You see that's the issue I have. How do we know about their loyalties. Looking at the way things were in Swat and even in Waziristan, most people supported the Taliban and were extremely pro-active. You just ennumerated the various ways in which they went out of their way. But are the tribesmen in Waziristan really terrified? The Mehsuds are the Talibans. The Talibans needs to be stopped using as a blanket term... for some time. We have to assess who are the people who are in their ranks and files.
First of all, Mehsud call themselves TTP, not The Taliban, its the wazir tribe and Afghan ones who use and are referred to as The Taliban. I believe its now been established that who is in whose ranks and what is the agenda of each one of them. The factor that has been keeping the link between Wazir Taliban and TTP has been the AQ guys and the old Soviet Afghan war veterans, otherwise the conflict between wazir taliban and Mehsud led TTP could have been used a long time ago, the way it is being used now. But the Wazir Taliban and Afghan Taliban both have recognized this menace, and that is why none is gonna help them by sending fighters to their aid. Afghan Taliban were already fed up of them as they had repeatedly told them to not to fight PA, rather concentrate there but to no avail as Afghan Taliban don't like to make PA & GoP fully against them.
Taimi great effort but this isn't what i had in mind. Most of this I know already and has been discussed quite a lot here. Why not take the debate to the next level (have been around for the same time as you and know all the answers that come from the usual suspects
).
Move beyond the half-heartedness or full-heartedness bit and the resources,and really analyse how the operations were done, and I mean the tactics and the strategy. Say for instance, what the army intended to do. Most of this info about the older operations is available.
Well problem in discussing tactics and strategies is, that it will take don't know how many pages to discuss, as there are tactics involved on so many fronts, you have night fighting techniques, surveillance & reconnaissance, how the movements of troops takes place, how the engineers detect and disable IEDs and mines as this time in both operations very rarely we hear of advancing troops getting injured or killed by IEDs or mines even the militants must have planted God knows how many, add to it the booby traps, how the heights are being captured, NLI units are very good at that and quiet some of them have been utilized as they are our mountain warfare experts, this time you see the troops first capture the surrounding heights, clear the adjacent area, secure it and then launch the assault on the villages, plus a lot of fighting takes place at night time, as PA is using this to their advantage, same happened in swat also. If you have something specific that you wish to discuss then do let know otherwise its a very long discussion and argument thing, due to which i did not went into dept.
Zal Zala? That's not the name that one has heard for the last operation. It was far fancier and snappier.
hmmmmmm, well that is the name that i remember, would you be kind enough to tell the one that you heard which is fancier and snappier
Elaborate on the "no proper strategy and tactics" bit. Trust me I have been in many a debate here and followed many others that have said the exact opposite. Trying to convince certain people that the operations were "half-hearted" has been an uphill task. (lol... I don't wish to see you dead but yeah let's see how it goes)
Well, very simple, SOPs wouldn't used to be followed fully, troops did not wished to kill own countrymen, troops would used to be thrust forward without securing or looking after the flanks and rear, due to which many times troops would used to get cut off and either killed or captured, fortunate ones would escape back. Army was in no great numbers, hardly a division strength rather a brigade or so, FC used to be relied a lot, which was in reality unreliable, due to their training, people from the same area and tribe being put forward to attack own tribesmen, BUT FC guys did showed a lot of courage in some very tough engagements. In many places they hold of the attacking militants who used to be in greater numbers, the FC guys who held and gave a fight to hundreds of attacking militants at the Sararogha Fort, some got killed, some captured and some reached the Jandola base on foot. If anyone says it wasn't half-hearted effort, well then they don't know what was happening over there. In the videos of this operation you won't be seeing FC guys anywhere, which is a frequent scene we would see in operations in other areas.
Umm... that bit about sending a strong message, well that is covered in the FCR's collective responsibility clause. That anyone found supporting/harboring militants will bear the brunt. The army had circulated notices about it. No way fair but desperate measures.
They had been repeatedly warned, but as they did not listened, it was done.
For Bajaur, Mohmand, Khyber, and Swat: well the last is fairly recent so we can omit that. But you know and I know about securing supply lines, sending a few troops, destroying militant infrastructure, .... in far more detail due to all the prior discussions. So then what... where did the army make or break it, area wise. Why are our discussions so surperficial...
Could you little bit elaborate as to what you are referring and what is that you wish to target for discussion.
How about this: of the total militants in Swat, how many have been captured or killed? Rather how many are unaccounted for --- that will give you the real success about any COIN plan.
They have dissipated but for how long?
Except for Fazllulah, i believe the top 5 or 6 commander of Swat TTP either killed or captured. Many others among the top commanders also killed or captured, rest would be also. I believe the figure of captured or surrendered has reached around 1000, the 900 figure was confirmed to me by someone who is involved there. Hundreds got killed too, see ISPR does not releases the figure of killed by just guessing, the get information from their human intelligence assets, from the dead bodies found at scenes of battle, from the troops involved in fighting, most importantly the intercept of communication between militants as they of course have to give a picture to their superior commanders of dead and injured. If ISPR had been giving very falsely figures or exaggeration, then why don't we seeing it in SW operation, so far only 300 killed with so much progress, if they had to exaggerate they must have by now given at least a figure between 600-1000 or so, but whatever figure they provide the real would not be much far away from the one provided. As sometime back in an ISPR release some 900 militants captured was told, my guy confirmed the same figure, plus minus there. Also, lot of the so called militants were not the hardcore ones, many were forced to join, some joined for fun and some were the criminal elements and some for money as they were being paid a good amount, so once the operation started many deserted as they were not the hardcore type. Some would be out there, but in total disarray and Army won't go till they are sure that none is left. Plus look at the activities there now, its getting better day by day, the Militants back is broken, yes they can still crawl, but InshAllah that will be taken care too.
Lol... how about the people who wrote the training and strategical/tactical man. manuals for the army to follow? Do we disregard the trainers now just because they have a retired in their name? Every plan is flexible and adaptable but their are certain key approaches that have to be kept in hindsight.
No, i did not meant in a disrespecting style, my Dad himself was a counter insurgency instructor at sometime and trained the hur mujahids, and also had the distinction of training some of the first batches of Sri Lankan officers sent for counter insurgency training. But text book things have their own use and in practical things may be same in some cases, different in some. We had the experience of only tackling Balochistan COIN, which is totally different then what we are faced now, terrain wise, tactics employed by militants, their fighting ability and weapons employed, so things change, basics are there of textbooks but in practical arena, things change a lot. Those analysts may talk from book point of view or quoting other insurgencies, but on the ground it would be very different, so they may not be fully aware what challenges lie on the ground.
Right in the middle of Rah-e-Rast, there was a small news item that had come in the papers. It was about FC men being ambushed at exactly the same spot where another sizeable convoy was ambushed three years back. Talking about learning lessons, this time around as well the men were disarmed, some killed.
Well that ambush took place in NWA, in which Lt Col Tahir, a captain and one Lt with about some 30+ guys got martyred, same spot where 3 years ago also an ambush happened. these were army guys, not FC involved, this specific area has a historical importance too as british lost a lot of men here too, actually this is a very very narrow pass with very high and nearly impossible slope to climb from the area where the road passes, that is the reason doing operations in NWA and SWA are not that easy. It was basically due to non diligence of the convoy or army in following the proper SOPs, as we had a peace agreement with them, so the army guys were casual and paid the price in the face of trust, that there is a peace agreement.
And where are we getting news from... the ISPR. Do I believe all that is churned out... hell no.
Its common sense they won't tell each and everything in black & white, but they are not that much of liars, it may be not 100% truth but its not 100% lie too.
Do we have the resources????
By all counts, even the DG-ISPR's, we are over-stretching our resources.
He is saying we are over stretching the resources, not that we don't have the resources. Resources are there but its just that the resources available for some specific area or objective are being utilized for areas or objectives which were not planned for initially.
When you let them run to the mountains, you have a larger field to cover and need even more resources rather than having the militants contained in a smaller circle.
The militants need place to sleep, rest, things to eat, need water, need supply lines, ration to use, contact with locals, with families if any, if those mountains are not gonna provide them these things, for how long will they gonna fight ?? for 8 years they were here, made all the infrastructure, where in the mountains are they gonna find all this. Its not very easy to live in mountains with no basic necessities. The main aim is to dislodge them from their safe heaven, let them go into mountains, they will get bored themselves over there, no vodka or whatever other brands, no women, no electricity, bombings from the air, artillery fire to give a wake up call, army in their pursuit, its not an easy task to live like that, specially when they have been used to all this for many years.
No, no. I did not mean that. You said they are controlling "more and more". My point: they controlling, nothing more and nothing less. The fight is over. Now they need to sustain this control over a longer period and make a transit. Reduce, rather nullify, all hit and run attacks. For instance, the one that took place in Kohat killing 6 soldiers was a grim reminder of how the network is still alive there.
Swat and other areas in Malakand Agency have not been 100% under control yet, army first cleared the area of major infestation, now they are expanding to areas where they get information of having militants so that no room to relax and regroup is given. They are doing both things, controlling the already cleared areas and expanding to the unexplored areas where militants are hiding and moving.
Oppressor? Vietnam was about communism, Malaya was about communism again (one of the most sucessful COIN of the twentieth century), Lebanon had peace-keepers in it. Nothing oppressive about them, sparing the IDF.
Vietnam was communism for US, for locals it wasn't otherwise US won't have gotten a defeat. As for Malaya, you are right but the large factor played in succeeding the COIN operation was the stupidity done by the communists themselves which made the locals go totally against them and some innovative thinking by the British forces. If the people of Lebanon or some majority group representing locals doesn't wants a peace keeping force then what else you gonna call it? A peace keeping force having Americans that too
?? ISAF is also a security force, but they are thought as oppressors.
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