Taliban in trouble

Strategy Page:

The influx of American troops is showing up throughout southern Afghanistan. Areas that had long been dominated by the Taliban, or pro-Taliban tribes, are now being raided by American troops. U.S. intelligence forces arrived before the combat troops, and the increased reconnaissance and electronic monitoring effort produced a more detailed picture of who the Taliban were, where they lived and what they were up to. All that was needed was more troops to work the target list. The Taliban tactics appear to consist of avoiding foreign troops (except for greater use of roadside bombs), and trying to concentrate forces to drive Afghan police and government officials out of the countryside. This would have some chance of success were it not for the foreign troops.

The buzz in the villages and neighborhoods of southern in Afghanistan is all about the Taliban bombing a mosque in Pakistan, and the local Pushtun clans there forming militias (which are only done in the most dire emergency) and going after any Taliban fighters, or pro-Taliban tribesman, they can find. The new American commander (Stanley McChrystal) in Afghanistan, who has a Special Forces background, wants to take advantage of this by having foreign troops work more closely with local (to their bases) Afghans. General McChrystal has more Special Forces, along with lots more soldiers and marines. McChrystal is also keeping his staff of 400 troops in Afghanistan for three years at a time. This will provide more continuity, although at some cost to family life for the personnel involved. McChrystal is being given a lot of leeway to modify tactics and methods. It's understood that the Special Forces are used to operating this way, and getting away with it. McChrystal has been told to try the Special Forces techniques on a large and broad scale. The collapse of Taliban in support in Pakistan makes the Afghan Taliban vulnerable, and now is the time to take advantage of that.

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The Taliban are not keeping up. The Taliban are using more roadside bombs, a tactic that requires more cash than just gangs of gunmen intimidating villagers and killing cops. The bombs require better paid bomb builders and teams for placing and detonating the explosives. While the bombs are the most effective way to kill foreign troops, this still results in a lower casualty rate than was encountered in Iraq. There, the roadside bomb tactic ultimately failed. But the Taliban, knowing this, have no choice, because if they don't kill at least a few foreign troops, their credibility, and morale, will collapse. That is happening anyway, as the foreign troops now go after the sources of Taliban cash (smuggling, drugs, extortion). In Pakistan, the army is breaking all tradition and going after the pro-Taliban tribes. Since the founding of Pakistan (and for centuries before), soldiers stayed out of the tribal territories. No more, and the Taliban have lost their sanctuary, and much tribal support. It's do or die time for the Taliban. With so many things going against them, they have to show some progress this year, or find themselves in a downward spiral they won't recover from.

Al Qaeda is also having cash flow problems....

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Petraeus says the attacks are up, but I have always maintained that is a poor metric of the state of the war. Attacks went up in Iraq during the surge too, but the enemy was not winning. What happened in Iraq and will happen in Afghanistan is that it will start taking more and more attacks to have any effect at all, as the intelligence builds on our side and finds ways to avoid or defeat the IEDs used by the Taliban. One thing that should become obvious is that it takes trucks or autos to transport the IEDs for the most part. The Taliban's favorite mode of trasport is the motorcycle which lacks the capacity to carry heavy bombs. The UAVs will be tracking their movements.