enhanced_deficit
02-01-2018, 12:10 AM
With the longest US war getting worse, isn't it time for Dems/critics to sit together with GOP and POTUS to find a solution for way forward instead of undermining current Commander in Chief by questioning his mental fitness (https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/05/politics/garamendi-trump-mental-fitness/index.html)?
The U.S. Is Losing Badly in Afghanistan, but the Trump Administration Is Telling Americans Less
By Tom O'Connor On 1/31/18
The U.S. and allied local security forces have failed to secure most of Afghanistan, according to a recent investigation that came shortly after the Pentagon refused to release unclassified data on the conflict for the first time ever.
Despite waging nearly 17 consecutive years of war and spending up to $1 trillion (http://www.newsweek.com/trumps-afghanistan-plan-definition-insanity-say-gop-and-dem-congress-members-655144), the U.S.-led attempt to defeat the Taliban has left the insurgents openly active in up to 70 percent of Afghanistan, according to a BBC study (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-42863116) published Tuesday. The report also found that a rival ultraconservative Sunni Muslim organization, the Islamic State militant group (ISIS), controlled more territory than ever, further complicating the beleaguered effort to stabilize the country.
What a federal watchdog chief found particularly “troubling” and a “worrying development,” however, was that none of this information could be included in its mandatory quarterly report on the war. John Sopko, head of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), said he was instructed by the Department of Defense (DOD) “not to release to the public data on the number of districts, and the population living in them, controlled or influenced by the Afghan government or by the insurgents, or contested by both.”
A letter preceding SIGAR’s report (https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/quarterlyreports/2018-01-30qr.pdf) added, “SIGAR was informed this quarter that DOD has determined that although the most recent numbers are unclassified, they are not releasable to the public.”
A member of the Afghan security forces takes position at the site of a blast and gun fire in Jalalabad, Afghanistan January 24, 2018. The U.S.-backed Afghan government has steadily lost control to insurgents of the Taliban and ISIS in recent years. Parwiz/Reuters
SIGAR said it is the first time the watchdog was blocked from releasing this information, on which it has reported since January 2016, and it was the first time ever “that SIGAR has been specifically instructed not to release information marked ‘unclassified’ to the American taxpayer” since it was created by Congress in 2008 to monitor the already extensive U.S. role in the conflict. SIGAR was deeply critical of the Pentagon and said the public should be especially concerned because trends had historically painted the picture of an increasingly unsuccessful and costly war effort.
The next day, the Pentagon released the statistics, and Navy Captain Thomas Gresback, a spokesman for coalition troops in Afghanistan, told Newsweek (http://www.newsweek.com/pentagon-buries-numbers-isis-taliban-control-afghanistan-795098) in an email, “A human error in labeling occurred” and “It was NOT the intent...to withhold or classify information which was available in prior reports.”
Gresback denied that the figures were censored and said the U.S.-led coalition was in control of 56 percent of the country, the lowest number reported to date. The BBC study Tuesday placed that number even lower, at 30 percent, less than a third of Afghanistan. Gresback said insurgents controlled a record-breaking 14 percent, while the BBC study estimated 4 percent, claiming the vast majority of the country was still disputed.
Both evaluations were released after a week of heightened violence in Afghanistan that saw both the Taliban and ISIS claim attacks that killed a collective of at least 138 people, mostly civilians.
http://s.newsweek.com/sites/www.newsweek.com/files/styles/embed-lg/public/2018/01/31/rts1lfek.jpg A map locates recent attacks in Kabul, Afghanistan, amid a particularly violent week, on January 28, 2017. Reuters
In its latest report, SIGAR also noted that this was the second time in a row the Trump administration had restricted the watchdog from publishing numbers previously made public. In its last quarterly report in October, SIGAR reported historic losses (http://www.newsweek.com/us-report-war-afghanistan-historic-losses-hides-death-toll-made-public-697776) for the U.S.-backed Afghan government, but were unable to include the number of casualties among Afghan troops.
“If they start classifying this stuff now, what are they going to do next month?” Sopko told The New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/30/world/asia/afghanistan-war-redacted-report.html) at the time. “It’s a slippery slope.”
http://www.newsweek.com/us-losing-so-badly-afghanistan-trump-administration-hid-figures-796466
Analysis Trump Caught in Afghan Quagmire Following Recent Taliban Attacks
U.S. president said he will increase U.S. troops there, but offers no diplomatic plan for ending war
Zvi Bar'el
Jan 30, 2018 3:47 AM
The bloody harvest in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, has yielded at least 130 people killed over nine days. In the latest attack (https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/taliban-kills-scores-across-afghanistan-in-biggest-terrorist-attack-this-year-1.5458454) on Monday at the entrance to a military academy, at least 12 people were killed. Two days earlier an ambulance laden with explosives blew up near a military checkpoint, killing at least 103 people, and a week before that the Intercontinental Hotel was attacked by a group of armed men who killed at least 18 people, 12 of them foreigners.
Since 2011, when Afghanistan was occupied by the United States and coalition forces, Western estimates are that 150,000 people have been killed there, including more than 2,500 coalition fighters.
https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/.premium-trump-caught-in-afghan-quagmire-following-recent-attacks-1.5771249
The U.S. Is Losing Badly in Afghanistan, but the Trump Administration Is Telling Americans Less
By Tom O'Connor On 1/31/18
The U.S. and allied local security forces have failed to secure most of Afghanistan, according to a recent investigation that came shortly after the Pentagon refused to release unclassified data on the conflict for the first time ever.
Despite waging nearly 17 consecutive years of war and spending up to $1 trillion (http://www.newsweek.com/trumps-afghanistan-plan-definition-insanity-say-gop-and-dem-congress-members-655144), the U.S.-led attempt to defeat the Taliban has left the insurgents openly active in up to 70 percent of Afghanistan, according to a BBC study (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-42863116) published Tuesday. The report also found that a rival ultraconservative Sunni Muslim organization, the Islamic State militant group (ISIS), controlled more territory than ever, further complicating the beleaguered effort to stabilize the country.
What a federal watchdog chief found particularly “troubling” and a “worrying development,” however, was that none of this information could be included in its mandatory quarterly report on the war. John Sopko, head of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), said he was instructed by the Department of Defense (DOD) “not to release to the public data on the number of districts, and the population living in them, controlled or influenced by the Afghan government or by the insurgents, or contested by both.”
A letter preceding SIGAR’s report (https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/quarterlyreports/2018-01-30qr.pdf) added, “SIGAR was informed this quarter that DOD has determined that although the most recent numbers are unclassified, they are not releasable to the public.”
A member of the Afghan security forces takes position at the site of a blast and gun fire in Jalalabad, Afghanistan January 24, 2018. The U.S.-backed Afghan government has steadily lost control to insurgents of the Taliban and ISIS in recent years. Parwiz/Reuters
SIGAR said it is the first time the watchdog was blocked from releasing this information, on which it has reported since January 2016, and it was the first time ever “that SIGAR has been specifically instructed not to release information marked ‘unclassified’ to the American taxpayer” since it was created by Congress in 2008 to monitor the already extensive U.S. role in the conflict. SIGAR was deeply critical of the Pentagon and said the public should be especially concerned because trends had historically painted the picture of an increasingly unsuccessful and costly war effort.
The next day, the Pentagon released the statistics, and Navy Captain Thomas Gresback, a spokesman for coalition troops in Afghanistan, told Newsweek (http://www.newsweek.com/pentagon-buries-numbers-isis-taliban-control-afghanistan-795098) in an email, “A human error in labeling occurred” and “It was NOT the intent...to withhold or classify information which was available in prior reports.”
Gresback denied that the figures were censored and said the U.S.-led coalition was in control of 56 percent of the country, the lowest number reported to date. The BBC study Tuesday placed that number even lower, at 30 percent, less than a third of Afghanistan. Gresback said insurgents controlled a record-breaking 14 percent, while the BBC study estimated 4 percent, claiming the vast majority of the country was still disputed.
Both evaluations were released after a week of heightened violence in Afghanistan that saw both the Taliban and ISIS claim attacks that killed a collective of at least 138 people, mostly civilians.
http://s.newsweek.com/sites/www.newsweek.com/files/styles/embed-lg/public/2018/01/31/rts1lfek.jpg A map locates recent attacks in Kabul, Afghanistan, amid a particularly violent week, on January 28, 2017. Reuters
In its latest report, SIGAR also noted that this was the second time in a row the Trump administration had restricted the watchdog from publishing numbers previously made public. In its last quarterly report in October, SIGAR reported historic losses (http://www.newsweek.com/us-report-war-afghanistan-historic-losses-hides-death-toll-made-public-697776) for the U.S.-backed Afghan government, but were unable to include the number of casualties among Afghan troops.
“If they start classifying this stuff now, what are they going to do next month?” Sopko told The New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/30/world/asia/afghanistan-war-redacted-report.html) at the time. “It’s a slippery slope.”
http://www.newsweek.com/us-losing-so-badly-afghanistan-trump-administration-hid-figures-796466
Analysis Trump Caught in Afghan Quagmire Following Recent Taliban Attacks
U.S. president said he will increase U.S. troops there, but offers no diplomatic plan for ending war
Zvi Bar'el
Jan 30, 2018 3:47 AM
The bloody harvest in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, has yielded at least 130 people killed over nine days. In the latest attack (https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/taliban-kills-scores-across-afghanistan-in-biggest-terrorist-attack-this-year-1.5458454) on Monday at the entrance to a military academy, at least 12 people were killed. Two days earlier an ambulance laden with explosives blew up near a military checkpoint, killing at least 103 people, and a week before that the Intercontinental Hotel was attacked by a group of armed men who killed at least 18 people, 12 of them foreigners.
Since 2011, when Afghanistan was occupied by the United States and coalition forces, Western estimates are that 150,000 people have been killed there, including more than 2,500 coalition fighters.
https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/.premium-trump-caught-in-afghan-quagmire-following-recent-attacks-1.5771249