The attacks “are not about armed confrontation. They are about subversion of the government,” said Terrence K. Kelly, a senior researcher at the Washington-based RAND Corporation who has studied how rebuilding efforts work in war zones. America’s strategy counts on development work to increase the legitimacy and reach of the Karzai government. With these attacks the Taliban can “turn off the delivery of services — which makes the government look bad,” he said.
USAID insists it will not scale back its work in Afghanistan because of the attacks, according to Rebecca Black, the agency’s deputy mission director for Afghanistan.
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Break guerillas’ moral-mental-physical hold over the population, destroy their cohesion, and bring about their collapse via political initiative that demonstrates moral legitimacy and vitality of government and by relentless military operations that emphasize stealth/fast-tempo/fluidity-of-action and cohesion of overall effort.
*If you cannot realize such a political program, you might consider changing sides! -Page 108, Patterns of Conflict, Col. John Boyd
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They must fear us, if they feel it is necessary to attack us. They know that we are out in the towns of Afghanistan, connecting with the people, and winning them over with jobs and support. And when we say we are doing this in the name of the Afghan government, and people see the fruits of this labor, well then that makes the government look good. Happy people, happy government, and sad sad sad Taliban. lol It also makes the Taliban’s shadow government sad, because now they have to contend with the goodwill the contractors are spreading.
So what does this mean? From a strategist point of view, and from a COIN point of view, my people (contractors) are actually connecting with the Afghans and making an impact. We are the civilian face of the war effort, and the Taliban fear us. They must, if they are purposely trying to attack us–I thought we didn’t matter?
It also means that we should be doing more of it. If the Taliban fear what we are doing, then I say increase the effort and further support the various programs that we are involved with out there. Focus on the programs that make the Afghan government look good, and makes the Taliban shadow government look frivolous and pathetic. Keep connecting with the people and providing them with jobs and purpose.
Now on to another factor of these attacks. Because the US and ISAF militaries are so hung up on living on the big box FOBs and commuting to work, the Taliban and their shadow government is pushing around the population and terrorizing them into doing what they want. That is what shadow governments do–they undermine the current government with the idea of making them look illegitimate or ineffectual. That shadow government will do everything it can to either win over the population, or impose their will on the population. In order to stop that shadow government, you need to provide a ‘big stick’ in the area that will put the smack down on these guys. You also have to be better at influencing the people than the shadow government. It also helps that the current government is legitimate and not corrupt in the eyes of the people.
And that is a big problem. Crazy Karzai and his clown posse is not helping things at all, and in turn, the people have no respect for the government. It will also hurt the troops and police morale, both of the Afghans and of the Coalition. No one likes working for a loser.
Ideally, if you can’t change Karzai’s tune, then he should be voted out by the people. Unfortunately, Karzai is rigging the voting booths, and that simple act of screwing with the electoral process is to me the one area that needs to be fixed. Why would people vote to change out a leader, if they cannot trust that their vote is being counted? If we are in this war for the long haul, the goal should be to clamp down on election fraud and use every bit of muscle we can to ensure that it is fair. In fact, we should be planning for the next election, and learn from past efforts of worthless elections. We can also use a big stick to beat down this shadow government in the meantime.
We must get the troops out into the population centers. (FOBs equals few and large, COP’s equals many and small-New Rules of War) Do it Ramadi style, and convoy right into the worst parts of these towns and cities, and move right on in with a well supported platoon or company. Pick a city block, pay the owners of the block and homes really well, and then walk the beat like a cop. The image the people should have, is a troop presence, mixed with an Afghan police presence, all with the expressed desire of protecting the people and pushing out this shadow government and enemy forces. This would be the big stick in these areas, and with this kind of presence, they could also protect the various contractors out there that are trying to get aid out to the people. Clear, hold, build.
We must protect and serve the people, and to do that, we need to get out there and live where they live. Or troops can continue to commute to their job site, and protect the people when it is convenient. Meanwhile, the contractors outside the wire, will continue to be the focus of the Taliban, and the Taliban shadow government will continue to do what they want. Ideally, we must have sound leadership in the Afghan government as well or something the people can respect. Boyd made a point on emphasizing this as well. (see quote up top)
I would also like to say that I am not alone in this thinking. Tim from Free Range International has an excellent post on the same subject and I highly recommend his blog to further your research on the matter.-Matt
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Attacks against contractors surging in Afghanistan
By NOOR KHAN and TIM SULLIVAN
April 24, 2010
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — The message, very often, is sent with bloodshed.
A suicide bombing last week on a fortified Kandahar guesthouse shared by Western contracting companies killed four Afghans and injured several Americans. An Afghan engineer was shot dead in March as he helped inspect a school not far from the Pakistan border. An Afghan woman who worked for a U.S.-based consulting firm was shot by motorbike-riding gunmen as she headed home in this southern city.
Attacks on U.S. contractors, construction companies and aid organizations have been rising just as the United States pushes faster development of Afghanistan, one of the world’s poorest countries, as a priority in its strategy to counter the insurgency.
The number of contractor attacks is elusive since the workers are from many nations and work for a number of different organizations, but the toll has jumped precipitously since President Barack Obama launched a massive troop surge last December.
Of the 289 civilians working for U.S. contractors killed between the start of the Afghanistan war in late 2001 and the end of last year, 100 died in just the last six months of 2009, according to a report by the Congressional Research Service.
To a degree, those killings have mirrored an increase in U.S. service member deaths, which roughly doubled in the first three months of 2010 compared to the same period in 2009.
Many of the recent attacks against civilian contractors have been around Kandahar, the one-time Taliban capital where the U.S. is poised to launch a major operation in the coming weeks, but violence against contractors has spiked across Afghanistan.
“The insurgents are trying to say ‘You can’t do it,'” Gen. Stanley McChrystal said in a speech last week in Paris, shortly after two bombings shook Kandahar. “I think we’ll see that for months as they make an effort to stop progress. But I don’t think that they’ll be successful.”
In some ways, though, they already have been successful.
Contractors say they are staying in the country, but they have been forced to retreat even further behind blast walls and heavily armed security perimeters. The security drives up costs, making interaction with regular Afghans harder and slowing reconstruction projects.
“We have become the targets of the Taliban,” said Azizullah, the owner of a construction company that builds bridges and irrigation projects in the southern provinces of Kandahar and Helmand, insurgent strongholds. “If we travel, they try to kidnap us and hold us for huge ransoms. If we don’t pay, they kill us,” said Azizullah, who like many Afghans has only one name.
His workers travel in U.S. military convoys for protection whenever possible, he said.
That doesn’t surprise Gulali, a tribal elder from Kandahar province. “Of course the Taliban are against any of these people working for the Afghan government or the Americans or other foreigners,” said the elder, who also uses only one name.
He believes many of the recent attacks are by militants simply looking for softer targets. While nearly all foreign companies in Afghanistan now work out of guarded compounds, they do not have the massive fortifications and overwhelming firepower found at nearly any American military installation.
The Taliban “want to use the easiest option,” he said.
But the attacks are challenging a key part of America’s aims in Afghanistan.
Washington’s counterinsurgency plans call for aggressive development to build up everything from Afghanistan’s roads to its sewer systems to its irrigation networks. Much of the actual work is paid for by USAID, the government’s main international aid agency, then contracted through corporations that often subcontract the actual the work to smaller companies. On the ground, many employees are Afghans overseen by small groups of Western administrators.
The attacks “are not about armed confrontation. They are about subversion of the government,” said Terrence K. Kelly, a senior researcher at the Washington-based RAND Corporation who has studied how rebuilding efforts work in war zones. America’s strategy counts on development work to increase the legitimacy and reach of the Karzai government. With these attacks the Taliban can “turn off the delivery of services — which makes the government look bad,” he said.
USAID insists it will not scale back its work in Afghanistan because of the attacks, according to Rebecca Black, the agency’s deputy mission director for Afghanistan.
Contractors insist they are also staying.
The Louis Berger Group/Black & Veatch, a joint venture building major infrastructure projects across the country, was among the companies based in the Kandahar guest house attacked last week.
In a statement, the joint venture said they were “currently conducting a comprehensive review of the recent events in Kandahar to assess what changes, if any, are required to continue our work.”
Story here.