Word: talibanism
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...Iraq, Obama's anticipated next stop on a trip that will also take him to Jordan, Israel, Germany, France and Britain, even though the Iraqi theatre has more than twice as many troops. So far it looks as if the trend will continue in July. On the 6th Taliban forces raided an outpost in Eastern Afghanistan, killing 9 US soldiers in the greatest single loss of American soldiers since a helicopter was shot down...
...Egypt, Iran or even Lebanon is more important; if we are worried about poverty, Africa is more important. A troop increase is likely to inflame Afghan nationalism because Afghans are more anti-foreign than we acknowledge and the support for our presence in the insurgency areas is declining. The Taliban, which was a largely discredited and backward movement, gains support by portraying itself as fighting for Islam and Afghanistan against a foreign military occupation...
...whose policy papers are often ignored by Afghan civil servants and are invisible to the population. Our lack of success despite our wealth and technology convinces ordinary Afghans to believe in conspiracy theories. Well-educated people have told me that the West is secretly backing the Taliban and that the U.S.'s main objective was to steal Afghanistan's emeralds, antiquities and uranium - and that we knew where Osama bin Laden was but had decided not to catch...
...military strategy, meanwhile, should focus on counterterrorism - not counterinsurgency. Our presence has so far prevented al-Qaeda from establishing training camps in Afghanistan. We must continue to prevent it from doing so. But our troops should not try to hold territory or chase the Taliban around rural areas. We should also use our presence to steer Afghanistan away from civil war and provide some opportunity for the Afghans themselves to create a more humane, well-governed and prosperous country. This policy would require far fewer troops over the next 20 years, and they would probably be predominantly special forces...
...opened a doner kebab restaurant, and learned that young people were bored with their household fare, and expressed their worldliness by eating things their mother's couldn't cook. So after serving Turkish cuisine in Kuwait, he turned to serving soul food in the erstwhile stamping ground of the Taliban...