An End to Libya's Eastern Oil Blockade?

On the evening of 6 April Libya’s Justice Minister Salah al-Marghani appeared on national television to announce that an initial agreement had been reached with the federalist group whose protests at eastern oil terminals have cost the country over $8 billion in lost revenues to date. Al-Marghani stated that the settlement: ‘provides for re-opening the oil ports in two stages. The ports at Zueitina and Hariga will be handed over to the state with the signature of this agreement.’ He also said that the two largest occupied ports - Ras Lanuf and Es Sidra - would be reopened ‘after two to four weeks of further negotiations’ with the federalist rebels. Similarly, Ibrahim al-Jathran, the leader of the blockaders, confirmed that the siege had ended at the two ports, announcing: ‘We did this out of goodwill to build trust, have a dialogue and solve all problems between Libyans by peaceful means.’ While al-Jathran also stated that further talks were needed to reach a breakthrough, early reports suggest that Zueitina terminal is already making preparations to load crude as his men watch on, but delays are expected at Hariga due to technical difficulties. In terms of export capacity, both terminals are relatively small fry, with a combined output of about 180,000 barrels per day (bpd) when compared to the recent export capacity of both Ras Lanuf (200,000 bpd) and Es Sidra (360,000 bpd). As such, al-Jathran’s opening of the smaller ports is clearly an initial confidence-building exercise, although it does represent a potentially significant first step toward a resolution of the oil crisis. 

Al-Jathran’s willingness to negotiate with the government is indicative of his weakened position. Since the U.S. Navy intervened on 10 March to escort the tanker at the centre of the escalating oil crisis back to a port controlled by the Libyan government it has become increasingly clear that the federalists would struggle to sell their oil illegally. Moreover, al-Jathran’s high-risk attempts to do so highlighted his self-serving factionalist motivations to the majority of the Libyan public, cutting away their support. Meanwhile, al-Jathran’s political wing, the Political Bureau of Cyrenaica (PBC) was beginning to fracture, as the council of eastern elders and prominent businessmen who are backing him urged him to negotiate with the government or they would end their support. Faced with growing public and political isolation, it was clear that al-Jathran had to act to relieve some pressure and re-build his image as a patriot. For their part, the Libyan government have also been in a fix. On 24 March an unrelated protest forced the western el-Feel field to halt production, whilst another ongoing protest at the 330,000 bpd Sharara field shut-in production there. The chronic disruptions have reduced total Libyan production to 150,000 bpd, the lowest level since September 2013, and on 25 March forced the government to seek a $2 billion emergency loan from the central bank to make up for lost revenues.

Faced with such a situation, an agreement was seen a propitious by both sides and represents their desire to be seen be doing everything possible to end the blockade. A one-page document detailing the agreement was subsequently published by the Ministry of Justice detailing the initial settlement. It includes a promise that the protesters will not face trial and that they will be paid their salaries in full. It also states that a committee to oversee loading at the terminals will be established, as will another to investigate past unloading at the ports to address the federalists’ claims of faulty metering. There are also reports that the national headquarters of the Petroleum Facilities Guard will be re-located to Brega, the home of the PBC, as part of the deal. Crucially, however, there is no mention of any agreement in the sharing of oil revenues along federal lines that has been a central demand of the blockaders from the outset. It appears that al-Jathran had been seeking 15 percent share of national oil wealth to be allocated to the Cyrenaica region. This question is of such importance, both to the federalists and the government, that whether or not it can be answered in a manner acceptable to both sides is likely to determine if the larger terminals will open in the near future.

It is very telling that the document released by the Ministry of Justice is signed by al-Jathran, his political deputy, and Sherief el-Waffi, a member of the legislature with authorisation to negotiate on behalf of the government. This fact, and acting Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni’s recent silence on the issue, highlight that the government remain keen to keep their distance from the negotiations in case they should fail. Moreover, it also indicates their tacit acknowledgement of the remaining difficulties in resolving the central question of shared oil revenues. Al-Jathran’s recent statements indicate that he sees the recent agreement as simply an opening move, and that he intends to pursue this central issue. For his part, al-Thinni recently stated that any division of oil revenues is a constitutional rather than a political matter. Given these challenges, al-Marghani’s hopes that the main terminals could be open within two-four weeks may be optimistic. Unless al-Jathran’s backers desert him completely, or al-Thinni backs down or is replaced, it is difficult to see how the current issue can be resolved quickly. Given al-Thinni’s position, successful negotiations would likely see increasing emphasis placed on the Constitutional Drafting Committee to write a settlement into the constitution. However, the constitutional drafting process will take months, and once completed, must be ratified by the Libyan public. A week is a long time in the Byzantine world of Libyan politics, but with the western fields still shut-in, it appears there is still some way to go before Libya’s oil production reaches normal output.

British and Irish veterans talk about PTSD and Irish deployment to UN Syria mission...

http://www.rte.ie/radio/utils/radioplayer/rteradioweb.html#!rii=9%3A20226309%3A0%3A%3A

'Afghanistan: danger that security may be lost in translation.'

Irish Times article, 20 June 2013.
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/uk/afghanistan-danger-that-security-may-be-lost-in-transition-1.1435828

Transparency, Campaign Disconnect and Civil-Military Relations: A Follow-Up to Beef, Tomatoes and Solar Panels...

I was in Oxford last week for a very interesting conference on military cohesion and was lucky enough to have a brief chat with a senior British army officer on the sides. I was surprised to learn that he had heard about my piece on the micro-metrics of COIN and – as usual for him – he was very gracious and friendly in explaining his side of the story, and in doing so he has enabled me to clarify and expand on the arguments made in the previous piece.

Firstly, I would like to say that I apologise if any offence was caused in the previous piece; it was the last thing I intended to do with an article that was substantially about the mismatch between the metrics of operational and strategic progress.

The piece was written out of frustration though. Frustration at losing comrades in Afghanistan who appear to have died for little in the long run. Frustration at being so badly under-resourced in terms of boots on the ground (this was 2008) that it undermined our best efforts to improve the locals’ lives. But the article was also written from a frustration borne out of a year spent carefully analysing official data of the COIN campaign in Afghanistan for the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. In this data, especially the U.S. Department of Defense’s biannual Progress Report, the changes to the metrics used to assess strategic progress, the failure to provide long-term contextual data to triangulate some of the presented data and the emphasis on small positive gains over larger negative scores (and I can provide examples of all these in much greater depth if need be) may have worrying implications for the transparency military operations and therefore, for civil-military relations. Namely, how do we, as citizens in developed democracies, actually know the results of these campaigns if the metrics being used are questionable and perhaps politically influenced? In short, reports of strategic progress in Afghanistan, and the strategic narrative crafted by strategic communications experts, may not be entirely accurate. Thus, when I hear commanders stating their ‘cautious optimism’ about Afghanistan, I find it very frustrating. I am not the only one who is worried; other people who watch the campaign closely have aired the same concerns: Professor Cordesman, BBC File on 4 and journalist Ben Anderson to name but a few.

Within that context, hearing an operational-level commander espouse ‘cautious optimism’ whilst not mentioning the strategic problems of the campaign added to my worries about the reality of current strategic narrative. However, the officer gently pointed out in our conversation that, because he is a serving soldier, he is curtailed as to what he can say about the wider campaign, and that as an operational commander the strategic issues I highlighted are actually the responsibility of his commanders. It was abundantly clear just how capable, intelligent and decent this officer is – like many other operational and strategic commanders. In short, he gets the bigger picture, he just can’t talk about it publicly because he is duty bound to be apolitical and follow his mission. His points were good and they got me thinking...

What appears to be happening at present is that in the absence of solid evidence of strategic progress in Afghanistan, the metrics of operational progress, perhaps unintentionally, are being used to fill the void to support the strategic narrative. For me, the real crux of the problem concerns the effect of the well-documented campaign disconnect between operational success and strategic failure in Afghanistan is having on civil-military relations. Operational commanders are quite right to portray their operational successes with whatever evidence they have to back such claims up, but in the absence of transparency on the strategic trajectory of the campaign, these operational successes are often being reported – by both higher command and the media – out of context and as indicating strategic success. If governments and the top military commanders, who do have the remit to comment candidly on the strategic situation, remain reluctant to divert from the strategic narrative when ‘discrepant information’ contradicts it (and the reasons for this are myriad, but include politics to careerism to institutional positivism) then are those operational commanders’ beneath them who remain silent – whilst just doing their job – unwittingly contributing to this lack of transparency?

The ground-up nature of COIN and the campaign disconnect in Afghanistan may have combined to create a situation where the soldierly qualities of being apolitical, media-averse and remaining committed to the mission are themselves distorted into becoming political acts, precisely because those above them are playing politics about the reality of progress. In a way, following Clausewitz, this shouldn’t surprise anyone, but perhaps the devolved level to which war is becoming a political act is something new, as Emile Simpson has noted. This raises some interesting questions for modern civil-military relations in democracies.

Firstly, as public opinion is inherently related to the fighting power of democracies, the public does need to be shielded from the realities of war if support for, or at least the acceptance of, wars is to continue: David Lloyd George’s remark in 1917 that ‘if people knew the truth… the war would be stopped tomorrow’ still holds true. Moreover, governments need to be both patient and resolute in the face of the public’s understandable lack of appetite for modern conflicts that are often perceived as abstract wars of choice. The question, though, is to what degree? Is it acceptable to pick statistics that better reflect your goals, al la Osborne, than those that don’t? Is that politicising the conduct of war to a greater extent than in the past? Is it only acceptable in wars of national survival? What about lines-to-take and strategic communications management? How much is too much? When is it right for soldiers to speak out if the mission will not deliver the success the politicians are promising?

These questions are also related to the second point: the impact of both the Vietnam and Iraq wars on the public psyches of the American and British populations. I’m not an expert on this, but the long-term impact of the deep divisions in American public life wrought by the Vietnam War may have made future generations more reluctant to engage with the realities of modern conflict. In many respects our professional militaries are the most detached from our societies than they have ever been and, despite the welcome signs of support for the forces, it would be accurate to say most soldiers feel the public are not interested in the conflicts that they fight in their name. Closer to home, the anti-Iraq invasion protests of 2003 may come to be seen as a crucial turning point in British civil-military relations, not because the military did anything wrong – they just followed orders (many albeit with deep reservations; one Brigadier told me he was planning the invasion in the MoD building in Whitehall as his wife marched below his window) – but because the British government did not listen to the people. This has created a sense of apathy about politicians’ use of our armed forces that still lingers today in many respects. While Chomsky’s democratic deficit arguments may take things too far, the decline in the population’s confidence that they are the ultimate controller of their armed forces, coupled with these forces’ repeated deployment over the past 12 years in unpopular wars, may have profoundly altered British civil-military relations.

I’m not sure how unique the current disconnect between the reality of progress in Afghanistan and the strategic narrative is, but I am pretty certain it is creating an uneasy paradox for operational commanders who cannot speak candidly on the strategic situation. Of course, there was censorship in previous wars, but our standards of transparency our higher today, especially in wars that are not fought for national survival (as much as previous narratives have tried to convince us otherwise). Ultimately, it comes back to the military’s relations with the population. Today, most of these occur through the media and are controlled to a large degree by the ban on members of the armed forces speaking freely to the media and the need to stick to lines-to-take that support the dominant strategic narrative. Yet, in an era of social media where any member of the public can express their opinions in almost any forum, is such a ban really reflective of the society we live in? Does it actually keep the military from the people it is meant to serve? And is it fair – commanders can’t exactly defend themselves on a blog can they? At a personal level, members of the armed forces have no qualms about expressing their views of the war, but why do commanders feel that they can’t publicly express their views on the strategic situation in Afghanistan, whether they are in line with the strategic narrative or not? It just feels to me like something may be wrong here.

 I don’t have the answers to many of these questions, but that doesn’t mean they are not worth asking. As conflict and the media has changed in the last decade, so too it is valid to question the reality of the old military virtues of being apolitical and unable to comment candidly in public.

Beef, Tomatoes and Solar Panels: The Dubious Micro-Metrics of COIN

I had the good fortune to hear Brigadier Doug Chalmers talk last week at Exeter’s new Security and Strategy Institute about his recent experience of commanding the U.K’s Task Force Helmand in Afghanistan. The talk had a particular operational focus on the main effort of British forces, Nad-e-Ali district in central Helmand, during which Brigadier Chalmers emphasised how things ‘were better than when we arrived’ when he left and that he was ‘cautiously optimistic’ about Afghanistan’s future. Heat maps of Nad-e-Ali district were produced to show how insurgent activity had been forced outside the predetermined centres of gravity in the district, including markets, roads and coalition/ANSF bases, by joint British and Afghan efforts. Photos of an empty market ‘then’ and a bustling one ‘now’ seemed to showcase the improvement. So far, so nothing new.

The real problem for me came when Brigadier Chalmers – who is obviously incredibly capable, intelligent and well-read on COIN and the history of Helmand – spoke about the micro-econometrics by which he judged the campaign. The presence of butchers selling beef in the market was a good indicator of growing trade and confidence because, in the 45 degree heat of the Afghan summer and without refrigeration facilities, each butcher had to be certain he would sell his cuts the same day he slaughtered his cattle. The sale of tomatoes in the market, which have to be imported from Iran and Pakistan, showed that the roads were safe and that normal commercial flows were returning to the region (although the same could be argued of flows of weapons/insurgents no doubt?). Finally, the fact that solar-powered public lighting installed by development aid projects remained on the main street and had not been pilfered demonstrated that there was a growing sense of community within the town and with that a wider sense of confidence about Afghanistan. If ever one could seize on Nagl and Kilcullen’s micro-indicators of success, then Brigadier Chalmers surely had, and on the face of it, such arguments seem convincing. Until you consider the macro-indicators of the wider campaign.

Firstly, the heat map of Nad-e-Ali; it’s all well and good keeping the insurgents out of the centres of gravity for the moment, but there is not much evidence to suggest that this will continue once coalition forces leave the area and handover security duties to the Afghans. The purple lozenges of security are more likely to shrink and the red swathes of enemy activity are more likely to grow when the ANSF are left to their own devices. The gains made by joint coalition/ANSF operations are unlikely to be maintained when the drive and professionalism of NATO forces is removed.

Taking the ANSF issue to the strategic level there are also four other major issues.

Firstly, the current rate of attrition in the ANA (as of November 2012) is officially 2 per cent per month. God knows why NATO decides to quantify attrition rates on a monthly basis but I suspect the fact that this means that the ANA is losing 24 per cent of its personnel every year has something to do with it. This is simply unsustainable, and is likely to get worse, not better, as coalition troops withdraw and ANA units take the lead in combat ops.

Secondly, while we constantly hear that Afghans are now leading over 80 per cent of all operations, and they are currently conducting 85 per cent of their own training, there is little mention that that in the last year ISAF has lowered its criteria of classification for ANA (35^th minute) units to be capable of independent operations, thereby allowing more units in the lower categories to qualify for the highest category.

Thirdly, the central metric of the Afghan campaign is an economic one. Although it has experienced rapid economic growth recently – the IMF estimates Afghanistan’s GDP to be over $19 billion – without the inflation generated by over 100,000 NATO troops and their support staff, the country’s GDP is historically close to $12 billion. The cost of training and equipping an ANSF of 352,000 is forecast by the U.S to be $4-6 billion a year for the foreseeable future, depending on their size. Thus, funding its security forces will cost Afghanistan about a third to a half of its actual GDP every year. This is simply unsustainable.

Fourthly, such a fact presents a clear rationale for cutting the size of the ANSF. 230,000 has been the number suggested.  Yet even if you take into account that half of Afghanistan’s population may not require a dense ANSF presence, to secure the remaining 15 million inhabitants or so would require a force ratio far greater than this allows. Indeed, forces this size would fall far short of the number required by NATO’s own doctrine to successfully conduct a counter-insurgency campaign. Such doctrine holds that 20-25 counter-insurgents are needed per 1,000 members of the population. Even given the geographic concentration of Afghanistan’s insurgency in the south and east of the country, the 230,000 figure falls far below this ratio. Again, big strategic problems remain unsolved.

So, as you can see, there are for more telling metrics that can be used to assess the likelihood of strategic success in the Afghan campaign than beef, tomatoes and solar panels.  And the metrics included here are simply some of those related to the ANSF, others on security, corruption, Pakistan’s interference, and wider economic figures could also be used to triangulate the strategic direction of Afghanistan.. While coalition forces are to be commended for undoubtedly delivering operational successes, it is the failure of commanders to draw the distinction between the limits of these successes’ relationship to the wider strategic context that worried me the most. Perhaps speaking candidly is too much to expect from serving officers, but as a result I was left with the sinking feeling that the ‘cautious optimism’ of the military was simply shorthand for ‘not my pay-grade.’ Indeed, at times it felt like there was a big-eared grey mammal laughing at the back of the room because, strategically, the only thing that warrants cautious optimism in Afghanistan at the moment is the prospect of a negotiated peace settlement, and that is a long shot.

NATO 'on message' on Afghanistan... but what does the message mean?

While NATO Secretary General Rasmussen is to be congratulated for his personal commitment to Afghanistan (The Daily Telegraph, 23rd October 2012), as should his wider organisation and the men and women of our own armed forces, some of the statistics quoted in his Telegraph Op-Ed remain questionable, especially in light of a report issued today by the UK Parliament’s International Development Committee that states that a viable state in Afghanistan is not achievable.

Firstly, when Mr. Rasmussen says that: 'During the first six months of this year, Afghans led over 80 per cent of all operations, and they are currently conducting 85 per cent of their own training' he fails to mention that in the last year ISAF has lowered its criteria of classification for ANA units to be capable of independent operations, thereby allowing more units in the lower categories to qualify for the highest category. This has been discussed in a recent BBC Radio File on 4 (36th minute) investigation and by Professor Cordesman of the Council on Foreign Relations in his report that questions the failed metrics of 10 years of war in Afghanistan.

Secondly, Mr. Rasmussen fails to mention that attrition in the Afghan National Army is averaging about 2% per month throughout the year. For some reason, ISAF prefers to give this figure as a monthly percentage rather than an annual one. Whatever way you look at it, there is no escaping the fact that the ANA are losing about 24% of its force a year to attrition. This is beyond what most analysts agree is sustainable in the long term.

Thirdly, Mr. Rasmussen is picking statistics that reflect progress in certain regions of Afghanistan at the expense of other regions with negative trends. When he says 'in and around Kabul, enemy-initiated attacks fell by 17 per cent in the first eight months of this year, compared with the same period last year' he fails to mention that Kabul has traditionally been one of the safest regions with the least attacks. Moreover, the latest US Department of Defence report on Afghanistan (page 70) describes the Kabul area of operations as ‘statistically insignificant (less than one percent) compared to all security incidents throughout Afghanistan’. By contrast if you take Regional Command South which includes Kandahar province - the seat of the insurgency - as a real indicator of progress, then according to the same report (page 119), violence actually increased by 13% during the traditionally quieter winter period. Furthermore, violence in RC-S represents 21% of Afghanistan's total, so this is an important indicator.

Fourthly, Mr. Rasmussen's choice of the 'enemy-initiated attack' metric is also questionable as it does not include potential attacks and undetonated Improvised Explosive Device 'finds'. As the most recent UK government report has outlined, the metric which includes these variables, known as 'security incidents' has experienced no significant change recently.

Fifthly, Mr. Rasmussen and NATO maintain that 'transition remains on schedule' and that 'in the course of 2013, the Afghans will have the lead for security throughout their country.' These plans are indeed, on schedule, but the key qualitative and quantitative question here is 'transition to what exactly'? Given the wider context of the West’s mission in Afghanistan, transition is not an end in itself. If NATO hands security over to Afghan forces that in some regions are unable to venture outside their bases, then how are we to know the accurate picture of reality? While NATO will definitely fulfil its mission of transition, the effects of that transition remain highly uncertain and should not be separated from the post-transition security situation.

Finally, Mr. Rasmussen's piece must be seen in the context of declining public support for the war: 70% of Americans and 73% of Britons are now against the war. Furthermore, the respected security think-tank International Crisis Group has recently released a damning report on Afghanistan's transition while the New York Times, having supported the war for the last eleven years, published a seminal editorial entitled ‘Time to Pack up’ on 22nd October calling for a withdrawal based on a schedule dictated only by the security of the troops. The fact that the newspaper of the city that has most reason to see troops remain in Afghanistan is now calling for US forces to exit speaks for itself.

NATO and the international community have shown remarkable commitment to Afghanistan. However, I believe the statistics quoted in Mr. Rasmussen's piece need to be seen in their wider context. Furthermore, despite the best efforts of NATO, the West’s wider security and stability mission in Afghanistan is heading for strategic failure. This is due to both our own hubris and the pervasive corruption and incompetence of those we chose to ally ourselves with in Afghanistan. The only solid and perhaps long-term gain we have achieved after eleven years of war is the reduction of al-Qa’eda in the country. This had mostly been achieved by March 2002.

Media failing in its coverage of Afghanistan.

The death of another two British soldiers last week in Helmand was followed by the usual 30-second Colonel’s voxpop on the 10 o’clock news and accompanied by the standard release of heartfelt messages of condolence from their surviving comrades on the MoD website.  Other than the quick delivery of facts, there has been very little analysis of the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan by the British media.

Before turning to why this is, a round-up of the events over the last ten days may provide some context as to what is actually going on in the country.  On 6 August the Afghan Defence Minister, General Abdul Rahim Wardak, quit after parliament voted to remove him over border clashes with Pakistan. Wardak was seen as a close ally of both the US and the UK whose loss ‘could have significant consequences for transition’ according a senior coalition diplomat in Helmand province.

The same day, a police chief in Ghor province was killed by an explosives-laden donkey, further evidence, if it was needed, of the success of the Taliban’s campaign to assassinate Afghan officials ahead of NATO’s 2014 withdrawal. This campaign has already seen a 53 percent increase in targeted killings of officials by the Taliban between January and June this year; somewhat offsetting  the positive news released by the UN on 8 August that civilian casualties had dropped by 15 percent during this period compared with the same period in 2011.

However, since most civilian casualties (some 77 percent) are caused by the insurgency, even if the lower civilian casualty trend continues (it won’t, July has already seen a further 5 percent erosion) what this really signifies is the insurgency is getting better at directing kinetic activity to where it matters most: onto Afghan officials and their civilian sympathisers.

Next, on the night of 9 August, three US special forces soldiers were shot dead as they broke the Ramadan fast over a meal with their Afghan colleagues in Sangin. The ‘green on blue’ incident marked the third of its kind that week: three other NATO troops were killed the same day and another a day later.  There have been 27 such attacks this year which have left at least 37 NATO soldiers dead, highlighting the increasing infiltration of the Afghan security forces since the NATO withdrawal announcement. So far, this year’s figures are on course to be  50 percent up on last year’s.

On 14 August Afghanistan experienced its worst day of violence of 2012 when suicide bombers stuck markets in Nimruz and Kunduz provinces, killing up to 50 civilians. This was followed a day later by another bomb attack on a market in Herat city that wounded 18 and then the alleged shoot-down of a US Blackhawk helicopter today that killed 11 soldiers yesterday. Afghanistan hasn’t had as bad a week as this since the urinating-on-corpses and Koran-burning scandals of January and February.

Granted summer fighting season always sees increases in attacks, but taken together and in context, these events belie the ground truth in Afghanistan: it’s not getting any better and when the West leaves it will get worse, quickly.

To be fair, the British media has reported these stories; the basic facts are easy to find online. But what is really missing is any meaningful analysis. Very few of the seasoned war correspondents seem willing to stick their necks out, call a spade a spade and reveal the West’s efforts in Afghanistan the unmitigated failure they undoubtedly are. Why is this?

The most obvious answer is to be found in the increasingly familiar relationship between the British military and the British media that has been engendered by ten years of journalists covering Britain at war. As the military control access to the battlefields, and given the dangers of reporting unilaterally, correspondents are forced to rely on the military embed system that assigns them to certain locations and military units. 

Quite simply, if a correspondent writes an article that is too far ‘off message’, the next time they apply for an embed they are likely to find their application at the bottom of the pile. And when it is eventually approved it will be for a location far removed from where the news is breaking. Editors, already averse to Afghan news after eleven years of inoculation, are not going to tolerate a defence correspondent who cannot cultivate good sources in, and stories from, the military. Generally, write something negative and you’ll find what sources you had shut up shop. Then try to earn a living as a defence correspondent.

And so, we, the public get the diluted, policy-centric version of events in Afghanistan: the positivist euphemisms of career and legacy-orientated military officers who are ‘cautiously optimistic’ about Afghanistan’s future. The constant press conferences stating that the transition to an ANSF lead remains ‘on track’ despite the reality that less than ten percent of ANSF units are able to conduct independent operations, that ethnic divisions and desertions are rapidly increasing – thereby undermining the future integrity of the ANSF, and that once security duties are handed over Western armies see it as ‘mission accomplished’ paying little attention to subsequent events on the ground.

Such facts are borne out by the recent comments made by an internal security officer in the Ghorband valley, outside Kabul, to the BBC: ‘during operations, we have found bomb-making factories, huge caches of weapons and ammunition. But the government told people “everything is fine.” They lied.’

As a security professional who has served in the British army in Afghanistan and has worked as a research analyst on the country for an international security organisation, I understand the institutional and cultural restraints that can be placed on soldiers and journalists to tow the line. Indeed, undue criticism undermines fighting power: fortitude and courage of conviction are often the difference between victory and defeat. It would be wrong to ignore that the military have delivered real operational successes in Afghanistan.

The problem is – in the military’s own words – these gains ‘remain fragile and reversible’ and have not been converted into the strategic nor the political gains needed to stabilise Afghanistan. Given the nature of Afghan culture and the Afghan state, it is highly questionable if the military could ever have delivered these anyway, even if resourced eternally. 

Unlike other interventions in Iraq and Libya, it is obvious that Afghanistan, fundamentally, is going one way, and that is down. Northern warlords are already re-arming in preparation for the coming civil war with the southern Pashtuns after NATO withdraws. ANSF troops occupying the ‘transitioned territories’ marked as green areas on headquarters’ maps are increasingly confined to their bases and will be more so when the West leaves. Expect a more savvy Taliban to gradually take back territories British and other nations’ blood was spilt on as what’s left of the NATO force positions itself in a few major population centres. 

Which brings me back to the latest British soldiers to be killed. Of course they knew the risk of their vocation and of course they died doing a job they loved. But suggesting that that job, in Afghanistan, is going to have a tangible and long-lasting effect is flying in the face of evidence.  And logically, if we are leaving in 2014/15 regardless of whether the job is done or not, then why not leave it not-done in 2012? It would save hundreds of lives.

However, it appears that losing the battle for public perceptions is a fate worse than death for the West’s strategic communications specialists.

An officer recently told me that when he arrived in Camp Bastion at the beginning of his tour, a colonel addressed his group, saying that – and I ad lib here – ‘they needed to see the job through to honour those who have given their lives.’ When the sacrifices of those who have gone before are cited as the primary reason to sacrifice those who live today, we know the situation is beyond saving.

Now, not in 2014, the West should leave the areas that will slip to insurgent control and concentrate its dwindling forces in areas where they can have long lasting effect and conduct counter-terror strikes if need be.  Expending young men and women’s lives in districts that will effectively ‘transition’ to Taliban control in two years anyway is simply the pursuance of a failing strategy that runs counter to reality.

Afghanistan: The metrics of strategic failure.

Those attending the NATO summit on Afghanistan on Sunday in Chicago have a lot to reflect on. So far, 2012 has not been a good year for the organisation nor the country. The killing last Saturday of two British servicemen again highlighted the increasing ‘Green on Blue’ attacks by Afghan security personnel on NATO soldiers, while US Marines urinating on corpses, Korans being burnt, the murder of 17 Afghan civilians by a renegade American sergeant and a large attack on Kabul have all represented serious political setbacks. These setbacks have been all the more significant given that the military campaign cannot now save the West from long-term strategic failure.

This is not to say the military have failed in their mission: in the regions where they have been sufficiently resourced, strong tactical and operational gains were made during 2010/11 in the key provinces of Helmand and Kandahar. The transition of security duties to Afghan forces also remains on schedule.  However, these successes have not translated into the strategic, and ultimately, the political gains it the surge was designed to deliver.

In the 2007 Iraq surge, for example, violence decreased by about 70% in five months. In doing so it created the space within which governance and the rule of law could begin to be established. Twelve months into the surge in Afghanistan, the U.N estimated that violence had risen by 39%; governance remains patchy at best. Furthermore, violence is increasing even in areas that are meant to be secure: attacks in the Kandahar region rose by 13% over the winter 2011/12 period. Attacks in the East were up 3%. Taken together, these figures indicate that in the two regions where insurgent violence is most concentrated, attacks have continued to rise, even during the traditionally more benign winter months.

Meanwhile, NATO states populations’ support for the war is at their lowest levels ever (27 percent in the U.S), France and Australia have already announced accelerated withdrawal timetables and progress toward a political settlement has stalled. A December  2011 US National Intelligence Estimate concluded that pervasive corruption and Kabul’s incompetent governance had undercut the surge’s security gains and that President Karzai’s government might not survive a NATO withdrawal at all. Basic metrics support this view.

The central statistic of the Afghan campaign is an economic one. Although it has experienced rapid economic growth recently – the IMF estimates Afghanistan’s GDP to be over $19 billion – without the inflation generated by over 100,000 NATO troops and their support staff, the country’s GDP is historically close to $12 billion. The cost of training and equipping the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) is forecast by the U.S to be $4-6 billion a year for the foreseeable future, depending on their size. Thus, funding its security forces will cost Afghanistan about a third to a half of its actual GDP every year. This is simply unsustainable.

Of course, the U.S and its NATO allies are aware of this. Reports suggest that the U.S will continue to provide $5 billion next year; it hopes NATO members will make up the $1.3 billion difference. However, so far the alliance has only raised $550 million (Britain has given $110 million), leaving a significant shortfall in ANSF funding. Moreover, the long term sustainability of even this amount is in question. With Europe’s financial woes continuing, it will become increasingly difficult to justify funding an unpopular and distant war that could eventually see NATO governments supporting one side in a civil war.

Here, the echo of the Soviet experience in the country begins to reverberate loudly. When the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, they continued to fund and equip President Najibullah’s forces. With Soviet support, the beleaguered president was able to cling to power, gradually ceding some 90% of the country to the Muhajideen insurgency as his army’s appetite for the conflict waned. However, when the Russians turned off the money tap in 1992, Najibullah’s regime rapidly crumbled. 

NATO knows that the ANSF in their current form are unsustainable. Next year, the U.S will cut in half the $11.2 billion it gave the ANSF for 2012; the net result being that, after a rush to reach ANSF manning of 352,000, the force will be reduced just as it hits this target. The latest NATO figures indicate that Afghan forces currently total 344,000, but given the long term questions over sustainability, a force of about 230,000 is now being considered more realistic. 

Forces this size would fall far short of the number required by NATO’s own doctrine to successfully conduct a counter-insurgency campaign. Such doctrine holds that 20-25 counter-insurgents are per 1,000 members of the population. Even given the geographic concentration of Afghanistan’s insurgency in the south and east of the country, the 230,000 figure falls far below this ratio. By comparison, Iraq, which has a similar population to Afghanistan, has over one million army and police personnel for its 30 million citizens. Simply put, even ignoring Pakistan’s hand in Afghanistan’s affairs, without a large and sustainable security force to suppress the insurgency, the government will be unable to hold the areas NATO forces have fought hard to clear. The only way to avoid this scenario is through some sort of political settlement.

However, in the short term at least, a political settlement seems unlikely. The Sunday assassination of Maulvi Rahmani – a top negotiator for Karzai’s High Peace Council with strong links to the Taliban– has highlighted the continuing precariousness of the negotiations process.  Mahaz-e Mullah Dadullah, a hard line insurgent faction, has claimed responsibility for the killing. Their actions indicate that many elements of the Taliban remain opposed to any negotiated settlement that would deny them the return of to an Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Clinton has not spoken pro-actively on negotiations in over a year. Ahmed Rashid, a leading Afghan analyst, recently indicated that the main reason for this is due to disagreements within the U.S administration over whether the negotiations process should be prioritised at all.

Yet some sort of a political settlement is now the only way the West can arrest Afghanistan’s slide into civil war. Otherwise, on their current trajectory, the basic metrics of its eleven year investment of blood and treasure in Afghanistan point towards strategic failure. When combined with the qualitative evidence of widespread corruption the complete picture is even worse: a lack of popular support for the Afghan government, an internal Pashtun/non Pashtun divide, a massive forthcoming shortfall in aid as military assistance is cut and the continuing undermining of stability by Pakistan provides the context within which the quantitative evidence must be understood. Reports that former Northern Alliance warlords have begun re-arming in preparation for the Afghanistan NATO leaves behind suggest they understand the ground truth better than those meeting in Chicago this weekend.

Egypt: Army conscripts could prove decisive in determining future....

From the Irish Times http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2011/1126/1224308187300.html?via=rel

Momentum Grows for Labalaba VC

In an excellent article in last week's Sunday Times (pay),  Lord Ashcroft outlined the exploits of Royal Ulster Rifles and SAS soldier Sgt. Talaiasi Labalaba in the battle of Mirbat in 1972, when 9 SAS soldiers confronted an enemy force estimated to be between 250 to 400 strong.

Given the need to raise awareness of the valour of both Fijian Labalaba, and another SAS medic of Irish descent, Trooper Thomas Tobin, I have reproduced a large sections of the article below in an effort to spread the word...

“It was dawn on July 19, 1972, when the Adoo, a group of highly trained, heavily armed communist guerrillas, tried to seize the port of Mirbat on the Arabian Sea. After a series of setbacks, they were looking for a big military victory in their battle with the Sultan of Oman’s troops and their SAS allies.

The attack came during the monsoon season, on a day when it was raining lightly and with low cloud cover. The guerrillas’ initial aim was to target a small detachment of gendarmerie, slitting the throats of the eight men occupying a watch-point on the edge of the port.

However, things did not go to plan and an exchange of gunfire was heard by the nine SAS men staying in a nearby British Army Training Team house. As Kealy saw the waves of enemy rebels advancing, he was soon barking orders to his men.

Labalaba, known affectionately to his comrades as “Laba”, ran some 500 yards to a gun-pit to fire a 25-pounder gun single-handedly, even though, for maximum effect, it needed to be manned by five men.

Labalaba knew that if the gun fell into enemy hands, they would sweep through the port and so he kept up a relentless fire. As the enemy closed in on the sole soldier, Labalaba was eventually seriously wounded by a round from a Kalashnikov rifle.

“I’ve been chinned but I am okay,” he said over his walkie-talkie, his jaw in tatters. Trooper Sekonaia Takavesi, a fellow Fijian and close friend, responded by grabbing his self-loading rifle and running to the gun-pit under a hail of fire.

The two Fijians held off the advancing enemy for several minutes but Takavesi realised they needed more support, so he ran back to the small fort to get help, returning with Walid Khamis, an Omani gunner.

Khamis was the next man to be hit, falling to the floor and writhing in agony after being shot in the stomach. Shortly afterwards Takavesi was shot in the shoulder, meaning there were only two seriously injured Fijians to hold off the enemy from the gun-pit.

Labalaba realised he was almost out of ammunition and so he tried to reach a 60mm mortar nearby to continue his assault on the enemy. However, he was shot fatally in the neck as he reached for the weapon.

When the 25-pounder gun fell silent, Kealy and a volunteer, Tobin, ran to the gun-pit, again dodging enemy bullets. As Tobin tried to tend the wounded, he was shot in the face and fell to the ground.

Yet just as the situation appeared hopeless, the SAS had two strokes of luck. The first was that the cloud lifted and two jets from the Sultan’s air force were able to fly low over the scene, strafing the guerrillas with cannon fire.”

The article goes on to describe...

"Second, unknown to Kealy, other members of the SAS based at Um al-Quarif had learnt of the battle and had been ordered to travel the 35 miles to Mirbat to help their comrades.

After the cloud lifted and the SAS reinforcements were helicoptered to the edge of Mirbat, the guerrillas were soon on the retreat.

After four hours of ferocious and continuous fighting, the enemy had been defeated, leaving behind some 40 fighters who were dead or seriously wounded. The SAS lost two men — Labalaba and Tobin — but Takavesi survived and was later awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal, while Kealy was awarded the Distinguished Service Order.

However, Labalaba was simply mentioned in dispatches and Tobin’s bravery received no official recognition.

The reason given for the small number of gallantry awards was that the SAS were involved in a secret war and that to have awarded posthumous VCs would have drawn unwanted attention to their activities.

The failure of the authorities adequately to recognise the gallantry of Labalaba and Tobin rankles with the SAS servicemen past and present.

Peter Winner, a former SAS sergeant (whose name has been changed for security reasons), is one of the many aggrieved that Labalaba, in particular, has never received a posthumous VC.

Winner, who fought at Mirbat and later took part in the Iranian embassy siege, has said: “So to keep the war secret, all they gave him [was] MID [mentioned in dispatches]. You can get that for walking up the Falls Road [in Belfast]. The guy deserved a VC for what he did.”

A new book, SAS Operation Storm, co-authored by Roger Cole, who took part in the battle as an SAS corporal, has also championed the cause of both men.

Helen Tobin, a solicitor and one of the dead medic’s three sisters, wants justice for her brother too. “It was a battle in which a real band of brothers faced overwhelming odds and we do not believe their heroism, and that of their comrades, was ever given the recognition due. We hope ... that will be forthcoming,” she said.

The Victoria Cross was instituted by royal warrant in 1856 for what Queen Victoria said ought to be “for most conspicuous bravery or some daring pre-eminent act of valour or self-sacrifice or extreme devotion to duty in the presence of the enemy”.

Surely these emotive words accurately describe the circumstances in which Labalaba and Tobin lost their lives. And surely, too, the time is now right for their bravery, at long last, to be properly recognised."

I fully support Lord Ashcroft's efforts and if you do too, get tweeting and facebooking...

Sgt. Labalaba

It's Great To Know

A former soldier responds to the findings of the Commons Defence Select Committee on Operations in Afghanistan.

It’s great to know…

It’s great to know that we could never have won.

It’s great to know we were undermanned. It’s great to know we had no helicopters. It’s great to know we had no strategy. 

It’s great to know the planners didn’t plan. It’s great to know there was no intelligence. It’s great to know we were overstretched. It’s great to know the Generals didn’t say.

It’s great to know the army had its reputation to uphold. 

It’s great to know the ministers didn’t know. It’s great to know the MoD was unprepared. It’s great to know the Land Rovers were useless. It’s great to know the IEDs were dangerous.

It’s great to know there were financial constraints.

It’s great to know Iraq diverted resources. It’s great to know there was no reserve.

It’s great to know there was no co-ordination. It’s great to know there were too many face changes.

It’s great to know they were fighting too. It’s great to know about the political battles.

It’s great to know our government doesn’t hold us responsible.

It helps us forget about the friends we lost.

Afghanistan: All over bar the shouting... and dying.

President Obama’s decision on Wednesday night to begin withdrawing U.S troops from Afghanistan marks the beginning of the end of the surge he ordered 18 months ago. With America’s longest war now in its 11^th year, military and civilian casualties still rising, and the war costing the U.S over $10 billion a month, Patrick Bury outlines the Obama surge’s impact on the strategic situation in Afghanistan and what the end game in Afghanistan may look like.

President Obama’s decision to withdraw 10,000 troops from Afghanistan by the end of the year, and a further 23,000 by September 2012, effectively marks the end of the surge he announced in December 2009. 18 months on, the surge has delivered operational successes where troops have been concentrated in the southern provinces of Helmand and Kandahar, but it has failed to deliver the strategic, and most importantly, political gains that Obama hoped for when he tied his presidency to the war in Afghanistan.

Leon Trotsky once remarked that “insurrection is an art, and like all arts has its own laws.” When President Obama announced the surge, he was acting on the advice of his military chiefs, who had asked for 40,000 troops to implement a comprehensive counter-insurgency (COIN) strategy centered on protecting the Afghan population. Obama gave them 30,000, choosing the COIN approach over the more limited counter- terror approach advocated as more realistic by Vice-President Biden and many others.

That such a COIN “strategy” could work was based largely on the fact that it had in Iraq, yet COIN itself was never, and never will be, a strategy in itself. It is merely the military part of an overall strategy.

Yet in Afghanistan, in the absence of coherent grand strategy, COIN has become the strategy as the International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) mission crept further and further toward comprehensive nation building. Furthermore, as Trotsky outlined, the Afghan insurrection has laws of its own, quite apart from those of Iraq, which, combined with Afghanistan’s political, economic and social landscape, have meant that from the outset such a strategy had far less chance of success than in Iraq.

With Obama now signaling the end of the surge, he is acknowledging that these factors are insurmountable within a pragmatic political timeframe. The evidence of this is obvious for those who care to look. In a recently released UN report, Afghan civilian casualties in May totalled 368, the highest since records began in 2007 and effectively the highest since the war began in 2001. Military casualties have also soared with the surge, further undermining public support.

Also this month, the conclusion of a two year Senate Foreign Relations Committee inquiry stated that the impact of the billions of dollars of U.S development aid was questionable and in many cases had aided the insurgency. At present, military spending and development aid account for 97 per cent of country’s gross domestic product, a figure that shows just how unsustainable the whole nation building project is. And the fact that the inquiry questioned the very efficacy of using aid as a stabilisation tool over the long run has serious implications for the continued funding of an Afghan COIN/ nation building approach that is draining American coffers rapidly.

But the most significant issue that has eroded the political and public support for the war is the killing of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan last month. There is no avoiding the fact that Al Qaeda was the reason ISAF went into Afghanistan. Now that their leader is dead and the terror network’s members number less than 100 in the country, it is very hard to explain to Americans and Europeans alike why they should fund, and their soldiers should die for, a nation building project in Afghanistan. Obama realises this, as does Prime Minister Cameron and President Sarkozy, who have both announced their own timetables for withdrawal. Their Afghanistan adventure, it seems, is all over, bar the shouting.

Indeed, Bin Laden’s assassination has shown Afghanistan up for what it has been for years: a sideshow. Pakistan, its nuclear arsenal and its large population are now the obvious strategic prize China and the U.S will compete for. As the Afghan Security Forces increase in quantity - and at a slower pace in quality - fewer Americans and Europeans will be needed to stop the Taliban re-taking Kabul by force. Political reintegration processes may yet help stabilise the country. But, ultimately, it is all about Pakistan now.

That is one of the main reasons why America will look to keep military bases in Afghanistan after the transition to Afghan security forces in 2014. And that is why they will probably keep about 25,000 troops in the country in an advisory role after that date too. A military presence in the centre of Asia, close to both Pakistan and China, has too much strategic potential to be squandered by a complete drawdown of forces. Moreover, these troops will be ready to conduct counter-terror operations in the Af/Pak border regions, finally confirming that the counter-terror strategy was the most viable all along.

Such a 180 degree reversal of policy is tragic for the Afghan civilians and ISAF men and women who died during the surge. And for those still on the frontline in Afghanistan, whilst the shouting continues, there is much dying to be avoided in the meantime...