Afghanistan Strategy Reaffirmed

The incoming Commander of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), General David Petraeus, visited NATO Headquarters. He met with the NATO Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, and addressed the North Atlantic Council and representatives of the ISAF troop contributing nations.


The NATO Secretary General congratulated General Petraeus upon his nomination as ISAF Commander (COMISAF). He insisted that this was a change of command, not a change of strategy, and that all 46 nations had reaffirmed their full support to the mission. “We will all continue the current strategy to take on the Taliban politically and militarily in their heartland; to gradually transfer lead security responsibility to the Afghans; and to help the Government of Afghanistan in providing good governance and delivering basic services to the Afghan people,” the Secretary General said.

In his briefing, General Petraeus stressed the importance of civil-military partnership with the Government of Afghanistan, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) and other key stakeholders. “All of us recognize the imperative of linking arms and making way together. We must achieve unity of effort,” he said.

Looking at his goals for 2010, General Petraeus said: “we will look into the expansion of security; the performance of the Afghan national security forces and their growth, not only in terms of numbers but also in capacity; and we will look into complementary activities in terms of governance and the delivery of basic services.” He insisted that this will have to be carried out in a spirit of full inclusivity and transparency.

Nato commanders to put Afghan troops in front line for new southern push

Tom Coghlan, Jerome Starkey in Kabul, and Deborah Haynes

Nato commanders are to change their tactics in the battle for Kandahar, putting Afghan forces at the forefront of the operation to drive the Taleban from their spiritual heartland.

Operation Omid — the Pashto word for hope — is the next stage of a year-long campaign to retake southern Afghanistan. It will target the southern city and surrounding areas with a “gradual squeeze” different from Operation Moshtarak, the airborne assault on the Marjah district of Helmand province last month.

A key aspect will be putting large numbers of new Afghan troops into chains of “firebases” — offering artillery support to infantry — to be built on the approaches to the city, according to Western and Afghan officials. A political drive will parallel the military operation to try to heal tribal fissures that the Taleban have exploited.

The Kandahar mission will be followed by operations to stabilise the provinces of Zabul and Ghazni. Khalid Pashtun, an MP for Kandahar, said that 24 firebases will be built in the district of Zarai. They will be used to control the movement of insurgents and weapons as part of Nato commander General Stanley McChrystal’s plan to secure the population from Taleban influence.

Kandahar holds symbolic value: it was the first capital of Afghanistan, and became the birthplace of the Taleban in 1994. The performance of Afghan forces will be critical if militants are to be convinced that they cannot succeed even after a planned reduction in Western forces in the next three to five years. In this respect, the operation will bear comparison with the Charge of the Knights operation in Basra in 2008, in which the Iraqi Army emerged as a credible force.

For the full article click here for the TimesOnline

Operation Moshtarak: finally working together?

Operation Moshtarak is different to other operations in the Afghan war because of the role taken by Afghan troops, writes former Paratrooper and video journalist Josh Fortune.

Josh Fortune is a former paratrooper who is now working for NATOchannel.tv as a video journalist. He has been in Afghanistan since April 2008.

"They look awfully like UFOs," I thought, looking up at the six glowing lights in the sky, which were hanging ominously above us several kilometers away like some sort of silent sentinels.

They were the next wave of Canadian and British Chinook helicopters, preparing to swoop down and deliver their load of Afghan and British soldiers into Northern Nad Ali to mark the start of Operation Moshtarak – which means "together" in Dari, one of the primary languages spoken in Afghanistan.

Moshtarak was supposed to herald the first truly joint operation where Afghan and ISAF forces would live, work, and fight alongside each other in clearing out the Taliban and bringing security to parts of central Helmand.

I must admit that prior to the mission I was sceptical. I had been involved in the heli-borne air assault on Operation Khanjar last summer, where 4,000 Marines were dropped into parts of Southern Helmand. That operation was supposed to be joint as well.

However, it rapidly became clear to me that in the area I was in the only Afghan presence was a couple of token border police. They had very little role in the proceedings and only ever seemed to hinder the Marines as opposed to helping them.

After two years over here – and many operations in Helmand - my cynical edge seemed intent on telling me that Moshtarak would be more of the same, that the Afghan forces would have little effect, and that ISAF would be doing all the work with the Afghan soldiers unwillingly riding the coat tails of their coalition counterparts.

The eerie lights in the sky wheeled into the Camp Bastion helipad, and the Estonian and Afghan soldiers I was embedded with began to make their way to their assigned Chinook.

As we ran towards the overwhelming heat and noise of the Chinook, I struggled to think of any time in the past that I had heard of Afghan and ISAF forces involved in an air assault together – I had certainly never seen anything like it, and I doubted that it had ever happened on such a large scale before.

The ride to our LZ (or Landing Zone) was a brief one, and after six or seven minutes of staring into the dimly lit face of the Afghan soldier sitting opposite me, an Estonian soldier pounded my shoulder and bellowed "ONE MINUTE" in my ear.

I put my thumb up and duly passed the message on down the line. The Chinook touched down, and we all bundled out – into thick, wet mud.

For the full article click here for Channel 4

Lethal bombing in south Afghanistan

Al Jazeera English


A roadside bomb has claimed the lives of 11 civilians in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand, according to local government officials.

Daud Ahmadi, the governor's spokesman, told journalists on Sunday that "a civilian car struck a roadside bomb in Nawzad district" in the north of the province.

Blaming the Taliban for the attack, Ahmadi said the dead included two children and two women.

Thousands of US, NATO and Afghan troops have been pursuing a major offensive against the Taliban in Helmand's Marjah and Nad Ali areas since February 13.

Helmand is the most troubled region in Afghanistan with the highest level of activity by insurgents, mostly remnants of the Taliban ousted from the government by US-led forces in late 2001.

The current operation, called Moshtarak (Dari for "together"), is aimed at driving the Taliban from their strongholds and is part of Washington's new war strategy for Afghanistan announced late last year.

The town of Marjah continues to see sporadic resistance.

Over a dozen foreign soldiers and at least two of their Afghan counterparts have been killed during Moshtarak. Dozens of Taliban fighters have also died although the authorities have yet to give a precise figure.

At least 15 civilians have also been killed in the offensive, 12 of them by a rocket fired by US forces and intended to hit Taliban resistance.

Operations are set to expand to other Taliban strongholds, particularly in the neighbouring province of Kandahar, where the Taliban maintain a large presence.

About 121,000 international troops, mainly from the United States and NATO, are stationed in Afghanistan fighting the Taliban.

The Taliban are getting increasingly desperate in their attacks on coalition forces

Con Coughlin, The Telegraph


I have just returned from Afghanistan (a more detailed dispatch will shortly appear in the Telegraph) where I found the mood among British troops to be remarkably upbeat. Following the success of Operation Mostarak, the military campaign to drive Taliban insurgents from the strategically important Helmand town of Nad-e Ali, there is a clear sense among British and other Nato commanders that an important corner has been turned in the relentless campaign against the Taliban, and that the insurgents are on the run.

This would explain the increasingly desperate tactics the Taliban are employing, such as today’s car bomb attacks in Kabul, to try to impress their supporters that they remain a force to be reckoned with.

But terror tactics alone are never going to determine the outcome of a conflict. If the Taliban want to prevail, they have to hold on to territory that they can use as a bargaining chip in any future negotiations on the future of the country.

But the fact that Nato forces – which have been immeasurably strengthened by the arrival of extra U.S. troops in support of Washington’s military surge strategy – means the Taliban are gradually being forced to concede ground – in some cases even laying down their weapons. This means the only tactic open to them is to resort to car bomb attacks on heavily-populated civilian areas, which is an illustration of the Taliban’s weakness, not its strength.

Taking It to the Taliban

Time Online


Two days before launching the most ambitious military campaign of the Obama Administration, General Stanley McChrystal, commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, convened a meeting in Kabul of 450 tribal elders and scholars from Helmand province. The general's objective: to build support for Operation Moshtarak, a massive offensive on the Taliban stronghold of Marjah. McChrystal ran through the military phase of the plan, which would involve 6,000 U.S. Marines and British soldiers and 4,500 Afghan troops and police. Then he described how these troops would protect the town while a "government in a box" — a corps of Afghan officials who had been training for this moment for months — would start administering the town. The elders all signed off on the plan, but not before one of them warned the American general, "You have to understand that if you don't do what you say, we'll all be killed."

McChrystal repeated the chieftain's words Feb. 18 in a secure video teleconference with President Barack Obama and his top advisers on Afghanistan and Pakistan. By then, the operation, by all accounts, was going well. NATO troops had encountered only sporadic resistance; much of the town was under the control of the U.S. Marines. British-led forces, meanwhile, had taken the nearby community of Showal. Some government in a box was already being unpacked.

There was good news from other fronts too. In Pakistan, a joint operation in Karachi by the CIA and Pakistan's own spy agency, Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), had netted a very big fish: Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Afghan Taliban's military chief. In quick succession, the ISI had also rolled up two of the Taliban's "shadow" governors of Afghanistan's provinces and another senior figure. And in North Waziristan, near Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, a missile launched from a CIA drone had struck at the heart of the Haqqani network, an al-Qaeda-affiliated group responsible for countless attacks on NATO troops. The network's current leader, Sirajuddin Haqqani, survived, but his younger brother Mohammed had been killed.

After a year of mostly grim tidings from Afghanistan and Pakistan, Obama could have been allowed a moment of satisfaction. But McChrystal's recounting of the Helmand chieftain's warning ensured that the mood in the White House's Situation Room during the conference call was somber. According to National Security Adviser Jim Jones, who was there, Obama added an exhortation of his own, using the idioms of counterinsurgency warfare. "Do not clear and hold what you are not willing to build and transfer," he told McChrystal, a maxim he had repeated often over the previous months. "You've heard me say it many times, but it bears repeating," Obama said as he signed off.

NATO: 600 new trainers for Afghan forces

The Washington Post


PALMA DE MALLORCA, Balearic Islands -- NATO allies have pledged 600 more instructors to train the expanding Afghan security forces - a key element in the allied strategy for defeating Taliban insurgents.

NATO spokesman James Appathurai said Wednesday that the new trainers, along with 1,000 pledged in December, make up about half of the number needed for the training effort.

"That already takes us about halfway to the total increase in trainers we will need by the end of 2010 - and brings the overall number of new contributions, since December, to about 39,500," Appathurai said.

The strategy formulated by the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, calls for gradually handing over responsibility for the war to Afghan government troops.

With European capitals tightening defense budgets and growing public opposition to what many see as an unwinnable war, NATO hopes the Afghan National Army will grow from about 97,000 troops now to 171,600 by the end of next year, and the Afghan National Police from about 94,000 officers to 134,000. Within five years, the Afghan security force should reach 240,000 soldiers and the police 160,000.

But in a dramatic political fallout, the Dutch government collapsed Saturday after Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende tried to meet a NATO request to keep the Netherlands' 2,000-strong contingent in Afghanistan from coming home this year. A majority of the Dutch parliament backed a withdrawal as planned this summer.

The Dutch crisis has prompted fears that other NATO nations could rethink their commitments to the eight-year war. Canada, which serves in the same southern region as the Dutch, also plans to remove its 2,800 troops from Afghanistan by next year.

Appathurai is accompanying NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, who will attend a meeting of European Union defense ministers on this Spanish island.

The two-day meeting in Mallorca opened a day after U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates criticized America's European allies, saying their reluctance to resort to military force was limiting NATO's ability to fight effectively.

"Mr. Gates knows perfectly well the efforts that the European Union and the member states of NATO are carrying out in Afghanistan," Spanish Defense Minister Carme Chacon said.

VIDEO: Operation Moshtarak - Part 2

Food and water runs out for Marjah civilians

Kim Sengupta, The Independant

For Afghans who didn't get out before Operation Moshtarak began, the attack is taking its toll. Kim Sengupta reports from Helmand

US Marines and a Danish tank on the outskirts of Marjah yesterday

As desperate residents of Marjah warned that food and water were running out yesterday, the Operation Moshtarak endgame got under way with Nato and Afghan government forces attempting to force their way into one of the last remaining Taliban enclaves.

The need for supplies in the former Taliban stronghold is becoming increasingly urgent for those who did not leave town when the fighting began. But for now, the US-led troops are focused on what they hope will be a final battle with the insurgents in the town, who repeatedly attempted to block their path yesterday.

The coalition faced ambushes among the narrow alleyways and roadside bombs on the edges of a two-square-mile stretch on the western edge of the combat zone. Warplanes, helicopter-gunships and unmanned drones circled above, but were being used only sparingly because, US commanders claimed, the militants were using civilians as shields.

Lt-Col Brian Christmas, commander of 3rd Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, said: "They are squeezed. It looks like they want to stay and fight, but they can always drop their weapons and slip away."

Around 600 Afghan policemen from the Public Protection Force, the newly established gendarmerie, were waiting to move into the remainder of Marjah, as the projected first step towards establishing Afghan government control. General Mohieddin Ghouri, the head of the Afghan army in Helmand province, said: "They are in Marjah centre, in the bazaar. We are busy carrying out the clean-up and search operations" with a view to eventually setting up police posts there.

But despite that progress, Western officials face a major humanitarian problem in the aftermath of the assault – a time that US Nato commander General Stanley McChrystal has predicted will be far more challenging than the fighting phase.

Marjah residents, speaking on the telephone, described the hardship they faced. Abdul Ghias, 53, said, "Most people cannot get hold of medicine or food, and people cannot work their farms." Yaqub Rashid, a shopkeeper, said: "We are too scared to go out because of all the firing going on. We were also worried about stepping on bombs that have been planted. Neighbours are sharing food with each other, but we are now facing a problem. Many of us did not run away and stayed behind to protect our homes. But we need help."

There has been a massive airlift of food, water and fuel to areas recaptured from the Taliban, with the British Joint Helicopter Force based at Camp Bastion moving around 100 tonnes of supplies for troops and civilians.

The commanding officer, Lt-Col Mike Smith, said: "After the insertion of forces, we have had to ensure that there was an uninterrupted flow of supplies. We have also helped with infrastructure building, such as dropping a bridge over a canal in the Nad-e-Ali area."

He added that an absence of resistance on the ground was making the process easier. Last week, Maj-Gen Nick Carter, the British commander of Isaf (International Security and Assistance Force) in the south of the country, said it would take around 30 days to clear insurgents from targeted areas. Twelve Nato soldiers and between 15 and 21 civilians have died.

NATO Says Operation Moshtarak is Making Progress

Voice of America Online


NATO officials said Sunday the route clearance offensive by international forces is making progress in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province, a Taliban outpost.

The alliance says Operation Moshtarak has improved freedom of movement in the area. British, U.S. and Afghan forces began the ground offensive in the town of Marjah as part of an effort to regain control of one of the Taliban's largest remaining strongholds.

However, NATO officials said in a statement the combined forces have encountered IED (improvised explosive device) strikes, weapon finds, and some small arms fire.

Meanwhile, NATO announced Sunday it has captured two militants, including a suspected Taliban commander. The men were detained Friday.

On Saturday, Afghan President Hamid Karzai renewed his call for the Taliban to accept peace and join with the government.

Reuters news agency quotes a Taliban spokesman Sunday rejecting the president's call for peace, saying Mr. Karzai is only a puppet who cannot represent a nation or a government.

During a speech at the opening session of the Afghan parliament in Kabul, Mr. Karzai also urged international troops to prevent civilian deaths.

NATO says it is committed to reducing civilian casualties as it continues its offensive in Marjah.

The alliance said its troops killed a civilian in Marjah Friday, after a man dropped a box that troops believed was a bomb and began running towards NATO forces. At least 16 civilians have been killed since the beginning of the offensive.

U.S.-led NATO forces and Afghan troops launched a major offensive against the Taliban on February 13.

At least 12 NATO troops and about 120 insurgents have been killed during the fighting. Hundreds of Afghans are fleeing the violence.

VIDEO: Civilians flee southern Afghanistan

Reuters

British Logistic Convoys link up and supply newly created patrol bases in Nad e Ali district

VIDEO: Operation Moshtarak - Part 1

British reinforcements for central Helmand

Euronews


Day six of a major assault against the Taliban in Afghanistan has seen reinforcements flown in to bolster British forces in the centre of Helmand Province.

They left from Camp Bastion bound for the middle of the province as part of Operation Moshtarak, aimed at extending the Afghan government’s control in one of the country’s most troubled areas.

The joint NATO and Afghan mission is the biggest offensive since the American-led invasion in 2001.

The British were heading for Nad Ali, while American and Afghan forces have concentrated on Marjah, the heart of the last Taliban stronghold in Helmand.

British troops in Nad Ali encountered sporadic contact, trading machine-gun fire with insurgents. They are pressing home the latest assault that began on Wednesday by chasing Taliban fighters who escaped the first wave. A British soldier was killed in an explosion in Nahr-e-Saraj.

In Marjah, American and Afghan troops have secured the main roads, bridges and government centres according to the Marine commander in southern Afghanistan.

Brigadier General Larry Nicholson claimed that the combined forces have achieved their intial military objectives.

VIDEO: NATO says progressing in Afghanistan

Reuters

UK Forces - 28 Royal Engineers Python clears route

War in Afghanistan: Boost in battle for Helmand as Taleban's No 2 arrested

The Scotsman

THE nine-year military operation in Afghanistan has claimed its most important scalp to date after the Taleban's deputy leader was arrested.


Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, responsible for the organisation's military strategy in Afghanistan, was captured by United States and Pakistani forces in a secret joint operation in Karachi.

It comes at a crucial time, as Nato forces engaged in Operation Moshtarak advance into Taleban strongholds in the southern Afghan province of Helmand.

Baradar was second in influence only to Taleban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar, and his arrest has raised hopes that the insurgency will be weakened.

It is understood he was held at a roadside checkpoint between seven and ten days ago and has since been held at a secret location where he is undergoing interrogation from intelligence officials from the US and Pakistan. One Pakistani officer said Baradar "was talking".

His capture – which has been denied by the Taleban – follows the escalation of CIA missile strikes against militant targets along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan that have reportedly killed many mid-level insurgent commanders.

The involvement of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency, which is thought to have led the raid, suggests Islamabad is becoming increasingly receptive to US demands to take a hard-line approach to terrorists using the country as a safe haven.

Pakistani interior minister Rehman Malik would not confirm the arrest and said only that the authorities had arrested a "number of people who are running away from Afghanistan and coming to Pakistan".

John Kerry, chairman of the US Senate foreign relations committee, claimed the development was evidence of greater co-operation between the two states.

He said: "I think that is really a signal that wherever people go, wherever they are, the government of Pakistan is determined to continue to ferret out those people who engage in violent extremist acts against the people of Pakistan."

Sher Mohammad Akhud Zada, a former governor of Afghanistan's Helmand province and a member of the Afghan parliament, said: "If Pakistani officials had wanted to arrest him, they could have done it at any time. Why did they arrest him now?"

Baradar is regarded as the brains behind the Taleban's military strategy of hit-and-run attacks, improvised explosive devices and ambush tactics.

He is said to have told his sub-commanders last July: "Keep your weapons on your backs and be on your motorcycles. America has greater military strength, but we have greater faith and commitment."

Baradar, 42, who has never been photographed, fought against Soviet forces in the Afghan mujahideen war, ran the organisation's leadership council, known as the Quetta Shura, and is in charge of the Taleban's financial planning. According to Interpol, he was deputy defence minister in the Taleban regime that ruled Afghanistan until it was ousted in the 2001 US-led invasion. More recently, he has spearheaded the fighting in south and south-west Afghanistan, where British forces are concentrated.

Like other Taleban leaders, he is subject to UN sanctions, which include the freezing of his assets, a travel ban and an arms embargo.

With Baradar no longer responsible for co-ordinating military operations, opinion was divided among analysts as to the impact his arrest will have on the Taleban's efforts to repel Nato forces.

Major General Nick Carter, the British commander of Nato forces in southern Afghanistan, said while he was not aware of Baradar being involved specifically in Marjah and Nad-e-Ali, his arrest was indicative of a "dislocated" leadership among the Taleban.

He said: "It's obviously encouraging from our perspective if some of their strategic-level players are being rolled up. In terms of the leadership on the ground, our sense is that they have been significantly dislocated.

"Certainly, the nature of the resistance that both the US Marine Corps and the ANSF (Afghan National Security Forces] have met in Marjah would indicate that that is the case. And that's also been the case in northern Nad-e-Ali."

Publicly, at least, Baradar has rejected any notion of a deal with the United States.

In an interview last year, he said the Taleban did not see the point in reconciliation talks with the Afghan government or Washington. "Our basic problem with the Americans is that they have attacked our country," he said.

We've got the Taliban on the run, but for how long?

The Telegraph


This is not a good time to be a Taliban fighter. As Nato forces consolidate their hold over large swathes of southern Helmand following the resounding success of Operation Moshtarak, which was launched at the weekend, we learn that Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar has been captured at the safe house in Karachi where he has been hiding out.

Pakistani security officials report that Baradar was actually taken into custody on February 8, several days before the Moshtarak offensive was launched, and this might explain why the American, British and Afghan forces charged with clearing the Taliban out of their main terror bases in Helmand have met with such relatively light resistance.

Baradar is credited with being the strategic mastermind behind the Taliban’s dogged resistance to Nato’s attempts to pacify the country, and if he was no longer able to direct operations then it is easy to understand why the Taliban have been reluctant to fight.

But while Nato forces have acquitted themselves admirably – with the tragic exception of the rogue missile that killed several Afghan civilians – by clearing the Taliban from places like Nad-e-Ali, the task of stabilising Helmand is far from complete. As Major-General Nick Carter, the head of British forces in Helmand, remarked yesterday, we have only reached the end of the beginning in terms of the formidable challenges that lie ahead.

Securing the ground is just the first step in a far broader counter-insurgency, where the primary objective is to persuade local Afghans to renounce their support for the Taliban and embrace the government of President Hamid Karzai.

Even though the Taliban are no longer prepared to stand and fight for their beliefs on the field of battle, they are unlikely to shy away from the battle for Afghan hearts and minds, and we will need to be on our mettle if we are to prevail.

NATO offensive in Helmand hailed a success

Euronews


NATO forces claim the first phase of Operation Moshtarak has been a great success.

More that 15,000 troops swept into Marjah and Nad Ail in Helmand province to oust the Taliban from their heartland.

British army Colonel Matt Bazely is pleased with the operation’s progress to date:

“So far it’s all gone really well, no incidents of great concern and now we’ve made our way a short distance north of those areas currently held by the insurgents. The local reaction has been fantastic so far.”

It was estimated that between 400 and 1,000 insurgents were based in the area before the assault.

NATO’s aim is to secure Marjah, which has a population of around 125,000 and then back up the military operation by bringing in aid and public services.

Displaced people and conflict go hand in hand and residents of Marjah who fled the strife are arriving in Lashkar Gah.

However, many of the displaced are unhappy with the living conditions in Helmand’s provincial capital.

One man said:

“We escaped from our area because of the fighting, I am asking our government to help us here, some of my family are sick we medicines and other supplies as soon as possible.“Marjah has long been breeding ground for the Taliban and other groups with its lucrative poppy trade, which the west says, finances insurgent activity.

Major Afghanistan offensive 'launched in Marjah'

BBC NEWS


Thousands of American and Afghan troops have launched the biggest offensive in Afghanistan since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, the US military says.

Helicopter-borne US marines and Afghan troops are attacking the Taliban-held town of Marjah in Nad Ali district in a bid to re-establish government control.

Nato says Marjah is home to the biggest community under insurgent control in the south and 400 to 1,000 militants.

Many residents fled ahead of Operation Moshtarak - meaning "together" in Dari.

Nato had distributed leaflets in the Marjah area warning of the planned offensive in a bid to limit civilian casualties. Villagers said they warned Taliban fighters to leave the area or be killed.

On Friday, British forces began a "softening up" process, taking part in a Nato ground and air offensive in Helmand province.

'First wave'

Operation Moshtarak will be led by the US Marine Corps, but British troops will also be involved, supported by Danes and Estonians. Some reports say more than 15,000 troops in total will be sent to the area. The initial offensive in Marjah on Saturday saw more than 4,000 US marines, 1,500 Afghan soldiers and 300 US soldiers move in by helicopter under cover of night.

The assault was preceded by illumination flares, which were fired over the town at about 0200 (2130 GMT), the Associated Press reported.

"The first wave of choppers has landed inside Marjah. The operation has begun," said Capt Joshua Winfrey, commander of Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines, which was at the forefront of the attack.

For the first time Afghan forces have been at the forefront of planning and will share the burden of the fighting. Afghan police will provide support after the initial military operations end.

Once the area is secured, Nato hopes to provide aid and to restore public services in the area. The aim, the alliance says, is to win support among the estimated 125,000 people who live there and prevent the Taliban from regaining control.

Will Afghanistan operation end the Taliban?

Channel 4 News Online

Ahead of Operation Moshtarak, the biggest military land offensive since Vietnam, Colonel Richard Kemp predicts the advance of the British army will be slow - but the operation will succeed.


We are on the eve of Operation Moshtarak, by far the largest air-ground offensive ever launched by Nato in Afghanistan.

The objective is to install an administration loyal to the Kabul government into the strategically important population centres of Marjah and Babaji to the west of the central Helmand town of Lashkar Gah, and then to bring lasting security to the people there. Meaning "together", Moshtarak is the first operation comprehensively planned in partnership with the Afghan national security forces.

The combined Nato and Afghan forces must first clear out the Taliban. That will not be an easy task. Following General McChrystal’s iron policy of prioritising protection of the local population and minimising civilian deaths over and above destroying the enemy, the operation has been signalled for months. This is intended to tell the Taliban that a sledge-hammer is coming their way: "stand aside or you’ll be crushed". The hope: that less committed insurgents will not resist the coalition onslaught.

That will happen, and many will simply continue their normal way of life as farmers and tradespeople, leaving the Kalashnikov under the bed. Others will stand and fight. Or more accurately: plant improvised explosive devices, booby traps and mines, then lay up in ambush positions and snipe and machine-gun our troops before melting away through the well-recced rat-runs and irrigation canals that criss-cross the whole area.

The novel tactic of ensuring the enemy know we are coming has already been heavily criticised by our army of armchair generals, and that will intensify as we take casualties. It goes against the vital military principle of surprise.

But British General Nick Carter, who is commanding the operation, is no fool. He is right to adopt this approach, and he knows also that you cannot disguise the target or time-frame of such a massive operation in the environment of central Helmand. He understands only too well that though most members of the Afghan National Army are loyal and professional soldiers, they have been extensively infiltrated by Taliban sympathisers and the details of any jointly planned large-scale operation will be revealed to the enemy.

Moshtarak will succeed. After the preliminary "shaping" operations in which the operational area is cordoned and vital intelligence gathered about the enemy’s dispositions and intentions, there will be a few days’ hard fighting during the decisive phase of the assault. The advance will be slow as our forces methodically check every inch of the ground they have to cross for mines, booby traps and roadside bombs.

To read the full article click here

Afghanistan conflict an 'information war'

BBC


It's called shaping the battlefield. It's not the traditional air onslaught or artillery barrage designed to weaken an intended enemy before the offensive goes in.

Instead it's now about shaping the information battlefield, because in Afghanistan - and in modern warfare in general - information has become the new front line.

At the very heart of Nato and the Pentagon, the disciples of the new art of "strategic communications" know that perceptions matter.

Nato's top commander in Afghanistan, Gen Stanley McChrystal, made this point explicitly in a recent interview.

"This is all a war of perceptions. This is not a physical war in terms of how many people you kill or how much ground you capture, how many bridges you blow up. This is all in the minds of the participants."

Any information you send out carries with it a variety of messages.

'Telegraphed'

Take the current operation in Helmand. It has been broadcast widely in advance. It even has a not-so-catchy title: Operation Moshtarak, which in Dari translates as "together".So there you have it, already three messages, if not more.

The operation's title is in a local language and it stresses the idea of partnership - doubly signifying that this is a joint operation between Nato and Afghan government forces doing the job "together".

The advance warning too sends a crucial signal - it is part of a deliberate and explicit strategy to encourage civilians to take precautions; to calm and inform tribal leaders; and perhaps to encourage some Taliban fighters to make themselves scarce.

"This operation has certainly been telegraphed in advance far more than previous operations," one Nato insider said, "but the alliance has been doing this kind of thing for some time.

"The message is clear. We are determined to take the area, but in such a way as to minimise violence", the official said. "But if we have to fight for it, we will win."

'Psy-ops'

That sounds just a bit more like the traditional kind of message you would expect at such a time, but the reality is that on the information battlefield, just as in operations on the ground, things have changed dramatically.What began as inducement or encouragement for troops to lay down their arms, or basic instructions to civilians not to get in the way of military operations - think leaflets dropped by aircraft in World War II - has blossomed into almost a social science of cause and effect.

Psychological operations or "psy-ops" of the 1950s have morphed into information warfare.

There have been uneasy debates about where the boundary line between this and the traditional press officer's role should be, because, let's face it, the media is an involuntary actor in this drama too.

However the new discipline of strategic communications seeks to go beyond information operations, press briefings and leaflet drops. It is, in the words of one alliance official, "an over-arching concept that seeks to put information at the very centre of policy planning."

When you are fighting wars within communities in an effort to secure popular support for one side or another - the traditional struggle for hearts and minds - you can see how central the concerns of the new strategic information warriors have become.

In some ways, this is at the very core of modern counter-insurgency strategy.

To read the full article click here