While the Obama administration is watching the battlefield in Afghanistan, hoping for a quick weakening of the Taliban, regional powers are ratcheting up tensions in and outside that country. Pakistan and Iran in particular want to ensure that by the time the United States is ready to talk to the Taliban, the region’s future will [...]
President Obama’s inaugural pledge to defeat Al Qaeda and Taliban appears in stark contrast to the ground realities in Afghanistan. Obama’s much hyped AF PAK policy is believed to have been practically castigated to history after multiple reviews. The US military’s assessment of the war in Afghanistan too paints a bleak picture. The Taliban today [...]
After the failure of high level talks between India and Pakistan over their long running disputes, both countries are now locked in an escalating proxy war in Afghanistan. If no solution is found to reconcile Pakistani and Indian interests in Afghanistan, the coming months might see stepped up terrorist attacks against Indians in Kabul and [...]
Already there have been reports indicating that the Pakistan-based terrorist group Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LeT), perpetrator of the 2008 Mumbai attacks, has superseded al Qaeda in the global threat stakes. Indeed, a recent Newsweek report referred to the LeT as “potentially the most dangerous outfit on the planet”
The top US and NATO commander in Afghanistan vowed this [...]
President Obama’s AF–PAK policy unveiled only last year is dead. There is a paradigm shift, in a total turnaround to Obama’s inaugural pledge to defeat Al-Qaeda and Taliban in Afghanistan. Today US and ISAF appear reconciled to the fact that, they cannot defeat them. The new design is to get the Afghan government to engage [...]
The Indian Prime Minister, Mr. Manmohan Singh, on his visit to Saudi Arabia made the surprise offer of dialogue to Pakistan on all issues ranging from Kashmir, Indus Water Treaty to Terrorism. This Indian pronouncement within days after scuttling the Secretary-level talks in Delhi is really baffling. Both India and Pakistan entered the Delhi talks [...]
US is facing defeat like situation in Afghanistan, which compelled top bosses at Pentagon and White House to reconsider US’ Afghan strategy. The heavy toll of alien forces at the hand of Taliban since last two years, especially in the months of December 2009, January and February 2010 forced the foreign forces to pullout their [...]
Operation Moshtarak — the drive by 15,000 US and British and Afghan troops to reclaim the southern part of Helmand province from Taleban control has been launched. The pace of fighting has now been slowed with pockets of Taliban offering fierce, but uncoordinated resistance. The greatest challenge facing international forces at the moment seems to [...]
Those with interest in the military history would know that withdrawal in face of mounting enemy pressure is one of the most difficult operations to execute. The luxury to pack up and ‘run away to fight another day’ in face of a determined enemy who would like to drive home the advantage of his superiority [...]
Presently, it is being said that the Holbrooke visit to this region as well as the Gates visit from India to Pakistan is to pressure Pakistan into accepting a more direct Indian role in Afghanistan - to be suggested in London.
There are a series of events unfolding, seemingly delinked from each other, but in reality [...]
