From One Free Korea:
At Last, Plan B
Posted by Joshua Stanton on August 30, 2010 at 10:27 pm · Filed under Counterfeiting, Money Laundering, Sanctions, Cheonan Incident
This afternoon, the Treasury Department finally announced its long anticipated sanctions against North Korea, in the form of a sweeping new executive order. The order, pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, authorizes the blocking of assets of “any person” providing what Treasury calls “material support” for North Korea’s WMD proliferation, money laundering, counterfeiting, trade in luxury goods, bulk cash smuggling, and pretty much everything North Korea does that violates UNSCR 1718 or 1874, or the U.S. Criminal Code.
In addition to the new order, Treasury also imposed new sanctions against several North Korean entities under the existing Executive Order 13382. Below the fold, I’ve pasted the text of the Executive Order, President Obama’s letter forwarding the EO to the Speaker of the House, two Treasury press releases, and some remarks by OFK favorite Stuart Levey, all of which I’ve archived here to aid your research and mine.
My initial reaction is that the new EO gets it just right. It’s narrowly targeted at North Korea’s illicit activities, but it’s also broad enough to cover the main ones — arms and drug trafficking, money laundering, currency and pharmaceutical counterfeiting, and the squandering of its resources on luxury goods while North Korean children starve in the streets. This is a tough-yet-refined version of the Plan B I’ve been advocating since its earliest draft in 2006.
Here is the key language:
All property and interests in property that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of any United States person, including any overseas branch, of the following persons are blocked and may not be transferred, paid, exported, withdrawn, or otherwise dealt in:
(i) the persons listed in the Annex to this order; and
(ii) any person determined by the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State:
The EO then goes on to describe a wide range of activities, assistance, and financial activities that could support North Korea’s illicit activities, including the assets of any entity held by a U.S. person, or within U.S. jurisdiction. This means that if a Chinese entity is involved in helping a blacklisted North Korean entity acquire missile components, Treasury could freeze the Chinese entity’s tainted assets based in the U.S., assets of its U.S. subsidiaries, its assets in U.S. banks, or potentially, the entity’s foreign bank’s correspondent accounts in U.S. banks. This is all we could ask, and — if applied vigorously — it will be enough to force international businesses to choose between the use of the global financial system and their business ties with North Korea. Yes, North Korea could try to conceal, blur, obfuscate, and obscure which companies are connected to its illicit activities, but Treasury’s answer to this is that its effect will be to spread suspicion to all North Korean entities, even those that claim to be legit. This could be a severe blow to North Korea’s ability to comingle illicit and legitimate finance (the essence of money laundering) and will terrify investors and cause capital flight from the Palace Economy just as the Kim Dynasty is trying to engineer a smooth succession.
For Senator Sam Brownback, it is also a rightful claim to an important legacy when he leaves the Senate to become, almost assuredly, the next Governor of Kansas. In recent months, as North Korea’s behavior changed thinking in the Obama Administration, Brownback effectively lobbied State for tougher economic sanctions, and skillfully parlayed the stayed threat of nomination holds to build friendships with State Department officials with whom he found common ground. In the absence of strong conservative thinkers on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Brownback filled the void, seized the opportunity to build relationships in the Treasury Department, and encouraged it to press for tougher enforcement. The question now turns to the Administration’s determination to use this tool aggressively, and follow the money to the very ash heap of the Kim Dynasty if necessary.
Who is targeted? A lot of entities that were already on Treasury’s list of specially designated nationals, but also, two key additions: Bureau 39 of the Korean Workers’ Party, and the notorious Reconnaissance Bureau, the prime suspect in the recent attempt to assassinate Hwang Jang Yop. Also sanctioned was a North Korean state enterprise responsible for making and exporting submarines and torpedoes.
For the moment, senior State Department people like Robert Einhorn seem determined to use financial pressure to force a fundamental change in North Korea’s behavior, and talk of re-engaging with North Korea all seems very theoretical and conditional. I don’t think anything short of a coup will actually cause that fundamental change, and the real test will come when State and the Administration come to grips with this. For now, this is all we could have hoped for from this Administration.
Letter from the President — Blocking Property of Certain Persons with Respect to North Korea
TEXT OF A LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT TO THE SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AND THE PRESIDENT OF THE SENATE
August 30, 2010
Dear Madam Speaker: (Dear Mr. President:)
Pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA), I hereby report that I have issued an Executive Order (the “order”) that expands the scope of the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13466 of June 26, 2008, and takes additional steps with respect to that national emergency.
In 2008, the United States terminated the exercise of certain authorities under the Trading With the Enemy Act (TWEA) with respect to North Korea, and also declared a national emergency pursuant to IEEPA to deal with the unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States posed by the existence and risk of the proliferation of weapons-usable fissile material on the Korean Peninsula. Executive Order 13466 continued certain restrictions on North Korea and North Korean nationals that had been in place under TWEA.
I have determined that the Government of North Korea’s continued provocative actions, such as its unprovoked attack on and sinking of the Republic of Korea Navy ship Cheonan in March 2010, which resulted in the deaths of 46 sailors; its announced test of a nuclear device and missile launches in 2009; its violations of United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1718 of October 14, 2006, and UNSCR 1874 of June 12, 2009, including the procurement of luxury goods; and the illicit and deceptive economic activities through which it obtains financial and other support, including money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods and currency, bulk cash smuggling, and narcotics trafficking, destabilize the Korean peninsula and imperil U.S. Armed Forces, allies, and trading partners in the region, and warrant the imposition of additional sanctions.
The United Nations Security Council, in Resolutions 1718 and 1874, requires Member States to take certain measures to prevent, among other activities, the transfer of most arms and related materiel to or from North Korea and the transfer of luxury goods to North Korea. The United States has implemented those two UNSCRs, and the order strengthens that implementation.
The order is not targeted at the people of North Korea, nor at those who provide legitimate humanitarian relief to those people, but rather is aimed at specific activities of the Government of North Korea and others undertaken in defiance of UNSCRs 1718 and 1874. The order targets the international network that supports the Government of North Korea through arms sales and illicit economic activities, including money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods and currency, bulk cash smuggling, and narcotics trafficking.
The order leaves in place all existing sanctions imposed under Executive Order 13466, and blocks the property and interests in property of persons listed in the Annex to the order. The order also provides criteria for designations of persons determined by the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State:
• to have, directly or indirectly, imported, exported, or reexported to, into, or from North Korea any arms or related materiel;
• to have, directly or indirectly, provided training, advice, or other services or assistance, or engaged in financial transactions, related to the manufacture, maintenance, or use of any arms or related materiel to be imported, exported, or reexported to, into, or from North Korea, or following their importation, exportation, or reexportation to, into, or from North Korea;
• to have, directly or indirectly, imported, exported, or reexported luxury goods to or into North Korea;
• to have, directly or indirectly, engaged in money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods or currency, bulk cash smuggling, narcotics trafficking, or other illicit economic activity that involves or supports the Government of North Korea or any senior official thereof;
• to have materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or goods or services to or in support of, the activities described in sections l(a)(ii)(A)-(D) of the order or any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to the order;
• to be owned or controlled by, or to have acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to the order; or
• to have attempted to engage in any of the activities described in sections l(a)(ii)(A)-(F) of the order.
I have delegated to the Secretary of the Treasury the authority, in consultation with the Secretary of State, to take such actions, including the promulgation of rules and regulations, and to employ all powers granted to the President by IEEPA and the United Nations Participation Act, as may be necessary
to carry out the purposes of the order. I have also delegated to the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State, the authority to determine that circumstances no longer warrant the blocking of the property and interests in property of a person listed in the Annex to the order, and to take necessary action to give effect to that determination.
The order was effective at 12:01 p.m., eastern daylight time on August 30, 2010. All executive agencies of the United States Government are directed to take all appropriate measures within their authority to carry out the provisions of the order.
I am enclosing a copy of the Executive Order I have issued.
BARACK OBAMA
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Executive Order from the President — Blocking Property of Certain Persons with Respect to North Korea
EXECUTIVE ORDER
BLOCKING PROPERTY OF CERTAIN PERSONS WITH RESPECT TO NORTH KOREA
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA), the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.), section 5 of the United Nations Participation Act of 1945 (22 U.S.C. 287c) (UNPA), and section 301 of title 3, United States Code; in view of United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1718 of October 14, 2006, and UNSCR 1874 of June 12, 2009; and to take additional steps with respect to the situation in North Korea,
I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, hereby expand the scope of the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13466 of June 26, 2008, finding that the continued actions and policies of the Government of North Korea, manifested most recently by its unprovoked attack that resulted in the sinking of the Republic of Korea Navy ship Cheonan and the deaths of 46 sailors in March 2010; its announced test of a nuclear device and its missile launches in 2009; its actions in violation of UNSCRs 1718 and 1874, including the procurement of luxury goods; and its illicit and deceptive activities in international markets through which it obtains financial and other support, including money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods and currency, bulk cash smuggling, and narcotics trafficking, destabilize the Korean peninsula and imperil U.S. Armed Forces, allies, and trading partners in the region, and thereby constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.
I hereby order:
Section 1. (a) All property and interests in property that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of any United States person, including any overseas branch, of the following persons are blocked and may not be transferred, paid, exported, withdrawn, or otherwise dealt in:
(i) the persons listed in the Annex to this order; and
(ii) any person determined by the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State:
(A) to have, directly or indirectly, imported, exported, or reexported to, into, or from North Korea any arms or related materiel;
(B) to have, directly or indirectly, provided training, advice, or other services or assistance, or engaged in financial transactions, related to the manufacture, maintenance, or use of any arms or related materiel to be imported, exported, or reexported to, into, or from North Korea, or following their importation, exportation, or reexportation to, into, or from North Korea;
(C) to have, directly or indirectly, imported, exported, or reexported luxury goods to or into North Korea;
(D) to have, directly or indirectly, engaged in money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods or currency, bulk cash smuggling, narcotics trafficking, or other illicit economic activity that involves or supports the Government of North Korea or any senior official thereof;
(E) to have materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or goods or services to or in support of, the activities described in subsections (a)(ii)(A)-(D) of this section or any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order;
(F) to be owned or controlled by, or to have acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order; or
(G) to have attempted to engage in any of the activities described in subsections (a)(ii)(A)-(F) of this section.
(b) I hereby determine that, to the extent section 203(b)(2) of IEEPA (50 U.S.C. 1702(b)(2)) may apply, the making of donations of the types of articles specified in such section by, to, or for the benefit of any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order would seriously impair my ability to deal with the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13466 and expanded in scope in this order, and I hereby prohibit such donations as provided by subsection (a) of this section.
(c) The prohibitions in subsection (a) of this section include, but are not limited to:
(i) the making of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services by, to, or for the benefit of any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order; and
(ii) the receipt of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services from any such person.
(d) The prohibitions in subsection (a) of this section apply except to the extent provided by statutes, or in regulations, orders, directives, or licenses that may be issued pursuant to this order, and notwithstanding any contract entered into or any license or permit granted prior to the effective date of this order.
Sec. 2. (a) Any transaction by a United States person or within the United States that evades or avoids, has the purpose of evading or avoiding, causes a violation of, or attempts to violate any of the prohibitions set forth in this order is prohibited.
(b) Any conspiracy formed to violate any of the prohibitions set forth in this order is prohibited.
Sec. 3. The provisions of Executive Order 13466 remain in effect, and this order does not affect any action taken pursuant to that order.
Sec. 4. For the purposes of this order:
(a) the term “person” means an individual or entity;
(b) the term “entity” means a partnership, association, trust, joint venture, corporation, group, subgroup, or other organization;
(c) the term “United States person” means any United States citizen, permanent resident alien, entity organized under the laws of the United States or any jurisdiction within the United States (including foreign branches), or any person in the United States;
(d) the term “North Korea” includes the territory of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the Government of North Korea;
(e) the term “Government of North Korea” means the Government of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, its agencies, instrumentalities, and controlled entities; and
(f) the term “luxury goods” includes those items listed in 15 C.F.R. 746.4(b)(l) and Supplement No. 1 to part 746 and similar items.
Sec. 5. For those persons whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order who might have a constitutional presence in the United States, I find that because of the ability to transfer funds or other assets instantaneously, prior notice to such persons of measures to be taken pursuant to this order would render these measures ineffectual. I therefore determine that for these measures to be effective in addressing the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13466 and expanded in scope in this order, there need be no prior notice of a listing or determination made pursuant to section 1(a) of this order.
Sec. 6. The Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State, is hereby authorized to take such actions, including the promulgation of rules and regulations, and to employ all powers granted to the President by IEEPA and the UNPA, as may be necessary to carry out the purposes of this order. The Secretary of the Treasury may redelegate any of these functions to other officers and agencies of the United States Government consistent with applicable law. All agencies of the United States Government are hereby directed to take all appropriate measures within their authority to carry out the provisions of this order.
Sec. 7. The Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State, is hereby authorized to determine that circumstances no longer warrant the blocking of the property and interests in property of a person listed in the Annex to this order, and to take necessary action to give effect to that determination.
Sec. 8. This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, agents, or any other person.
Sec. 9. This order is effective at 12:01 p.m., eastern daylight time on August 30, 2010.
BARACK OBAMA
THE WHITE HOUSE,
August 30, 2010.
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August 30, 2010
TG-839
Fact Sheet: New Executive Order Targeting Proliferation and Other Illicit Activities Related to North Korea
Today President Obama issued an Executive Order freezing the assets of certain persons with respect to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea). This new Order expands the scope of the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13466 of June 26, 2008 and takes additional steps to address that national emergency. In the new Executive Order, the President finds that certain actions and policies of the Government of North Korea constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.
The Order targets the government of North Korea’s continued involvement in a wide range of proliferation and other illicit activities in defiance of UN Security Council Resolutions (UNSCRs) 1718 and 1874 and other illicit activities in defiance of international norms. The Order directs the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State, to target for sanctions individuals and entities facilitating North Korean trafficking in arms and related materiel; procurement of luxury goods; and engagement in illicit economic activities, such as money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods and currency, bulk cash smuggling and narcotics trafficking. This new Executive Order supplements existing U.S. sanctions targeting proliferators of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and those who support them, under which North Korean entities and individuals have been designated to date.
President Obama also identified the following entities and individual for sanctions by listing them on the Annex to the Order:
· The Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB), North Korea’s premiere intelligence organization involved in North Korea’s conventional arms trade;
· RGB commander Lieutenant General Kim Yong Chol;
· Green Pine Associated Corporation, a North Korean conventional arms dealer subordinated to the control of the RGB; and
· Office 39 of the Korean Workers’ Party, which provides critical support to North Korean leadership in part through engaging in illicit economic activities and managing the leadership’s slush funds.
The U.S. government has longstanding concerns regarding North Korea’s involvement in a range of illicit activities conducted through government agencies and associated front companies. North Korea’s nuclear and missile proliferation activity and other illicit conduct violate UN Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1874, and these activities and their other illicit conduct violate international norms and destabilize the Korean Peninsula and the entire region. In signing this Order, President Obama has frozen the property and interests in property of the three entities and one individual listed on the Annex. This Order provides the United States with new tools to disrupt illicit economic activity conducted by North Korea.
* Arms proliferation: North Korea has long been engaged in the sale of conventional arms to countries in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Africa. Since the 2009 adoption of UNSCR 1874, which bans all arms transfers from North Korea, authorities in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East have seized North Korean shipments suspected of carrying prohibited arms and related materiel.
* Narcotics trafficking: During the past three decades, North Korean citizens, diplomats and government officials have engaged in narcotics trafficking. Officials in Turkey, Egypt, Taiwan and Japan have linked North Korean officials to narcotics possession, distribution and smuggling.
* Counterfeiting currency: The United States continues to investigate North Korea’s manufacture and distribution of the highly deceptive counterfeit of the U.S. $100 and $50 bills, also known as the “supernote.” The United States Secret Service has made definitive connections between the supernote and the government of North Korea. Since its first detection in 1989, the Secret Service has seized approximately $63 million of supernotes globally.
* Procurement of luxury goods: UNSCR 1718 requires Member States to prohibit the direct or indirect supply, sale of transfer to North Korea of luxury goods, which North Korean leadership uses to secure the loyalty of elites and the military. In July 2009, Italian authorities prevented the sale of luxury yachts worth more than $15 million to an Austrian company because they were ultimately destined for North Korea.
* Deceptive financial practices: North Korea continues to engage in deceptive financial practices to disguise the true nature of its transactions, using government agencies and front companies to engage in WMD and missile proliferation-related and other illicit activities and to evade detection by financial institutions around the world. All of the conduct above is facilitated by the deceptive financial practices North Korea engages in to disguise the true nature of its transactions.
President Obama identified the following entities and individual for sanctions by listing them on the Annex to the Order:
The Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB)
The Reconnaissance General Bureau is North Korea’s premiere intelligence organization, created in early 2009 by the merger of existing intelligence organizations from the Korean Workers’ Party, the Operations Department and Office 35, and the Reconnaissance Bureau of the Korean People’s Army. RGB trades in conventional arms and controls the North Korean conventional arms firm Green Pine Associated Corporation (Green Pine), which was also identified for sanctions by the President today for exporting arms or related materiel from North Korea.
The RGB is commanded by General Kim Yong Chol, who was also identified for sanctions today.
Green Pine Associated Corporation (Green Pine)
The conventional arms firm Green Pine Associated Corporation was subordinated to the control of the RGB in 2009 and has been identified for sanctions by the President for exporting arms or related material from North Korea. Green Pine specializes in the production of maritime military craft and armaments, such as submarines, military boats and missiles systems, and has exported torpedoes and technical assistance to Iranian defense-related firms.
Green Pine is responsible for approximately half of the arms and related materiel exported by North Korea and has taken over many of the activities of the Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation (KOMID), which is listed in the Annex to Executive Order 13382 of June 2005. KOMID was also designated by the UNSCR 1718 Committee to be subject to the provisions of paragraph 8(d) of UNSCR 1718.
Office 39 of the Korean Workers’ Party (Office 39)
Office 39 of the Korean Workers’ Party engages in illicit economic activity to support the North Korean government. It has branches throughout the nation that raise and manage funds and is responsible for earning foreign currency for North Korea’s Korean Workers’ Party senior leadership through illicit activities such as narcotics trafficking.
Office 39 controls a number of entities inside North Korea and abroad through which it conducts numerous illicit activities including the production, smuggling, and distribution of narcotics. Office 39 has also been involved in the attempted procurement and transfer to North Korea of luxury goods.
· Office 39 produced methamphetamine in Sangwon, South Pyongan Province and was also involved in the distribution of methamphetamine to small-scale North Korean smugglers for distribution through China and South Korea. Office 39 also operates poppy farms in North Hamkyo’ng Province and North Pyongan Province and produces opium and heroin in Hamhu’ng and Nachin.
· In 2009, Office 39 was involved in the failed attempt to purchase and export to North Korea — through China — two Italian-made luxury yachts worth more than $15 million. Halted by Italian authorities, the attempted export of the yachts destined for Kim Jong-il was in violation of United Nations sanctions against North Korea under UNSCR 1718, which specifically require Member States to prevent the supply, sale, or transfer of luxury goods to North Korea.
Office 39 previously used Banco Delta Asia to launder illicit proceeds. Banco Delta Asia was identified by the Treasury Department in September 2005 as a “primary money laundering concern” under Section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act because it represented an unacceptable risk of money laundering and other financial crimes.
Identifying Information:
Entity: Reconnaissance General Bureau
AKA: Chongch’al Ch’ongguk
AKA: RGB
AKA: KPA Unit 586
Location: Hyongjesan-Guyok, Pyongyang, North Korea
Alt. Location: Nungrado, Pyongyang, North Korea
Individual: Kim Yong Chol
AKA: Kim Yong-Chol
AKA: Kim Young-Chol
AKA: Kim Young-Cheol
AKA: Kim Young-Chul
Location: Pyongan-Pukto, North Korea
DOB: circa 1947
Alt. DOB: circa 1946
Entity: Green Pine Associated Corporation
AKA: Chongsong Yonhap
AKA: Ch’o'ngsong Yo’nhap
Location: c/o Reconnaissance General Bureau Headquarters,
Hyongjesan-Guyok, Pyongyang, North Korea
Alt. Location: Nungrado, Pyongyang, North Korea
Entity: Office 39
AKA: Office #39
AKA: Office No. 39
AKA: Bureau 39
AKA: Central Committee
AKA: Bureau 39
AKA: Third Floor Division 39
Address: Second KWP Government Building (Korean – CH’O'NGSA),
Chungso’ng, Urban Town (Korean — DONG),
Chung Ward, P’yongyang, North Korea
Address: Chung-Guyok (Central District), Sosong Street,
Kyongrim-Dong, Pyongyang, North Korea
Address: Changgwang Street, Pyongyang, North Korea
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August 30, 2010
TG-840
United States Designates North Korean Entities and Individuals for Activities Related to North Korea’s Weapons of Mass Destruction Program
WASHINGTON – In joint actions, the U.S. Departments of Treasury and State today announced the designations of five North Korean entities and three individuals under Executive Order (E.O.) 13382 for supporting North Korea’s Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) program. Executive Order 13382 is an authority aimed at freezing the assets of WMD proliferators and their supporters thereby isolating them from the U.S. financial and commercial systems.
Also today, President Obama signed an Executive Order that directs the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State, to target for sanctions individuals and entities facilitating North Korean trafficking in arms and related materiel; procurement of luxury goods; and engagement in illicit activities, including money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods and currency, bulk cash smuggling and narcotics trafficking. The new Executive Order supplements E.O 13382, under which North Korean entities have been designated to date, and is consistent with measures required in UNSCRs 1718 and 1874.
Korea Taesong Trading Company and Korea Heungjin Trading Company
Pyongyang-based entities the Korea Taesong Trading Company and Korea Heungjin Trading Company, are used by the Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation (KOMID) for trading purposes. Korea Taesong Trading Company has acted on behalf of KOMID in dealings with Syria, and Korea Heungjin Trading Company acts as the procurement arm of KOMID. Korea Heungjin Trading Company is also suspected to have been involved in supplying missile-related goods to Iran’s Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group.
KOMID is Pyongyang’s premier arms dealer and main exporter of goods and equipment related to ballistic missiles and conventional weapons, with offices located in multiple countries around the world with the primary goal of facilitating weapons sales and seeking new customers for its weapons. It was listed in the Annex to E.O. 13382 of June 2005 and has been sanctioned by the United States repeatedly over the last 10 years for trading in missile technology. KOMID was also designated by the UNSCR 1718 Committee to be subject to the asset freeze provisions of UNSCR 1718.
Korea Taesong Trading Company was previously sanctioned by the U.S. Department of State in 2008 under the Iran, North Korea, and Syria Nonproliferation Act (INKSNA). INKSNA provides for the imposition of measures on entities or individuals for the transfer to or acquisition from Iran, Syria, or North Korea of equipment or technology controlled under multilateral export control lists or otherwise having the potential to make a material contribution to the proliferation of WMD or cruise or ballistic missile systems.
Second Economic Committee, Munitions Industry Department and Second Academy of Natural Sciences
The Munitions Industry Department and Second Economic Committee are involved in key aspects of North Korea’s missile program. The Munitions Industry Department is responsible for overseeing the development of North Korea’s ballistic missiles, including the Taepo Dong-2.
The Second Economic Committee is responsible for overseeing the production of North Korea’s ballistic missiles. The Second Economic Committee also directs the activities of KOMID.
The Second Academy of Natural Sciences is a national-level organization responsible for research and development of North Korea’s advanced weapons systems, including missiles and probably nuclear weapons. The Second Academy of Natural Sciences uses a number of subordinate organizations to obtain technology, equipment, and information from overseas, including Tangun Trading Corporation, for use in North Korea’s missile and probably nuclear weapons programs.
Tangun Trading Corporation is subordinate to the Second Academy of Natural Sciences and is primarily responsible for the procurement of commodities and technologies to support North Korea’s defense research and development programs and procurement, including materials that are controlled under the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) or the Australia Group. Tangun Trading Corporation was designated by the Department of State pursuant to E.O. 13382 in September 2009. Tangun Trading Corporation was also designated by the UNSCR 1718 Committee to be subject to the asset freeze provisions of UNSCR 1718.
Ri Je-son and Ri Hong-sop
Ri Je-son and Ri Hong-sop act for or on behalf of the General Bureau of Atomic Energy (GBAE), which is responsible for North Korea’s nuclear program and manages operations at the Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center. GBAE was designated by the United Nations in July 2009 for its involvement in North Korea’s nuclear program and subsequently sanctioned by the Department of State under E.O. 13382 in September 2009.
Ri Je-son is the Director of GBAE and is responsible for facilitating several nuclear endeavors including GBAE’s management of Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center and Namchongang Trading Corporation.
Ri Hong-sop is a councilor for GBAE. He is also the former Director of Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center. In that capacity he oversaw the three core facilities that the DPRK used to produce of weapons-grade plutonium: the Fuel Fabrication Facility, the 5MWe Experimental Reactor, and the Radiological Laboratory (Reprocessing Plant).
Ri Je-son and Ri Hong-sop were also designated by the UNSCR 1718 Committee to be subject to the asset freeze and travel ban provisions of UNSCR 1718.
Yun Ho-lin
Yun Ho-jin acts for or on behalf of Namchongang Trading Corporation (NCG), a North Korean trading company subordinate to GBAE. NCG has been involved in the procurement of Japanese- origin vacuum pumps that were identified at a North Korean nuclear facility, as well as nuclear-related procurement associated with a German individual. NCG was designated by the State Department pursuant to E.O. 13382 in June 2009.
Yun Ho-jin has acted on behalf of NCG in various capacities since the 1980s. As a senior official at NCG, he oversaw the import of items needed for North Korea’s uranium enrichment program.
Through an NCG office in China, Yun Ho-jin was also involved in purchases of sensitive material linked to the construction of a nuclear reactor in Syria.
Yun Ho-jin was also designated by the UNSCR 1718 Committee to be subject to the asset freeze and travel ban provisions of UNSCR 1718.
Identifying Information:
Entity: Korea Taesong Trading Company
Location: Pyongyang, North Korea
Entity: Korea Heungjin Trading Company
AKA: Hunjin Trading Co.
Location: Pyongyang, North Korea
Entity: Second Economic Committee
Location: Kangdong, North Korea
Entity: Munitions Industry Department
AKA: Military Supplies Industry Department
Location: Pyongyang, North Korea
Entity: Second Academy of Natural Sciences
AKA: 2nd Academy of Natural Sciences
AKA: Che 2 Chayon Kwahak-Won
AKA: Academy of Natural Sciences
AKA: Chayon Kwahak-Won
AKA: National Defense Academy
AKA: Kukpang Kwahak-Won
AKA: Second Academy of Natural Sciences Research Institute SANSRI
Location: Pyongyang, North Korea
Individual: Ri Je-Son
AKA: Ri Che-Son
DOB: 1938
Individual: Ri Hong-Sop
DOB: 1940
Individual: Yun Ho-jin
AKA: Yun Ho-chin
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August 30, 2010
TG-841
Under Secretary Stuart Levey Remarks on New Executive Order on North Korea
As Delivered
President Obama today signed an Executive Order establishing a new sanctions program that targets a wide range of illicit activities undertaken by the Government of North Korea. The Order gives the U.S. government new authorities to go after the arms sales, luxury goods procurement, money laundering, counterfeiting of currency and other illicit financial activities that enrich the highest echelons of the North Korean government while the North Korean people suffer.
The world by now is well aware of the North Korean government’s record of illicit activity and its belligerent behavior. Today the President decided that North Korea’s continued provocative actions, such as its unprovoked attack on the South Korean naval ship Cheonan in March of this year, which resulted in the ship’s sinking and the deaths of 46 sailors; its test of a nuclear device and its missile launches in 2009; its violations of UN Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1874; and its illicit and deceptive practices in international markets justify additional sanctions.
The destructive course that the North Korean government is charting is facilitated by a lifeline of cash generated through a range of illicit activities. North Korea’s government helps maintain its authority by placating privileged elites with money and perks, such as luxury goods like jewelry, luxury cars, and yachts. Not only do these transactions contravene UNSCR 1718, they are unconscionable in light of the fact that many of North Korea’s people live in dire poverty. The North Korean government receives millions of dollars every year from arms sales also outlawed by UN Security Council Resolutions. North Korea has been caught several times making these illicit arms sales, including to Iran and Syria. The North Korean government also benefits from illicit activities, such as drug trafficking, counterfeiting U.S. currency, and selling counterfeit cigarettes. All of this activity makes up a crucial portion of the North Korean government’s revenues.
These activities are carried out by a global financial network that generates this income and procures the luxury goods for the government of North Korea. That network is addressed directly by the President’s actions today. The President has identified for sanctions a key piece of this network, Office 39, a secretive branch of the North Korean government that manages slush funds and raises money for the leadership, including by trafficking drugs.
Also targeted for sanctions today by the President are key elements of North Korea’s infrastructure for importing and exporting conventional arms: Green Pine Associated Corporation, and its parent, the Reconnaissance General Bureau, and the Bureau’s commander, Lt. Gen. Kim Yong Chol. Green Pine is responsible for approximately half of the arms and related materiel North Korea exports, and has taken over many of the activities of another North Korean entity, KOMID, which was sanctioned by the U.S. for its involvement in proliferation-related activities in 2005 and listed for sanctions by the United Nations in 2009.
These measures are not directed at the people of North Korea, who, as Secretary Clinton has said, have suffered too long due to the misguided priorities of their government. Instead, the financial measures the President took today, as well as additional actions we will take in the weeks and months to come, are aimed at disrupting North Korea’s efforts to engage in illicit activities and its ability to surreptitiously move its money by deceiving banks and smuggling cash worldwide.
The activities we are targeting in this new sanctions program are violations of UN Security Council Resolutions or other international norms. By naming the individuals and entities involved in these activities, we will be excluding them from any access to the US financial system and, at the same time, we will be assisting responsible businesses and financial institutions around the world that are trying to protect themselves from illicit North Korean activities. We will continue to take such actions and also to share relevant information with the private sector and regulators around the world. As we have seen when we have taken similar actions in the past, financial measures such as these that focus on illicit conduct are highly effective in garnering the support of the private sector, which is already quite wary of North Korean-related business and the reputational and other risks it poses.
We are also announcing actions today under already-existing authorities to further target North Korea’s proliferation activities. The State Department and Treasury Department have identified five entities and three individuals for sanctions under Executive Order 13382, our proliferation Executive Order. These entities include two trading firms - Korea Taesong Trading Co. and Korea Heunjin Trading Co. - that act on behalf of North Korean arms dealer KOMID in deals involving Iran and Syria.
Special Advisor for Nonproliferation and Arms Control, Bob Einhorn, is here as well, and he will make some comments and explain in further detail, if he wishes, the actions taken by the State Department today.
The overall effect of the actions we are taking and the new program announcing by the President today is that North Korea’s illicit activities will face even greater scrutiny by banks and firms worldwide. North Korea’s leadership must choose the path it wishes to take: whether it will end its isolation by living up to its international obligations and responsibilities or pursue a path that will subject it to ever-increasing pressure.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Texas Governor Perry Denied Meeting Obama During Obama's Visit To Fort Bliss, Perry Wanted To Discuss Border Security
From Freedom's Lighthouse and FOX News:
Perry Offered Consolation Meeting After Request for Obama Face Time Denied
Published August 31, 2010
FoxNews.com
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Gov. Rick Perry speaks after he was endorsed by the Texas Association of Realtors Aug. 30 in San Antonio. (AP Photo)
The White House apparently offered a consolation meeting to Texas Gov. Rick Perry after he was denied face time with President Obama on his trip to Fort Bliss Tuesday.
The Republican governor's spokeswoman said Perry's request for a presidential meeting to discuss border security was rebuffed. According to Perry spokeswoman Katherine Cesinger, White House aides said the president would not be available for such a meeting.
Instead, White House spokesman Luis Miranda said Perry "was offered but declined" a meeting on border security with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and counterterrorism adviser John Brennan.
"Today, the president is at Fort Bliss to honor the troops who so bravely serve our country, but if the governor wants to have a meeting about the border, the White House has made that possible," Miranda said in a written statement.
Cesinger later said the governor was just looking for a meeting with the president, not his advisers.
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Ten Worst Places to LiveEmployees File Suit Against Coke for Cancelling Their Health Care10 Best Company NicknamesEXCLUSIVE: Mayo Says Citi Can't Be TrustedDouble-Dip Fears Hit Global Stocks"The governor does not need additional briefings about what is occurring on our border. What we need is an immediate deployment of additional resources," she said.
Perry was one of the first people the president saw when he stepped from Air Force One during an Austin visit on Aug. 9. On that occasion, Perry hand-delivered a letter to Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, warning about the "dire threat" from drug violence along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Miranda noted that the president has "directed unprecedented resources to the southwest border since launching the Southwest Border Initiative in March 2009" and signed into law $600 million in supplemental funds for border protection, law enforcement, 250 additional National Guard for Texas and a new Texas-based Predator drone to enhance surveillance to personnel on the ground.
Fox News' Major Garrett and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Perry Offered Consolation Meeting After Request for Obama Face Time Denied
Published August 31, 2010
FoxNews.com
Print Email Share Comments (504) Text Size
Gov. Rick Perry speaks after he was endorsed by the Texas Association of Realtors Aug. 30 in San Antonio. (AP Photo)
The White House apparently offered a consolation meeting to Texas Gov. Rick Perry after he was denied face time with President Obama on his trip to Fort Bliss Tuesday.
The Republican governor's spokeswoman said Perry's request for a presidential meeting to discuss border security was rebuffed. According to Perry spokeswoman Katherine Cesinger, White House aides said the president would not be available for such a meeting.
Instead, White House spokesman Luis Miranda said Perry "was offered but declined" a meeting on border security with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and counterterrorism adviser John Brennan.
"Today, the president is at Fort Bliss to honor the troops who so bravely serve our country, but if the governor wants to have a meeting about the border, the White House has made that possible," Miranda said in a written statement.
Cesinger later said the governor was just looking for a meeting with the president, not his advisers.
YOU MIGHT ALSO BE
INTERESTED IN
Ten Worst Places to LiveEmployees File Suit Against Coke for Cancelling Their Health Care10 Best Company NicknamesEXCLUSIVE: Mayo Says Citi Can't Be TrustedDouble-Dip Fears Hit Global Stocks"The governor does not need additional briefings about what is occurring on our border. What we need is an immediate deployment of additional resources," she said.
Perry was one of the first people the president saw when he stepped from Air Force One during an Austin visit on Aug. 9. On that occasion, Perry hand-delivered a letter to Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, warning about the "dire threat" from drug violence along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Miranda noted that the president has "directed unprecedented resources to the southwest border since launching the Southwest Border Initiative in March 2009" and signed into law $600 million in supplemental funds for border protection, law enforcement, 250 additional National Guard for Texas and a new Texas-based Predator drone to enhance surveillance to personnel on the ground.
Fox News' Major Garrett and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Embedded With The Taliban: Journalist Presents Enemy's Side Of The Story As They Attack U.S. Soldiers
From A Charging Elephant:
Aug 31, 2010 (15 hours ago)Embedded with Taliban: Journalist Presents Enemy’s Side of the Story as They Attack US Soldiersfrom Charging Elephant by divingnews@gmail.comPosted by Sun Tzu
Big Peace
From Journeyman Pictures: “Though they would eventually kidnap him, the Taliban granted journalist Paul Refsdal unprecedented access. This exclusive documentary shows us a side of the Taliban that we have never seen before.”
Aug 31, 2010 (15 hours ago)Embedded with Taliban: Journalist Presents Enemy’s Side of the Story as They Attack US Soldiersfrom Charging Elephant by divingnews@gmail.comPosted by Sun Tzu
Big Peace
From Journeyman Pictures: “Though they would eventually kidnap him, the Taliban granted journalist Paul Refsdal unprecedented access. This exclusive documentary shows us a side of the Taliban that we have never seen before.”
In Korea, A Model For Iraq
From AEI:
In Korea, a Model for Iraq By Paul Wolfowitz
New York Times
Monday, August 30, 2010
Vice President Joe Biden, who traveled to Iraq this week to mark the formal end of United States combat operations there, has claimed that peace and stability there could be "one of the great achievements" of the Obama administration. Of course, the largest share of credit belongs to the brave men and women of the American military, who have sacrificed so much and persevered through so much difficulty. Credit also goes to the Iraqi Army and police forces who have fought bravely and increasingly well, and to Iraq's people, who have borne a heavy burden. But it is good that President Obama and his administration also claim credit, because success in Iraq will need their support.
My hope is that the president understands that success in Iraq will be defined not by what we withdraw, but by what we leave behind. At a minimum, we need Iraq to be a stable country, at peace both within its borders and with its neighbors. And we should help Iraq to one day become a leader of political and economic progress in the Middle East.
The aftermath of another American war is instructive. Fifty-seven years ago, an armistice ended the fighting in Korea--another unpopular conflict, far bloodier than the Iraq war, although shorter. Civilian casualties were horrendous, and the United States and its allies suffered more than half a million military casualties. The South Korean Army took the heaviest losses, but the United States also paid a high price: 33,739 killed or missing in battle and 103,284 wounded.
My hope is that the president understands that success in Iraq will be defined not by what we withdraw, but by what we leave behind.Gen. Dwight Eisenhower won the 1952 presidential election, in part, on a promise to end the war. According to a poll taken in April 1953, three months before the armistice was signed, 55 percent of the American public thought the war had not been worth fighting, whereas only 36 percent thought that it had.
Yet when the war was over, the United States did not abandon South Korea. We had done so in 1949, when our post-World War II occupation of Korea ended, opening the door to North Korea's invasion the following year. This time, instead, we kept a substantial military force in South Korea.
The United States stuck with South Korea even though the country was then ruled by a dictator and the prospects for its war-devastated economy looked dim. With all its failings, South Korea was nevertheless a haven of freedom compared with the bleak and brutal despotism of North Korea.
We also understood that stability on the Korean Peninsula was critical for the peace of an entire region--a region that involved Japan as well as the Soviet Union and China. Most important, abandoning South Korea would have risked squandering all that had been gained.
Although South Korea has assumed the principal responsibility for its own defense, there are still 28,500 American troops on the peninsula. Our continued commitment prevented another war and today South Korea is a remarkable economic success story. A series of democratic elections, starting in 1987, have made it a political success story as well.
Some similar considerations apply to Iraq today. First, Iraq occupies a key position in the Persian Gulf, a strategically important region of the world--a position that is all the more important because of the dangerous ambitions of Iran's rulers.
Second, whatever the failings of Iraq's democracy, it bears no comparison to the regime that other hostile elements would impose. With all its imperfections, Iraq today is more democratic than South Korea was at the end of the Korean War, and more democratic than any other country in the Arab Middle East (with the possible exception of Lebanon).
We have withdrawn so many of our troops and relinquished a combat role because Iraqi security forces have been able to take on most of the security burden. Their numbers have grown from about 320,000 in December 2006 to more than 600,000 at the end of last year; they are also becoming more capable.
Of course, numbers are only part of the story, and Iraqi security forces still need assistance from the American military. Not surprisingly, the enemy has increasingly focused its attacks on Iraqi soldiers and police officers as the United States withdraws, although Iraqi losses are still far below what they were earlier in the war. Since June 2003, about 10,000 Iraqi security forces have been killed, twice the total of the United States and the entire international coalition.
Even as our combat commitment ends, our commitment to supporting Iraq must continue. That means continued political support, including offering our help in resolving the current stalemate over forming a government. (It's worth remembering that much of the difficulty the Iraqis are encountering arises from a Constitution and electoral system that the international community helped design. Moreover, this example of peaceful negotiations to create a government is something new in the Arab world.)
Our commitment must also include continued material support, particularly in the form of military and technical assistance. And though we have agreed to withdraw all our troops by the end of next year--a pledge that we must honor if the Iraqi government so desires--we need to remain open to the possibility of a mutually agreed longer-term security commitment or military presence for deterrence and support.
It is well worth celebrating the end of combat operations after seven years, and the homecoming of so many troops. But fully abandoning Iraq would damage the interests of the United States in the region and beyond. Maintaining a long-term commitment, albeit at greatly reduced cost and risk, is the best way to secure the gains that have been achieved with so much sacrifice.
Paul Wolfowitz is a visiting scholar at AEI.
In Korea, a Model for Iraq By Paul Wolfowitz
New York Times
Monday, August 30, 2010
Vice President Joe Biden, who traveled to Iraq this week to mark the formal end of United States combat operations there, has claimed that peace and stability there could be "one of the great achievements" of the Obama administration. Of course, the largest share of credit belongs to the brave men and women of the American military, who have sacrificed so much and persevered through so much difficulty. Credit also goes to the Iraqi Army and police forces who have fought bravely and increasingly well, and to Iraq's people, who have borne a heavy burden. But it is good that President Obama and his administration also claim credit, because success in Iraq will need their support.
My hope is that the president understands that success in Iraq will be defined not by what we withdraw, but by what we leave behind. At a minimum, we need Iraq to be a stable country, at peace both within its borders and with its neighbors. And we should help Iraq to one day become a leader of political and economic progress in the Middle East.
The aftermath of another American war is instructive. Fifty-seven years ago, an armistice ended the fighting in Korea--another unpopular conflict, far bloodier than the Iraq war, although shorter. Civilian casualties were horrendous, and the United States and its allies suffered more than half a million military casualties. The South Korean Army took the heaviest losses, but the United States also paid a high price: 33,739 killed or missing in battle and 103,284 wounded.
My hope is that the president understands that success in Iraq will be defined not by what we withdraw, but by what we leave behind.Gen. Dwight Eisenhower won the 1952 presidential election, in part, on a promise to end the war. According to a poll taken in April 1953, three months before the armistice was signed, 55 percent of the American public thought the war had not been worth fighting, whereas only 36 percent thought that it had.
Yet when the war was over, the United States did not abandon South Korea. We had done so in 1949, when our post-World War II occupation of Korea ended, opening the door to North Korea's invasion the following year. This time, instead, we kept a substantial military force in South Korea.
The United States stuck with South Korea even though the country was then ruled by a dictator and the prospects for its war-devastated economy looked dim. With all its failings, South Korea was nevertheless a haven of freedom compared with the bleak and brutal despotism of North Korea.
We also understood that stability on the Korean Peninsula was critical for the peace of an entire region--a region that involved Japan as well as the Soviet Union and China. Most important, abandoning South Korea would have risked squandering all that had been gained.
Although South Korea has assumed the principal responsibility for its own defense, there are still 28,500 American troops on the peninsula. Our continued commitment prevented another war and today South Korea is a remarkable economic success story. A series of democratic elections, starting in 1987, have made it a political success story as well.
Some similar considerations apply to Iraq today. First, Iraq occupies a key position in the Persian Gulf, a strategically important region of the world--a position that is all the more important because of the dangerous ambitions of Iran's rulers.
Second, whatever the failings of Iraq's democracy, it bears no comparison to the regime that other hostile elements would impose. With all its imperfections, Iraq today is more democratic than South Korea was at the end of the Korean War, and more democratic than any other country in the Arab Middle East (with the possible exception of Lebanon).
We have withdrawn so many of our troops and relinquished a combat role because Iraqi security forces have been able to take on most of the security burden. Their numbers have grown from about 320,000 in December 2006 to more than 600,000 at the end of last year; they are also becoming more capable.
Of course, numbers are only part of the story, and Iraqi security forces still need assistance from the American military. Not surprisingly, the enemy has increasingly focused its attacks on Iraqi soldiers and police officers as the United States withdraws, although Iraqi losses are still far below what they were earlier in the war. Since June 2003, about 10,000 Iraqi security forces have been killed, twice the total of the United States and the entire international coalition.
Even as our combat commitment ends, our commitment to supporting Iraq must continue. That means continued political support, including offering our help in resolving the current stalemate over forming a government. (It's worth remembering that much of the difficulty the Iraqis are encountering arises from a Constitution and electoral system that the international community helped design. Moreover, this example of peaceful negotiations to create a government is something new in the Arab world.)
Our commitment must also include continued material support, particularly in the form of military and technical assistance. And though we have agreed to withdraw all our troops by the end of next year--a pledge that we must honor if the Iraqi government so desires--we need to remain open to the possibility of a mutually agreed longer-term security commitment or military presence for deterrence and support.
It is well worth celebrating the end of combat operations after seven years, and the homecoming of so many troops. But fully abandoning Iraq would damage the interests of the United States in the region and beyond. Maintaining a long-term commitment, albeit at greatly reduced cost and risk, is the best way to secure the gains that have been achieved with so much sacrifice.
Paul Wolfowitz is a visiting scholar at AEI.
Obama-Wrecked Iraq
From AEI:
Obama Wrecked Iraq By John R. Bolton
Daily Beast
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
President Obama has an opportunity in Tuesday's Oval Office address on Iraq to show that he has finally learned something about American security in the hard world of international geostrategy. Of course, if he did, it would mean abandoning much of what he advocated during his election campaign, reversing many of his most-prized policies since his inauguration, disappointing his leftist political base, and causing acute heartburn on Norway's Nobel Peace Prize Committee. I'm not holding my breath. But if the president was blessed with a revelation during his summer vacation, perhaps he now understands what we have at stake in Iraq going forward.
One of the main criticisms of President Bush's decision to overthrow Saddam Hussein was that the United States had attacked the wrong target. Iraq wasn't the real threat, said these critics, it was Iran. In fact, they argued, by eliminating Saddam--who long advertised himself as the Arabs' defender against the Persians--Bush had actually strengthened Iran, laying the foundation for Tehran to expand its influence throughout the Middle East.
Iraq today is obviously no longer a regional predator, and it could potentially be a great success story, if Washington had the necessary patience and grand strategy.This criticism was always simplistic, since Iran's bankrolling of international terrorism, its progress toward deliverable nuclear weapons, and its ambitions for hegemony inside the Muslim world long antedated U.S. military action. The Iran threat was always there, and metastasizing, no matter what the United States did about Saddam.
And Saddam's threat was real. His regime had already used chemical weapons against its own people, and against Iran, committed aggression against Kuwait, threatened to do so against others, including Israel, and could easily do so again. Plainly, the United States, its friends, and its interests were threatened by both Iraq and Iran, and most imminently by an Iraq that was moving rapidly to break loose from United Nations sanctions and to rid itself of U.N. weapons inspectors. Once free, it was only a matter of time before Iraq would again produce weapons of mass destruction, and pose a threat to his neighbors and U.S. interests.
Iraq today is obviously no longer a regional predator, and it could potentially be a great success story, if Washington had the necessary patience and grand strategy. Ironically, the very critics who complained about the Bush administration's "mistake" in going after the wrong threat are prominent among those who have been urging a faster pullout of the remaining U.S. military forces from Iraq.
In addition, they oppose any U.S. or Israeli military action against Iran's steadily progressing nuclear weapons program, hoping instead that obviously inadequate economic sanctions or diplomacy will somehow frustrate Iran's nuclear ambitions. Even worse, many fully understand that neither sanctions nor diplomacy will stop Iran. They believe instead that a nuclear Iran can be contained and deterred, and therefore there is no reason to keep trying to prevent it. That, in turn, will almost certainly guarantee a devastating regional arms race, with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, and perhaps others obtaining nuclear weapons to protect themselves against a belligerent and very nuclear Iran.
Thus, the consequence of an Obama policy that continues the withdrawal of American forces down to zero in Iraq would unquestionably strengthen Iran, both inside Iraq among its Shiite allies, and also in the broader Middle East. Combined with Obama's unmodified pledge to begin withdrawing U.S. forces from Afghanistan in mid-2011, the American retreat from Iran's borders would be in full swing. Arab states around the Gulf are already concluding that American influence is fading, and they are seeking accommodations with Iran for their own safety's sake.
Obama's policy, and the one he is most likely to defend Tuesday night--withdrawing from Iraq--is exactly what the critics of Bush's invasion of Iraq have long waited to hear. But it will achieve precisely the opposite of what they say they wanted--stopping Iran's nuclear ambitions--and will leave Iran the increasingly dominant player in an ever-more-dangerous region.
This is truly a lose-lose policy for the United States. But I will be surprised if that's not exactly what we hear from President Obama.
John R. Bolton is a senior fellow at AEI.
Obama Wrecked Iraq By John R. Bolton
Daily Beast
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
President Obama has an opportunity in Tuesday's Oval Office address on Iraq to show that he has finally learned something about American security in the hard world of international geostrategy. Of course, if he did, it would mean abandoning much of what he advocated during his election campaign, reversing many of his most-prized policies since his inauguration, disappointing his leftist political base, and causing acute heartburn on Norway's Nobel Peace Prize Committee. I'm not holding my breath. But if the president was blessed with a revelation during his summer vacation, perhaps he now understands what we have at stake in Iraq going forward.
One of the main criticisms of President Bush's decision to overthrow Saddam Hussein was that the United States had attacked the wrong target. Iraq wasn't the real threat, said these critics, it was Iran. In fact, they argued, by eliminating Saddam--who long advertised himself as the Arabs' defender against the Persians--Bush had actually strengthened Iran, laying the foundation for Tehran to expand its influence throughout the Middle East.
Iraq today is obviously no longer a regional predator, and it could potentially be a great success story, if Washington had the necessary patience and grand strategy.This criticism was always simplistic, since Iran's bankrolling of international terrorism, its progress toward deliverable nuclear weapons, and its ambitions for hegemony inside the Muslim world long antedated U.S. military action. The Iran threat was always there, and metastasizing, no matter what the United States did about Saddam.
And Saddam's threat was real. His regime had already used chemical weapons against its own people, and against Iran, committed aggression against Kuwait, threatened to do so against others, including Israel, and could easily do so again. Plainly, the United States, its friends, and its interests were threatened by both Iraq and Iran, and most imminently by an Iraq that was moving rapidly to break loose from United Nations sanctions and to rid itself of U.N. weapons inspectors. Once free, it was only a matter of time before Iraq would again produce weapons of mass destruction, and pose a threat to his neighbors and U.S. interests.
Iraq today is obviously no longer a regional predator, and it could potentially be a great success story, if Washington had the necessary patience and grand strategy. Ironically, the very critics who complained about the Bush administration's "mistake" in going after the wrong threat are prominent among those who have been urging a faster pullout of the remaining U.S. military forces from Iraq.
In addition, they oppose any U.S. or Israeli military action against Iran's steadily progressing nuclear weapons program, hoping instead that obviously inadequate economic sanctions or diplomacy will somehow frustrate Iran's nuclear ambitions. Even worse, many fully understand that neither sanctions nor diplomacy will stop Iran. They believe instead that a nuclear Iran can be contained and deterred, and therefore there is no reason to keep trying to prevent it. That, in turn, will almost certainly guarantee a devastating regional arms race, with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, and perhaps others obtaining nuclear weapons to protect themselves against a belligerent and very nuclear Iran.
Thus, the consequence of an Obama policy that continues the withdrawal of American forces down to zero in Iraq would unquestionably strengthen Iran, both inside Iraq among its Shiite allies, and also in the broader Middle East. Combined with Obama's unmodified pledge to begin withdrawing U.S. forces from Afghanistan in mid-2011, the American retreat from Iran's borders would be in full swing. Arab states around the Gulf are already concluding that American influence is fading, and they are seeking accommodations with Iran for their own safety's sake.
Obama's policy, and the one he is most likely to defend Tuesday night--withdrawing from Iraq--is exactly what the critics of Bush's invasion of Iraq have long waited to hear. But it will achieve precisely the opposite of what they say they wanted--stopping Iran's nuclear ambitions--and will leave Iran the increasingly dominant player in an ever-more-dangerous region.
This is truly a lose-lose policy for the United States. But I will be surprised if that's not exactly what we hear from President Obama.
John R. Bolton is a senior fellow at AEI.
Al Queda Leader In Yemen Attempts To Recruit Saudi Soldiers
from The Long War Journal:
Al Qaeda leader in Yemen tries to woo Saudi soldiers
By Thomas JoscelynAugust 31, 2010
Said Ali al Shihri, former Guantánamo detainee and deputy leader of al Qaeda in Yemen. Photo from The SITE Institute.
In a nearly 15-minute audio tape released in early August, Said al Shihri, one of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s (AQAP) top leaders, tried to convince Saudi soldiers and security officers to serve al Qaeda. Al Shihri set forth a dozen reasons why Saudi citizens should betray the royals, and he offered a cursory plan for doing so.
Al Shihri said it should be “easy” to overthrow the House of Saud if his plan is followed.
Al Shihri called for willing recruits to form cells that can attract logistical support from members of the Saudi Air Force, Army, and office of the Interior Ministry. Al Shihri urged guards for the Saudi royals to turn on “the tyrant princes” and “kill them.” Those in charge of security at “weapons warehouses” inside the Kingdom and employees of the Interior Ministry are especially valuable recruits, al Shihri said.
Operational cells should also perform surveillance on “important targets” inside the Kingdom, al Shihiri advised, according to a translation of the tape obtained by the Long War Journal.
Al Shirhi’s tape is the just the latest example of how the Saudis’ rehabilitation program for former Gitmo detainees and other jihadists has faltered. Al Shihri was captured in northern Pakistan in late 2001 and handed over to American authorities. He was detained at Guantanamo until Nov. 9, 2007, when he was repatriated to the Saudis.
The Saudis arranged for a private jet to fly al Shihri and other Gitmo detainees back to the Kingdom. Typically, the former detainees are pampered, and are offered inducements to renounce al Qaeda, including jobs, cars, and wives. The Saudis set up an art therapy program as part of the rehabilitation effort, too.
The program does not try to convince the former detainees that waging violent jihad is inappropriate. Instead, the Saudis tell the Gitmo grads that jihad must be authorized by the right religious authorities – i.e., those loyal to the Saudi establishment – and not target Saudi Arabia itself. In written testimony supplied to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in February 2009, then Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair explained:
The rehabilitation course covers various religious topics, including takfir, loyalty, allegiance, terrorism, legal rules for jihad, and psychological instruction on self-esteem. The course does not address anti-Western/anti-U.S. views, focusing only on the difference between Wahhabism, Saudi Arabia's conservative branch of Islam, and takfirism, the violent ideology espoused by al Qaeda.
Al Shihri, who graduated from the Saudi rehabilitation program, clearly did not buy the program’s lessons. Throughout the tape, al Shihri warns Saudis that if they continue to remain loyal to the Kingdom, then they should “fear Allah” because they are serving the “sheikhs of Satan.”
Four assassination attempts on Saudi deputy interior minister
AQAP is actively targeting some Saudi princes for assassination, just as Said al Shihri calls for in his tape. According to the Saudi Gazette, al Qaeda has tried to kill Prince Muhammad Bin Naif Bin Abdul Aziz, who is the Saudi deputy interior minister and oversees the Kingdom’s counterterrorism efforts, four times since 2004.
The first attempt “involved a bomb-laden vehicle that was used to target the Ministry of Interior building in Riyadh.” In a second attempt, al Qaeda fired a missile at the prince’s plane but missed when the pilot took “evasive action.”
In a third attempt, an al Qaeda suicide bomber stuffed explosives in his rear and tried to blow up the prince. The bomber was on the Saudi Kingdom’s most wanted list, as is Said al Shihri, and pledged to turn himself in. The prince agreed to accept his surrender in person and that opened up a window of opportunity for al Qaeda. The suicide bomber was reportedly directed by senior AQAP leaders, including perhaps Said al Shihri himself.
Yousef al-Shihri, a former Gitmo detainee and now a member of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Photo courtesy of the NEFA Foundation.
The fourth attempt on the prince’s life is noteworthy because it involved Said al Shihri’s brother-in-law, Yousef al Shihri, who was also a former Guantanamo detainee. The Saudi Gazette reports that Yousef al Shihri and another al Qaeda terrorist were killed in a shootout with Saudi security forces along the border on Oct. 13, 2009. [For more on Yousef al Shihri, see LWJ report, Another former Gitmo detainee killed in shootout.]
The pair were dressed as women at the time, and their garb hid two suicide explosive belts. They had two other suicide belts in their possession that were reportedly intended for two other al Qaeda operatives living inside the Kingdom. Their intended target was Prince Muhammad Bin Naif.
Echoes of Anwar al Awlaki's messaging
Said al Shihri’s tape is similar in its message to the sermons delivered by Anwar al Awlaki, who is in hiding in Yemen. Awlaki has consistently tried to convince Muslim soldiers to turn on their armies in the name of jihad. Awlaki’s most infamous recruit in this regard is Major Nidal Malik Hasan, who went on a shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Tex., on Nov. 5, 2009.
Shortly after the Fort Hood attack, Awlaki wrote on his web site:
Nidal Hassan is a hero. He is a man of conscience who could not bear the contradiction of being a Muslim and fighting against his own people. No scholar with a grain of Islamic knowledge can deny the clear cut proofs that Muslims today have the right — rather the duty — to fight against American tyranny.
This theme – that Muslims cannot serve infidel armies and Allah at the same time – has been part of Awlaki’s messaging for years. Maj. Hasan even explored this theme in a presentation he gave to his colleagues at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. After the Fort Hood shooting, it emerged that the FBI was aware that Maj. Hasan was in contact with Awlaki via email, but the communications were dismissed as innocuous.
Anwar al Awlaki, from a jihadist website.
In a more recent tape, Awlaki proudly called Hasan one of his “students” and said that Hasan asked about the religious permissibility of certain acts, including serving in the American military.
Said al Shihri’s tape echoes Awlaki’s messaging. Al Shihri says that “some members” of the Saudi armed forces have asked for guidance from AQAP as to “whether they should remain at their jobs” or join al Qaeda in Yemen. Al Shihri counsels them to stay in Saudi Arabia and only flee if it is necessary to evade authorities.
Al Shihri wants Saudi recruits to serve al Qaeda from inside the Saudi establishment. AQAP is clearly hoping that some Saudis follow Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s path.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/08/al_qaeda_leader_in_y.php#ixzz0yFbJVVYb
Al Qaeda leader in Yemen tries to woo Saudi soldiers
By Thomas JoscelynAugust 31, 2010
Said Ali al Shihri, former Guantánamo detainee and deputy leader of al Qaeda in Yemen. Photo from The SITE Institute.
In a nearly 15-minute audio tape released in early August, Said al Shihri, one of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s (AQAP) top leaders, tried to convince Saudi soldiers and security officers to serve al Qaeda. Al Shihri set forth a dozen reasons why Saudi citizens should betray the royals, and he offered a cursory plan for doing so.
Al Shihri said it should be “easy” to overthrow the House of Saud if his plan is followed.
Al Shihri called for willing recruits to form cells that can attract logistical support from members of the Saudi Air Force, Army, and office of the Interior Ministry. Al Shihri urged guards for the Saudi royals to turn on “the tyrant princes” and “kill them.” Those in charge of security at “weapons warehouses” inside the Kingdom and employees of the Interior Ministry are especially valuable recruits, al Shihri said.
Operational cells should also perform surveillance on “important targets” inside the Kingdom, al Shihiri advised, according to a translation of the tape obtained by the Long War Journal.
Al Shirhi’s tape is the just the latest example of how the Saudis’ rehabilitation program for former Gitmo detainees and other jihadists has faltered. Al Shihri was captured in northern Pakistan in late 2001 and handed over to American authorities. He was detained at Guantanamo until Nov. 9, 2007, when he was repatriated to the Saudis.
The Saudis arranged for a private jet to fly al Shihri and other Gitmo detainees back to the Kingdom. Typically, the former detainees are pampered, and are offered inducements to renounce al Qaeda, including jobs, cars, and wives. The Saudis set up an art therapy program as part of the rehabilitation effort, too.
The program does not try to convince the former detainees that waging violent jihad is inappropriate. Instead, the Saudis tell the Gitmo grads that jihad must be authorized by the right religious authorities – i.e., those loyal to the Saudi establishment – and not target Saudi Arabia itself. In written testimony supplied to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in February 2009, then Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair explained:
The rehabilitation course covers various religious topics, including takfir, loyalty, allegiance, terrorism, legal rules for jihad, and psychological instruction on self-esteem. The course does not address anti-Western/anti-U.S. views, focusing only on the difference between Wahhabism, Saudi Arabia's conservative branch of Islam, and takfirism, the violent ideology espoused by al Qaeda.
Al Shihri, who graduated from the Saudi rehabilitation program, clearly did not buy the program’s lessons. Throughout the tape, al Shihri warns Saudis that if they continue to remain loyal to the Kingdom, then they should “fear Allah” because they are serving the “sheikhs of Satan.”
Four assassination attempts on Saudi deputy interior minister
AQAP is actively targeting some Saudi princes for assassination, just as Said al Shihri calls for in his tape. According to the Saudi Gazette, al Qaeda has tried to kill Prince Muhammad Bin Naif Bin Abdul Aziz, who is the Saudi deputy interior minister and oversees the Kingdom’s counterterrorism efforts, four times since 2004.
The first attempt “involved a bomb-laden vehicle that was used to target the Ministry of Interior building in Riyadh.” In a second attempt, al Qaeda fired a missile at the prince’s plane but missed when the pilot took “evasive action.”
In a third attempt, an al Qaeda suicide bomber stuffed explosives in his rear and tried to blow up the prince. The bomber was on the Saudi Kingdom’s most wanted list, as is Said al Shihri, and pledged to turn himself in. The prince agreed to accept his surrender in person and that opened up a window of opportunity for al Qaeda. The suicide bomber was reportedly directed by senior AQAP leaders, including perhaps Said al Shihri himself.
Yousef al-Shihri, a former Gitmo detainee and now a member of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Photo courtesy of the NEFA Foundation.
The fourth attempt on the prince’s life is noteworthy because it involved Said al Shihri’s brother-in-law, Yousef al Shihri, who was also a former Guantanamo detainee. The Saudi Gazette reports that Yousef al Shihri and another al Qaeda terrorist were killed in a shootout with Saudi security forces along the border on Oct. 13, 2009. [For more on Yousef al Shihri, see LWJ report, Another former Gitmo detainee killed in shootout.]
The pair were dressed as women at the time, and their garb hid two suicide explosive belts. They had two other suicide belts in their possession that were reportedly intended for two other al Qaeda operatives living inside the Kingdom. Their intended target was Prince Muhammad Bin Naif.
Echoes of Anwar al Awlaki's messaging
Said al Shihri’s tape is similar in its message to the sermons delivered by Anwar al Awlaki, who is in hiding in Yemen. Awlaki has consistently tried to convince Muslim soldiers to turn on their armies in the name of jihad. Awlaki’s most infamous recruit in this regard is Major Nidal Malik Hasan, who went on a shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Tex., on Nov. 5, 2009.
Shortly after the Fort Hood attack, Awlaki wrote on his web site:
Nidal Hassan is a hero. He is a man of conscience who could not bear the contradiction of being a Muslim and fighting against his own people. No scholar with a grain of Islamic knowledge can deny the clear cut proofs that Muslims today have the right — rather the duty — to fight against American tyranny.
This theme – that Muslims cannot serve infidel armies and Allah at the same time – has been part of Awlaki’s messaging for years. Maj. Hasan even explored this theme in a presentation he gave to his colleagues at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. After the Fort Hood shooting, it emerged that the FBI was aware that Maj. Hasan was in contact with Awlaki via email, but the communications were dismissed as innocuous.
Anwar al Awlaki, from a jihadist website.
In a more recent tape, Awlaki proudly called Hasan one of his “students” and said that Hasan asked about the religious permissibility of certain acts, including serving in the American military.
Said al Shihri’s tape echoes Awlaki’s messaging. Al Shihri says that “some members” of the Saudi armed forces have asked for guidance from AQAP as to “whether they should remain at their jobs” or join al Qaeda in Yemen. Al Shihri counsels them to stay in Saudi Arabia and only flee if it is necessary to evade authorities.
Al Shihri wants Saudi recruits to serve al Qaeda from inside the Saudi establishment. AQAP is clearly hoping that some Saudis follow Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s path.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/08/al_qaeda_leader_in_y.php#ixzz0yFbJVVYb
Lawsuit Challenges Right Of U.S. Government To Assassinate U.S. Citizens
from Antiwar.com Blog:
Lawsuit Challenges Govt’s Right to Assassinate US Citizens
ACLU, CCR Insist Constitution, International Law Prohibit Summary Killings
by Jason Ditz, August 30, 2010
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Antiwar Forum
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed a lawsuit today challenging the right of the Obama Administration to assassinate American citizens outside of any current war zones.
“The United States cannot simply execute people, including its own citizens, anywhere in the world based on its own say-so,” insisted the Executive Director of the CCR Vince Warren.
The Obama Administration however insists that it can do exactly that, when National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair announced to Congress that US-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, against whom no charges have been filed, was on the official CIA “assassination list.”
Though officials never explained where this new power to execute without charges came from, National Counterterrorism Chief Michael Leiter later explained that it would be “irresponsible” not to try to assassinate Awlaki.
The lawsuit is an effort by Awlaki’s father Nasser al-Awlaki to stop the assassination of his son. So far the administration has not addressed this lawsuit.
Lawsuit Challenges Govt’s Right to Assassinate US Citizens
ACLU, CCR Insist Constitution, International Law Prohibit Summary Killings
by Jason Ditz, August 30, 2010
Email This
Print This
Share This
Antiwar Forum
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed a lawsuit today challenging the right of the Obama Administration to assassinate American citizens outside of any current war zones.
“The United States cannot simply execute people, including its own citizens, anywhere in the world based on its own say-so,” insisted the Executive Director of the CCR Vince Warren.
The Obama Administration however insists that it can do exactly that, when National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair announced to Congress that US-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, against whom no charges have been filed, was on the official CIA “assassination list.”
Though officials never explained where this new power to execute without charges came from, National Counterterrorism Chief Michael Leiter later explained that it would be “irresponsible” not to try to assassinate Awlaki.
The lawsuit is an effort by Awlaki’s father Nasser al-Awlaki to stop the assassination of his son. So far the administration has not addressed this lawsuit.
Staying Power: The United States In Afghanistan Beyond 2011
From the Brookings Institution:
.Staying Power: The U.S. Mission in Afghanistan Beyond 2011
Afghanistan, U.S. Military, U.S. Department of Defense, Defense, Democracy Promotion
Michael E. O'Hanlon, Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy
Foreign Affairs
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DeliciousDiggFacebookGoogleLinkedInLiveNewsvineStumbleUponYahooTwitter.September/October 2010 —
Editor's Note: The following article was originally published in the September/October 2010 issue of Foreign Affairs.
Afghan internally displaced people wait to receive charity from the Islamic Relief organisation in Kabul.
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Reuters/Omar Sobhani
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Nine years ago, the United States worked with Afghanistan's Northern Alliance to overthrow the Taliban government in Kabul. The world was united, the cause for war was clear, and U.S. President George W. Bush enjoyed the support of roughly 90 percent of Americans. That was a long time ago.
Today, the war in Afghanistan is a controversial conflict: fewer than half of Americans support the ongoing effort, even as roughly 100,000 U.S. troops are in harm's way. Troops from more than 40 countries still make up the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), but fewer than ten of those countries take substantial risks with their forces in the turbulent south and east of the country. And as the Netherlands prepares to depart Afghanistan this year and Canada remains committed to doing so in 2011, two of these coalition partners will likely soon be gone. Meanwhile, support for the coalition among Afghans has declined to less than 50 percent from highs of 80-90 percent early in the decade.
Over the years, the U.S. mission has lost much of its clarity of purpose. Although voters and policymakers in the United States and elsewhere remain dedicated to denying al Qaeda safe haven in Afghanistan, they have begun debating whether a Taliban takeover would necessarily mean al Qaeda's return; whether al Qaeda really still seeks an Afghan sanctuary, as it did a decade ago; and whether U.S. forces could contain any future al Qaeda presence through the kinds of drone strikes now commonly employed in Pakistan. The most pressing question is whether the current strategy can work -- in particular, whether a NATO-led military presence of nearly 150,000 troops is consistent with Afghan mores and whether the government of President Hamid Karzai is up to the challenge of governing and keeping order in such a diverse, fractious land.
Such doubts would matter less if U.S. President Barack Obama did not seem to share them. Obama has more than doubled the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan since taking office, and his administration's protracted decision-making process last fall -- which resulted in the president's authorizing 30,000 additional troops for the Afghan mission -- was deliberate, serious, and intense. But to some in Washington, Kabul, and elsewhere, the length of that review signaled fundamental uncertainty on the part of the president himself. Contributing to this impression were leaks to the media that revealed major disagreements among top administration advisers.
Most important, in announcing his decision last December, Obama pledged to begin removing U.S. forces from Afghanistan by July 2011. By itself, the plan to make the military buildup temporary was not misguided or surprising; the Bush administration did much the same thing with the surge in Iraq. But Obama seemed to be promising a fairly rapid end to the war. Indeed, that appeared to be the message he wanted to highlight most for the U.S. Congress and the U.S. electorate. Aware of the nation's war fatigue, Obama tried to be muscular enough to create a chance to win the war while at the same time keeping the war's critics acquiescent.
Obama's attempt to have his cake and eat it, too, has had its downsides. To Afghans, Obama's words signaled that U.S. forces might depart before they had sufficiently built the Afghan security forces or achieved other key goals. Such a message may motivate some Afghans to accelerate reforms, as the Obama administration hopes, but it will also make many of them hedge their bets, unsure of what will come next. Obama's speech has had a similar effect in Pakistan, where the country's traditional support for the Afghan Taliban has diminished more slowly than it might otherwise have. Some Pakistani military leaders still consider the Afghan Taliban to be their best defense against the potential consequences of a premature U.S. departure: either chaos or too much Indian influence in the country. That many of these fears are exaggerated or incorrect does not make them any less important.
In fact, the Obama administration's statements about July 2011 and realistic projections of how long the mission will take suggest that no sudden withdrawal will occur. Given the nature of the Afghan insurgency's dramatic recovery since 2005 and the reasons Obama agreed to a major troop increase in the first place, the drawdown will likely be gradual, with at least 50,000 U.S. troops still in Afghanistan through 2012.
TALIBAN RESURGENCE, U.S. RESPONSE
In 2005, the Taliban and other insurgent groups began one of the most impressive comebacks against a U.S.-led military coalition in history. By the time Obama came into office, the United States had to develop a new strategy for a largely new war -- and one it was losing.
Such was the context for the Obama administration's fall 2009 policy review. Those in the administration who opposed sending more troops to Afghanistan -- apparently including Vice President Joe Biden, National Security Adviser James Jones, and Karl Eikenberry, U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan -- did so because of reasonable skepticism. After all, Washington had sent more than 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan in early 2009, and just a few months later the military was asking for tens of thousands more. The skeptics also believed that Afghanistan, with its tribal society and weak traditions of loyalty to the state, was not a promising place for a classic counterinsurgency operation. They argued that the twin goals of such an operation -- protecting the population and guiding the Afghan security forces toward self-sufficiency -- were inconsistent with Afghanistan's history, culture, and society.
In the end, however, the president decided that the skeptics did not offer a viable alternative strategy. The Bush administration had already tried a light-footprint approach in Afghanistan, and it had resulted in the Taliban's comeback -- including at least a fivefold increase in violence since 2005.
Since 2005, the Taliban and other insurgent groups -- such as the Haqqani network, another extremist Pashtun movement straddling central parts of the Afghan-Pakistani border -- had substantially improved their battlefield tactics. Several years ago, insurgents would sometimes mass a large number of fighters for battle only to lose quickly to Afghan security forces or to NATO reinforcements once they arrived. In the summer of 2006, for example, Taliban fighters sought to establish control over a large swath of southern Afghanistan but were defeated by a combination of Afghan, Canadian, and other NATO forces. By the end of 2009, however, the Taliban were typically launching large-scale coordinated operations against small, vulnerable NATO outposts, as in the city of Wanat in 2008 and in the Kamdesh District of Nuristan Province in 2009. More commonly, in smaller-scale attacks, insurgents adopted the practice of detonating roadside bombs to create initial injury and panic and then firing small arms against any incapacitated vehicles and Afghan and NATO security forces.
The Taliban had become, in many ways, a smarter insurgent force. They rarely targeted civilians with the sort of widespread and brutal bombings that al Qaeda in Iraq once commonly perpetrated. Indeed, compared to many war-torn lands and even to high-crime countries, such as Colombia, Mexico, Nigeria, or South Africa, Afghanistan remained a safer place for normal citizens in per capita terms. But the Taliban and other insurgents made life very dangerous for NATO soldiers, Afghan security forces, and Afghan government officials. In 2009, the NATO-led coalition lost 500 soldiers, about half the total from the previous seven years combined, and the Afghan security forces lost 1,000 personnel (mostly police). Meanwhile, assassinations of political, business, civic, and tribal leaders increased, too.
The Taliban also developed a shadow government that allowed it to provide an alternative (if crude) judicial system in southern Afghanistan, especially in rural areas. And it did so in a manner often considered fairer than the government's corrupt and plodding ways. The Taliban had learned to present a kinder, gentler face, so to speak, than it had when it ruled Afghanistan from the mid-1990s until 2001. The group remained widely disliked -- with 90-95 percent viewing it unfavorably in most polls -- but it had softened the population's anger. At the same time, in classic Mafia style, it continued to carry out just enough violence to be feared.
By late 2009, NATO intelligence estimated that the Taliban included at least 25,000 dedicated fighters, nearly as many as they had before 9/11 and far more than they had in 2005. The Taliban also had substantial influence in most key districts of Afghanistan -- keeping government officials away, requiring compliance with their edicts on property disputes and other legal matters, and sometimes taxing the population. These factors -- coupled with the fact that the Taliban and the Haqqani network remained fundamentally opposed to the Afghan constitution and believed they were winning the war -- led the Obama administration to conclude that the prospects were not good for high-level reconciliation with Afghan insurgents.
Against this backdrop, the administration decided it had little choice but to try a classic counterinsurgency approach. A light footprint could not arrest the Taliban's momentum, change the atmosphere of intimidation that the insurgency had created among Afghans, or protect the human intelligence networks needed to carry out even a limited counterterrorism strategy. Nor, the administration calculated, could it give the United States the leverage necessary to reform and strengthen the Afghan government. The best approach, then, was to carry out a limited state-building mission aimed at developing Afghan security forces that could dependably control their own territory and civilian governance institutions that could provide some degree of law and order and gradual economic progress. The Obama administration rightly considered this the likeliest way to achieve its narrow goal of stopping the Taliban from retaking power and, in turn, of preventing al Qaeda and related groups from regaining substantial sanctuaries on Afghan soil.
BATTLEFIELD UPDATE
The U.S. approach -- originally crafted by General Stanley McChrystal, now being implemented by General David Petraeus, and supported by such civilians as U.S. Ambassador Eikenberry; Mark Sedwill, NATO's senior civilian representative in Afghanistan; and Staffan de Mistura, the UN special representative in Afghanistan -- focuses on the south and east of the country, where insurgent activity has been greatest and where local populations have been most inclined to support or tolerate the insurgency. The approach is discriminating: of nearly 400 districts nationwide, U.S. forces are placing primary emphasis (in terms of military and civilian resources) on 81 and secondary emphasis on 41. The initial goal is to establish a contiguous zone of safety throughout the south and the east in which the population can feel relatively secure, Afghan institutions can take root, and transportation and commerce can develop.
There have already been major pockets of success, especially in southwestern Afghanistan's Helmand Province. To be sure, progress in the town of Marja, where the U.S. military launched a high-profile operation in February, remains slow. But that operation was overemphasized, both as a barometer of the war's momentum and as a model for future operations, because Marja had been a Taliban stronghold without any government presence; most major towns and cities feature a less visible insurgent presence combined with some degree of government capacity. As a whole, Helmand Province is improving, with most major population centers now opening schools and markets, farmers moving away from poppy as their preferred crop, and overall levels of violence dropping. (NATO and the Obama administration should better measure and document this progress; as it is now, observers must rely too much on anecdotal information and conversations with military and civilian officials, such as those I had when I visited Afghanistan in May.)
Such promising trends are not present, however, in Kandahar, the region that includes southern Afghanistan's largest city and that the Taliban consider their spiritual and historic capital. The number of assassinations of political leaders and tribal elders in Kandahar is up severalfold over the last few years, to at least one or two a week. Overall, rates of violence in the region have roughly tripled since 2006, according to ISAF figures.
Neither has the tide of battle turned against the insurgency on a national scale. From 2009 to 2010, overall levels of violence rose by 25-50 percent (depending on the metric used), and the Taliban showed increasing willingness to target civilians. ISAF currently estimates that only 35 percent of the priority districts have "good" security or better, a figure unchanged from late 2009; the number of such districts with "satisfactory" security has improved modestly, from 40 percent in late 2009 to 46 percent in the spring of 2010. Although the situation is not worsening, many priority districts still have only mediocre levels of security.
But it should not be surprising that the level of violence is still rising. The reduction of violence is a lagging, not a leading, indicator of success; in Iraq, for example, troop casualty levels increased through the first six months of the surge, as additional U.S. troops entered the country. Also, as its forces have tripled in size over the last two years, ISAF has been initiating far more contact with the enemy than before. And although U.S. commanders do not emphasize this point because enemy body counts are not a highly reliable measure of success, they acknowledge that the coalition is now far more effective when it comes to arresting and killing key insurgent leaders than it was just last year. Crucially, while making these adjustments, the coalition has kept civilian casualties low. McChrystal's directives on reducing the use of force around civilians have apparently reduced the proportion of ISAF-caused civilian casualties from 40 percent in 2008 to 25 percent in 2009 and less than 20 percent in 2010.
Yet such statistics hardly capture the full state of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan. Two other factors get to the heart of what is involved in strengthening and legitimating the Afghan state: the development of the Afghan security forces and the fight to curb endemic corruption. The first is generally a good news story, at least with regard to the Afghan army; the second remains grim and calls for some new ideas from ISAF, the international community, and Afghans themselves.
TRAINING AND MENTORING
In the war's early years, the processes for recruiting, training, equipping, and fielding the Afghan security forces were quite poor. U.S. commanders told me last year, for example, that through 2008, only 25 percent of Afghan police officers received any professional training at all. Those who did receive training got too little and then almost no follow-up once deployed. Members of the security forces often reported to incompetent or corrupt leaders in the field and received pay that was too low to constitute a living wage. This dearth of resources was the result of Afghanistan's poverty and the economy-of-force philosophy that was guiding foreign actors.
NATO and Afghan officials have dramatically improved the situation. Since late 2009 -- when U.S. Lieutenant General William Caldwell, commander of the NATO training mission in Afghanistan, began working with troops from Canada and the United Kingdom to direct the initial training, equipping, and fielding of the Afghan security forces -- the number of personnel completing basic training and unit training each year has more than doubled. The quality of training is up, too, largely because teacher-to-student ratios have more than doubled (despite ongoing shortages of trainers). In the Afghan army, the better of the main security institutions, 20,000 recruits are in training at all times, and the force is on pace to reach its interim goal of 134,000 soldiers by this fall. This is partly because the army has increased soldiers' base pay, their pay for deployment to dangerous parts of the country, and other compensation. The rate at which new recruits are joining the force is now twice the rate at which soldiers are leaving.
Afghan enlistees who are illiterate -- the vast majority of them -- now receive mandatory literacy training. To train noncommissioned officers -- those who really make good militaries work at the ground level -- NATO has set up impressive new courses that focus on technical skills and on how to lead small units. And at the national military academy, which trains officers, enrollment and graduation rates have doubled in the last year. IASF has also convinced the Afghan government to improve the procedures for selecting officers and assigning them to duty after graduation. As a result, according to NATO officers involved in the training, nepotism and favoritism have declined. In addition, almost every officer from this year's graduating class is headed out to the field, unlike in years past, when political pressures kept graduates within Kabul. These innovations have begun to yield results in combat, with increasingly positive reports of the performance of Afghan army formations against insurgents in the south and east of the country.
The approach devised by McChrystal emphasizes long-term partnering between ISAF and Afghan units, which now (for the first time) train, plan, deploy, patrol, and fight together. As of early summer 2010, about 85 percent of all Afghan army units were engaged in such partnering, which allows Afghans to be mentored and to build confidence, since they know that, if ambushed, they will have some of the world's best soldiers fighting alongside them. It also gives NATO forces a direct view of the corruption within the Afghan ranks. Thus, ISAF officials can suggest that the Afghan minister of defense take remedial or disciplinary action regarding certain commanders in the field.
The mission to train the Afghan security forces still has difficulties, especially with regard to the police. On average, the police remain less competent and more corrupt than the army. ISAF's approach to training the police remains weaker than its approach to the army: ISAF relies largely on private contractors as trainers because soldiers are considered suboptimal for the task and because there are not enough Italian carabinieri or other NATO police officers in Afghanistan to handle the job. Even counting contractors, the training mission has roughly 1,000 fewer trainers than it needs. There are also too few police personnel available to partner with those Afghan police who have completed their initial training. To address such shortfalls, the U.S. government could ask for more help from NATO allies, such as Canada, France, and Italy. Additionally, it could create a program to allow police officers from the United States to take "sabbaticals" to work for a year in Afghanistan.
Overall, the Afghan security forces are making strong progress. Indeed, their improvement is likely to be constrained less by the limited capacity of foreign trainers than by the corruption and institutional weakness throughout Afghan society. Curbing that corruption and weakness is the crux of the United States' challenge.
CORRUPTION, CONTRACTING, AND KANDAHAR
The Afghan government has limited reach across its territory because it is hampered by a lack of human capital and an excess of corruption. Of the 122 Afghan districts receiving special emphasis from ISAF, only about ten will have representatives from the Afghan government by the end of 2010, and only ten more are expected to receive representatives in 2011. To mitigate the problem, international personnel and Afghan leaders are trying to use the traditional shura (council) consultation process to give all tribes and communities a voice in setting development priorities. The National Solidarity Program, an initiative of the Afghan Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development, can then provide cash grants to the communities represented by shuras (or by the related bodies known as community development councils). NATO military commanders and civilian personnel can often disperse funds in a similar fashion. Thus, there are a number of bodies promoting local order and development that are imperfect but much better than nothing.
The Afghan government is one of the most corrupt in the world. Piles of cash from Afghanistan make their way to Dubai every day, often taken from foreign aid budgets intended for development projects. Positions in government are routinely sold to the highest bidder, who then sells subordinate positions -- and the process ends with Afghan citizens having to pay bribes for virtually all government services.
The Afghan government's Major Crimes Task Force has undertaken at least one prominent prosecution, of a former minister of mines, Muhammad Ibrahim Adel, but the case is proceeding very slowly. More than a dozen other officials are under indictment or investigation for wrongdoing. These proceedings constitute a promising but still modest trend.
The corruption problem is particularly acute in Kandahar, where a mix of Afghan politics and NATO logistical needs is actually reinforcing the very corruption that fuels the insurgency. As a U.S. congressional report highlighted in June, ISAF relies on a system of private companies and security firms -- militias -- to transport supplies, construct roads and buildings, and protect vital supply lines and military bases. In so doing, the coalition not only tolerates but also strengthens a corrupt local order led by the syndicates of Gul Agha Sherzai (a former governor of Kandahar who is now governor of Nangarhar, in eastern Afghanistan, but whose family remains powerful in Kandahar) and Ahmed Wali Karzai (the head of Kandahar's provincial council and a half brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai). These syndicates are far more powerful than the offices of the provincial governor or the mayor of Kandahar, both of whom are appointed by the president. Like the Mafia, the Sherzai and Karzai families control economic and political favors throughout the province. They continue to earn money from ISAF -- and especially from the United States -- because U.S. procurement and contracting laws require any company winning U.S. contracts to fill out onerous paperwork and comply with other red tape. The Sherzai and Wali Karzai families are often corrupt, but only they have the personnel to fill out such forms, maintain contracting requirements, and produce rapid results on the ground. (Sometimes they pay off insurgents not to attack convoys; this achieves the immediate goal of getting supplies through, of course, but strengthens the insurgency in the process.)
Most NATO officials are aware of this paradoxical problem but have not produced a cogent strategy for addressing it. And although NATO forces in the area have good plans for how to strengthen the ability of the governor and the mayor to serve their constituents, that process will take time that the coalition may not have. Thus, U.S. forces risk destroying Kandahar as they try to save it. After all, corruption contributes to the insurgency as much as the Taliban's fanatical ideology does; the insurgency's strength in and around Kandahar is largely the result of certain tribes' becoming angry because they do not share in the region's wealth and choosing therefore to provide recruits to insurgent forces.
The U.S. military's recently formed Task Force 2010 has begun to provide oversight aimed at reducing abuses among Afghan contractors and subcontractors. In addition, the U.S. Congress could allow more flexibility in the application of U.S. contracting procedures in war zones, so that the military could reduce its complete dependence on groups such as the Sherzai and Karzai syndicates. Existing Afghan power brokers may object to ISAF efforts to work with a wider array of local actors, but ISAF need not cut off the former to improve the situation. The imperative is to spread the wealth more effectively -- to ensure that more tribes and powerful leaders have a stake in the current strategy and are therefore less likely to support the insurgency as a form of protest. This approach would require explaining to the existing power brokers that any violence they perpetrate against local competitors will jeopardize their ability to win business in the future. And now is the time to act, since local resistance to such changes will be easier to control while U.S. forces are still increasing their spending; it is easier to implement a new approach when the contracting pie is growing rather than shrinking.
WHAT IT TAKES
NATO's two-part mission in Afghanistan -- to protect the population while gradually training Afghan forces to assume that responsibility on their own -- can be set to an approximate schedule.
Counterinsurgency doctrine suggests that a security force of 600,000 is needed to ensure robust security throughout a country of 30 million people, such as Afghanistan. But any doctrine is only approximate. In the case of Afghanistan, the ratio of 20 security personnel for every 1,000 civilians probably needs to be applied only in those parts of the country where Pashtuns predominate, since only there is the insurgency intense. Among the rest of the population -- approximately 55 percent -- a ratio of fewer than 10 security personnel for every 1,000 citizens would likely suffice. This implies that security in Afghanistan could be maintained by a competent force of roughly 400,000 troops.
By the end of 2010, ISAF will have nearly 150,000 troops in Afghanistan. The Afghan security forces will number about 250,000, with perhaps 150,000 of those in decent shape or in strong partnership arrangements with NATO troops. That means that there will be roughly 300,000 competent security personnel in place, half foreign and half indigenous -- about 100,000 forces shy of the overall requirement of 400,000. Given that shortfall, some parts of the country will have to be left relatively unguarded into 2011. According to current ISAF projections, it will take until late 2011 for Afghan security personnel to number 300,000. Making the force 350,000 strong would take most of 2012, and reaching 400,000 would take until 2013.
As the Afghan security forces build toward 400,000 competent personnel, ISAF forces will be needed for two main reasons: to make up the difference between the available Afghan forces and the goal of 400,000 troops and to train and mentor those Afghan forces. How many forces are needed for the second mission? Afghan-ISAF partnering needs to be intense for roughly one full year after a unit is formed, and the current partnering approach requires ISAF units to team up with Afghan units of similar size or perhaps larger ones that are better trained. Thus, for example, a NATO battalion of 1,000 soldiers might pair with a relatively weak Afghan battalion of 1,000 or a relatively strong Afghan brigade of 3,000. Recognizing that such details will be worked out on a case-by-case basis and that all projections are therefore approximate, one can estimate that to add 75,000 Afghan personnel to the security forces, NATO would need to provide roughly 35,000 trainers, mentors, and partners for them. (Even if it required 50,000 trainers or only 25,000, the U.S. mission would be lengthened or shortened by only a few months.) In addition to the trainers, NATO would also need to deploy additional forces to boost the aggregate (Afghan and foreign) security personnel to reach the 400,000 goal.
Consider where the U.S. mission will be in mid-2012, when Obama will likely be running for reelection. According to ISAF projections, by then the Afghan security forces will have about 300,000 troops formed into units (plus some tens of thousands more in training but not yet deployable). If ISAF deploys 35,000 troops to train, mentor, and partner with Afghan units, that would make for a total security force of 335,000 in the country. For the total to reach 400,000, another 65,000 ISAF troops would be needed. There would then be 100,000 ISAF soldiers in total, and given likely allied contributions by that point, roughly 65,000 of those would be American. The bottom line, then, is that Obama would be asking voters to reelect him when there were still well over 50,000 U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.
According to current projections, the Afghan security forces could reach 400,000 by mid-2013. But even then, 75,000 Afghan soldiers would still require the help of an ISAF mentoring force of approximately 35,000 troops -- two-thirds, or more than 20,000, of whom would likely be U.S. troops.
To be sure, these are optimistic estimates. Troop requirements would increase if parts of Afghanistan besides the south and the east proved more dangerous than expected or if the planned ISAF approach proved deficient. And there is also the matter of how U.S. policy may evolve, especially regarding the vague July 2011 deadline that Obama has set.
DECIPHERING A DEADLINE
Thankfully, it appears unlikely that the United States will rapidly depart from Afghanistan starting in July 2011. For one, the campaign plan drafted by McChrystal and Eikenberry last summer envisioned having at least three years to fight the Taliban and train the Afghan security forces. By the summer of 2011, the Afghan security forces will still be well short of their necessary size and competence.
In light of such practical considerations, there are major strategic and political reasons why Obama is unlikely to reduce the U.S. commitment dramatically. Since his presidential campaign began, he has declared the Afghan-Pakistani theater his top national security priority. Because he has gained full ownership of this war by now, to accelerate the U.S. departure prematurely -- before the insurgency was weakened and Afghan forces adequately improved -- would risk being seen as conceding defeat in a war that he chose and led. And although an anxious Congress may push him to withdraw, the fear of seeming weak on national security will probably pull at least as firmly in the other direction.
To discern the likely significance of July 2011, it is perhaps most instructive to look at the words of key administration officials and military leaders. In announcing the so-called Afghan surge last December, Obama said, "These additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces, and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011. Just as we have done in Iraq, we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground." He added, "It must be clear that Afghans will have to take responsibility for their security. . . . That is why our troop commitment in Afghanistan cannot be open-ended -- because the nation that I am most interested in building is our own."
Several high-ranking officials spoke about the July 2011 date in the days after Obama's announcement. "While there are no guarantees in war, I expect that we will make significant headway in the next 18-24 months. I also believe that we could begin to thin our combat forces in about the same time frame," said Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, meanwhile, testified to Congress that "beginning to transfer security responsibility to the Afghans in summer 2011 is critical -- and, in my view, achievable. This transfer will occur district by district, province by province, depending on conditions on the ground. . . . The United States will continue to support [Afghans'] development as an important partner for the long haul. We will not repeat the mistakes of 1989, when we abandoned the country only to see it descend into chaos and into Taliban hands."
Months later, in May, at a press conference with Karzai, Obama elaborated on the deadline: "Beginning in 2011, July we will start bringing those troops down and turning over more and more responsibility to Afghan security forces that we are building up. But we are not suddenly, as of July 2011, finished with Afghanistan." The next month, in June, General Petraeus quoted Obama in emphasizing to Congress that the United States would not be "switching off the lights" in Afghanistan in July 2011.
These comments suggest a plan to withdraw U.S. troops gradually over several years, not precipitously in July 2011. To be sure, some officials have characterized that month as a major turning point. In perhaps the administration's most emphatic utterance, Biden reportedly told the journalist Jonathan Alter, "In July of 2011 you're going to see a whole lot of people moving out. Bet on it." And indeed, Obama is preserving some wiggle room so that if he judges next year that the war is clearly being lost, the United States could accelerate its drawdown and cut its losses, effectively acknowledging the failure of the current strategy. But that is not the existing plan, and nearly all public statements have emphasized that the troop reductions will be responsible, based on conditions on the ground, and gradual over a period of years.
The notion that the ISAF mission will be completed by July 2011 is not consistent with the conditions in Afghanistan, the U.S. campaign plan, or public utterances on the subject by administration officials. Indeed, it is likely that Obama will run for reelection with more than 50,000 U.S. troops still in Afghanistan, and with no realistic prospect of bringing them all home early in what would be his second term. He will have doubled U.S. expenditures on the war during his first term, and he may well also have presided over a doubling of U.S. casualties. The price for success will be high. But the United States and its partners can likely achieve a significant level of success -- represented by an Afghan state that is able to control most of its territory and gradually improve the lives of its citizens -- if ISAF and other key actors contain Afghan corruption and demonstrate several more years of resolve in what is already the United States' longest war.
.Staying Power: The U.S. Mission in Afghanistan Beyond 2011
Afghanistan, U.S. Military, U.S. Department of Defense, Defense, Democracy Promotion
Michael E. O'Hanlon, Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy
Foreign Affairs
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Editor's Note: The following article was originally published in the September/October 2010 issue of Foreign Affairs.
Afghan internally displaced people wait to receive charity from the Islamic Relief organisation in Kabul.
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Nine years ago, the United States worked with Afghanistan's Northern Alliance to overthrow the Taliban government in Kabul. The world was united, the cause for war was clear, and U.S. President George W. Bush enjoyed the support of roughly 90 percent of Americans. That was a long time ago.
Today, the war in Afghanistan is a controversial conflict: fewer than half of Americans support the ongoing effort, even as roughly 100,000 U.S. troops are in harm's way. Troops from more than 40 countries still make up the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), but fewer than ten of those countries take substantial risks with their forces in the turbulent south and east of the country. And as the Netherlands prepares to depart Afghanistan this year and Canada remains committed to doing so in 2011, two of these coalition partners will likely soon be gone. Meanwhile, support for the coalition among Afghans has declined to less than 50 percent from highs of 80-90 percent early in the decade.
Over the years, the U.S. mission has lost much of its clarity of purpose. Although voters and policymakers in the United States and elsewhere remain dedicated to denying al Qaeda safe haven in Afghanistan, they have begun debating whether a Taliban takeover would necessarily mean al Qaeda's return; whether al Qaeda really still seeks an Afghan sanctuary, as it did a decade ago; and whether U.S. forces could contain any future al Qaeda presence through the kinds of drone strikes now commonly employed in Pakistan. The most pressing question is whether the current strategy can work -- in particular, whether a NATO-led military presence of nearly 150,000 troops is consistent with Afghan mores and whether the government of President Hamid Karzai is up to the challenge of governing and keeping order in such a diverse, fractious land.
Such doubts would matter less if U.S. President Barack Obama did not seem to share them. Obama has more than doubled the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan since taking office, and his administration's protracted decision-making process last fall -- which resulted in the president's authorizing 30,000 additional troops for the Afghan mission -- was deliberate, serious, and intense. But to some in Washington, Kabul, and elsewhere, the length of that review signaled fundamental uncertainty on the part of the president himself. Contributing to this impression were leaks to the media that revealed major disagreements among top administration advisers.
Most important, in announcing his decision last December, Obama pledged to begin removing U.S. forces from Afghanistan by July 2011. By itself, the plan to make the military buildup temporary was not misguided or surprising; the Bush administration did much the same thing with the surge in Iraq. But Obama seemed to be promising a fairly rapid end to the war. Indeed, that appeared to be the message he wanted to highlight most for the U.S. Congress and the U.S. electorate. Aware of the nation's war fatigue, Obama tried to be muscular enough to create a chance to win the war while at the same time keeping the war's critics acquiescent.
Obama's attempt to have his cake and eat it, too, has had its downsides. To Afghans, Obama's words signaled that U.S. forces might depart before they had sufficiently built the Afghan security forces or achieved other key goals. Such a message may motivate some Afghans to accelerate reforms, as the Obama administration hopes, but it will also make many of them hedge their bets, unsure of what will come next. Obama's speech has had a similar effect in Pakistan, where the country's traditional support for the Afghan Taliban has diminished more slowly than it might otherwise have. Some Pakistani military leaders still consider the Afghan Taliban to be their best defense against the potential consequences of a premature U.S. departure: either chaos or too much Indian influence in the country. That many of these fears are exaggerated or incorrect does not make them any less important.
In fact, the Obama administration's statements about July 2011 and realistic projections of how long the mission will take suggest that no sudden withdrawal will occur. Given the nature of the Afghan insurgency's dramatic recovery since 2005 and the reasons Obama agreed to a major troop increase in the first place, the drawdown will likely be gradual, with at least 50,000 U.S. troops still in Afghanistan through 2012.
TALIBAN RESURGENCE, U.S. RESPONSE
In 2005, the Taliban and other insurgent groups began one of the most impressive comebacks against a U.S.-led military coalition in history. By the time Obama came into office, the United States had to develop a new strategy for a largely new war -- and one it was losing.
Such was the context for the Obama administration's fall 2009 policy review. Those in the administration who opposed sending more troops to Afghanistan -- apparently including Vice President Joe Biden, National Security Adviser James Jones, and Karl Eikenberry, U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan -- did so because of reasonable skepticism. After all, Washington had sent more than 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan in early 2009, and just a few months later the military was asking for tens of thousands more. The skeptics also believed that Afghanistan, with its tribal society and weak traditions of loyalty to the state, was not a promising place for a classic counterinsurgency operation. They argued that the twin goals of such an operation -- protecting the population and guiding the Afghan security forces toward self-sufficiency -- were inconsistent with Afghanistan's history, culture, and society.
In the end, however, the president decided that the skeptics did not offer a viable alternative strategy. The Bush administration had already tried a light-footprint approach in Afghanistan, and it had resulted in the Taliban's comeback -- including at least a fivefold increase in violence since 2005.
Since 2005, the Taliban and other insurgent groups -- such as the Haqqani network, another extremist Pashtun movement straddling central parts of the Afghan-Pakistani border -- had substantially improved their battlefield tactics. Several years ago, insurgents would sometimes mass a large number of fighters for battle only to lose quickly to Afghan security forces or to NATO reinforcements once they arrived. In the summer of 2006, for example, Taliban fighters sought to establish control over a large swath of southern Afghanistan but were defeated by a combination of Afghan, Canadian, and other NATO forces. By the end of 2009, however, the Taliban were typically launching large-scale coordinated operations against small, vulnerable NATO outposts, as in the city of Wanat in 2008 and in the Kamdesh District of Nuristan Province in 2009. More commonly, in smaller-scale attacks, insurgents adopted the practice of detonating roadside bombs to create initial injury and panic and then firing small arms against any incapacitated vehicles and Afghan and NATO security forces.
The Taliban had become, in many ways, a smarter insurgent force. They rarely targeted civilians with the sort of widespread and brutal bombings that al Qaeda in Iraq once commonly perpetrated. Indeed, compared to many war-torn lands and even to high-crime countries, such as Colombia, Mexico, Nigeria, or South Africa, Afghanistan remained a safer place for normal citizens in per capita terms. But the Taliban and other insurgents made life very dangerous for NATO soldiers, Afghan security forces, and Afghan government officials. In 2009, the NATO-led coalition lost 500 soldiers, about half the total from the previous seven years combined, and the Afghan security forces lost 1,000 personnel (mostly police). Meanwhile, assassinations of political, business, civic, and tribal leaders increased, too.
The Taliban also developed a shadow government that allowed it to provide an alternative (if crude) judicial system in southern Afghanistan, especially in rural areas. And it did so in a manner often considered fairer than the government's corrupt and plodding ways. The Taliban had learned to present a kinder, gentler face, so to speak, than it had when it ruled Afghanistan from the mid-1990s until 2001. The group remained widely disliked -- with 90-95 percent viewing it unfavorably in most polls -- but it had softened the population's anger. At the same time, in classic Mafia style, it continued to carry out just enough violence to be feared.
By late 2009, NATO intelligence estimated that the Taliban included at least 25,000 dedicated fighters, nearly as many as they had before 9/11 and far more than they had in 2005. The Taliban also had substantial influence in most key districts of Afghanistan -- keeping government officials away, requiring compliance with their edicts on property disputes and other legal matters, and sometimes taxing the population. These factors -- coupled with the fact that the Taliban and the Haqqani network remained fundamentally opposed to the Afghan constitution and believed they were winning the war -- led the Obama administration to conclude that the prospects were not good for high-level reconciliation with Afghan insurgents.
Against this backdrop, the administration decided it had little choice but to try a classic counterinsurgency approach. A light footprint could not arrest the Taliban's momentum, change the atmosphere of intimidation that the insurgency had created among Afghans, or protect the human intelligence networks needed to carry out even a limited counterterrorism strategy. Nor, the administration calculated, could it give the United States the leverage necessary to reform and strengthen the Afghan government. The best approach, then, was to carry out a limited state-building mission aimed at developing Afghan security forces that could dependably control their own territory and civilian governance institutions that could provide some degree of law and order and gradual economic progress. The Obama administration rightly considered this the likeliest way to achieve its narrow goal of stopping the Taliban from retaking power and, in turn, of preventing al Qaeda and related groups from regaining substantial sanctuaries on Afghan soil.
BATTLEFIELD UPDATE
The U.S. approach -- originally crafted by General Stanley McChrystal, now being implemented by General David Petraeus, and supported by such civilians as U.S. Ambassador Eikenberry; Mark Sedwill, NATO's senior civilian representative in Afghanistan; and Staffan de Mistura, the UN special representative in Afghanistan -- focuses on the south and east of the country, where insurgent activity has been greatest and where local populations have been most inclined to support or tolerate the insurgency. The approach is discriminating: of nearly 400 districts nationwide, U.S. forces are placing primary emphasis (in terms of military and civilian resources) on 81 and secondary emphasis on 41. The initial goal is to establish a contiguous zone of safety throughout the south and the east in which the population can feel relatively secure, Afghan institutions can take root, and transportation and commerce can develop.
There have already been major pockets of success, especially in southwestern Afghanistan's Helmand Province. To be sure, progress in the town of Marja, where the U.S. military launched a high-profile operation in February, remains slow. But that operation was overemphasized, both as a barometer of the war's momentum and as a model for future operations, because Marja had been a Taliban stronghold without any government presence; most major towns and cities feature a less visible insurgent presence combined with some degree of government capacity. As a whole, Helmand Province is improving, with most major population centers now opening schools and markets, farmers moving away from poppy as their preferred crop, and overall levels of violence dropping. (NATO and the Obama administration should better measure and document this progress; as it is now, observers must rely too much on anecdotal information and conversations with military and civilian officials, such as those I had when I visited Afghanistan in May.)
Such promising trends are not present, however, in Kandahar, the region that includes southern Afghanistan's largest city and that the Taliban consider their spiritual and historic capital. The number of assassinations of political leaders and tribal elders in Kandahar is up severalfold over the last few years, to at least one or two a week. Overall, rates of violence in the region have roughly tripled since 2006, according to ISAF figures.
Neither has the tide of battle turned against the insurgency on a national scale. From 2009 to 2010, overall levels of violence rose by 25-50 percent (depending on the metric used), and the Taliban showed increasing willingness to target civilians. ISAF currently estimates that only 35 percent of the priority districts have "good" security or better, a figure unchanged from late 2009; the number of such districts with "satisfactory" security has improved modestly, from 40 percent in late 2009 to 46 percent in the spring of 2010. Although the situation is not worsening, many priority districts still have only mediocre levels of security.
But it should not be surprising that the level of violence is still rising. The reduction of violence is a lagging, not a leading, indicator of success; in Iraq, for example, troop casualty levels increased through the first six months of the surge, as additional U.S. troops entered the country. Also, as its forces have tripled in size over the last two years, ISAF has been initiating far more contact with the enemy than before. And although U.S. commanders do not emphasize this point because enemy body counts are not a highly reliable measure of success, they acknowledge that the coalition is now far more effective when it comes to arresting and killing key insurgent leaders than it was just last year. Crucially, while making these adjustments, the coalition has kept civilian casualties low. McChrystal's directives on reducing the use of force around civilians have apparently reduced the proportion of ISAF-caused civilian casualties from 40 percent in 2008 to 25 percent in 2009 and less than 20 percent in 2010.
Yet such statistics hardly capture the full state of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan. Two other factors get to the heart of what is involved in strengthening and legitimating the Afghan state: the development of the Afghan security forces and the fight to curb endemic corruption. The first is generally a good news story, at least with regard to the Afghan army; the second remains grim and calls for some new ideas from ISAF, the international community, and Afghans themselves.
TRAINING AND MENTORING
In the war's early years, the processes for recruiting, training, equipping, and fielding the Afghan security forces were quite poor. U.S. commanders told me last year, for example, that through 2008, only 25 percent of Afghan police officers received any professional training at all. Those who did receive training got too little and then almost no follow-up once deployed. Members of the security forces often reported to incompetent or corrupt leaders in the field and received pay that was too low to constitute a living wage. This dearth of resources was the result of Afghanistan's poverty and the economy-of-force philosophy that was guiding foreign actors.
NATO and Afghan officials have dramatically improved the situation. Since late 2009 -- when U.S. Lieutenant General William Caldwell, commander of the NATO training mission in Afghanistan, began working with troops from Canada and the United Kingdom to direct the initial training, equipping, and fielding of the Afghan security forces -- the number of personnel completing basic training and unit training each year has more than doubled. The quality of training is up, too, largely because teacher-to-student ratios have more than doubled (despite ongoing shortages of trainers). In the Afghan army, the better of the main security institutions, 20,000 recruits are in training at all times, and the force is on pace to reach its interim goal of 134,000 soldiers by this fall. This is partly because the army has increased soldiers' base pay, their pay for deployment to dangerous parts of the country, and other compensation. The rate at which new recruits are joining the force is now twice the rate at which soldiers are leaving.
Afghan enlistees who are illiterate -- the vast majority of them -- now receive mandatory literacy training. To train noncommissioned officers -- those who really make good militaries work at the ground level -- NATO has set up impressive new courses that focus on technical skills and on how to lead small units. And at the national military academy, which trains officers, enrollment and graduation rates have doubled in the last year. IASF has also convinced the Afghan government to improve the procedures for selecting officers and assigning them to duty after graduation. As a result, according to NATO officers involved in the training, nepotism and favoritism have declined. In addition, almost every officer from this year's graduating class is headed out to the field, unlike in years past, when political pressures kept graduates within Kabul. These innovations have begun to yield results in combat, with increasingly positive reports of the performance of Afghan army formations against insurgents in the south and east of the country.
The approach devised by McChrystal emphasizes long-term partnering between ISAF and Afghan units, which now (for the first time) train, plan, deploy, patrol, and fight together. As of early summer 2010, about 85 percent of all Afghan army units were engaged in such partnering, which allows Afghans to be mentored and to build confidence, since they know that, if ambushed, they will have some of the world's best soldiers fighting alongside them. It also gives NATO forces a direct view of the corruption within the Afghan ranks. Thus, ISAF officials can suggest that the Afghan minister of defense take remedial or disciplinary action regarding certain commanders in the field.
The mission to train the Afghan security forces still has difficulties, especially with regard to the police. On average, the police remain less competent and more corrupt than the army. ISAF's approach to training the police remains weaker than its approach to the army: ISAF relies largely on private contractors as trainers because soldiers are considered suboptimal for the task and because there are not enough Italian carabinieri or other NATO police officers in Afghanistan to handle the job. Even counting contractors, the training mission has roughly 1,000 fewer trainers than it needs. There are also too few police personnel available to partner with those Afghan police who have completed their initial training. To address such shortfalls, the U.S. government could ask for more help from NATO allies, such as Canada, France, and Italy. Additionally, it could create a program to allow police officers from the United States to take "sabbaticals" to work for a year in Afghanistan.
Overall, the Afghan security forces are making strong progress. Indeed, their improvement is likely to be constrained less by the limited capacity of foreign trainers than by the corruption and institutional weakness throughout Afghan society. Curbing that corruption and weakness is the crux of the United States' challenge.
CORRUPTION, CONTRACTING, AND KANDAHAR
The Afghan government has limited reach across its territory because it is hampered by a lack of human capital and an excess of corruption. Of the 122 Afghan districts receiving special emphasis from ISAF, only about ten will have representatives from the Afghan government by the end of 2010, and only ten more are expected to receive representatives in 2011. To mitigate the problem, international personnel and Afghan leaders are trying to use the traditional shura (council) consultation process to give all tribes and communities a voice in setting development priorities. The National Solidarity Program, an initiative of the Afghan Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development, can then provide cash grants to the communities represented by shuras (or by the related bodies known as community development councils). NATO military commanders and civilian personnel can often disperse funds in a similar fashion. Thus, there are a number of bodies promoting local order and development that are imperfect but much better than nothing.
The Afghan government is one of the most corrupt in the world. Piles of cash from Afghanistan make their way to Dubai every day, often taken from foreign aid budgets intended for development projects. Positions in government are routinely sold to the highest bidder, who then sells subordinate positions -- and the process ends with Afghan citizens having to pay bribes for virtually all government services.
The Afghan government's Major Crimes Task Force has undertaken at least one prominent prosecution, of a former minister of mines, Muhammad Ibrahim Adel, but the case is proceeding very slowly. More than a dozen other officials are under indictment or investigation for wrongdoing. These proceedings constitute a promising but still modest trend.
The corruption problem is particularly acute in Kandahar, where a mix of Afghan politics and NATO logistical needs is actually reinforcing the very corruption that fuels the insurgency. As a U.S. congressional report highlighted in June, ISAF relies on a system of private companies and security firms -- militias -- to transport supplies, construct roads and buildings, and protect vital supply lines and military bases. In so doing, the coalition not only tolerates but also strengthens a corrupt local order led by the syndicates of Gul Agha Sherzai (a former governor of Kandahar who is now governor of Nangarhar, in eastern Afghanistan, but whose family remains powerful in Kandahar) and Ahmed Wali Karzai (the head of Kandahar's provincial council and a half brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai). These syndicates are far more powerful than the offices of the provincial governor or the mayor of Kandahar, both of whom are appointed by the president. Like the Mafia, the Sherzai and Karzai families control economic and political favors throughout the province. They continue to earn money from ISAF -- and especially from the United States -- because U.S. procurement and contracting laws require any company winning U.S. contracts to fill out onerous paperwork and comply with other red tape. The Sherzai and Wali Karzai families are often corrupt, but only they have the personnel to fill out such forms, maintain contracting requirements, and produce rapid results on the ground. (Sometimes they pay off insurgents not to attack convoys; this achieves the immediate goal of getting supplies through, of course, but strengthens the insurgency in the process.)
Most NATO officials are aware of this paradoxical problem but have not produced a cogent strategy for addressing it. And although NATO forces in the area have good plans for how to strengthen the ability of the governor and the mayor to serve their constituents, that process will take time that the coalition may not have. Thus, U.S. forces risk destroying Kandahar as they try to save it. After all, corruption contributes to the insurgency as much as the Taliban's fanatical ideology does; the insurgency's strength in and around Kandahar is largely the result of certain tribes' becoming angry because they do not share in the region's wealth and choosing therefore to provide recruits to insurgent forces.
The U.S. military's recently formed Task Force 2010 has begun to provide oversight aimed at reducing abuses among Afghan contractors and subcontractors. In addition, the U.S. Congress could allow more flexibility in the application of U.S. contracting procedures in war zones, so that the military could reduce its complete dependence on groups such as the Sherzai and Karzai syndicates. Existing Afghan power brokers may object to ISAF efforts to work with a wider array of local actors, but ISAF need not cut off the former to improve the situation. The imperative is to spread the wealth more effectively -- to ensure that more tribes and powerful leaders have a stake in the current strategy and are therefore less likely to support the insurgency as a form of protest. This approach would require explaining to the existing power brokers that any violence they perpetrate against local competitors will jeopardize their ability to win business in the future. And now is the time to act, since local resistance to such changes will be easier to control while U.S. forces are still increasing their spending; it is easier to implement a new approach when the contracting pie is growing rather than shrinking.
WHAT IT TAKES
NATO's two-part mission in Afghanistan -- to protect the population while gradually training Afghan forces to assume that responsibility on their own -- can be set to an approximate schedule.
Counterinsurgency doctrine suggests that a security force of 600,000 is needed to ensure robust security throughout a country of 30 million people, such as Afghanistan. But any doctrine is only approximate. In the case of Afghanistan, the ratio of 20 security personnel for every 1,000 civilians probably needs to be applied only in those parts of the country where Pashtuns predominate, since only there is the insurgency intense. Among the rest of the population -- approximately 55 percent -- a ratio of fewer than 10 security personnel for every 1,000 citizens would likely suffice. This implies that security in Afghanistan could be maintained by a competent force of roughly 400,000 troops.
By the end of 2010, ISAF will have nearly 150,000 troops in Afghanistan. The Afghan security forces will number about 250,000, with perhaps 150,000 of those in decent shape or in strong partnership arrangements with NATO troops. That means that there will be roughly 300,000 competent security personnel in place, half foreign and half indigenous -- about 100,000 forces shy of the overall requirement of 400,000. Given that shortfall, some parts of the country will have to be left relatively unguarded into 2011. According to current ISAF projections, it will take until late 2011 for Afghan security personnel to number 300,000. Making the force 350,000 strong would take most of 2012, and reaching 400,000 would take until 2013.
As the Afghan security forces build toward 400,000 competent personnel, ISAF forces will be needed for two main reasons: to make up the difference between the available Afghan forces and the goal of 400,000 troops and to train and mentor those Afghan forces. How many forces are needed for the second mission? Afghan-ISAF partnering needs to be intense for roughly one full year after a unit is formed, and the current partnering approach requires ISAF units to team up with Afghan units of similar size or perhaps larger ones that are better trained. Thus, for example, a NATO battalion of 1,000 soldiers might pair with a relatively weak Afghan battalion of 1,000 or a relatively strong Afghan brigade of 3,000. Recognizing that such details will be worked out on a case-by-case basis and that all projections are therefore approximate, one can estimate that to add 75,000 Afghan personnel to the security forces, NATO would need to provide roughly 35,000 trainers, mentors, and partners for them. (Even if it required 50,000 trainers or only 25,000, the U.S. mission would be lengthened or shortened by only a few months.) In addition to the trainers, NATO would also need to deploy additional forces to boost the aggregate (Afghan and foreign) security personnel to reach the 400,000 goal.
Consider where the U.S. mission will be in mid-2012, when Obama will likely be running for reelection. According to ISAF projections, by then the Afghan security forces will have about 300,000 troops formed into units (plus some tens of thousands more in training but not yet deployable). If ISAF deploys 35,000 troops to train, mentor, and partner with Afghan units, that would make for a total security force of 335,000 in the country. For the total to reach 400,000, another 65,000 ISAF troops would be needed. There would then be 100,000 ISAF soldiers in total, and given likely allied contributions by that point, roughly 65,000 of those would be American. The bottom line, then, is that Obama would be asking voters to reelect him when there were still well over 50,000 U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.
According to current projections, the Afghan security forces could reach 400,000 by mid-2013. But even then, 75,000 Afghan soldiers would still require the help of an ISAF mentoring force of approximately 35,000 troops -- two-thirds, or more than 20,000, of whom would likely be U.S. troops.
To be sure, these are optimistic estimates. Troop requirements would increase if parts of Afghanistan besides the south and the east proved more dangerous than expected or if the planned ISAF approach proved deficient. And there is also the matter of how U.S. policy may evolve, especially regarding the vague July 2011 deadline that Obama has set.
DECIPHERING A DEADLINE
Thankfully, it appears unlikely that the United States will rapidly depart from Afghanistan starting in July 2011. For one, the campaign plan drafted by McChrystal and Eikenberry last summer envisioned having at least three years to fight the Taliban and train the Afghan security forces. By the summer of 2011, the Afghan security forces will still be well short of their necessary size and competence.
In light of such practical considerations, there are major strategic and political reasons why Obama is unlikely to reduce the U.S. commitment dramatically. Since his presidential campaign began, he has declared the Afghan-Pakistani theater his top national security priority. Because he has gained full ownership of this war by now, to accelerate the U.S. departure prematurely -- before the insurgency was weakened and Afghan forces adequately improved -- would risk being seen as conceding defeat in a war that he chose and led. And although an anxious Congress may push him to withdraw, the fear of seeming weak on national security will probably pull at least as firmly in the other direction.
To discern the likely significance of July 2011, it is perhaps most instructive to look at the words of key administration officials and military leaders. In announcing the so-called Afghan surge last December, Obama said, "These additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces, and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011. Just as we have done in Iraq, we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground." He added, "It must be clear that Afghans will have to take responsibility for their security. . . . That is why our troop commitment in Afghanistan cannot be open-ended -- because the nation that I am most interested in building is our own."
Several high-ranking officials spoke about the July 2011 date in the days after Obama's announcement. "While there are no guarantees in war, I expect that we will make significant headway in the next 18-24 months. I also believe that we could begin to thin our combat forces in about the same time frame," said Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, meanwhile, testified to Congress that "beginning to transfer security responsibility to the Afghans in summer 2011 is critical -- and, in my view, achievable. This transfer will occur district by district, province by province, depending on conditions on the ground. . . . The United States will continue to support [Afghans'] development as an important partner for the long haul. We will not repeat the mistakes of 1989, when we abandoned the country only to see it descend into chaos and into Taliban hands."
Months later, in May, at a press conference with Karzai, Obama elaborated on the deadline: "Beginning in 2011, July we will start bringing those troops down and turning over more and more responsibility to Afghan security forces that we are building up. But we are not suddenly, as of July 2011, finished with Afghanistan." The next month, in June, General Petraeus quoted Obama in emphasizing to Congress that the United States would not be "switching off the lights" in Afghanistan in July 2011.
These comments suggest a plan to withdraw U.S. troops gradually over several years, not precipitously in July 2011. To be sure, some officials have characterized that month as a major turning point. In perhaps the administration's most emphatic utterance, Biden reportedly told the journalist Jonathan Alter, "In July of 2011 you're going to see a whole lot of people moving out. Bet on it." And indeed, Obama is preserving some wiggle room so that if he judges next year that the war is clearly being lost, the United States could accelerate its drawdown and cut its losses, effectively acknowledging the failure of the current strategy. But that is not the existing plan, and nearly all public statements have emphasized that the troop reductions will be responsible, based on conditions on the ground, and gradual over a period of years.
The notion that the ISAF mission will be completed by July 2011 is not consistent with the conditions in Afghanistan, the U.S. campaign plan, or public utterances on the subject by administration officials. Indeed, it is likely that Obama will run for reelection with more than 50,000 U.S. troops still in Afghanistan, and with no realistic prospect of bringing them all home early in what would be his second term. He will have doubled U.S. expenditures on the war during his first term, and he may well also have presided over a doubling of U.S. casualties. The price for success will be high. But the United States and its partners can likely achieve a significant level of success -- represented by an Afghan state that is able to control most of its territory and gradually improve the lives of its citizens -- if ISAF and other key actors contain Afghan corruption and demonstrate several more years of resolve in what is already the United States' longest war.
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