Before Senate, McChrystal Cautiously Confident On Afghanistan

By Laura Smith - University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

U.S. Army General Stanley McChrystal said Tuesday that the mission in Afghanistan is difficult, and that success will require steadfast commitment and may come at a significant cost.

Gen. McChrystal, Commander of the NATO Internation Security Assistance Force, and U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Afghanistan on ways to protect the country from threats, such as al-Qaeda.

“To pursue our core goal of defeating al-Qaeda and preventing their return to Afghanistan, we must disrupt and degrade the Taliban’s capacity, deny their access to the Afghan population and strengthen the Afghan Security forces,” McChrystal said.

"Rolling back the Taliban is a pre-requisite to the ultimate defeat of al-Qaeda,” the General added.

However, McChrystal cited a bevy of reasons for optimism.

“My confidence derives first from the Afghans' resolve, since it is their actions that will ultimately matter most in ending this conflict, with their interests secured...Second, we do not confront a popular insurgency...Third, where our strategy is applied we’ve begun to show that we can help the Afghans establish more effective security and more credible governance. Finally, Afghans do not regard us as occupiers,” he said.

McChrystal also said that the American military faces many challenges in Afghanistan, but asserted that "our efforts are sustained by one unassailable reality: neither the Afghan people nor the international community want Afghanistan to remain a sanctuary for terror and violence.”

Before the committee hearing began, protesters expressed their opposition to the war, holding up signs that read, “Surge Big Mistake,” and “Jobs Not Bombs."

Most Pakistanis Don’t Know What Al-Qaida Is, Says Survey

Travis Martinez, University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

The average Pakistani citizen has little to almost no understanding of the al-Qaida network or the Afghan Taliban organization, according to Georgetown University School of Foreign Service Professor Christine Fair.

“Many Pakistanis don’t know what al-Qaida is...Sure enough we went around a room and asked if people knew al-Qaida: Few knew,” said Fair of a survey she conducted in Pakistan earlier this year.

According to Fair, one woman that openly responded to the survey correlated the Taliban and al-Qaida with Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

The Senate Rebuilds Pakistan

By Michael Ruhl, University of New Mexico - Talk Radio News Service

Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.)
Photo by Michael Ruhl

In the next 5 years, the Pakistani infrastructure will be fortified by almost $10 billion American dollars, if Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) have anything to say about it. The aptly titled Kerry-Lugar Bill will provided money for rebuilding the lives of civilians in war torn Pakistan.

Both Kerry and Lugar said that most of the money that has been funneled into Pakistan in the past few years has gone towards security. The aim of this bill is to shift the balance, to place more of an emphasis on infrastructure.

The Senators want to use the money for building schools, improving health care, building bridges, water projects, and other elements of infrastructure. Kerry said that the target projects are “things that would improve life and give people a sense of progress” to civilians.

The money would also be used for ensuring an independent media, expanding human rights and the rule of law, expanding transparency in government, rooting out political corruption and countering the drug trade.

Additionally military funding would be conditioned upon several things, including Pakistani security forces preventing al Qaeda and Taliban forces from operating in Pakistan. The military forces would not be able to interfere in politics or in the judicial process, according to the provisions of the bill.

The legislation bill would give $1.5 billion each year from FY 2009-2013, and would recommend similar amounts of money over the subsequent five years. There would be required benchmarks to measuring how effective the funding is, and the President will have to submit semi-annual reports to Congress about progress made.

Bridging The Cultural Divide To Fight Terrorists

By Michael Ruhl, University of New Mexico – Talk Radio News Service

General David Petraeus
Photo By Michael Ruhl

According to General David Petraeus, an educated American soldier that can bridge the cultural divide with the Muslim world can more effectively fight the War on Terror. This soldier would understand the social context they are operating within, and would understand the broad implications and consequences of military action.

General Petraeus, Commander of U.S. Central Command, discussed U.S. military strategy in the Middle East and South Asia while testifying today before Congress.

“While additional military forces clearly are necessary (in Afghanistan), they will not by themselves be sufficient to achieve our objective,” said the General. America’s objective, he said, is to make sure extremists do not have a haven from which to plan and execute another attack on the level of the 9-11 attacks.

A smarter military can better understand the necessary social infrastructure to facilitate lasting peace within a region. This combined with intelligent military action, international cooperation, the building of infrastructure and a swath of other initiatives will help America secure the region, according to Petraeus. “You cannot kill or capture your way out of an industrial strength insurgency,” the General said.

"We also need to expand just the basic knowledge of Afghanistan among our forces," Petraeus said. He continued that greater knowledge will lead to a "nuanced and granular understanding" that will enable the Army to undertake the kind of sophisticated reconciliation processes in Afghanistan that were important in Iraq.

Congressman Norm Dicks (D-Wash.) agreed that soldiers should be educated, and brought attention to the U.S. Army’s Homestead Program. Dicks said this program involves an Officer taking a year off from active service to live in a country, learn the language, and understand the culture. Retired Army General John Abizaid did a program similar to this. Abizaid was former Commander of U.S. Central Command.

The U.S. Army could not be reached for comment on the current funding of the program, but Dicks expressed concern on the small number of individuals enrolled in it.

The necessary approach to success involves placing security in the hands of the Afghans, Petraeus said, which means helping them collectively realize that the biggest security threat in the region comes from dissident extremist elements within the country, most notably Al-Qaeda. He emphasized that America’s presence in Afghanistan is not permanent, and that Afghanistan’s government and economy must be encouraged by its citizens.

Witnesses of mass corruption

"Based on the cases that I have personally investigated, I believe that at least $18 billion has been lost due to waste and corruption in Iraq, more than half of which is American tax payer money," said Former Chief Investigator (Baghdad) of the Iraqi Commission on Public Integrity Salam Adhoob during a hearing on corruption and waste in Iraq.

"Of this $18 I billion believe at least $4 billion has been lost due to corruption and criminal acts in the Ministry of Defense alone."

Adhoob went on to explain the extent of the corruption in the al-Maliki government, citing instances in which senior members of the Ministry, including the Defense Minister and Defense Secretary General, would establish poorly funded front companies through relatives which they would then award billion dollar contracts. These deals apparently brought very few results

"The front company charged $4.5 million for helicopters that cost only $1.5 million dollars...the company never delivered the M-18 helicopters. Helicopters were not the only military equipment not delivered by these front companies. Despite having been paid in full the two companies delivered only a small percentage of weapons and other military equipment that had been ordered by the Ministry of Defense," said Adhoob.

CPI investigators later found out that the front companies diverted a substantial amount of their profits to fund to al-Qaeda. Adhoob stated that nobody involved in the Defense Ministry has yet faced any legal consequences.

The committee also addressed accusations of corruption among U.S. officials and corporations.

"One of the biggest U.S. contractors, the Parsons Corporation, was paid $31 million to build an Iraqi prison in Diyala, Iraq. Iraqi contractors got paid an additional $9 million...the prison was supposed to house 3,600 inmates, but it was never finished, and today it sits abandoned," said Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.)

An anonymous witness later stated that the Minister of Justice specifically told an U.S. government officials that the Iraqi government did not want this prison built since it was too close to the Iranian border. The U.S. ignored this request and contracted it anyways.

There is doubt over how corruption and waste will be confronted in the future. The current head of CPI announced that an amnesty law passed by the Iraqi Parliament will block the investigation of 700 cases of alleged corruption in Baghdad alone.