Afghanistan withdrawal plan is incoherent...... Note the level of trust Karzai has for the US and West in general.... Also note level of faith that the Karzai government can keep things together....
Afghan president Hamid Karzai on Saturday said that a number of nations are looking to implement the feudal system in Afghanistan by transferring certain places to Taliban control.
Sources at the Afghan Foreign Ministry have informed SPIEGEL ONLINE that embassy staff members have said they would apply for asylum in their respective host countries or at least apply for an extension of their service until the presidential election in spring 2014. "They are hoping that there is more clarity about the future of our country by that point," said an employee of the ministry. "I feel as though there has been an exodus. No one wants to return toAfghanistan," said the employee, who added that they couldn't be faulted for wanting to stay away from"the situation in the country."According to recent surveys, most Afghans believe the country will sink into chaos and violence and expect that civil war will break out once Western forces withdraw at the end of 2014. For months, the Taliban and various other ethnic groups have been arming themselves in preparation for a fight for power in the country.The Fiction of a Bright Future
Many Afghan diplomats are the sons and daughters of high-ranking politicians who are also trying to go abroad as soon as possible and stay there until the situation in Afghanistan becomes clearer.
International foundations and organizations that organize educational trips and conferences for Afghans abroad have also become more cautious recently. They know that more and more trip participants will disappear. It is said in Kabul that several Afghan teachers never returned from a trip organized recently by the German government. And a high-ranking official from the Afghan Foreign Ministry called home during a trip to Canada to say that he wouldn't be coming back.
"I can confirm this trend," says Tinko Weibezahl, the head of the Kabul office of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. "In recent months some of our most qualified contacts have left the country. The refugees are above all "the highly educated, who were much more optimistic about the future a year ago," Weibezahl says. Government ministers, lawmakers and senior military officials are also attempting to get their families out of the country.
The story of the hopeful future of an Afghanistan that stands on its own two feet, that is safe and peaceful and democratically governed, "is just a story that the West likes to tell us," says a senior official from the presidential palace in Kabul. "This story has just one catch: Most Afghans don't believe it."
2014 ... 2020 .... when does the war efforts end actually ? Does the strategy moving forward make sense when the Afghan Army doesn't appear able to stand on its own and certainly won't have enough equipment / resources or know how to operate it....
Published 1, June 21, 2013 Bizarre , International , Military 26 Comments
As President Obama starts our intervention into yet another war in Syria and members call for even greater intervention, we have another measure of how costly our war in Afghanistan has been. Stars and Stripes is reporting that the U.S. will abandon or destroy $7 billion in equipment rather than ship it home under the tight schedule for withdrawal. Once again, history will record the insanity of both President Bush and President Obama in spending hundreds of billions on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while cutting key educational, environmental, and scientific programs needed in this country. Members who rail against support for things like NPR will not even take note of $7 billion in equipment going up in smoke in Afghanistan. In the perfect metaphor, the billions of dollars of scrap metal will be turned into Afghan pennies.
Foreigners plotting to impose feudalism in Afghanistan: Karzai
By GHANIZADA - 29 Jun 2013, 9:45 pm
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Afghan president Hamid Karzai on Saturday said that a number of nations are looking to implement the feudal system in Afghanistan by transferring certain places to Taliban control.
While speaking during a press conference with the British Prime Minister David Cameron in Kabul, President Hamid Karzai said that certain nations during the past six months are trying to impose the feudal system on Afghan people through Taliban militants.
President Karzai said that Western nations are not involved behind such a plot and the issue has been discussed with the foreign nations including British Prime Minister David Cameron who has assured that West is not involved in this agenda.
In the meantime Karzai said that reports suggest Pakistan is struggling to implement the feudal system in Afghanistan, and we are not sure what will be the benefit of Pakistan behind this agenda since such a system will not be favorable for Pakistan too.
Karzai also pointed that Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) recently announced their support from Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and Taliban supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar. He said that the nnouncement by Pakistani Taliban shows that they are separating themselves from the Pakistani government and are
looking to hold talks with the Afghan government through Taliban office in Qatar.
looking to hold talks with the Afghan government through Taliban office in Qatar.
However president Karzai insisted that nothing will be achieved through such efforts since Afghanistan is aware of such efforts and the government of Afghanistan is holding talks with the nations involved behind this.
President Karzai also said that the people of Afghanistan showed their unity while plans were made to create parallel governments with the opening of the Taliban office in Qatar, and the patriotic Taliban figures also opposed with the plan.
In the meantime British Prime Minister David Cameron said that he discussed the continued support of United Kingdom to Afghanistan beyond 2014 with the Afghan officials.
David Cameron said that United Kingdom will continue to support and train Afghan security forces beyond 2014. He also said that United Kingdom supports the upcoming presidential election which scheduled to be organized in 2014.
Cameron also insisted that Taliban group will not have any role in the future of Afghanistan if the group continues to its terror and violence.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/diplomats-defect-as-western-withdrawal-from-afghanistan-nears-a-907601.html
Exodus: Afghan Diplomats Defect as Western Withdrawal Nears
DPA
An Afghan security official at Kabul Airport after a battle with the Taliban.
The situation in Afghanistan is becoming so precarious that Afghan diplomats no longer want to return to their homeland. Up to 100 foreign service employees set for rotation back to Kabul from assignments abroad have now defected.
A total of 105 Afghan diplomats were meant to report for duty at the Foreign Ministry in Kabul on Saturday. They were being rotated out of their foreign postings as scheduled, and it was time to return to headquarters. Yet just five of them have resurfaced. The others have apparently remained in the countries where they had been posted, among them several employees of the Afghan Embassy in Berlin.
ANZEIGE
Many Afghan diplomats are the sons and daughters of high-ranking politicians who are also trying to go abroad as soon as possible and stay there until the situation in Afghanistan becomes clearer.
International foundations and organizations that organize educational trips and conferences for Afghans abroad have also become more cautious recently. They know that more and more trip participants will disappear. It is said in Kabul that several Afghan teachers never returned from a trip organized recently by the German government. And a high-ranking official from the Afghan Foreign Ministry called home during a trip to Canada to say that he wouldn't be coming back.
"I can confirm this trend," says Tinko Weibezahl, the head of the Kabul office of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. "In recent months some of our most qualified contacts have left the country. The refugees are above all "the highly educated, who were much more optimistic about the future a year ago," Weibezahl says. Government ministers, lawmakers and senior military officials are also attempting to get their families out of the country.
The story of the hopeful future of an Afghanistan that stands on its own two feet, that is safe and peaceful and democratically governed, "is just a story that the West likes to tell us," says a senior official from the presidential palace in Kabul. "This story has just one catch: Most Afghans don't believe it."
2014 ... 2020 .... when does the war efforts end actually ? Does the strategy moving forward make sense when the Afghan Army doesn't appear able to stand on its own and certainly won't have enough equipment / resources or know how to operate it....
International forces will provide advice to Afghan military until 2020
Senior military sources say Nato will continue to play major role as Afghan forces are unprepared for 2014 withdrawal
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British troops in Helmand. Nato combat forces are due to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of 2014. Photograph: Shamil Zhumatov/Reuters
International forces will provide logistical advice to the Afghan military up until 2020 after concluding that Afghanistan's national security forces will be unprepared for full operations when Nato combat troops withdraw from the country at the end of 2014.
As David Cameron paid a visit to British troops in Helmand province on Armed Forces Day, senior military sources indicated that Nato would need to play a major role in Afghanistan until the end of the decade.
The prime minister said British forces were reaching the final phase of the 12-year campaign. But senior British military sources said the Afghan forces would need advice on providing close air support, the distribution of food and fuel and on medevac facilities.
British military commanders have been able to make their assessments after Nato handed control of security for the whole of the country to Afghan forces this month. The commanders have concluded that a great deal has been achieved but that Afghan forces will not have built their capacity to full operational levels by the time Nato combat troops leave at the end of 2014.
The military advice contrasts with the approach of Cameron, who aims to have a minimal British footprint in Afghanistan by 2015. Britain is to provide financial help and is to run an officer training academy near Kabul dubbed "Sandhurst in the sand".
The prime minister arrived in Afghanistan on Saturday after General Nick Carter, the deputy commander of Nato operations in Afghanistan, told the Guardian that opportunities to build a dialogue with the Taliban had been missed in the past decade. The US recently announced that it would hold talks with the Taliban, who have been allowed to open a political office in the Qatari capital, Doha.
Cameron indicated that he had some sympathy for Carter's view. He told Sky News in Lashkar Gah: "I think you can argue about whether the settlement we put in place after 2001 could have been better arranged. Of course you can make that argument. Since I became prime minister in 2010 I have been pushing all the time for a political process and that political process is now under way.
"But at the same time I know that you cannot bank on that, which is why we have built up the Afghan army, built up the Afghan police, supported the Afghan government so after our troops have left, and they will be leaving under the programme we have set out. This country shouldn't be a haven for terrorists."
The prime minister said it was right to talk to the Taliban and dubbed the Nato operation a success after it denied al-Qaida a base in Afghanistan. He said: "We want a political solution as well as making sure we have a security solution. What we have done in Afghanistan is we came here to stop it being used as a base for terrorist activities. That has been and is successful."
The US agreed to talk to the Taliban after dropping a series of conditions which had included an unequivocal renunciation of al-Qaida and an agreement to abide by the Afghan constitution. The Taliban simply said they agreed that Afghanistan should not be used as a base to attack other countries.
British diplomatic sources voiced strong support for the change of tack by the US. They even suggested that the Afghan constitution could be amended to take account of some of the Taliban's concerns.
One source said the constitution followed a winner-takes-all approach which concentrated strong powers in the hands of the president. This is not seen to be compatible with a process of reconciliation. But the other key Taliban demand – to give the constitution a more Islamic flavour – is regarded as unacceptable because diplomatic sources believe the constitution is sufficiently Islamic.
Any changes to the constitution would take place after the presidential election in April 2014. Hamid Karzai has to stand down as president after serving two terms.
The sources said Taliban prisoners would have to be released as part of negotiations. They would be free to play a role in the Afghan armed forces.
The prime minister announced during his visit that a wall at the main British army base at Camp Bastion, which commemorates soldiers who lost their lives in the conflict, is to be dismantled and rebuilt in Britain with funds from the Libor bank fines. The Bastion memorial wall at the National Arboretum in Staffordshire will be built with £300,000 from the £35m armed forces covenant (Libor) fund.
The prime minister said: "Britain must never forget those who gave their lives in Afghanistan. A Bastion memorial wall back at home deserves every penny of this funding. It will give us a permanent place to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan and to show how proud and thankful we are for all they gave serving our country. They must never be forgotten."
A senior No 10 source added that after 2014 the British presence in Afghanistan would be a matter for the country's national security council.
Turning U.S. Billions Into Afghan
Pennies: U.S. To Destroy $7 Billion
In Equipment in Afghanistan Rather
Than Ship It Home
Published 1, June 21, 2013 Bizarre , International , Military 26 Comments
As President Obama starts our intervention into yet another war in Syria and members call for even greater intervention, we have another measure of how costly our war in Afghanistan has been. Stars and Stripes is reporting that the U.S. will abandon or destroy $7 billion in equipment rather than ship it home under the tight schedule for withdrawal. Once again, history will record the insanity of both President Bush and President Obama in spending hundreds of billions on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while cutting key educational, environmental, and scientific programs needed in this country. Members who rail against support for things like NPR will not even take note of $7 billion in equipment going up in smoke in Afghanistan. In the perfect metaphor, the billions of dollars of scrap metal will be turned into Afghan pennies.
Some 20 percent of our equipment in Afghanistan will be destroyed or abandoned rather than ship it home. Much of the equipment will be shredded to make pennies for Afghans.
By the way, some of the trashed equipment will be the Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicles that were built at huge expensive starting in 2007. Now a few year later, the Pentagon says that it really does not see the use for about 12,300 of its 25,500 MRAPs. These vehicles cost $1 million each and will now be turned into pennies or scrap.
Once again, certain Afghan companies will be rich off the program which is selling millions of pounds of scrap for a few cents per pound.
The military says that transporting the equipment would cost $2 billion to $3 billion and repairing the gear would cost $8 billion to $9 billion.
Even accepting this cost-benefit analysis, we are still left with the insane cost of these wars. Few people in government are willing to admit how little we have accomplished in these wars. China is moving into Iraq and taking oil rights and other benefits. Iraq has moved under the sphere of influence of Iran. The Taliban is on the rise in Afghanistan and we continue to be hated in many areas. For our part, we have tens of thousands of wounded or dead soldiers and hundreds of billions in cost.
Now on to Syria . . .
US to Spend $771M on Planes Afghans Can’t Use
SIGAR recommends suspending activity on contracts
An Mi-17 helicopter used by the Afghan Air Force / AP
BY:
The U.S. government is about to spend more than $771 million on military aircraft that the Afghan people “lack the capacity to operate,” according to the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR).
The Department of Defense says that it is moving forward with the purchase despite SIGAR’S warning that the planes will go to waste.
SIGAR only discovered the DOD’s plans while performing an audit of its Afghan Special Mission Wing (SMW).
“SIGAR is recommending that DOD suspend all activity under the contracts awarded for the 48 new aircraft until capacity issues are properly addressed,” it said in a press release Friday morning.
SIGAR additionally discovered that “DOD awarded $553 million to Rosoboronexport, a Russian government agency, after receiving SIGAR’s recommendations that moving forward was imprudent,” according to the release.
Lt. Col. James Gregory, a Pentagon spokesman, told the Washington Free Beacon that it does “not concur with the SIGAR report recommendation” and that a delay in shipment is not in the United States’ security interests.
SIGAR’s audit of SMW found that the planes are not useful because the Afghans have hired illiterate and untrained pilots to fly them.
The Afghan forces have experienced “difficulty finding recruits who are literate and do not have associations with criminal/insurgent activity,” according to the audit.
“Only seven pilots are qualified to fly with night vision goggles, which is necessary for most counter-terrorism missions,” SIGAR reported.
The SMW program also has poor U.S. government oversight, leading to waste and problems in sustaining what the DOD believes is a critical project in post-war Afghanistan.
“NATO and DOD do not have a plan with milestones and dates for achieving full strength for the SMW to justify the fleet size,” SIGAR reported, noting that most maintenance projects are still performed by the United States.
“DOD performs 50 percent of maintenance and repair and 70 percent of critical maintenance and logistics management for SMW and does not have a plan for transferring these functions to the Afghans,” SIGAR said.
The United States still intends to spend $109 million per year despite the flaws, “for oversight, maintenance, training, and logistics support for the next several years,” according to SIGAR.
These deeply entrenched problems have contributed to the program’s slow growth.
“SMW had less than one-quarter of the 806 personnel needed to reach full strength and during the length of the audit made no tangible growth,” SIGAR found.
In addition, the “Afghan Ministries of Defense and Interior do not have an agreement on the SMW command and control structure, impacting growth and capacity,” according to SIGAR.
SIGAR predicts that once the United States fully exits Afghanistan in the coming year the Afghans will not be prepared to maintain or operate the planes.
Gregory said delaying the shipment of planes until SIGAR’s performance criteria are met “would not be in our national interest.”
“Delaying contract award pending agreement between the ministries on transition of SMW administrative control would unacceptably delay our efforts to develop the SMW into a capable force,” Gregory said.
“The contract for the PC-12 [planes] was signed on Oct. 13, 2012, and the contract for the Mi-17 [planes] was finalized on June 16, 2013,” he said.
The SMW is still a relatively new creation, meaning that improvement efforts are already underway, the official said.
“The SMW was formally established less than a year ago and sustainment efforts, including training, are presently underway,” Gregory said. “Delivery of the aircraft in question will take place over the next eighteen months. This will include training on how to operate and maintain the aircraft and associated equipment.”
“DOD has been implementing or has agreed with implementing the other recommendations in the report, which will help avoid the adverse outcome that it warns against,” he added.
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