generalspeaking

Welcome to Afghan Spring

The Afghan Taliban - supported by the Haqqani network of terrorists in Pakistan - will be well satisfied with their day's work reflected by a well-planned and -executed attack on points across the safe stronghold of Kabul and other Afghan cities.  The Spring Offensive has begun.  And the Taliban have achieved, through this bold initiative, the delivery of the message; that no place in Afghanistan is secure from their entry and subsequent attacks.

What has been demonstrated is the opening act, with more, far more to come.  The 18 hours of attack and counterattack that succeeded in Kabul, Nangarhar, Logar and Paktia, were not devastatingly destructive, in a sense, just dreadfully unsettling, more than anything.  Four civilians were killed, 11 members of the Afghan security forces.  Forty-two Afghan security forces members were injured, as well as 32 civilians.

Two Taliban attackers were arrested, and 36 of their members involved in the attack, killed.  It is the well planned attack on the capital Kabul, where security is held to be tight.  Particularly around Western embassies, government buildings and NATO bases.  But, as in the September assault on the U.S. embassy, the tactic of using a still-under-construction building as a base from which to mount rocket and machine-gun assaults on diplomatic residences and luxury hotels below, proved fairly traumatic.

"Even though yesterday's attacks didn't harm many foreign or Afghan forces, the insurgents wanted to show that they are stronger and can reach any spot with organized, complex attacks", commented Noor-ul-haq Ulumi, a former Afghan Army general.  And they did that quite well, in fact.  Fighters armed with machine guns, rockets and suicide vests struck eight sites across Kabul as well as those three provincial capitals outside the city.

And, it was reported, some of the attackers came disguised as women, wearing burkas.  The Afghan parliament building came under attack.  "These attacks are the beginning of the spring offensive and we had planned them for months", Zabihullah Mujahid boasted.  Revenge, he said, for the burning of Korans in February at the U.S. airbase, and the massacre of 17 civilians by an American soldier in Kandahar.

It is one thing for the Taliban to visit violence and death on the people of Afghanistan.  This is, after all, the country they claim to be theirs to rule.  Quite another thing for foreigners to invade their country and deny them their right to rule.  And should the foreigners kill Afghans for whatever reason, be they Islamist insurgents or villagers mistakenly harmed, they can anticipate revenge.

Theirs was a busy agenda on Sunday where fighting continued in Jalalabad, along with Logar and Paktia provinces.  NATO forces responded, killing suicide-vest-wearing attackers attempting to storm their targets.  Before Monday dawned, militants managed to successfully fight their way into a jail in northwest Pakistan.  Freeing almost 400 prisoners.

Thus effectively restoring hugely the numbers of their fighters who had been destroyed by Afghan and NATO forces in this initial foray.

Labels: Afghanistan, NATO, Security, Societal Failures

posted by Pieface @ Monday, April 16, 2012