By Dave Anderson:
The basic US strategy in Afghanistan is to use a surge of forces to create temporarily more favorable facts on the ground against the Taliban, Pashtun tribal militias and other armed groups that are not favorably disposed to the current Kabul government while the Kabul goverment greatly expands its armed forces so that in a few years "they can stand up as we stand down..."
Part of this plan is for a massive amount of new equipment to be sent to the Afghan government. Reuters has the details:
The United States has pledged $16 billion to spend on training and equipping Afghanistan's army and air force, but the country needs more to build a force that can guarantee stability, an Afghan army official said on Wednesday.
Defence Ministry spokesman Zaher Azimy said Kabul hoped a donor conference in London next month would provide cash and supplies needed for ambitious plans to expand the army to 240,000 soldiers, from over 100,000 at present.
"For the expansion process of the army, the United States has pledged $16 billion," Azimi said, adding that the cash would be spread out over the period needed to scale up the army, currently estimated at around four years.
The CIA estimates that the entire GDP for Afghanistan, including the black-market flows to be roughly $11.7 billion dollars. How exactly does the government of Afghanistan maintain and sustain a capital base that is 150% of total GDP, or perhaps 200% of overt market GDP? This is the same problem as expanding the Afghan Army and National Police force; the Kabul government can not pay those forces without massive foreign assistance, at which point there is a nasty legitimacy loop in place.
No comments:
Post a Comment