Pakistani Successes May Sway U.S. Troop Decision - NYTimes.com

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By SABRINA TAVERNISE and ERIC SCHMITT

SARAROGHA, Pakistan — This windswept, sand-colored town in the badlands of western Pakistan is empty now, cleared of the militants who once claimed it as their capital. But its main brick buildings, intact and thick with dust, tell not of an epic battle, but of sudden flight.

A month after the Pakistani military began its push into the Taliban stronghold of South Waziristan, militants appear to have been dispersed, not eliminated, with most simply fleeing. That recurring pattern illustrated the problems facing the Obama administration as it enters its final days of a decision on its strategy for Afghanistan.

Success in this region, in the remote mountains near the Afghan border, could have a direct bearing on how many more American troops are ultimately sent to Afghanistan, and how long they must stay.

Pakistan has shown increased willingness to tackle the problem, launching sweeping operations in the north and west of the country this year, but American officials are still urging it to do more, most recently in a letter from President Obama to Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, over the weekend.

On Tuesday, the military escorted journalists on a tour of the area, where it closely restricts access, showing piles of things they had seized, including weapons, bombs, photos and even a long, curly wig. “It all started from here,” said Brig. Muhammed Shafiq, the commander here. “This is the most important town in South Waziristan.”

But lasting success has been elusive, tempered by an agile enemy that has moved easily from one part of the tribal areas to the next — and even deeper into Pakistan — virtually every time it has been challenged.

American analysts expressed surprise at the relatively light fighting and light Pakistani Army casualties — seven soldiers in five days in Sararogha — supporting their suspicions that the Taliban fighters from the local Mehsud tribe and the foreign fighters who are their allies, including a large contingent of Uzbeks, have headed north or deeper into the mountains. In comparison, 51 Americans were killed in eight days of fighting in Falluja, Iraq, in 2004.

“That’s what bothers me,” an American intelligence officer said. “Where are they?”

The Pakistani military says it has learned from past failures in a region where it lost hundreds in fighting before. It spent weeks bombing the area before its 30,000 troops entered. It struck alliances with neighboring tribes.

But the pending campaign was no secret, allowing time for local people and militants to escape, similar to what happens during American operations in Afghanistan.

“They are fleeing in all directions,” said a senior Pakistani security official, who did not want to be identified while discussing national security issues. “The Uzbeks are fleeing to Afghanistan and the north, and the Mehsuds are fleeing to any possible place they can think of.”

But there was some fighting, as destruction in Sararogha’s market area shows, and the fact that the military now occupies the area is something of a success, analysts say. American officials have expressed measured praise for the Pakistani operation so far.

“The Pakistani Army has done pretty well, and they have learned lessons from the Swat campaign, including the use of close-air support from their fighter jets,” said a senior American intelligence official, referring to the army’s first offensive this spring.

But big questions remain: How long will the military be able to hold the territory? And once they leave, will the militants simply come back?

“Are they really winning the people — this is the big question,” said Talat Masood, a military analyst and former general in Islamabad, the capital. “They have weakened the Taliban tactically, but have they really won the area if the people are not with them?”

Winning them over will not be easy. Waziristan’s largely Pashtun population has been abandoned by the military in the past, including in 2005, when, after a peace deal, a military commander called Baitullah Mehsud, the head of the Taliban, a “soldier of peace.” People who are from this area are still deeply skeptical of the army’s intentions.

“People want to know: how serious is the military this time?” said a military official who asked not to be named in order not to undermine the official position publicly.

The military argues that it is, saying that it has lost 70 soldiers in this operation so far, on top of more than 1,000 killed in the last several years of conflict.

Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, principal spokesman for the Pakistan military, said that about 50 percent of the Mehsud territory is now under army control, including most major towns and roads, and that the military would soon begin to press into villages where militants were hiding.

Finding a reliable local partner will be difficult. The Taliban and Al Qaeda have ruled the impoverished area for so long that they have altered its social structure, killing hundreds of tribal elders and making it hard for the military to negotiate.

The alliances that the military has struck with neighboring tribal leaders, including Hafiz Gul Bahadur, may also prove problematic. The senior Pakistani security official said Mr. Bahadur was hosting the families of two top Pakistani Taliban leaders.

Some American officials also voiced concern that if and when the Pakistani Army crushes the Mehsuds, it will declare victory and cut more permanent peace deals with other Pakistani militant factions, rather than fighting and defeating them.

But the Pakistani military argues that as long as the other groups are not attacking the Pakistani Army or state, it would be foolish to draw them into the war, particularly because Pakistan is not confident the United States will be around much longer.

Mr. Masood explained the thinking: “You are 10,000 miles away and we are going to live with them, so how can we take on every crook who is hostile to you?”

And there is history to overcome. One Pakistani intelligence official pointed to the American abandonment of the region in 1989, after the Soviet Union left Afghanistan. “If they leave in haste, like they left in the past, we will be back to the bad old days,” the official said. “Our jihadis would head back to Afghanistan, reopen training camps, and it will be business as usual.”

Sabrina Tavernise reported from Sararogha, Pakistan, and Eric Schmitt from Washington. Ismail Khan contributed reporting from Peshawar, Pakistan.

Pakistani army shows off captured Taliban posts - washingtonpost.com

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'FOUNTAINHEAD OF TERRORISM'
Arsenal, signs of mini-state found

By Pamela Constable
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, November 18, 2009

SARAROGHA, PAKISTAN -- A toy car booby-trapped with explosives, chemistry textbooks and handwritten case files from a Taliban court were among the debris left behind by fleeing Islamist militants in this remote village in the conflicted tribal region of South Waziristan.

The now-deserted village, which was retaken by Pakistani army forces two weeks ago and visited by Western journalists on Tuesday for the first time since, had been a stronghold of Taliban forces for nearly five years. Army officials described its capture as a military and psychological milestone in their month-old operation to flush militants out of the region.

"This place was a fountainhead of terrorism. All government authority was expelled, and the Taliban leaders even had press conferences here," said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, a military spokesman, standing on the roof of a mosque that overlooked the rubble of a market, school and military fort that were destroyed in five days of heavy fighting.

Yet even though army officials said they had killed 180 Taliban fighters in Sararogha, bringing their reported enemy toll to more than 550 since the Waziristan operation began, they acknowledged that hundreds more had melted away into the vast desert scrub and craggy hills surrounding this outpost, testing the army's will to continue pursuing them.

The Obama administration has been pressing Pakistan to move more aggressively against Taliban forces, a message that national security adviser James L. Jones was reported to have carried to Pakistani officials during a visit last week. In particular, U.S. officials have urged the army to move into neighboring North Waziristan, where most fighters are thought to have fled.

But Pakistani officials have bristled at the suggestion. Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi declared Monday that Pakistan "will not be prodded by outsiders" into conducting specific military operations. Although Pakistan and the United States cooperate closely in the war against Islamist terrorism, the partnership has been fraught with frustration and clashing strategic goals.

Public resentment against the United States has grown with persistent reports in the Pakistani media that Xe Services, the U.S. contractor formally known as Blackwater, is operating in Pakistan. The Pakistani Taliban blamed Xe on Monday for a series of bombings against civilians, including a car bombing that killed more than 100 civilians in a Peshawar market late last month. In an English-language statement posted on its Web site, the Taliban said that Pakistani and U.S. government charges that insurgents were responsible for the blast were part of a plot "to create hatred among the common people" against the Taliban.

Xe is thought to have two Defense Department contracts in Pakistan -- one to construct U.S. training centers for the Frontier Corps, the Pakistani government security force that operates in the border regions, and another to assist in operations at a Pakistani air base in Baluchistan from where the CIA has launched missile attacks from unmanned aircraft against insurgent targets.

Amid the signs of bilateral military frictions, army officials seemed eager Tuesday to portray the recent capture of Sararogha, and another longtime Taliban stronghold in the village of Laddha about 20 miles north, as proof that their Waziristan campaign is moving ahead successfully. The army flew a group of journalists to the region by helicopter.

Army officials said they had carried out a three-phase strategy this month to encircle the area, attack Sararogha by air and finally send in ground forces. They said they met fierce resistance from rocket attacks and artillery in the surrounding hills but finally prevailed after a five-day battle.

Once in Sararogha, they found ample evidence of a Taliban mini-state. A school had been turned into a militia training center and courthouse, with classes in how to manufacture improvised explosives and formal hearings on local disputes. Directives on Taliban letterhead, left scattered in empty rooms, ordered certain mullahs to be given weapons and decreed that no marriage dowry should cost more than $900.

Morale seemed high among the hundreds of soldiers stationed in the two villages. Many wore long beards, and some saluted visiting officers with the Muslim greeting "Salaam aleikum." But they took pains to distinguish their notion of faith from the violent credo of the Taliban.

Officials in both towns said the majority of Taliban forces in the area seemed to be Pakistani, although they said a few had been Uzbek. There was not a single civilian visible in either place, only a few stray donkeys grazing among the rubble of ruined mosques, shops and schools. Army officials said that the inhabitants had fled during or before the recent fighting, but that once the region is secure, they hope the government can attract civilians back with new roads and development projects.

Despite the gung-ho mood in the wake of these recent advances, military officials acknowledged that the Taliban was well organized, armed and equipped, and that the campaign against the group is far from won. They estimated that there are 5,000 to 8,000 active Taliban fighters in Waziristan, which means that only a fraction have been killed.

"I do not see an end to this war," Maj. Nasir Khan said. "They want to stretch our resources thin and lure us into difficult areas. We cannot take on these monsters everywhere at once, but they are terrorists, and we must keep on fighting them."

Yemen denounces Iranian 'interference' in its internal affairs - washingtonpost.com

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Sunni government says Shiite Tehran meddling in conflict with rebels

By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, November 12, 2009

SANAA, YEMEN -- The Yemeni government on Wednesday lashed out against what it described as Iranian "interference" in its affairs, escalating tensions in a civil conflict pitting Yemen's army against Shiite rebels that has drawn in Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, and raised fears of a regional proxy war.

"We affirm that Yemen categorically rejects any interference in its internal affairs by any party whatsoever," a Foreign Ministry spokesman told the government-run Saba news agency. "Yemen also rejects any attempt by any party to represent itself as the protector of sons of the Yemeni people."

The comments came a day after Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki publicly warned that countries in the region should not intervene in Yemen's internal affairs. "Those who pour oil on the fire must know that they will not be spared from the smoke that billows," Mottaki declared in what many viewed as a veiled threat by the Shiite theocracy to Saudi Arabia's Sunni rulers.

Saudi Arabia launched an offensive last week inside Yemen after Shiite rebels, known as Hawthis, staged a cross-border raid, killing a Saudi border guard and briefly seizing Saudi territory. Saudi fighter jets crossed the 930-mile border with Yemen and bombed the rebels' northern mountainous havens. On Tuesday, Saudi officials said the kingdom had imposed a naval blockade on northern Yemen's Red Sea coast to prevent weapons from reaching the rebels, who accuse Saudi Arabia of backing Yemeni forces against them.

The Hawthis, who are named after their leader's clan, have been fighting the Yemeni government since 2004, but the fighting has escalated dramatically in the past three months. Saying they are marginalized politically and economically, the rebels are seeking a greater religious voice for their Zaydi brand of Shiite Islam. Yemen's Sunni-ruled government says the rebels are trying to turn the nation into a Shiite state.

Yemen has accused Iran of funneling arms and providing financial backing to the rebels, but the Yemeni government has not provided evidence to support the assertions. The rebels have insisted that they receive no support from Iran or any other foreign powers.

The fighting has displaced about 175,000 people in Yemen's northwest Saada province, according to the United Nations.

German Limits on War Face Afghan Reality - NYTimes.com

By NICHOLAS KULISH

Published: October 26, 2009

KUNDUZ, Afghanistan — Forced to confront the rising insurgency in once peaceful northern Afghanistan, the German Army is engaged in sustained and bloody ground combat for the first time since World War II.

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A German soldier stands guard in a compound in Kunduz Province. Two men from his company were killed in June, among 36 German soldiers who have died in the Afghan war. More Photos »

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Soldiers near the northern city of Kunduz have had to strike back against an increasingly fierce campaign by Taliban insurgents, while carrying the burden of being among the first units to break the German taboo against military combat abroad that arose after the Nazi era.

At issue are how long opposition in Germany will allow its troops to stay and fight, and whether they will be given leeway from their strict rules of engagement to pursue the kind of counterinsurgency being advocated by American generals. The question now is whether the Americans will ultimately fight one kind of war and their allies another.

For Germans, the realization that their soldiers are now engaged in ground offensives in an open-ended and escalating war requires a fundamental reconsideration of their principles.

After World War II, German society rejected using military power for anything other than self-defense, and pacifism has been a rallying cry for generations, blocking allied requests for any military support beyond humanitarian assistance.

German leaders have chipped away at the proscriptions in recent years, in particular by participating in airstrikes in the Kosovo war. Still, the legacy of the combat ban remains in the form of strict engagement rules and an ingrained shoot-last mentality that is causing significant tensions with the United States in Afghanistan.

Driven by necessity, some of the 4,250 German soldiers here, the third-largest number of troops in the NATO contingent, have already come a long way. Last Tuesday, they handed out blankets, volleyballs and flashlights as a goodwill gesture to residents of the village of Yanghareq, about 22 miles northwest of Kunduz. Barely an hour later, insurgents with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades ambushed other members of the same company.

The Germans fought back, killing one of the attackers, before the dust and disorder made it impossible to tell fleeing Taliban from civilians.

“They shoot at us and we shoot back,” said Staff Sgt. Erik S., who, according to German military rules, could not be fully identified. “People are going to fall on both sides. It’s as simple as that. It’s war.”

The sergeant added, “The word ‘war’ is growing louder in society, and the politicians can’t keep it secret anymore.”

Indeed, German politicians have refused to utter the word, trying instead to portray the mission in Afghanistan as a mix of peacekeeping and reconstruction in support of the Afghan government. But their line has grown less tenable as the insurgency has expanded rapidly in the west and north of the country, where Germany leads the regional command and provides a majority of the troops.

The Germans may not have gone to war, but now the war has come to them.

In part, NATO and German officials say, that is evidence of the political astuteness of Taliban and Qaeda leaders, who are aware of the opposition in Germany to the war. They hope to exploit it and force the withdrawal of German soldiers — splintering the NATO alliance in the process — through attacks on German personnel in Afghanistan and through video and audio threats of terrorist attacks on the home front before the German elections last month.

Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the senior American and allied commander in Afghanistan, is pressing NATO allies to contribute more troops to the war effort, even as countries like the Netherlands and Canada have begun discussing plans to pull out. Germany has held out against pleas for additional troops so far.

Ties between Germany and the United States were strained last month over a German-ordered bombing of two hijacked tanker trucks, which killed civilians as well as Taliban. Many Germans, from top politicians down to enlisted men, thought that General McChrystal was too swift to condemn the strike before a complete investigation.

Germany’s combat troops are caught in the middle. In interviews last week, soldiers from the Third Company, Mechanized Infantry Battalion 391, said they were understaffed for the increasingly complex mission here. Two men from the company were killed in June, among 36 German soldiers who have died in the Afghan war.

The soldiers expressed frustration over the second-guessing of the airstrike not only by allies, but also by their own politicians, and over the absence of support back home.

While the intensity of the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan’s south has received most attention, the situation in the Germans’ part of the north has deteriorated rapidly. Soldiers said that just a year ago they could patrol in unarmored vehicles. Now there are places where they cannot move even in armored vehicles without an entire company of soldiers.

American officials have argued that an emphasis on reconstruction, peacekeeping and the avoidance of violence may have given the Taliban a foothold to return to the north.

German officers here said they had adjusted their tactics accordingly, often engaging the Taliban in firefights for hours with close air support. In July, 300 German soldiers joined the Afghan Army and National Police in an operation in Kunduz Province that killed more than 20 Taliban fighters and led to the arrests of half a dozen more.

The German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung called the operation “a fundamental transition out of the defensive and into the offensive.”

Germany’s military actions are controlled by a parliamentary mandate, which is up for renewal in December. The German contingent has unarmed drones and Tornado fighter jets, which are restricted to reconnaissance and are not allowed to conduct offensive operations.

German soldiers usually stay in Afghanistan for just four months, which can make it difficult to maintain continuity with their Afghan partners. The mandate also caps the number of troops in the country at 4,500.

A NATO official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, called the mandate “a political straitjacket.”

A company of German paratroopers in the district of Chahar Darreh, where insurgent activity is particularly pronounced, fought off a series of attacks and stayed in the area, patrolling on foot and meeting with local elders for eight days and seven nights.

“The longer we were out there, the better the local population responded to us,” said Capt. Thomas K., the company’s commander. Another company relieved them for three days but then abandoned the position, where intelligence said that a bomb was waiting for the next group of German soldiers.

“Since we were there, no other company has been back,” the captain said.

Stefan Pauly contributed reporting from Berlin.

BBC -|Attack shuts all Pakistan schools

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All schools and universities have been closed across Pakistan a day after suicide bombers attacked an Islamic university in the capital, Islamabad.

Four people died and at least 18 were wounded in the twin blasts at the International Islamic University.

The Taliban claimed the attack and said there would be more violence unless the army ended its offensive in the tribal areas of South Waziristan.

Meanwhile, at least four people died in more intense fighting in that region.

Pakistani troops are battling to gain control of the key Taliban-held town of Kotkai, but say they are meeting fierce resistance.

A Taliban spokesman said 40 soldiers had been killed in an attack on a security post near the town, but the army gave a much lower figure.

The army said it had killed 90 militants since beginning its offensive on Saturday.

Because of reporting restrictions, it is extremely hard to find out what is going on in South Waziristan.

The fighting has caused tens of thousands of civilians to flee the area.

'Sense of loss'

Wednesday's attack was the first since the army launched its offensive against the Taliban in South Waziristan.

The militants have threatened more such attacks if the army continues its offensive.

Following the attack, Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik said that Pakistan was now in what he called a state of war.

The government has ordered the closure of schools, colleges and universities to prevent them from being targeted by suicide bombers.

Some students said they were scared to go to classes.

"It's really a tragedy for us and there's a real sense of loss with the acts of terrorism," Islamabad student Shehzeen Anwar told the BBC.

"Students are terrified and they're afraid to go out. Roads are almost empty and people are staying at home."

Earlier, schools run by the armed forces and the government - and some public schools - closed for a week as a result of the South Waziristan operation.

The BBC's M Ilyas Khan, in Islamabad, says the present closure is indefinite.

However, schools, colleges and universities may reopen next week if the security threat decreases, he says.

A wave of attacks on Pakistani cities has killed more than 180 people during the month of October alone.

Chechen Separatist in Rare Talks

A Chechen separatist envoy and a regional government representative say they have held talks on bringing stability to the south Russian region.

The prime minister of the government-in-exile, Akhmed Zakayev, and Dukuvakha Abdurakhmanov, chairman of the Chechen parliament, said they had met in Oslo.

Mediators said the talks were the first between the two sides in eight years.

Russian forces have fought two wars against separatists in the mainly Muslim republic since 1994.

The conflicts claimed more than 100,000 lives and left it in ruins.

Mr Zakayev represents the separatists' political wing, not the military wing that is leading the insurgency in Chechnya.

He said the two sides had "discussed political issues being solved not by force but by political means".

"I would like to express delight that this has taken place," he added. "I'm strongly convinced every Chechen person should be well aware of the processes taking place, and should take part in them."

“ This meeting has been authorised not only by [Chechen President Ramzan] Kadyrov himself... It has been happening in perfect co-ordination with the highest leadership in the Kremlin ”
Ivar Amundsen Chechnya Peace Forum

Mr Abdurakhmanov meanwhile said the talks had centred on "the total political stabilisation of the Chechen Republic and the final consolidation of Chechen society".

Norwegian mediator Ivar Amundsen, the director of the human rights group, Chechnya Peace Forum, said it was the first time there had been "a serious political dialogue between the Russian-installed regime in Chechnya and the government-in-exile".

"This meeting has been authorised not only by [Chechen President Ramzan] Kadyrov himself... It has been happening in perfect co-ordination with the highest leadership in the Kremlin," he said, adding that further talks would be held in London in 10 days' time.

Six months ago, Mr Kadyrov declared that political normalisation could not be achieved without the involvement of Mr Zakayev.

He repeated the offer of reconciliation last month, telling Russian television that there would be no point in imprisoning him and that he would like the former actor to play a role in reviving Chechen culture.

When asked on Friday if he would take up offer, Mr Zakayev told BBC Russian: "I will definitely return to the Chechen Republic and there are no conditions that I would impose on this."

Spreading insurgency

Mr Zakayev was a leading rebel in Chechnya until 2000, but fled and sought asylum in the UK when Russia regained control.

In 2003, a British court rejected Moscow's request for his extradition on kidnapping and murder charges, saying that there was substantial risk of him being tortured by the authorities.

Two years ago, Mr Zakayev declared himself prime minister of the rebel Republic of Ichkeria after the President, Doku Umarov, described Western countries as the enemies of all Muslims, and announced his intention to install shariah across the region.

Any statement of support from him for the Kremlin-backed government in Chechnya would aid Moscow, analysts say.

Chechnya has in recent years been more peaceful. In April, President Dmitry Medvedev ordered the end of a decade-long "counter-terrorism operation", intended to pave the way for the withdrawal of thousands of troops.

But since then several attacks have taken place. Earlier this month, two police officers and two soldiers were killed in a gun battle with militants in southern Chechnya.

Fighting has also spread to neighbouring Dagestan and Ingushetia, where correspondents say a violent Islamist insurgency is growing.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/8167526.stm

Published: 2009/07/24