A new direction in Afghanistan...
 

Below is an interesting article from the Wall Street Journal describing recent efforts to enlist the local populations in ungoverned areas of Afghanistan to begin defending themselves in order to create the stability necessary for prosperity.

It is an interesting approach and has been met with enormous initial success. Any thoughts or comments are welcome.


"RABAT, Afghanistan—The men of this remote village, dressed in crisp beige uniforms and armed with Kalashnikovs, are defending their land against the Taliban, in a U.S. Special Forces-driven experiment that is set to spread nationwide.

New legislation, hammered out by American and Afghan officials and expected to be enacted by President Hamid Karzai in coming weeks, would authorize armed village forces across Afghanistan and bring them into the country's law-enforcement system.

The strategy, long advocated by U.S. Special Operations commanders, aims to provide a grass-roots counterbalance to the insurgents and fill a security vacuum in swaths of rural Afghanistan that .."

Obviously this is just an excerpt, Google has cached the full version (below link) and I have included the link to the article on WSJ which only displays a portion of the article but has a photo gallery available.


U.S. Enlists New Afghan Village Forces - WSJ.com

U.S. Enlists New Afghan Village Forces - WSJ.com

Well I tell ya, in the 9th inning anything is welcome.

Will we be crossing the Friendship Bridge in a few years?
(soviet exodus)

I think we should have done this from the beginning. if we are going to feign interest in their well-being, we should actually involve them in the proceedings.

I know this is more or less a dead thread, but anyone who is interested in the way ahead in Afghanistan should also check out this article:

http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/...AND_MG1002.pdf

It is an article written by Seth Jones (Author of The Graveyard of Empires) and is a fairly comprehensive look at the creation of tribal forces opposed to the taliban.