest that we open the doors of the airbase itself to the Taliban.

 

[Peter Dow]

Bomb Taliban Jihadi indoctrination bases in Pakistan.

I am suggesting that our forces bomb the Taliban Headquarters known as "the University of Jihad" or Darul Uloom Haqqania, Akora Khattak, 50 kilometres (31 miles) east of the provincial capital, Peshawar.

More about the place in this BBC webpage

BBC NEWS | South Asia | The 'university of holy war'

The significance of this place is that it is the main recruitment and command centre for the Taliban which must be known to our military intelligence officers and so it is a mystery why they have not advised our generals to bomb this place before now or if they did advise our generals to bomb it why they didn't actually bomb it?

It makes no sense in a war to give the enemy headquarters a free pass and immunity from being targeted. It just makes their commanders feel untouchable which is not how we want them to feel. We want them arrested or dead or in great fear that soon they will be arrested or dead and bombing their HQ gives them that idea.

Our forces do not have ground forces close enough to use artillery to destroy this target so that leaves NATO to use its aerial power - drones and bomber planes, to bomb the target from the air.

So apart from not wanting to use nuclear weapons on such a weak target which would be over-kill, I think bombing using the very heaviest conventional bombs, MOABs or heavy bombing from B52s or C130s is appropriate.

So a "MOAB" would be one of those.

[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZX5h2fjhKyQ"]Ultimate Weapons- Mother of all Bombs - YouTube[/nomedia]

Which has a blast radius of 450 feet or 137 metres.

Heavy bombing could be used to totally level such targets, or turn the target site into one huge crater field - obliterate it. Give the Jihadis a demonstration that they won't ever forget!

Then if the Taliban and Jihadi leaders relocate to a new recruitment, indoctrination and command base, blast that to pieces as well.

Our forces will have to establish air superiority over the target areas to allow not only unmanned drones but piloted heavy bombers with a much heavier bomb load to over-fly the area reasonably safely.

If and when Pakistan objects to our plans to aerial bomb these enemy indoctrination bases we should tell them that because our view is that Pakistan does not control the ground there to our satisfaction - because Pakistani police or military have not arrested and handed over the likes of the Darul Uloom Haqqania and other Taliban leaders operating on the ground for removal to Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp and not closed down the University of Jihad and other Taliban bases then the Pakistan military don't deserve control of the air space over that ground which they don't satisfactorily control.

So we can say "Sorry" if the Pakistanis don't like this violation of their sovereignty but the needs of war mean this is something we must do. We wouldn't intend to permanently deprive Pakistan of control over its air space; this would be a temporary measure until the war on terror is won.

Pakistan had their chance to arrest or kill the Taliban leaders in their Pakistan bases but now it is too late so we are going to flatten the Taliban bases in that part of Pakistan from the air and we need total air superiority over the target area in order to protect our pilots.

The Pakistan government and military has complained about drone strikes in parts of Pakistan but Pakistan has not gone to war with us about it, thankfully.

Hopefully, the Pakistanis will not want to contest air superiority with their military but if they do decide to fight to resist our air-superiority where we need it to bomb the Taliban then we must be prepared to take out all nearby Pakistani ground to air missile batteries and any air fighters they send against us to contest air superiority.

If the Pakistanis decide to fight us over control of Pakistan's air space then of course there is a risk this could escalate to all-out war if the Pakistanis really want to make a casus belli out of the sovereignty issue and the matter of us requiring to destroy the Taliban so possibly we should make it clear to the Pakistanis that the US President or the NATO supreme commander have the option to use nuclear weapons against Pakistani military bases anywhere in Pakistan if that was necessary to win an all-out war with Pakistan.

That's not our aim to escalate to an all-out war with Pakistan here but Pakistan should be careful not to escalate the situation from one where we need to go after the Taliban only into one where the official Pakistan military gets dragged into a war with us unnecessarily.

This risk of having to fight and win an all-out war with Pakistan is a lesser risk than failing to defeat the Taliban, withdrawing from Pakistan having achieved little to secure Afghanistan and thereby giving encouragement to Jihadis the world over to commit more acts of terrorism and war elsewhere in the world including in our homelands. So Pakistan should not force us to make that choice of two risky options because their defeat is preferable to our own defeat in our opinion.

Pakistan should avoid war with the West by stepping back and allowing us to destroy the Taliban in Pakistan because it is the Taliban and the Jihadis who are the true enemies of the Pakistani and Afghan people. We are the friends of the people of Pakistan and we will prove that by defeating their and our enemy, the Taliban and associated Jihadis.

Hopefully the Pakistanis will back off and let us bomb the Taliban without threat from Pakistan's air defences. We should tell Pakistan that we are doing them a favour which they will thank us for in the long run though we appreciate the embarrassment for them in the short term.

Targeting the University of Jihad, Akora Khattak

Here are the co-ordinates for Akora Khattak.

Geohack - Akora Khattak

34° 0′ 2.17″ N, 72° 7′ 18.06″ E
34.000603,72.121683

and if you look on Google Maps the co-ordinates for Akora Khattak seems to be centred right on the Darul Uloom Haqqania / University of Jihad.

That location is in a built-up area (of course the cowards would use civilian human shields) so using the MOAB is bound to do a fair amount of collateral damage to surrounding buidings and people. So the word should go out now - evacuate Akora Khattak and don't live within 5 miles of any such jihadi university otherwise you could be seriously inconvenienced.

The target area of the campus of University of Jihad looks to be about 100 metres x 100 metres. Hard to guess from the satellite photo.

Here is the Jihadis' own website for the base International Islamic University: Darul Uloom Haqqania which has a number of photographs and is helpfully in English.

Anyway a MOAB on that lot is certainly going to spoil their day and their terror-war plans.

 

[Peter Dow]

Where did we go wrong?

Weak strategic thinking and planning by US and then NATO generals has dragged out the Western intervention in Afghanistan since 2001 and caused far more casualties to our soldiers than was ever necessary.

The military general staff has lacked vision about the enemy and failed to comprehend and react appropriately to intelligence reports that Al Qaeda, the Taliban and other jihadi terror groups are proxies for hostile states, typically managed from Pakistan and funded from Saudi Arabia.

Military strategic essentials have been neglected, such as - when occupying territory, always ensure secure supply routes from one strong point to another.

Instead NATO-ISAF forces in Afghanistan have been deployed in isolated bases, deployed more like tethered goats as bait for the enemy than a conquering or liberating army.

Some combination of military incompetence by the generals and a preference for appeasement on the part of the civilian political leadership has perversely left the West bribing our enemies within the Pakistani terrorist-proxy-controlling state and continuing business-as-usual with our enemies in the Saudi jihadi-financing state.

It’s never too late to learn lessons and adopt an alternative competent and aggressive military strategy and to that end, I have published a detailed improved AfPak military strategy in posts above.

 

[STURM]

We are the friends of the people of Pakistan and we will prove that by defeating their and our enemy, the Taliban and associated Jihadis.

Yes, yes, we heard that party line way back in 2001. Part of the problem was that from an early stage, as long as Pakistan cooperated in hunting down AQ, the Bush administration was more than willing to turn a blind eye to Pakistan's involvement with the Taliban. The U.S. didn't mind the lack of democracy and human rights in Pakistan as long as the Pakistani government helped in the 'war against AQ - the Pakistanis understood this and they used this to their advantage. But then as time progressed and the situation in Afghanistan worsened, the U.S. started to divert it's attention to the Taliban, as it realised it was the Taliban and not AQ, that was the main problem and presented the greatest danger. By doing what you proposed, would be illogical and very counter productive. Strikes on remote areas in FATA are one thing but strikes on cities such as Peshawar are another very different matter as it could lead to an all out civil war in Pakistan. As it is, the drone strikes, have made the U.S. extremely unpopular with ordinary Pakistanis, who don't support the Taliban or other hardline groups.

Various Pakistani governments, by backing groups like Hetmatyer's Herz Islami and later the Taliban - to enable strategic depth to be achieved in event of a war with India - share a major part of the blame. Similarly, the army has always courted extremist right wing parties in Pakistan, to increase their level of support and to be used a leverage against politicans who appeared to be secular or who tried to lessen the army's influence - and this policy has backfired badly with disastrous results. The Pakistan won't reverse its longstanding policy by severing relations with the Pakistani Taliban and other groups overnight because this would be contrary to its perceived national interests. A major problem for Pakistani's is that a lot of what the U.S. wants them to do would be counter productive to Pakistan. As a senior Pakistan general once said : 'We can't take certain measures to suit short term American interests as this would harm our long term interests' And the situation in Afghanistan is very much linked to Kashmir whichs since the dayPakistan got independence has always been an area of prime importance for the Pakistan army. One reason why the Pakistan army courted and aided various insurgent groups is because these groups were meant to be used in Kashmir against the Indians.

Heavy bombing could be used to totally level such targets, or turn the target site into one huge crater field - obliterate it. Give the Jihadis a demonstration that they won't ever forget!

After more than 10 years of war, billions spent and massive doses of firepower being expended, what 'demonstration', short of a tactical nuke, will teach the 'jihadists' a lesson?? The solution to the problem - as proven in other counter insurgency campaigns - is not an over reliance on firepower and an attritional based strategy but a combined military/political/economic approach to win over the population and reduce the support available to the insurgents.......

So what should the response of the West be? Should we surrender to the Jihadis, or should we fight to win?

'Jihadists'? The main resistance is theTaliban and groups like the Haqqani network and they would more accurately be described as 'insurgents' rather than 'jihadists'. Most of the Taliban are fighting simply to rid their country of foreign troops and not all who support or fight alongside the Taliban subcribe to the Taliban's ideology. The Taliban have no desire, unlike AQ, to export their ideology beyond their borders and they have learn their lesson in that they will not allow foreigners, AQ or otherwise, to hijack them. They fully realise that it was theTaliban's association with AQ that led to the American invasion and the subsequent Taliban loss of power. As to whether 'we' should fight them - 'we' have already decided to withdraw by 2014 and more than a year ago, came to the conclusion that the Taliban can't be defeated by miliary means alone, have to be part of any future peace process and that talks have to be held with them.

That may mean buying out farmers who are growing crops, buying their land around the camp, compensating them but only if they are growing worthwhile crops.

If they are growing poppy fields then they don't deserve compensation in my book.

There was a time when NGOs and the UN was pleading desperately for donors to provide cash aid so that Afghan farmers could find alternative crops to make a living. Problem is, no one in the U.S. administration was interested, as the focus was on the military aspects of the campaign and cash was instead used to buy the loyalty and cooperatiion of the warlords. For a fraction of the cash that was being spent on military needs, crops could have been provided to farmers and could have kept them fed until the news crops could be cultivated. Just to put things in perspective, the farmers who grow opium, are mainly under the employment of warlords or landowners, who receive backing from the U.S. and Karzai's government. The Taliban aren't the only ones making a buck from the production of opium and the average farmer is simply doing it to feed his family as he is provided with no other alternative - you need to keep this in mind.

Weak strategic thinking and planning by US and then NATO generals has dragged out the Western intervention in Afghanistan since 2001 and caused far more casualties to our soldiers than was ever necessary.

Unfortunately, it has also led to the deaths of thousands of Afghan civilians, which in turn has played a part in why the presence of foreign troops is unpopular with many Afghans. Another reason as to why the U.S. became unpopular was because Rumsfeld, in the 2003-2003 period - adopted the policy of buying off warlords, to 'rent' them, to save costs and to avoid the need for large numbers of troops to be brought in. This policy went down very badly with ordinary Afghans. Remember that a big reason why the Taliban came to power was because it started going after the warlords.