News from the front, Iraq, the Middle East, and elsewhere.

[stoat]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_Logs

Somewhat interesting. It seems that I have a more realistic mental image of the conflict than The Guardian, as friendly fire incidents, civilian casualties, Pakistani collusion, and a high rate of Special Forces involvement aren't that shocking, in my opinion. It is still a war, after all. There is a vast amount of stuff to slosh through, so it'll be interesting to see what nuggets fall out.

[Yossarian0815]

IED map:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/datablog/interactive/2010/jul/26/ied-afghanistan-war-logs

[Dirtweasle]

The documents, to be made available by an organization called WikiLeaks, suggest that Pakistan, an ostensible ally of the United States, allows representatives of its spy service to meet directly with the Taliban in secret strategy sessions to organize networks of militant groups that fight against American soldiers in Afghanistan, and even hatch plots to assassinate Afghan leaders.

Taken together, the reports indicate that American soldiers on the ground are inundated with accounts of a network of Pakistani assets and collaborators that runs from the Pakistani tribal belt along the Afghan border, through southern Afghanistan, and all the way to the capital, Kabul.   

LINK

So, our Allie and regional sponser is playing us for idjits while we give them money we cannot afford.   

My flippant suggestion to PUFO the heck out of there is actually looking more like a viable idea all the time.

[stoat]

I'm kind of intrigued by how this was covered by the different papers. The Guardian viewed the whole thing as a shocking revelation and has perhaps the most thorough coverage to date, and they focused on civilian deaths, special forces involvement, and IEDs. Der Spiegel has only a few articles, but chose to write mainly about how the documents reflected poorly on the Bundeswehr. The New York Times has a few articles, but the main tilt seems to be about the Pakistani influence. Likewise, last night there was a single article on the Chicago Tribune website that only mentioned the Pakistani bits. In this morning's paper, that article was not present, and a small sidebar announced only the leak of the documents, and did not at all discuss what they contained. It seems that everyone is taking from these files what they want in order to push previously held opinions.

[Seminole]

My flippant suggestion to PUFO the heck out of there is actually looking more like a viable idea all the time.

After the fall of South Vietnam in 1975, U.S. Col. Harry Summers remarked to his North Vietnamese counterpart, "You know you never defeated us on the battlefield." After a moment, the North Vietnamese officer replied: "That may be so, but it is also irrelevant."

[VAB]

 It seems that everyone is taking from these files what they want in order to push previously held opinions.

Some of the Guardian's reporting borders on the bizarre. They give the impression they were unaware until recently that there was a war being fought, and are outraged that the US and UK governments have been covering up the existence of this war for years. They also seem to be of the opinion that killing the enemy during war is a dastardly thing to do.

[stoat]

 It seems that everyone is taking from these files what they want in order to push previously held opinions.

Some of the Guardian's reporting borders on the bizarre. They give the impression they were unaware until recently that there was a war being fought, and are outraged that the US and UK governments have been covering up the existence of this war for years. They also seem to be of the opinion that killing the enemy during war is a dastardly thing to do.

They certainly push the "civilian tragedy" harder than most, which was the point I had. And there reporting here falls in line. They have an interactive map of the 300 most interesting incidents the reports revealed, and the synopses are dishonestly short. The plurality are "civilian casualties," but they are things such as "Spanish gunner wounds civilian," or "camp guard kills civilian." I'm sure you could read the whole report to learn the circumstances, but there is no information here about whether the rules of engagement were followed, and if we're making big noise about non-fatal gunshot wounds, I would recommend The Guardian hang out in the Back of the Yards neighborhood in Chicago on any given weekend.

[ridgeway]

The documents, to be made available by an organization called WikiLeaks, suggest that Pakistan, an ostensible ally of the United States, allows representatives of its spy service to meet directly with the Taliban in secret strategy sessions to organize networks of militant groups that fight against American soldiers in Afghanistan, and even hatch plots to assassinate Afghan leaders.

Taken together, the reports indicate that American soldiers on the ground are inundated with accounts of a network of Pakistani assets and collaborators that runs from the Pakistani tribal belt along the Afghan border, through southern Afghanistan, and all the way to the capital, Kabul.   

LINK

So, our Allie and regional sponser is playing us for idjits while we give them money we cannot afford.   

My flippant suggestion to PUFO the heck out of there is actually looking more like a viable idea all the time.

It is a surprise that the ISI is (in whole or in part) in cahoots with the Taliban?  I thought this was common knowledge since the '90s -- which is probably why our State Department is just finding out.

Note that the ISI <> the Pakistani government [fingers crescented].

[dumrox]

IED map:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/datablog/interactive/2010/jul/26/ied-afghanistan-war-logs

Interesting map.  I had no idea that there were that many IED's being set, and surprised the clear rate is as high as it is.

On May 21st, 2007, there's a large, light green circle just north of Kabul.  That doesn't seem to make sense in that it's color coded as found and cleared, but sized as a 20+ casualty IED.  Are they sizing them based on potential or is this just an error?

Just finished watching the timeline.  I saw a few more of the oversized, light green circles, mostly down south.

[Yossarian0815]

The outrage is that the war in Afgh was sold as more or less under control in the early to middle naughties.

Not unlike Iraq where the out of control situation was kept secret from the public before the election of 2004. The extent of the tragedy only became clear when Petraeus was selling the success of the surge.

I don´t think that Obama would have been pro Afghanistan war during the campaign if he had known the extent of NATO´s failure.

Remember how the turbine story was sold in that video that somebody posted on the BFC forum. According to the Guardian, said turbine is sitting there unused because they can´t get enough cement through taliban lines to install it. Incredible.

[MilhachVlhandsandwich]

 It seems that everyone is taking from these files what they want in order to push previously held opinions.

Some of the Guardian's reporting borders on the bizarre. They give the impression they were unaware until recently that there was a war being fought, and are outraged that the US and UK governments have been covering up the existence of this war for years. They also seem to be of the opinion that killing the enemy during war is a dastardly thing to do.

Well it is the Guardian.  It's just what they do.  They still have one columnist who is a genuine Stalinist and half a dozen who are Marxists.  Their grasp on reality is limited.

[VAB]

The outrage is that the war in Afgh was sold as more or less under control in the early to middle naughties.

It kinda was.

[Yossarian0815]

Casualties may be a measure of failure, but aren´t a good measure of success.
I.e. in the british book I read the Royal Fusiliers often complained that they weren´t even under the control of the immediate surroundings of their compounds, to which the Brass/Politicians in London answered that as long as they don´t have casualties it can´t be that bad.

[Dirtweasle]

I'm kind of intrigued by how this was covered by the different papers. ...

[...]

...  seems that everyone is taking from these files what they want in order to push previously held opinions. 

Not all that unusual really.  Especially with the whole Terrorism story writ large, different papers reflect a point of view, and in the long rung it's why reading multiple sources is always interesting.

[Dirtweasle]

The State Dept. has released their memo on the release of Lockerbie bomber al-Megrahi[/url].

Can't quite understand why the GOP is attacking State over this.   Seems like State under the direction of Her Rotteness may have done the best they could gioven the situation.