Word: kabul
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Perhaps the highest-risk strategy outlined in Obama's agenda is his hope that within 18 months, Afghan security forces will be able to take a greater role in protecting the country. When Karzai took a new oath of office at his inauguration ceremony in Kabul last month, he promised that by the end of his five-year term, Afghan security forces would be "capable of taking the lead in ensuring security and stability across the country." Accelerating the process in order to achieve the necessary number of well-trained Afghan soldiers - ideally estimated to be 134,000 troops, compared...
...country. That makes civilian efforts as vital as military operations and of longer duration." To do so, she and Obama envision a "civilian surge" of agriculturists, rule-of-law experts and development strategists that should be in place by early 2010. As part of that expansion, the Kabul embassy has plans to expand into a neighboring compound and has already signed a long-term lease on property designated to be a new consulate for the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. Plans for another consulate, in the western city of Herat, are also in the works...
...Pakistan's aim has always been to have a friendly government in Kabul that is an accurate representation of the Pashtun population," says Nawaz. "If there's a reconfiguration of the Karzai government, it brings more Pashtuns in, Pakistan may want to play a part to try and bring in people that may be supporting the Taliban but are not ideologues." Such a solution would probably not involve Mullah Omar and the Afghan Taliban directly but would perhaps include the notorious Haqqani network based in Pakistan's North Waziristan and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, leader of Hizb-e-Islami - both of which...
...observers say that, in fact, the Pakistani military views the Afghan Taliban leadership and groups such as Hekmatyar's Hizb-e-Islami and the Haqqanis as a means of securing its interests in Afghanistan. "It's leverage in the sense that it allows them to have a government in Kabul that is neutral, if not pro-Pakistan," says Nawaz. "That's why they've always hedged on the Afghan Taliban...
Even if Saudi Arabia or others stepped into the financial breach, not all Afghans are convinced that the Taliban leadership can be easily peeled away from al-Qaeda. A senior Afghan security official points to a recent attack on the U.N. compound in Kabul that was planned and financed by al-Qaeda but executed by the Taliban. The war has brought their causes closer together, he says. "Now the real Taliban is no different from the real al-Qaeda. They are not a bunch of hungry guys fighting because al-Qaeda is paying them. They will never accept our vision...