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Afghanistan

Taliban say they recruited soldier who killed French troops

2012-01-22

[Pak Daily Times] The Afghan Taliban said on Saturday they had recruited an Afghan soldier who rubbed out four French soldiers a day earlier, raising fears the myrmidon group had managed to deepen its infiltration of the country's struggling security forces. The killings prompted La Belle France to threaten an early pullout from the NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions...
-led war. The claim of responsibility raises serious concerns about handing control of security over to the Afghan army and police, which NATO-led forces are currently in the process of doing before all foreign combat troops leave by the end of 2014. "The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has recruited people in important positions," Taliban front man Zabihullah Mujahid told Rooters by telephone from ~~Qazi's guesthouse~~ an undisclosed location, using another name the bad turban group call themselves. "Some of them have already accomplished their missions." The killings in Kapisa province were the latest in a string of such attacks in which Afghan troops turn on their Western allies and mentors.

Posted by:Fred

#2 Northern Cousin posted the following last night on the French story, which I found thought-provoking:

#7 I have deployed three times to Afghanistan, including almost a full year working next to ANA each and every day. They are a proud people and take these kind of incidents extremely seriously.

There are three problems ---

1 Stolen ANA uniforms -which are easy to come by when you have over a 1000 soldiers defecting from the ranks every month. The old "use the uniform" trick

2.Unfortunately, the larger number of attacks have been soldiers that lose the bubble. We can really rub people the wrong way. And when their pay is on average 200 to 300 bucks a month, which some of us earn in a day or less, its easy to get, well, out of step. What is not reported is the number of attacks of ANA against their own.

3. The ANA has been forced to push its numbers at an extrem pace. In part because the West wants to say --- over to you and get out of Dodge. Result poor sreening - and where some just sign up to a room and food for the winter away from ones village, Taliban symbathizers can get recruited. No lie detector there. No written exam either as 9 out of 10 recruits cant read.

What irritates me is the French knee jerk reaction. He just placed a lot more people in danger. The Taliban arent stupid. Hey lets do this some more and more countries will leave --- lets do more the ANA on Coalition attack more -its working. I was furious when I heard his weak whining press conference statements. And the most at risk, in my view will now be his own troops. Big oops. He shoould had have his peepee slapped by other heads of state. But that will not happen. Too sensitive --- More likely behind the scene view - The French gov would like to pull troops to cut costs - and now they have an excuse -a lame one but an excuse nevertheless.

Posted by: Northern Cousin
2012-01-21 23:02

Posted by: trailing wife 2012-01-22 11:07

#1 A failure of counterintelligence and screening by unit NCOs.

Even ROTC units in the US strongly screen against kooks and "unreliables", and they get their fair share. The screening process never ends, even with senior NCOs and officers, who have to be watched for their own set of problems.

This killer probably put out all kinds of warning flags that nobody noticed, or just ignored.

Posted by: Anonymoose 2012-01-22 10:41

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