Word: nato
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...easy. Monthly casualty figures for U.S. service members in Afghanistan now rival those in Iraq--though there are about a quarter the number of troops there. Insurgent groups have spread to previously peaceful regions. "We are not exactly in a stalemate, but we are still marching uphill," says a NATO military commander in Kabul. He compares Afghanistan today with "about where we were in Iraq in 2004 to 2005"--which is just before it started to get really...
...seems to share that assessment. While still a "work in progress," the National Intelligence Estimate on Afghanistan, due out after the U.S. elections, portrays a country on a "downward spiral," says a Pentagon official who was briefed about the report. The key reasons: a revitalized Taliban, inadequate U.S. and NATO forces, the funds generated for the Taliban by narcotics, and a government so consumed by corruption and inefficiency that it cannot offer a reasonable alternative to the insurgents...
...pledged $20 billion to nearly double the Afghan army's strength by 2012, but it is still short more than half the necessary military trainers to do the job. "The sheer business of training the army, equipping them, deploying them and creating the infrastructure takes time," says the NATO commander. "And the only way to buy time is to bring in more alliance or coalition troops...
...most NATO nations either can't or won't send more troops, and the U.S. armed forces are spread thin between two wars. So the next U.S. Administration may perforce have to abandon the big stick in favor of speaking more softly. Army General David McKiernan, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, has made it clear that there is no purely military solution. "It's not just a question about more soldiers," he has said. "It's a question about more governance, about more economic aid, about more political assistance for the government of Afghanistan...
...While there have been several attempted and successful suicide bombings on the fringes of Kabul against Afghan and NATO army convoys, this is the first attack in the city since July 7, when a suicide bomber in a vehicle set off explosives outside the gates of the Indian embassy, killing at least 60 people, including an Indian diplomat. Some observers have warned that the mounting violence in the capital may in fact get worse in the coming weeks, following recent changes at the Interior Ministry, which historically been riddled with corruption. The replacement of the former Minister of the Interior...