E-MAIL THIS LINK
To: 

Brits finding more Taleban than expected
LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan - There are greater numbers of Taleban rebels putting up a fight in southern Afghanistan than expected by the newly-deployed British military, a senior commander said. British troops are however still more than a match for the militants as seen in clashes earlier this month, the commander told reporters at a British base in Lashkar Gah, the provincial capital of Helmand province.

The British commander, speaking late Tuesday on condition of anonymity, said the military had underestimated the strength of the hardline Islamic Taleban when it drew up plans to deploy in the restive southern region 16 months ago. Now that 3,300 soldiers are assembling in Helmand, where they are taking over control of security from the US military, they are beginning to see a different picture. “I suppose the most significant difference has been the extent to which the Taleban have had some successes this year and are probably in slightly greater numbers then we might have expected after the excellent work done by our American predecessors,” the commander said.

Quizzed on what he meant by the larger presence, the commander said he was talking about hundreds not thousands of rebels.
All with, as it turns out, Pakistani papers ...
Also they had shown their determination with a series of suicide bombings over the winter months -- a period when militants normally go to ground. “It is an indication of the boldness and the resilience of the organisation because ... they will stay and fight,” he said.
Yeah, yeah, okay, enough hand wringing, the BBC is happy. Now go get the Taleban.
The commander noted, however, that the level of Taleban activity was only the same as for the latter half of last year. They “haven’t come out hugely more than they were last year and they haven’t come out 10 foot tall either,” he said.

The Taleban has a hard core of “hundreds not thousands” of members, with other factions also taking part in the fight, according to the commander. “What we have detected and read about is over time these people are going to make a decision about which they think is going to be the winning side,” he said, insisting that it would be the Afghan government supported by NATO.

British troops, under the umbrella of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, are due to take over control of security in the whole of Helmand by the end of July. They have already pushed faster and deeper than expected into the north of the province since the start of June. In that time, the force has had three significant clashes with militants, losing one British soldier with dozens of rebels killed.
Which is the important point.
“Our recent events here have demonstrated how, with the right sort of focus, we can definitely overmatch the Taleban and we can do it in a clever and surgical way,” the commander said.

Turning to the long-term view of the mission to put Afghanistan back on its feet, through development programmes, good governance and security, the commander indicated that it may take at least 20 years. “If you were to talk about the totality of the effort to produce a self reliant Afghanistan you could be talking a couple of decades plus,” he said.

NATO forces, however, would likely stop taking the lead on security much sooner, the commander said. The goal is to build up the Afghan army and police to take over from the foreign troops in the way the US-led coalition is attempting to hand back control of security to their Iraqi counterparts. “We will achieve a similar sort of inversion, I would suggest, some time in the next four to five years give or take,” said the commander.
Posted by: Steve White 2006-06-21
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=156797