Messages In This Digest (10 Messages)

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1.: Afghan War Reminder: Yesterday's Assets, Today's Casus Belli

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Sun Jan 3, 2010 8:00 am (PST)

http://www.usnews.com/articles/news/world/2008/07/11/afghan-warlords-formerly-backed-by-the-cia-now-turn-their-guns-on-us-troops.html?PageNr=2

U.S. News & World Report
July 11, 2008

Afghan Warlords, Formerly Backed By the CIA, Now Turn Their Guns On U.S. Troops
They defeated the Soviets with Washington's help, but now they attack Americans as the new occupiers

[Excerpts]

[T]wo of the most dangerous players are violent Afghan Islamists named Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Jalaluddin Haqqani, according to U.S. officials.

In recent weeks, Hekmatyar has called upon Pakistani militants to attack U.S. targets, while the Haqqani network is blamed for three large vehicle bombings, along with the attempted assassination of Karzai in April.

Ironically, these two warlords — currently at the top of America's list of most wanted men in Afghanistan — were once among America's most valued allies. In the 1980s, the CIA funneled hundreds of millions of dollars in weapons and ammunition to help them battle the Soviet Army during its occupation of Afghanistan. Hekmatyar, then widely considered by Washington to be a reliable anti-Soviet rebel, was even flown to the United States by the CIA in 1985.

"He was the most radical of the radicals," recalls former Rep. Charlie Wilson, immortalized in the recent film Charlie Wilson's War for his role in directing U.S. military aid to anti-Soviet Afghan warlords. "He didn't hate us as much as he hated the Soviets," he adds, "but he sure didn't like us much." In his early years, the warlord distinguished himself by throwing acid in the faces of unveiled women. Today, a senior defense official says Hekmatyar is "as vicious as they come." In 2002, the CIA shot a Hellfire missile from an unmanned drone in an effort to kill him.

U.S. officials had an even higher opinion of Haqqani, who was considered the most effective rebel warlord. "I adored Haqqani. When I was in Afghanistan, Haqqani was the guy who made sure I would get out," says Wilson. "He was a marvelous leader and very beloved in his territory."

Haqqani was also one of the leading advocates of the so-called Arab Afghans, deftly organizing Arab volunteer fighters who came to wage jihad against the Soviet Union and helping to protect future al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Today, U.S. military officials are not certain that Haqqani is alive, though he was featured in an undated video that recently surfaced. "Either way, the Haqqani we're fighting now is the son" — 34-year-old Sirajuddin Haqqani — says the senior U.S. military official. "He gets a lot of benefit from his father's prestige."

Today, the Haqqani network is driving the recent rise in violence in eastern Afghanistan, according to U.S. military officials. Haqqani "is definitely the strongest" enemy in the border provinces of Paktia, Paktika, and Khost, known among military officials as p2k. The senior U.S. military official notes that Haqqani is increasingly moving to more-asymmetric means of attack to avoid straight-on shootouts with better-armed U.S. forces, a general tactical guidance that came from Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar last year. To that end, U.S. military officials estimate that they have seen a 10 percent rise in use of roadside bombs, which now account for one third of the attacks against coalition forces in the country.
....
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2.: Latest U.S. Drone Attack Kills Five In Pakistan

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Sun Jan 3, 2010 1:14 pm (PST)

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=115265&sectionid=351020401

Press TV
January 3, 2010

Fresh US drone attacks kill 5 in Pakistan

Fresh attacks by American unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) on Sunday killed five people in Pakistan's North Waziristan.

North Waziristan has witnessed a growing number of US missile raids. Drone attacks on Thursday and Friday left some seven people dead in the northwestern area.

The attacks, carried out by the US Central Intelligence Agency in cooperation with the Pentagon, reportedly killed more than 700 civilians in Pakistan in 2009.

Islamabad says it is involved in major offensives against militants in the northwestern parts of the country as the large-scale presence of the US military in Afghanistan has sent the militants across the border into Pakistan.

Meanwhile, the drone raids have turned the spotlight on Washington which is accused of ignoring legal and moral principles with the deadly operations on a sovereign soil.

In Washington, the attacks are hailed as a 'surgical' counterinsurgency tool. Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmoud Qureshi recently condemned the attacks as "counterproductive and unhelpful."

The attacks, believed to be initiated from airbases located inside Pakistan's territory, have played a strong role in the growing anti-American sentiment in Pakistan.
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3.: Opinion: Last Year Was Remarkably Like the Year Before

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Sun Jan 3, 2010 4:27 pm (PST)

http://tucsoncitizen.com/petrol/2010/01/last-year-was-remarkably-like-the-year-before

Tuczin Citizen
January 3, 2010

Last Year Was Remarkably Like the Year Before!
Jimmy Petrol

The new year saw the world's two superpowers continuing to garner resources worldwide, each in its own special way.

The Chinese redoubled their efforts to provide valuable infrastructure in South America, Africa and the South Pacific. By providing roads, hydro-electric installations (dams) and the like, the clever Chinese manage to ingratiate the governments who hold title to the last remaining pockets of natural resources while providing the infrastructure necessary to remove said materials (oil, timber, copper, etc.) from the countries they lie in. This is called investment and diplomacy, a set of standards lost to the western powers, who confuse verbosity, posturing and establishment of puppet governments with world-class statesmanship.

The Western Powers, meantime, celebrated new beginnings with more of the same; the military presence (read: gunfire, air strikes) in the Middle East escalated. This attempt to establish a squatter's rights claim on some of the bonanza oil reserves left on the planet became more of a reality, with oil flowing out of the middle east toward the west in ever increasing volume. New pipelines from the Baltics, headed for the European market, were in the works as 2007 rolled in.
....
By mid-summer, the gang at the Pentagon awakened with a start, reporting to Congress that among "major and emerging power" China has the "greatest potential to compete militarily" with America. The surprise computation came, no doubt, after an intern found the Pentagon's largest computer had been unplugged for some time. Plugging it back in, hopefully, reduced the operating capacity of those machines at the University of California and Livermore Labs.
....
August heat brought more good news from the Arctic; melting icecaps increasingly uncover valuable resources. The disappearance of those big, white, reflective ice-fields may be bad for global warming, but after we cut down all the trees to mitigate their loss, we can get down to the business of digging up all the cool stuff buried down there. Canada announces the establishment of a new deep-water port and military training base to maintain claims to the Arctic land mass. Not to be left out in the warm, the Kremlin planted a Russian flag on the seabed via mini-sub. Technically, a brilliant strategy; claim land mass that will someday be dryer, once we get rid of all the extra oxygen (left on it's own, the oxygen in CO2 could get itself recombined with hydrogen, forming water. Very bad)
....
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4.: U.S. To Combine, Expand Use Of Ship-Based Interceptor Missiles

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Sun Jan 3, 2010 4:34 pm (PST)

http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=4441026

Defense News
January 4, 2010

U.S. Navy Juggles Ships To Fill BMD Demands
By Christopher P. Cavas

No sooner did the Aegis ballistic missile defense (BMD) system become operational in 2008 than U.S. combatant commanders started asking for BMD-equipped ships to begin patrolling their areas.

Central Command needed a "shooter" in the northern Arabian Gulf. European Command wanted one in the eastern Mediterranean. Pacific Command already had Aegis ships with limited BMD capabilities on guard around Japan for a potential launch from North Korea.

The demand for BMD ships is only expected to increase, driven in part by rising concerns about Iran's intentions and the U.S. decision in September to cancel an anti-missile system in Poland and the Czech Republic and rely instead on Aegis.
....
Worries that valuable Aegis ships might be locked into the BMD mission were discussed in December at a two-day seminar at the National Defense University (NDU) in Washington. Reporters were allowed to quote comments made at the seminar under the condition that no speaker be identified.

"Sea-based ballistic missile defense is a necessary component of any theater defense," said the senior officer. "We need to find ways to get folks to use the ships in ways consistent with their being a ship - to realize they are not a point-defense asset."

One analyst added, "The demand signal is ahead of the pot of ships."

U.S. Navy spokesman Lt. Tommy Buck said the service is working to manage the demand.

"Combatant commanders need to understand BMD-capable ships are multimission-capable. BMD is one available asset," Buck said Dec. 18.
.....
27 BMD Ships By 2013

Twenty-one cruisers and destroyers will have been upgraded with the Aegis BMD capability by early 2010, and six more destroyers are to receive the upgrade in 2012 and 2013. But at least one senior officer at the seminar noted "there will be no more new ships for missile defense."
....
This fall, a San Diego-based ship, the destroyer Higgins, deployed to the eastern Mediterranean to provide BMD defense for European Command and take part in exercises.

Both moves are unusual, as it's rare for an Atlantic Fleet ship to visit Japan or for a Pacific ship to patrol the Mediterranean.

Such cross-deployments require more coordination by fleet planners.

"Effective global force management requires global visibility on requirements," Buck said. "U.S. Fleet Forces Command [headquartered in Norfolk, Va.] and Pacific Fleet [headquartered in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii] collaborate, coordinate and communicate to have more complete knowledge of location and status of fleet capabilities and work to best employ those capabilities to meet global combatant commander requirements to include BMD."

The senior officer said one way to manage demand is to encourage combatant commanders to give "sufficient warning to have ships on station. We need to remind [combantant commanders] that these are multimission ships."

The BMD cruisers and destroyers are also equipped to handle anti-submarine, land-attack, air-defense and other tasks.

Other Issues

Other sea-based BMD issues discussed during the NDU conference included the need to expand fire-control networks to catch up to the expanded reach of the Standard Missile-3 [SM-3] BMD missiles.

"Our missiles are good; the missiles can outfly the radars," a senior officer said. "We need fire-control networks to carry out long-range engagements."

A consideration in the use of sea-based BMD is the need to keep the systems at a very high state of readiness. Naval systems, the senior officer pointed out, are built to continue functioning even after some battle damage.

"Most systems on a ship are still effective even when they're degraded," he said, holding his hand out about shoulder-high. "But the readiness of the ballistic defense missiles and their radars needs to be up here," he said, raising his hand high above his head.
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5.: Seychelles: AFRICOM Adds Troops, Aircraft In Indian Ocean

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Sun Jan 3, 2010 5:46 pm (PST)

http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=67002

Stars and Stripes
January 4, 2010

U.S. Africa Command adds aircraft, personnel to bolster anti-piracy
By Mark Abramson

-Patrol Squadron 26's insignia, a skull over a compass and two bombs or torpedoes that form an X, resembles the Jolly Roger flag, which symbolizes piracy....The move to base P-3s in the Seychelles comes after the Navy tested the idea in August by operating an Orion out of the airport and the U.S. started flying Reaper drones from the island nation more than a month ago

KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany: U.S. Africa Command has bolstered its anti-piracy forces with the recent addition of maritime patrol aircraft and more personnel in the Seychelles islands.

The Navy last month deployed three P-3 Orion aircraft from the Maine-based VP-26 Tridents, along with 112 sailors, to the Seychelles to patrol the waters off East Africa and the island nation for pirates. Patrol Squadron 26's insignia, a skull over a compass and two bombs or torpedoes that form an X, resembles the Jolly Roger flag, which symbolizes piracy.

"They can cover a wide area of water and a wide area in general and they can stay up a long time," said Navy Capt. John Moore, the commodore of Combined Task Force 67 in Sigonella, Italy, which flies P-3s. "The P-3 is uniquely suited for counterpiracy missions."

P-3s operating out of the Seychelles' Mahe regional airport can stay airborne for up to eight hours, he said.
....
The move to base P-3s in the Seychelles comes after the Navy tested the idea in August by operating an Orion out of the airport and the U.S. started flying Reaper drones from the island nation more than a month ago to combat piracy. U.S. Africa Command and Navy officials said there are no plans to arm the P-3s and Reapers.

Moore described the mission so far as a success, but he stopped short of saying whether P-3s will be deployed routinely to the Seychelles. Orions rotate in and out of the Horn of Africa area every six months.

The program to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities in the Horn of Africa was planned to last several months but may be lengthened as its effectiveness is determined, AFRICOM officials said in an e-mail.
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6.: Five U.S., British Soldiers Die In Afghan Bomb Attacks

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Mon Jan 4, 2010 5:45 am (PST)

http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/usa/4-US-Service-Members-British-Soldier--Die-in-Afghan-Blasts-80567067.html

Voice of America News
January 4, 2010

4 US Service Members, British Soldier Die in Afghan Blasts

NATO and British officials in Afghanistan say four U.S. service members and a British soldier died Sunday in separate roadside bomb explosions in the southern part of the country.

A NATO statement Monday announced the deaths of the U.S. service members, but did not give any details about the victims' branch of service or exact location of the blast.

The British Ministry of Defense says its soldier died on foot patrol in Helmand province.

Last year, insurgent violence in Afghanistan reached its highest level of the war, which began in late 2001.

Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.
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7.: Baltic States At Center Of NATO, EU Global Battlegroups

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Mon Jan 4, 2010 5:50 am (PST)

http://www.defpro.com/news/details/12244/

Defense Professionals
January 4, 2010

Lithuanian troops enter standby in NATO Response Force and EU Battle Group

-The formation of the Response Force enabled the Alliance to respond to crises of various characters including collective defence in any part of the world. The NATO Response Force (NRF) is a highly ready and technologically advanced force of the Alliance made up of land, air, sea and special forces' components that can deploy to the region of operation within five days from making the decision. It is self-sustainable and capable of performing missions worldwide across the whole spectrum of operations.

The Trilateral Baltic Battalion (BALTBAT) manned by Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia began duty in the 14th rotation of the NATO Response Force (NRF-14) on January 1. On the same date Lithuanians will also enter a half-year standby period in the EU Battle Group.

130 personnel of the Lithuanian Contingent in the EU Battle Group comes from the Motorised Infantry Company and logistics platoon, CIMIC division, and MP division of King Mindaugas Mechanised Infantry Battalion and includes military assigned to the multinational staff. Other countries represented in the Battle Group along with Lithuania are Poland, Latvia, Slovakia and Germany.

THe Trilateral Baltic Battalion was established for duty in NRF-14 in September 2007 and is led by Lithuania. Estonia and Lithuania supplied BALTBAT with military divisions and Latvia - with staff personnel.

Lithuania has assigned mechanised infantry and staff support companies, and a logistic support division and Estonia a mechanised infantry company and logistic support element to the Battalion. The countries increased their contribution by a military company and anti-tank platoon (Lithuania) and units of mine clearance and military police (Estonia) since Latvia decreased input due to the recession in its economy in summer 2009. More than 600 military from the 800-strong BALTBAT's staff are Lithuanians.

"This is the priority task in Lithuanian troops' combat training, less important only than training and participation in international missions," said Minister of National Defence Rasa Jukneviciene. "Duty in NRF-14 would be a great test and responsibility for Lithuania if the force had been activated and deployed to an operation region in crisis by NATO's decision to provide assistance.

"There are no doubts about professionality of our troops, however, it would require amassing financial assets for redeploying NRF-14." According to the Minister, many states do not include assets for redeploying Response Force in their budgets because financing is allocated once the decision to send troops to an operation is made. Decision of allocation may be passed by the parliament or government of the state.

BALTBAT will conduct a half-year rotation in the land component of NRF-14 led by Denmark. Two parts of the component are two US infantry brigades (BALTBAT serves with one of them) and Greek Infantry Brigade. Personnel for NRF-14 is also submitted by the Netherlands, Spain, the UK, the Czech Republic, Norway, Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria and Italy.

The formation of the Response Force enabled the Alliance to respond to crises of various characters including collective defence in any part of the world. The NATO Response Force (NRF) is a highly ready and technologically advanced force of the Alliance made up of land, air, sea and special forces' components that can deploy to the region of operation within five days from making the decision. It is self-sustainable and capable of performing missions worldwide across the whole spectrum of operations.

NATO member states assign units for NRF on a half-year rotational basis. Before standby national units assigned for duty in NRF undergo six-month training program including individual and joint training for units. During the duty period national units maintain standby in their home countries ready to deploy into the operation region within a set time if NATO passed a decision to employ NRF.

The decision to establish the NATO Response Force was made by NATO member states at the Prague Summit in November 2007. Battle groups are activated upon the decision of the North Atlantic Council. The first time the forces were activated in October 2005 to assist the earthquake-devastated Pakistan. Then Lithuania contributed water purification unit to the operation.

Lithuania sent a national unit to NRF for the first time in 2005. Logistic (water purification) unit of the Lithuanian Armed Forces performed duty in 2005 and 2008, Special operations forces squadrons - in 2005, 2006 and 2008, troops of the Lithuanian Air Force in 2008, and Mine hunter and sweeper of the Lithuanian Naval Force - in 2006, 2007, 2009.

The EU Battle Groups are multinational joint crisis management forces.

Member states of the EU assign national units and equipment for six-month standby in the forces. The assigned national military units maintain high readiness in their home states and are capable of setting up for deployment in 5-10 days to any location beyond the borders of the EU at 6 thousand kilometers radius around Brussels in case political leadership of the EU decided to send a Battle Group to a crisis region. The first EU Battle Group entered standby in the beginning of 2005, and two units have been maintaining standby each half-year since 2007. Staff of each Battle Group is made of around 2 thousand troops.
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8.: NATO Incorporates Czech Republic Into AWACS System

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Mon Jan 4, 2010 5:59 am (PST)

http://praguemonitor.com/2010/01/04/%C4%8Dr-joins-natos-awacs

Czech News Agency
January 4, 2010

CR joins NATO's AWACS

Prague: The Czech Republic became a member of NATO's airborne early warning and control system known as AWACS Friday.

The Czech government decided on the step in mid-December.

The country is now the 18th state protected by AWACS aircraft with the characteristic radar dish protruding from the back, close to the tail.

The Czech Republic will pay about 290,000 euros annually to the NAPMO programme from the budget of the Defence Ministry.

The joining of the programme will raise the quality of and reinforce the overall defence-ability of the Czech Republic and strengthen its position in NATO.

AWACS planes mainly operate from the Geilenkirchen base in Germany. They also use advance airports in Greece, Italy, Norway and Turkey.
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9.: U.S. To Go Ahead With Massive Arms Delivery To Taiwan

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Mon Jan 4, 2010 6:10 am (PST)

http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1147197&lang=eng_news

Taiwan News
January 4, 2010

U.S. not stopping arms sales to Taiwan: Military

TAIPEI: The Ministry of National Defense denied media reports Monday that the United States was stopping plans to sell military hardware to Taiwan.

Not only the sale of advanced F-16 C/D jets and Black Hawk helicopters had been put off, but even the delivery of parts worth US$50 million was stalling, the Chinese-language Apple Daily said. If the military did not receive those parts by May or June, some of its most sophisticated weapons systems would be difficult to use, according to the paper.

The ministry rejected the reports, saying it had received no such notification from Washington. All military deals worth more than US$50 million needed the authorization of Congress, the ministry added.

Ruling Kuomintang lawmaker Lin Yu-fang said that last week's decision by the Legislative Yuan to take measures against the imports of potentially risky U.S. beef products had provided State Department opponents of arms sales to Taiwan with an excuse to step up their obstruction.

On the opposite side, the Washington Post reported Sunday that the Obama Administration would soon announce the sale to Taiwan of a package worth billions of U.S. dollars including the Black Hawk helicopters, anti-missile systems and plans for diesel-powered submarines in a move likely to anger China.

In combination with an eventual meeting with the Dalai Lama later this month, the weapons announcement might lead to a strong reaction from Beijing, the paper said.

China might decide to cancel military exchanges with the U.S. or keep its President Hu Jintao away from a nuclear security summit in April, the Washington Post said.
....
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10.: Ex-General: U.S. To Experience 500 Afghan War Casualties Monthly

Posted by: "Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff@yahoo.com rwrozoff

Mon Jan 4, 2010 6:18 am (PST)

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2010/01/army_casualties_010410w/

Army Times
January 4, 2010

Surge in casualties predicted in Afghanistan
By Gina Cavallaro

-"What I want to do is signal that this thing is going to be $5 billion to $10 billion a month and 300 to 500 killed and wounded a month by next summer. That's what we probably should expect. And that's light casualties."

Americans should prepare to accept hundreds of U.S. casualties each month in Afghanistan during spring offensives with enemy forces.

The dire forecast was made by retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, an adjunct professor of international affairs at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, in a periodic assessment of political and security issues he has conducted in the war zone since 2003.

"What I want to do is signal that this thing is going to be $5 billion to $10 billion a month and 300 to 500 killed and wounded a month by next summer. That's what we probably should expect. And that's light casualties," said McCaffrey, who is also president of his own consulting firm in Arlington, Va., and has conducted numerous trips to the war zones to assess the political and military challenges at hand.

As of Dec. 20, there had been 305 U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan in 2009, the large majority of those due to hostile action. The number of wounded as of the same date for 2009 was 2,102, with more than half of those unable to return to duty.

A month-by-month breakdown using data compiled by Army Times shows that in 2009, the highest number of wounded and dead in Afghanistan occurred from June, with 210 wounded and killed through October, when 318 were listed as wounded or killed.

October was the deadliest month for U.S. troops, with 50 killed in hostile action; but September saw the most wounded with 457 taken out of the fight.

McCaffrey predicts those numbers will go higher, up to 500 casualties per month, as the winter thaw permits enemy and coalition forces to launch their respective offensives.

McCaffrey, a three-time recipient of the Purple Heart medal who also earned the Distinguished Service Cross twice during combat in Vietnam, told Army Times that "people are shocked when I add the numbers up," but what he's discussing, he said, is not significantly higher than what is being suffered by U.S. in Afghanistan now.

His reports are compiled with information gathered in theater and from research conducted beforehand. McCaffrey traveled to the war zone for this report as an academic from West Point at the invitation of theater commander Gen. David Petraeus, commander of Central Command, and Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the operational commander in Afghanistan, he said.

Building a viable Afghan state with its own security force, he said, is a three- to 10-year commitment, as it is unlikely the U.S. will achieve the political and military goals set forth by President Barack Obama in his Dec. 1 speech announcing a 30,000-troop increase.

Plans to grow the Afghan national army to 240,000 by 2013, McCaffrey said, "is a growing success story," but the police force, which is now up to 92,000, continues to be a "work in progress" that is six years behind the army in development. To increase the police force to a level of integrity that can operate at village level in a competent manner, he said, will take a decade.

The addition of 30,000 troops in Afghanistan, he said, will enable McChrystal to put soldiers on the ground in areas that have been impossible to cover because of the size of the country, which he described as "bigger than the state of Texas" with 28 million people and hostile terrain.

He noted that until last year the U.S. had been in Afghanistan with only one brigade.

"In theory they're going to partner with Afghan units and [that will] get the Afghans out there," he said.

And, he said, the enemy has been attacking in battalion-sized formations. He recommended that U.S. units make sure they have supporting artillery whether they're in a combat outpost or on the move.
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