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27 January 2011 By Rick Rozoff The largest foreign military force ever deployed in
Afghanistan is now well into the tenth year of the
longest and what has become the deadliest war of the
21st century. Some 154,000 occupation troops, almost two-thirds
American and the rest from fifty other nations, are
waging an armed conflict that has become more lethal
with each succeeding year. At the beginning of this month Agence France-Presse
calculated that over 10,000 people had been killed in
Afghanistan in 2010. Based on official Afghan
government figures and those from the icasualties
website, record-level fatalities were documented in
every category: The U.S., its North Atlantic Treaty Organization
allies and assorted NATO partnership nations lost 711
soldiers, a substantial increase from the preceding
year when the death toll was 521. The remaining 9,370
killed were Afghans. According to AFP they were: 810 government troops, 1,292 police, 2,043
civilians and 5,225 people referred to as "militants."
It is uncertain how many dead in the last category
properly belong in the one preceding it. The United
Nations, for example, said 2,412 civilians were killed
and 3,803 wounded in the first ten months of last
year, a 20 percent increase over 2009. The fighting and the killing grew in intensity as
the year came to a close, with the U.S. and NATO
escalating bombing raids and counterinsurgency ground
operations. Last February NATO forces launched Operation
Moshtarak in Helmand province, the largest offensive
to date in the war that began on October 7, 2001. At
least 15,000 foreign and government troops conducted a
lopsided onslaught against at most a few hundred
Taliban fighters with the population of Marjah the
main victim. The next month U.S. and NATO forces began Operation
Omaid to gain control of Kandahar city, capital of the
province of the same name, and prepared Operation
Hamkari in the province, which was repeatedly delayed
in large part because of the failure of the drawn-out
and indecisive offensive in neighboring Helmand. The
Hamkari offensive did not get underway until September
and on a less ambitious scale than Operation Moshtarak.
This month a delegation of Afghan officials, led by
President Hamid Karzai's adviser Mohammad Sadiq Aziz,
claimed that the still ongoing Operation Omaid has
caused $100 million in damages to fruit crops (on the
eve of harvest season), livestock and property. "The
Om[a]id (Hope) military operation, which has been
going on for some time in Arghandab, Zhari, and
Panjwai districts, has inflicted severe damage to the
people," Aziz said. [1] On January 24 President Karzai himself accused NATO
of cutting down as many as 4,000 trees in Ghazni
province. "The president in condemning this act
emphasises to the international forces that they must
avoid such action, which is a crime against
Afghanistan's public properties and destroys the
environment," [2] read a statement issued by the
president's office. Evidently the only plant to be
left untouched by NATO is the opium poppy. On a day-to-day basis U.S. and NATO increased
three-prong attacks on both sides of the
Afghan-Pakistani border: An unprecedented level of
bombings, intensified special forces night raids and a
dramatic escalation of deadly drone missile strikes in
northwestern Pakistan. The U.S. Navy announced on the first day of this
year that the 1,000th sortie for the war in
Afghanistan had been launched from the nuclear-powered
supercarrier USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea on
December 28. Warplanes taking off from its deck logged
almost 6,000 flight hours in the last four months of
2010. Last year the U.S. Air Force more than doubled the
amount of joint terminal attack controllers (JTACs)
ordering air strikes in Afghanistan, who last October
alone coordinated over 1,000 missions, the largest
monthly amount of the war so far. The Air Force plans to spend over $23 million to
construct new facilities in Germany and Italy "for
airmen who call in airstrikes for Army combat troops
in Afghanistan." It is planning to double the amount
of tactical air control personnel, including joint
terminal attack controllers, "the airmen trained to
call in airstrikes on enemy targets." [3] A $13 million Air Support Operations Squadron
complex is planned for the U.S. Army base in Vilseck,
Germany and a $10 million installation is planned at
the Aviano Air Base in Italy. Vilseck is home to the 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment
and an infantry brigade and Aviano hosts an air
support operations squadron which supports the 173rd
Airborne Brigade Combat Team based at Vicenza. The upgrades are part of a $100 million package for
U.S. major military construction projects in Europe
for use in wars to the east and the south. This month the U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III
transport aircraft marked its two millionth flight
hour "just four years after passing its first
million-hour mark, and the first million hours took 16
years to reach." [4] Its missions are overwhelmingly
in support of the war in Afghanistan. The Pentagon announced on January 20 that "airdrop
operations in Afghanistan reached an unprecedented
level in 2010 with a record 60.4 million pounds of
cargo airdropped. "[T]he 60.4 million pounds is nearly twice the
previous record year of 2009, when more than 32.2
million pounds of cargo were airdropped, U.S. Air
Forces Central statistics show." "Since 2006, the annual amount of airdropped
supplies and equipment has practically doubled every
year. Air Force Central statistics released yesterday
show that 3.5 million pounds were airdropped in 2006,
8.12 million in 2007, 16.57 million in 2008, 32.26
million in 2009 and 60.4 million in 2010." The air dropping of equipment to U.S. and NATO
troops is conducted by C-17 Globemaster III, C-130
Hercules and C-130 Super Hercules planes which operate
out of the Bagram Airfield and the Kandahar Airfield
in Afghanistan. In the words of the director of the Combined Air
and Space Operations Center's Air Mobility Division,
"This continued sustainment of our warfighting forces
is key to counterinsurgency operations, which require
persistent presence and logistics." [5] The website of U.S. Air Forces Central states: "The Combined Air and Space Operations Center
Weapons System, also known as the AN/USQ-163 Falconer
Weapon System, commands and controls the broad
spectrum of what air power brings to the fight: Global
Vigilance, Global Reach, and Global Power. Located in
the Air Forces Central theater of operations, the CAOC
provides the command and control of airpower
throughout Iraq, Afghanistan and 18 other nations….The
CAOC is a true joint and Coalition team, staffed by
U.S. Air Force, U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine
Corps and Coalition partners." [6] In the middle of this month NATO deployed two
Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft
to Afghanistan, "where crews will be tasked with
tracking the Alliances' missions against Taliban
insurgents." [7] Also this month it was revealed that the U.S. is
adding to its drone fleet of Predators and Reapers
with the introduction of the Gordon Stare, more
advanced in scope and sophistication than its
predecessors, able to relay up to ten real time video
streams. "Gorgon Stare will be looking at a whole
city, so there will be no way for the adversary to
know what we're looking at, and we can see
everything," stated a Pentagon official recently. [8]
It hasn't been reported whether the new drone will be
equipped with the devastating Hellfire missiles
launched from Predator, Reaper and Grey Eagle unmanned
aerial vehicles. The U.S. has recently deployed M1 Abrams tanks to
Helmand province, the first heavily armored American
battle tanks used in the over nine-year war. The move
permits "ground forces to target insurgents from a
greater distance – and with more of a lethal punch –
than is possible from any other U.S. military vehicle.
The 68-ton tanks are propelled by a jet engine and
equipped with a 120mm main gun that can destroy a
house more than a mile away." [9] General David Petraeus, commander of all foreign
forces in Afghanistan, has intensified the
counterinsurgency war in Afghanistan to record levels.
Special operations raids and assassinations more than
tripled last autumn. Early this month Secretary of Defense Robert Gates
ordered an additional 1,400 Marines deployed to
Afghanistan, "temporarily," raising the number of U.S.
troops in theater to the current authorized level of
101,000. Last year the number of nations officially
providing NATO troops for its International Security
Assistance Force operations in Afghanistan grew to 48,
exactly a quarter of United Nations members. That
tally excludes the armed forces of Afghanistan and
Pakistan and other countries that have assigned forces
to NATO for the war effort, including Bahrain,
Colombia, Egypt and Kazakhstan. In total there are over 150,000 foreign troops in
the country, 130,000 now under NATO command. The commander of the NATO Training Mission –
Afghanistan, U.S. Lieutenant General William Caldwell,
announced on January 5 that the Western military
bloc's spending on building a U.S. and NATO proxy
military in Afghanistan will total $20 billion for
last year and this. "The $20 billion for 2010 and 2011 is paying for
training, equipment and infrastructure. The figure is
a large increase over the $20 billion spent between
2003 and 2009." Caldwell also confirmed that "the NATO training
mission would remain as long as necessary, but at
least until 2016, when it expects to finish developing
the air force." "We're not leaving. If anything, our organization
will probably grow a little bit more in size." [10] On January 12 the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs
of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen, told a press
conference in Washington, D.C. that violence in
Afghanistan will continue to rise beyond its already
unprecedented scale in the spring when the fighting
season begins anew. In his latest monthly press conference on January
24, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen
concurred, stating: "I do not expect 2011 to be easy. We will continue
to drive deep into insurgent territory. And we expect
continued violence as the enemy fights back." In his January 25 State of the Union address,
President Barack Obama employed similar language –
"There will be tough fighting ahead" – though he
buried the topic of the world's largest and longest
war at the bottom of his speech under an avalanche of
platitudes like American family, Sputnik moment,
poised for progress, the future is ours to win, our
free enterprise system is what drives innovation, what
Americans have done for over 200 years: reinvented
ourselves and others being polished for his reelection
campaign next year. As of the 24th of this month, traditionally a quiet
one on the war front, the U.S. and NATO had already
lost 27 soldiers. A NATO air strike killed three
Afghan policemen earlier in the month, following
similar incidents on December 8 and 16 when eight
Afghan soldiers were killed in two bombing runs. On
January 15 a U.S. soldier shot and killed an Afghan
soldier. Two days later an Afghan soldier killed an Italian
serviceman and wounded another. The Italian soldier
was the 36th lost in Afghanistan. Less than a week
later a Polish soldier was killed in eastern
Afghanistan, the 23rd Polish soldier to die in the
country. Early in the month three Afghan civilians,
including a student, were killed in a NATO night raid
in Ghazni province, sparking a protest by hundreds of
people. Yet according to Admiral Mullen, "We must prepare
ourselves for more violence and more casualties in
coming months." While in Afghanistan two weeks ago, Vice President
Joseph Biden affirmed that "the United States is
prepared to stay in Afghanistan beyond 2014, if
Afghans wanted it." [11] Days later NATO commander General Petraeus stated
"Some international troops would stay in Afghanistan
beyond 2014," as last November's NATO summit
declaration "said the process would be
conditions-based, not calendar-driven." [12] "US Vice President Joseph Biden, German Chancellor
Angela Merkel and some other world leaders have
promised their troops will stay in Afghanistan even
after the agreed timeline." [13] German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle, while in
Pakistan en route to Afghanistan this month, "pledged
long-term support for Afghanistan, saying his country
would continue engagements there even after 2014…."
[14] In the words of a Russian analyst: "None of the targets set before the deployment of
forces to Afghanistan has been achieved. The
Taliban…have not been defeated, but military
operations have been expanded. American and NATO
forces have been denied access to many regions of the
country. Consequently, it's incorrect to say that the
allied forces control Afghanistan. In these
circumstances, American and NATO forces cannot
withdraw from the country because this may be
considered as a defeat." [15] In interviews with the Voice of Russia, Afghan
Defense Ministry spokesman General Zahir Azimi and
Kabul-based political scientist Nasrullah Stanakzai
averred that "Both the United States and NATO are
unlikely to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan in
2014." Azimi added, "local government security forces
will call the shots in Afghanistan by 2014, which,
however, will unlikely see the pull-out of the US' and
NATO's troops from this South Asian country." [16] Not only are American and NATO troops not going to
withdraw from Afghanistan or even began to "draw down"
this year as President Barack Obama pledged on
December 1, 2009, but their number has reached its
highest level to date and the war has been expanded
into Pakistan in the interim. The Conflict Monitoring Center, an independent
research group concentrating on South Asia, revealed
in a recent report that U.S. drone missile strikes in
Pakistan, described as an "assassination campaign
turning out to be a revenge campaign," have killed
2,043 people, "mostly civilians," over the last five
years. [17] Last year was the deadliest year by far, with 134
missile attacks in Pakistan's Federally Administered
Tribal Areas (overwhelmingly in North Waziristan)
killing nearly 1,000 people. The reports provided these details: "People in the tribal belt usually carry guns and
ammunition as a tradition. US drones will identify
anyone carrying a gun as a militant and subsequently
he will be killed." "Many times, people involved in rescue activities
also come under attack. The assumption that these
people are supporters of militants is quite wrong."
[18] Over 700 people were killed in the Central
Intelligence Agency-directed missile strikes the
preceding year, meaning over three-quarters of total
killings occurred in the past two years. At the
beginning of 2010 Dawn, Pakistan's leading
English-language newspaper, wrote: "According to the statistics compiled by Pakistani
authorities, the Afghanistan-based US drones killed
708 people in 44 predator attacks targeting the tribal
areas between January 1 and December 31, 2009. "For each Al Qaeda and Taliban terrorist killed by
US drones, 140 innocent Pakistanis also had to die.
Over 90 per cent of those killed in the deadly missile
strikes were civilians, claim authorities." [19] On the last day of 2010 a commentary on China's
Xinhua News Agency website stated: "The number of air strikes doubled this year over
the previous one, and the figure of people killed in
these strikes also doubled, which shows the growing
U.S. influence in Pakistan's territory." "People killed in drone strikes are usually
identified as militants or suspected militants by U.S.
officials and Pakistani security forces. But the real
fact always remains distant and far behind. There are
never any details of the names of people killed in
such aerial strikes in the media, nor are their
identities confirmed or faces shown. The exact account
always remains vague. "Besides these militants, a large number of
innocent civilians also became victims of the drone
strikes aimed at militants. They raised their voice in
protest but most of the times it is all in vain." [20] In addition to local protests, last month
demonstrations were held in Pakistan's capital of
Islamabad against the bloody and cowardly targeted
murders in the tribal areas. 10,000 people
demonstrated in Peshawar at the beginning of this week
demanding a halt to the attacks. To demonstrate how much the U.S. is concerned about
the outrage of Pakistanis over the missile strikes,
and the victims of the same, over the last four weeks
the CIA: Fired a missile at vehicles near the town of Ghulam
Khan in North Waziristan on December 31, killing eight
people. Killed 19 in three missile attacks in the same
region on the first of the year. On January 7 slew four more people in North
Waziristan. Five days afterward killed six in four missile
strikes. On January 18 killed at least five more people in
North Waziristan in an attack on "a house suspected of
housing militants." [21] On January 23 launched three drone strikes that
killed 13 people in North Waziristan. The targets
included a house, a motor vehicle and two people on a
motorcycle. With 62 killed in 24 days, the U.S. is on schedule
to slay another 1,000 Pakistanis this year as well in
what the State Department's Harold Koh calls targeted
killings as opposed to targeted assassinations. The
use of the last term, but not its practice, is frowned
upon by U.S. law. With the passing of several resolutions on
Afghanistan since September 2001 condemning terrorism
but not war, the United Nations Security Council has
been complicit in the expansion of a war that now
costs the lives of 10,000 Afghans a year and almost
three Pakistanis a day. One that includes 1,000 U.S.
and NATO air sorties (bombings, missile attacks and
strafing) a month in Afghanistan and on average over
twice weekly lethal missile strikes in Pakistan. Opposition to a war that, counting by days, is in
its tenth year and by the calendar its eleventh is
virtually non-existent on the official level. The
number of the 192 UN member states that have in any
manner opposed the Afghanistan-Pakistan war can be
counted on the fingers of one hand. When the Soviet Union intervened in Afghanistan in
late 1979 (with the support of both factions of the
ruling People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan) the
U.S. rallied other nations – in the General Assembly
and not the Security Council – to condemn the action.
A resolution demanding the "immediate, unconditional
and total withdrawal of the foreign troops from
Afghanistan" passed by a vote of 104-18 only 18 days
after the first Soviet troops arrived in the country.
According to major Western political and military
officials, U.S. and NATO troops will remain in
Afghanistan at least 15 years after the 2001 invasion. The U.S.-backed mujahideen in Afghanistan and
Northwest Pakistan posed a far greater potential
threat to the Soviet Union, which bordered
Afghanistan, than the Taliban could even theoretically
present to the U.S., Canada and their European NATO
partners. Even the most steadfast supporter of the current
war cannot with a straight face claim that over
150,000 foreign troops are in Central and South Asia
to "hunt Osama bin Laden" and to "combat al-Qaeda."
Not after ten years, surely. (Though Obama in his
State of the Union address persisted in asserting "al
Qaeda and their affiliates continue to plan attacks
against us.") The world stands indicted – and convicted – for not
so much tolerating as actively supporting a war of
unconscionable length with wildly disproportionate use
of force by most of the world's major military powers
(three of them nuclear nations). For accepting the
concept of indefinite, in practical terms permanent,
war as a natural state of affairs in the 21st century
as the exclusive prerogative of the world's
self-proclaimed sole military superpower and its
phalanx of fellow NATO members. 1) Reuters, January 11, 2011 http://www.afcent.af.mil/library/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=12152 7) Aero-News.net/Agence France-Presse, January
14, 2011 http://english.ruvr.ru/2011/../39462890.html 16) Pyotr Goncharov, US, NATO to stay on in
Afghanistan? http://english.ruvr.ru/2010/../38429252.html 17) Sify News http://www.sify.com/topics/Conflict-Monitoring-Centre.html …. http://www.pakistankakhudahafiz.com/download/DronesAnnualReport.pdf 18) Asian News International, January 3, 2011
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stopnato/message/43513 20) Misbah Saba Malik, Drone strikes lead to
disaster in Pakistan
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2010-12/31/c_13672471.htm 21) Xinhua News Agency, January 19, 2011 |
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