During Mr. Obama’s Situation Room briefings on his alternatives, those advocating a minimal commitment of new troops in Afghanistan have argued that the United States needs only enough forces to keep Al Qaeda “bottled up” in the mountainous tribal areas of Pakistan.

“You could argue that even under the status quo, we don’t see Al Qaeda coming into Afghanistan,” said one official sympathetic to this view. “And so an additional commitment of forces isn’t going to apply more pressure on our main target.”

Divorce that, for a moment, from the troop-escalation question, and this quote throws into relief a conflation of endgames that the Obama administration has committed from the start. If al-Qaeda isn’t coming back into Afghanistan under these current favorable circumstances, then it’s fair to take this official’s point that the strategy being pursued is, at least, taking a rather indirect and circuitous route to dealing al-Qaeda a strategic failure. But what it is designed for is the stabilization of Afghanistan. (No guarantee that it’ll be achieved, but still.) Here’s Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on ‘Meet The Press’ yesterday:

We want to get Al Qaeda. We want to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat those who attacked us. And we want to be able to give the Afghans the tools that they need to be able to defend themselves. We’re not interested in staying in Afghanistan.

As the anonymous official’s quote suggests, these are two different goals entirely. If the goal is to get al-Qaeda — well, it’ll be nice to give Afghanistan the tools to defend itself, but it’s besides the point. If, on the other hand, the goal is to give Afghanistan the tools to defend itself so that the United States can extract itself from Afghanistan, then it’s nice if we disrupt, dismantle, and defeat those who attacked us, but it’s besides the point. Since the day Obama announced his strategy in March, I’ve been making this point. Obama’s currently reviewing that strategy to see if it makes sense. Perhaps he could disentangle this confusion about when the United States will be done in Afghanistan.

Coll:

In an essay entitled “Reading the Taliban,” Joanna Nathan of the International Crisis Group updates some of her work on Taliban propaganda and communications strategies. Her analysis of the repetitious themes in Taliban magazines and DVDs—the recapitulation of Guantánamo imprisonment stories as folk culture narrative; the amplification of Pashtun grievances around ethnic revenge killings and notoriously corrupt figures such as the Uzbek commander General Dostum—is particularly chilling.

Hmm, so, uh, Guantanamo Bay, eh? Perhaps former Vice President Dick Cheney will want to retract this:

Another term out there that slipped into the discussion is the notion that American interrogation practices were a “recruitment tool” for the enemy. On this theory, by the tough questioning of killers, we have supposedly fallen short of our own values. This recruitment-tool theory has become something of a mantra lately, including from the President himself. And after a familiar fashion, it excuses the violent and blames America for the evil that others do. It’s another version of that same old refrain from the Left, “We brought it on ourselves.”

I’m sure he’ll get right on that.

[O]fficials and observers here differ over whether the inversion of the groups’ traditional power dynamic has led to better or worse relations. Indeed, it may be bringing al-Qaeda closer to certain Taliban factions — most notably, forces loyal to former Taliban cabinet minister Jalaluddin Haqqani — and driving it apart from others, including leader Mohammad Omar’s Pakistan-based group. The shifting alliances, analysts say, could have significant bearing on where the U.S. military chooses to focus its firepower.

That appears to track with the Obama administration’s desired goal of splitting the Taliban coalition and encouraging reconciliation with the Afghan government. Which in turn means either the intelligence is reflecting fanciful administration thinking or the administration has a solid intelligence grounding for its approach.

I also like this cheeky tweak at the counterinsurgency community:

This year, Omar’s military committee published a rule book for followers, calling on them to protect the population and avoid civilian casualties — much like U.S. counterinsurgency principles. He has railed against the corruption of President Hamid Karzai’s government, an issue that resonates with Afghans. He has also solicited support from other Muslim countries. But al-Qaeda’s agenda of global holy war and taste for mass-casualty attacks, no matter how many Muslim civilians are killed, complicate that goal.

To say the least!

It’s been widely speculated that Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of President Hamid Karzai, is deep into the drug game. (I even interviewed the Afghan ambassador to the United States about it in 2007.) Peters told me there’s no question. “I’ve been shown intelligence reports indicating he’s worked with a major drug trafficker connected to the Taliban and al-Qaeda,” she said. That would be Haji Juma Khan, the “Pablo Escobar of South Asia,” whom Peters describes as moving up to $1 billion worth of opiates annually.

Now check out this indictment of Khan from a New York Court last year. The indictment claims that Khan repeatedly kicks money up to the Taliban, and on several occasions, shortly after Khan’s payments come in, the Taliban pulls off attacks. I’m not sure how strong the connection is there — the Taliban surely have more than one revenue stream — but it’s not nothing, either. And despite the indictment, Khan’s network is still in business.

What’s the relationship between the two men? You’re not going to catch Ahmed Wali Karzai with large quantities of opium in his SUV. “He’s believed to be, by law enforcement officials, a facilitator of the drugs trade,” Peters said. “He is in a position to appoint sympathetic characters, people who look other way, to the right positions, so when shipments move on the highway, the police look the other way, checkpoints are not going to stop that car, and customs/border agents are not going to search that shipment. He’s a person who makes those relationships happen.”

And the people who benefit are the Taliban. What does the United States get out of the arrangement? According to The New York Times story, the recruitment of “an Afghan paramilitary force that operates at the C.I.A.’s direction” around Kandahar. Recently, Amnesty International identified an Afghan paramilitary group acting out of a former Taliban base known as Camp Gecko or Firebase Muholic, that also houses “regular international troops and special forces units, as well as personnel from intelligence agencies forces, such as the Central Intelligence Agency.” That would seem to fit the Times’ description. And here’s a recent report from New York University’s Center for International Cooperation that ties Gecko/Muholic’s Afghan residents to a June assassination that (however briefly) stunned observers:

The challenge posed by illegal militia groups employed by foreign armed forces to Afghan state authority was demonstrated on June 29, 2009, when 41 Afghan nationals employed by an “armed support group” (ASG) – an unregistered militia force – run by US Special Forces (SF) out of Camp Gecko in Kandahar killed the chief of police of Kandahar province and five other police officers. The incident occurred during a gun battle inside a government compound after the ASG sought the release of a one of their members arrested earlier that day. When the provincial attorney general refused and called the Afghan National Police, the firefight broke out. USSF claimed they could not be held responsible for the actions of the ASG, but the incident raised the question of how 41 heavily armed men and their vehicles could simply drive out of a USSF-run base. President Hamid Karzai responded to the killing, stating, “Such incidents negatively impact the state-building process in Afghanistan” and “weaken the government.”

My emphasis. The Times discusses the police shootout in its piece. Ahmed Wali Karzai told the Times reporters that the police chief, Matiullah Qati, was in the “wrong place at the wrong time.” Assume that’s true, and not the alternative explanation that Karzai had Qati killed. That suggests the money paid to Karzai, which helps him go about a business that helps finance Taliban attacks, also pays for a rogue force of killers.  And that’s the benign explanation.

Who’s going to be the first to call for a congressional investigation?

Today, gunmen overran and killed six U.N. employees in Kabul. The attack happened in a U.N. guest house used by about 40 foreigners, most of whom work for the U.N. elections commission. The New York Times:

The Taliban claimed responsibility. A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid said the attack was meant to warn people not to help in the Nov. 7 presidential runoff election between the incumbent, Hamid Karzai, and his challenger, Abdullah Abdullah.

“We have already informed that anyone who works for the second round will be targeted,” he said. “This is one of the attacks.”

There appears to be no sign that the U.N. will abandon Afghanistan, but the parallel is still ominous.

But once you start paying warlords with dubious human rights records, it can be very difficult to cut off or phase out the payments, particularly when the political structure necessary to keep the Afghan governance enterprise that supports the U.S. presence in business is essentially held together with baling wire. And when the resources of the United States are tied up, for years, in another war a few thousand miles to the west, perhaps there aren’t better practical options than to keep making those payments. Who wants to risk an eruption, or a political collapse, when the eyes of the Bush administration are on the chaos in Iraq? And since the military and intelligence priority during that period is to hunt terrorists, but you don’t have a robust intelligence network in-country and the Pashtun population isn’t going to tip you off because you don’t do anything for it, wouldn’t it make more sense to keep renting your politically connected warlords?

When the Obama administration says that it inherited an absolute mess from its predecessor, perhaps this might be an element of what it means.

Even assuming this is true, the story has no real implication for Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s efforts at reconciliation with lower- to mid-level Taliban fighters. Well, no implication beyond this observation:

“One cannot be too doctrinaire about these things,” a senior Nato officer in Kabul said. “It might well make sense to buy off local groups and use non-violence to keep violence down. But it is madness to do so and not inform your allies.”

Members of the Pakistani military (ispr.gov.pk)

Very little is clear about the forthcoming Pakistani military push into Waziristan, the rugged, mountainous tribal home base of the Pakistani Taliban and, most likely, Osama bin Laden. When it will begin; what its objectives are; how it will achieve them; and why it will succeed when a 2006 military assault ended in a disastrous ceasefire on the militants’ terms.

That lack of clarity extends to key questions for the U.S. in Pakistan and its associated war in Afghanistan. Will the push drive insurgents across the border? What will it mean for targeting al-Qaeda in Pakistan?

Illustration by: Matt Mahurin

The Obama administration, already involved in what the White House describes as a comprehensive review of strategy for the region, is now looking for the answers. One emerging assumption is that the Pakistani campaign will be protracted, and hardly a replay of this spring’s surprising Pakistani victory in the Swat Valley.

“The Pakistanis have been advertising their upcoming offensive for a while now,” said a U.S. counterterrorism official who insisted on anonymity while discussing sensitive planning issues. “So the terrorists know it’s on the way. They’ve had time to prepare.”

Beginning last week, Pakistani extremists unleashed a wave of violence across the country in anticipation of the offensive, even managing to storm the military staff’s Rawalpindi headquarters far from the tribal areas. On Thursday, another series of coordinated attacks rocked Lahore, the cultural capital of Pakistan. Since October 5, an estimated 150 Pakistanis have died as a result. “The message is to the Pakistani government and it is that news of the Taliban’s demise is greatly exaggerated,” said a former U.S. intelligence official with experience in Pakistan. “They have nothing to lose, they are willing to fight to the death, and they can take that fight to the Pakistani military’s front yard.” At a forum last week at the Council on Foreign Relations with Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, the Pakistani ambassador to Washington, Husain Haqqani, good-naturedly brushed off a reporter’s attempt to discuss the campaign.

The army’s invasion, the former intelligence official speculated, may be accelerated by the insurgent attacks. Reuters reported on Wednesday that the army was moving an estimated 28,000 troops into position, and some residents of Waziristan quoted by the news service said they saw “soldiers and tanks” approaching. The local government in South Waziristan said Wednesday that up to 90,000 residents have fled the area in preparation for the attack.

Fighting in Waziristan carries implications for two aspects of the Obama administration’s strategy, both of which impact the current White House review. First is whether the arrival of a significant Pakistani ground force will facilitate increased intelligence collection about high-level Taliban or al-Qaeda targets. At present, the Obama administration is considering the contention, advocated by Vice President Biden and the intelligence community, that the CIA’s drone strikes against al-Qaeda operatives in Pakistan more directly support the goal of destroying the terrorist organization than does a counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan. The return of Pakistani ground troops into Waziristan, coupled with the intelligence community’s increased focus on the region, might provide an opportunity to facilitate more intense and accurate drone strikes in addition to Pakistani battlefield assaults.

But that is hardly certain. “If the Pakistani military pushes hard into Waziristan, and we’re talking about some very, very rugged terrain here, they might force individual al-Qaeda figures to move,” said the U.S. counterterrorism official. “That, in turn, can make them more vulnerable. It is, at least potentially, a better collection environment. You can’t make hard and fast predictions, though. You just have to be ready to take advantage of any opportunities that might arise, because they won’t last long.”

The second concern for the administration is whether the insurgents will target the Pakistani army in Waziristan or send significant numbers of fighters across the porous border into Afghanistan. “If it looks like they can give their attackers a bloody nose, they’ll stand” and fight, said Thomas Houlahan, director of the military assessment program at the Virginia-based Center for Security and Science think tank. “But if they realize their unit will get overrun, those guys will melt away. They’ll go to a part of the tribal areas where the army isn’t, or they go into Afghanistan and come back later.”

That, in turn, raises questions about the demands the Pakistani campaign will create for a U.S. military effort in Afghanistan that is already considered underresourced by its commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, at a time when President Obama is considering a request for tens of thousands more troops. McChrystal’s spokesman, Lt. Col. Tadd Sholtis, said that operations against insurgents in either Pakistan or Afghanistan have “obvious implications for the pro-government forces of both countries,” but declined to address any question about how McChrystal might respond to any potential influx of Taliban fighters fleeing the Pakistani military.

Still, Sholtis said, communications channels remain open with the Pakistanis. “General McChrystal and General Kayani meet regularly in person to discuss a range of issues, including a meeting last week in Pakistan,” Sholtis said, referring to the Pakistani Army’s chief of staff.

Representatives for Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of all U.S. forces in the Middle East and South Asia, who also deals regularly with Kayani, did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

Haider Mullick, a senior fellow at the U.S. Joint Special Operations University, expressed cautious optimism that the Pakistani military would be able to fight the Taliban in the mountainous, rural terrain of Waziristan. The military has assets it did not have in its failed 2006 campaign, he said, including “popular support, high morale, better intel, better [intelligence] cooperation on drones, more precision weapons, two divisions of Army and Frontier Corps combined and at least 1000 special forces, [and] ten gunships.”

But, Mullick said, the effort might still “not make the cut unless at least 2 more divisions move in, more locals are evacuated and there is more ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence]-CIA NATO-Pak military cooperation.” While the army had learned some lessons in counterinsurgency — something Petraeus vouched for in April congressional testimony — it would still need to “spread a strong net, kill the irreconcilables, limit collateral damage, protect civilians who stay behind and leave behind something to work with, [like] basic social and economic infrastructures.”

Houlahan said a key indicator of Pakistani resolve will be whether it uses infantry units from the regular army for the assault. “If it’s primarily a Frontier Corps affair, then it’s clearly not serious in my view. The Frontier Corps is essentially up-armored tribal police,” he said, citing what he said was a Pakistani military tendency to “flatten entire villages with artillery and avoid sending in infantry. … They’ve relied too much on airpower, and have been hesitant to send these units in and force a climactic battle.”

“There’s been a heavy bombardment. They targeted some militant hideouts as well as pro-Taliban tribal elders,” said an intelligence agency official in the region, who declined to be identified.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik says the Pakistani Army’s move into Waziristan, home territory of the Pakistani Taliban and probably al-Qaeda, is “imminent.”

And yet, this happened this morning in Kabul:

A powerful suicide bomb rocked Kabul this morning outside the Indian embassy, destroying vehicles and splintering buildings, killing at least 17 civilians and wounding nearly 80 people, officials said.

There was an attack last year at India’s Afghanistan embassy as well. It makes no sense for these attacks to occur, at the very least, unless the insurgent groups believed they were acting in Pakistan’s interest.