...Troop Withdrawals in Afghanistan The United States is enduring a rapid withdrawal of troops while still attempting to empower the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. In doing so, the US Military has developed an increased reliance on engaging partner Afghan forces in order to better enable them with the ability to maintain operations autonomously post-withdrawal as well as reinforce the manpower of conventional US military units who continue to lose support with the decrease in occupying forces. One of the primary missions in Afghanistan is to establish a stable government and empower the Afghan military and police forces with the training and equipment necessary to protect and sustain the republic. Rapid withdrawal has left US troops more vulnerable as a result in the increased reliance on partnering with Afghan defense forces. The Taliban have recognized this as a weakness and by infiltrating the Afghan military and police forces have been able to successfully inflict numerous US and Afghan casualties through what is referred to as “Green on Blue” attacks. As a response, the US locks down on partnered missions. While this protects US troops, it detracts from the ability to enable Afghan troops with the ability to defend themselves and their government. Over the last decade, training missions have often become a secondary and tertiary responsibility of most US and NATO units. With poorly equipped and trained partner forces, the US cannot rely on the Afghan...
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...the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in an effort to preserve the communist government and ensure its own security, but it failed due to the superior tactics of guerilla fighters in a unique landscape and the United States’ support of the Afghan rebels. This war between Soviet forces and Afghan rebels was a struggle between the communist government and its opposition. The Soviet Union was unable to adjust to the terrain and battle space and was forced to withdrawal. This struggle highlights the strategic game that the United States and the Soviet Union played to prevent control by one another during the Cold War. According to Joseph Collins’ analysis of the Soviet invasion, the motives for the Soviets to invade Afghanistan...
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...Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan The Invasion of Afghanistan marked the beginning one of the darkest decades in Soviet political action. One of the most decisive event in the latter half of the Cold War, it raised tensions once again and put the two superpowers butting heads once again. A 10 year war that pitted the Soviets against the Mujahedeen backed by many western and fellow Arab nations. Countries had different reasons to support the fight against the Soviets such as the Americans who saw it as another Cold War struggle, to Egypt and other fellow Muslim nations it was to assist a fellow Muslim population fight back against the atheist invaders. This invasion of Afghanistan was met with a worldwide outcry for the USSR to immediately pull out and stop the fighting. The Soviet equivalent of Vietnam, this was a conflict that they realized was unwinnable far too late into the endeavor. This event brought the world to the end of Détente and created high tensions through much of the 1980’s. When the Soviet paratroopers landed over Kabul on Christmas of 1979 the time for current Prime Minister Hazifullah Amin was quickly running out. He was a very unpopular leader with many ideals that did line up with Moscow, however they decided that his time leading the nation was up. On December 27th Soviet troops stormed his palace and murdered him with most of his family. He was almost immediately replaced by Babrak Kamal, a politician who depended very heavily on the Soviet forces to stay...
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...series of deliberate and deadly terrorist acts. The victims were in airplanes or in their offices: secretaries, businessmen and women, military and federal workers, moms and dads, friends and neighbors. Thousands of lives were suddenly ended by evil, despicable acts of terror. The pictures of airplanes flying into buildings, fires burning, and -- huge structures collapsing have filled us with disbelief, terrible sadness, and a quiet, unyielding anger. These acts of mass murder were intended to frighten our nation into chaos and retreat. But they have failed. Our country is strong." George W. Bush Addressing the Nation on September 11, 2001. (Intellectual Takeout , 2014) During the 1990s, the end of the cold war led to an entirely new global security environment, marked by a focus on internal rather than inter-state wars. In the early 21st century, new global threats emerged. The attacks of 11 September 2001 on the United States clearly demonstrated the challenge of international terrorism, while subsequent events heightened concern about the proliferation of nuclear weapons and the dangers from other non-conventional weapons. The organizations of the UN system mobilized immediately in their respective spheres to step up action against terrorism. On 28 September, the Security Council adopted resolution 1373, under the enforcement provisions of the UN Charter, to prevent the financing of terrorism, criminalize the collection of funds for such purposes, and immediately freeze terrorist...
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...unleashed onto the buildings causing mass devastation and loss of life. Due to the explosion from the aircraft’s on the 60th floor, many people were killed, and those on the higher floors were left stranded. It turns out that most people believed...
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...January 27, 2010 War on Afghanistan We are all humans, and as other creatures we are imperfect and full of sin. We might have wrong thoughts, unique beliefs, or even dour doctrines. However, all these features shouldn’t drag us to be authoritarians under any circumstance. These words precisely illustrate the situation that was ongoing in Afghanistan under the rule of Taliban government. I tended to think that killing cannot be justified in defense of the innocent against unjust attack, whether the victim deserves it or not. But that right is not absolute; someone can forfeit that right if they willfully threaten or taken the lives of innocent people. Therefore, the American involvement in Afghanistan was fair and justified in order to bring the Afghan’s sorrow, tyranny, and violation of rights to an end. Historically, the country of Afghanistan was devastated by the successive wars. The people were exhausted from the consecutive occupations and tyranny. As a result, it summed in an enormous human and economic toll. After the Soviet withdrawal, the government steadily lost ground to the extremist forces. In early 1992, Kabul was captured, and Al-Qaeda militia men set up a new government consisting of a 50-member ruling council. The new brutal government started imposing their extremist, strict beliefs on people. They used radio broadcasts to coerce residents into adhering to their strict edicts. The extremists spread fear and despair among the Afghans by their brutal...
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...TO: Marc Grossman, Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan FROM: Senior Advisor SUBJECT: Strategy and Tactics for Negotiation on Resetting the Bilateral Relationship Between the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the United States INTRODUCTION: In your upcoming meetings this week with top Pakistani government officials, your priority must be to negotiate the re-opening of the ground lines of communication (GLOC) from Pakistan to Afghanistan. It is critical that a favorable agreement be made prior to the NATO summit in Chicago in May, in which the 2014 withdrawal from Afghanistan will be a major point of discussion. Your negotiations will focus on (1) securing the GLOC, (2) continuing our kinetic strike program, (3) Coalition Support Fund (CSF) reimbursements, (4) the Salala incident apology, and (5) President Zardari’s participation at the NATO summit. BACKGROUND: Yours will be the third high-level visit to Pakistan after the pausing of relations in the wake of the November 26 Salala cross-border incident and subsequent closing of NATO supply lines, following Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides’ and Administrator Raj Shah’s trips in early April. More pressingly, your visit comes immediately after the April 12 announcement of the Parliamentary Committee on National Security (PCNS)’s recommendations for the U.S.-Pakistan bilateral relationship, with which your interlocutors will base future foreign policy. POSITIONS OF PARTIES/ISSUES: a. GLOC: The...
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...for hegemony, with Pakistan establishing ties with the United States in 1954, and Afghanistan turning to the Soviet Union. The Soviets viewed Afghanistan not only as a strategic location to counter the US alliance with Pakistan, but also as a key trade location with access to oil. ● At the time, the Saur Revolution of April 1978 had recently taken place, where the Afghan communist party seized power in a coup and killed the prime minister, and set up a new government with close ties to the Soviet Union. Its ruthlessness with harsh military, social and land reforms, combined with economic measures that worsened conditions for the poor led to resistance by the Mujahideen,...
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...For much of the new millennium, the United States has waged war in foreign lands, much of which spawned from the tragic attacks on September 11, 2001. War, in essence, provokes debate of principle. In 2002, when the President asked for authorization to use military force against Iraq, who they believed to be behind the attacks, party lines were drawn. While it was rather normal to see a Republican supporting the intervention in Afghanistan and eventually Iraq, it was exceedingly rare to find a Republican against it. North Carolina Representative Walter Jones took the courageous stand as one of the first Republicans to recant his position; to defy his own party and his constituents in his opposition of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, in an effort to stop the brutal killing of people, which now stands at over 9,000 Americans for both war, plus nearly 210,000 civilians (Lutz); and unsustainable...
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...Pak-Afghan Trade Relation: Pakistan and Afghanistan have a history of bilateral trade relations and economic interactions. A distinguishing feature of relationship in both countries is the shared border spanning about 2500 kilometers which is crossed by some 50,000 people everyday. This reflects the strength of socio economic interaction between two countries. Pakistan is currently the largest trading partner of Afghanistan, while Afghanistan is Pakistan’s third largest trading partner. Pakistan's exports to Afghanistan tripled during last six years, from half a billion dollars in fiscal year 2004 to 1.5 billion dollars in 2010. Afghanistan is now Pakistan’s third major export destination after the United States and the United Arab Emirates. In the last fiscal year it has left behind China, United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia and Turkey in terms of generating our export earnings. The list of the items Pakistan is currently exporting to Afghanistan is long and varied. It includes cement and other construction materials including glass sheets, iron and steel structures, paints and varnishes plus a large number of electrical items, fuel and edible oils, oilseeds, food items including wheat flour and rice, fruits and vegetables, confectionary, mineral waters and ice creams, medicines, soaps and detergents and a vast array of kitchen wear and bathroom fittings. As it is a proved fact that in last about a half decade Afghanistan has made steady progress and development...
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...State of the Union Address on January 28, 2014 he mentioned many important details about America’s interaction with the rest of the world. One major point he focused on was America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan. At the beginning of Obamas presidency, there were 180,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now, all troops are out of Iraq and 60,000 troops have come home from Afghanistan. Afghan forces are now leading in their own security. The United States is now supporting a unified Afghanistan as it takes responsibility for its own future. The United States has been working to defeat al Qaeda’s leadership, al Qaeda affiliates and other extremists are now taking root in different parts of the world. In Yemen Somalia, Iraq and Mali America must work with partners to disrupt and disable terrorist networks. And in Syria America supports the opposition that rejects the agenda of terrorist networks. The United States will only fight in battles that are necessary to be fought, not the battles that terrorists want us to fight. The United States will not feed into extremism. America will counter terrorism not just by intelligence and military action but by standing by its constitutional ideas and setting an example for the rest of the world. America has rallied over 50 countries to prevent nuclear materials from falling into the wrong hands. That is why Syria’s chemical weapons are being eliminated. The United States will continue to work with the international community so that the Syrian...
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...Syrian President Bashar Assad warned against Western intervention in his country's 7-month-old uprising, saying such action would trigger an "earthquake" that "would burn the whole region." Assad comments were made against a backdrop of growing calls from anti-regime protesters for a no-fly zone over Syria and increasingly frequent clashes between government troops and army deserters, the most recent of which left at least 30 troops dead Saturday. I still think Western intervention will be appropriate if civilians continue to be hurt in the region. Syria has gone through drastic changes recently. The Arab League foreign ministers meeting approved sanctions against Syria on Nov. 27, the US Navy has dispatched an aircraft carrier for Syrian coastal waters, and the United States, Turkey and other countries have started evacuating nationals from Syria. These concerns have become the focus of world attention. Western intervention in the Syrian situation is a strategic consideration that has to do with reshaping the regional order, while the intensity of intervention mainly depends on the development and evolution of the state of affairs. The Western countries, represented by the United States, have increasingly intensified regional intervention to avoid becoming the biggest loser in the wave of the Middle East, and taken different treatments and multiple standards among the Middle Eastern countries according to their needs. The situations inside and outside Syria have undergone...
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...The origin of the Taliban can be traced back to the 1979 USSR invasion of Afghanistan. Bring in over one hundred thousand soldiers to preserve the Communist Government, which they were they met with fierce resistance fighters called Mujahedeen from whom the taliban evolved. The mujahedeen was a mix of Afghan resistance fighters and refugees who had crossed into Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province at the onset of the Soviet invasion and later been recruited to fight the Soviet infidels. The mujahedeen controlled 75% of Afghanistan despite fighting the might of the world’s second most powerful military power. Cold war politics produced a strong condemnation of the invasion, and in turn sending hundreds of millions of dollars worth of ammunitions and food to Afghanistan...
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...directions and possibly be destroyed in position. New variations include vertical envelopments or Airborne Troops or airmobile troops and amphibious envelopments (Goodman,1993). Noted single envelopments were accomplished by Alexander the Great at Arbela in 331 BC, Robert E. Lee at Chancellorsville in 1863, and Erwin Romme at Gazala in 1942, leading to the capture of Tobruk; famous double envelopments include those of Hannibal at the Battle of Cannae in 216 BC, the American Revolutionary War Battle of Cowpens in 1781, and the destruction of the 7th German Army at the Falaise Gap in 1944 (Goodman,1993). Defensive-offensive maneuvers include attack from a strong defensive position after the attacking enemy has been sapped in strength, as in two battles of the Hundred Years' War, Crecy in 1346 and Agincourt in 1415, or feigned withdrawals that attempts to lure the enemy out of position as performed by William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and also by Napoleon at the Battle of Austerlitz in 1805 (Goodman,1993). Turning maneuvers are indirect approaches that attempt to swing wide around an enemy's flank to threaten an enemy's supply and communication lines that the enemy is forced to abandon a strong position or be cut off and encircled (Goodman,1993). Napoleon was a master of the turning movement, using it many times between 1796 and 1812. Robert E. Lee used the maneuver at the Second Battle of Bull Run in 1862; the German drive to the French coast in 1940 was another...
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...Bilateral arrangements, and economic and energy leverages combined with cultural instructions are widely implemented in order to maintain Russian influence in Central Asia. Considering the fact that states in the region most importantly though not solely Kazakhstan, have begun to search for diversification and partnership with other great powers, they have gained a certain degree of independence from Moscow. Besides, in recent years China has emerged in Central Asia as an important rival to Russia in terms of influence, and has already established multiple agreements and investments with all of the states in the region. The degree of independence that Central Asian states have managed to gain due to their conviction to act separately from Moscow and to grab Western opportunities, as well as the Chinese presence in the region, suggest that Russian influence there is decreasing and will continue to do so in the near future. Russia has not lost its ambition to remain the main player in Central Asia, which is seen as a priority for its regional security, and besides the opposition both from the regional states and...
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