Afghanistan Rights Monitor SLAMS Washington Spin About "Progress" in Afghanistan

By Derrick Crowe

The Afghanistan Rights Monitor's (ARM) mid-year report on Civilian Casualties of Conflict (.pdf) blasts the happy-talk coming out of the Obama Administration about the deteriorating security situation and its effect on civilians:

Despite the high-profile spin in Washington and Kabul about progress made in Afghanistan, the Afghan people have only witnessed and suffered an intensifying armed conflict over the past six months. Contrary to President Barrack Obama's promise that the deployment of additional 30,000 US forces to the country would "disrupt, dismantle and defeat" Taliban insurgents and their al-Qaeda allies in the region, the insurgency has become more resilient, multi-structured and deadly. Information and figures received, verified and analyzed by Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM) show about 1,074 civilian people were killed and over 1,500 were injured in armed violence and security incidents from 1 January to 30 June 2010. This shows a slight increase in the number of civilian deaths compared to the same period last year when 1,059 deaths were recorded.

...In terms of insecurity, 2010 has been the worst year since the demise of the Taliban regime in late 2001. Not only have the number of security incidents increased, the space and depth of insurgency and counter-insurgency-related violence have maximized dramatically. Up to 1,200 security incident were recorded in June, the highest number of incident compared to any month since 2002.

The administration and their allies have continuously that "we're making progress," "we're turning the tide," or "we've begun to reverse the insurgents' momentum," but the data doesn't support their assertions. As ARM's report shows, civilian casualties continue to climb even as more troops flood into the country--troops executing a counterinsurgency (COIN) strategy supposedly premised on "protecting the population." The rise in troop levels and civilian casualties has been accompanied by an increasingly large and sophisticated insurgency and a widening lead in sympathy or support for the insurgents in key districts of Afghanistan.

Even the portion of the report that blasts the insurgent factions for their outrageously immoral tactics is bad news for the U.S. The report slams insurgents use of IEDs and suicide bombings as weapons of choice. A number of news outlets have noted this portion of the report along with the drop in U.S./NATO-caused civilian deaths, but it's a safe bet you won't find too many honest-to-God COIN-lovers cheering about the stats noted in this report. COIN doctrine asserts the importance not just of the protection of civilians from killings by counterinsurgents (in this case, U.S. and allied forces), but the protection of the people in general. Counterinsurgency doctrine says that people aren't going to switch to your side if they think they'll get killed for it, no matter how few cause civilian deaths your team causes.

ARM was similarly blunt when it came to the issue of the corruption and abuse rampant in the Afghan government and their police force:

Amidst widespread concerns about rampant corruption and abuse of power by the police, NATO has not only continued to recruit ill-qualified people to swamp police numbers but has reportedly reduced the training period to only four weeks.

An overwhelming majority of the police is illiterate and lack adequate knowledge about the basics of civil policing and human rights. Many police officers are addicted to drugs, have notorious criminal backgrounds or maintain allegiance to powerful militia or criminal commanders...Pervasive corruption and abuse of authority by the police have devastating impacts on individuals and communities that desperately need a sense of security, protection and the rule of law. Corrupt and abusive police also contributed to widespread criminality, criminal impunity and denial of peoples' access to justice and other essential services.

If you can't protect the population generally, from the perspective of COIN doctrine, you lose. If you lack a legitimate host nation government as a partner, you lose. And guess what? According to that doctrine--the doctrine used as the rationale for the troop-heavy American strategy in Afghanistan--the United States is losing. Badly.

If you're tired of seeing blood and treasure wasted on a brutal, costly war that's not making us safer, join Rethink Afghanistan on Facebook and sign up for a local Rethink the Afghanistan War Meetup.

Before the COINdinistas Start Spinning the UN Report...

By Derrick Crowe

You're going to hear a lot of crowing about the
reduction in NATO-caused civilian casualties in Afghanistan during the
last few months compared to the same time last year. (Read the full
report here
in PDF format.) This reduction took place in the context of a
massive spike in overall violence and a continually degrading security
environment in that country. Before the supporters of the
president's brutal, costly counterinsurgency strategy (referred to
without affection as "COINdinistas") get started this week, I want to
reiterate a
point I made a couple of months ago when the last round of silly,
disingenuous pro-counterinsurgency celebrations took place:

Selective Interpretation

COIN doctrine as interpreted by [COINdinistas] with the aid of the
stats [they] used asserts something like this: McChrystal and friends
reduce by 28 percent the number of civilians they kill, while the
Taliban increase the number they kill. The local population's animosity
builds toward the Taliban, triggering a shift in political support to
the U.S. and allies, a withdrawal of support for the Taliban and an
influx of intelligence to the counter-insurgents.

This interpretation, however, is a very academic exercise with major
blind spots as to the actual dynamic in Afghanistan and [and it's a
gross distortion of] the actual COIN doctrine described in the U.S.
Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual:

"Progress in building support for the [host nation]
government requires protecting the local populace. People who do now
believe they are secure from insurgent intimidation, coercion, and
reprisals will not risk overtly supporting COIN efforts. The populace
decides when it feels secure enough to support COIN efforts. (p. 179)"

"During any period of instability, people's primary interest is
physical security for themselves and their families. When [host nation]
forces fail to provide security or threaten the security of civilians,
the population is likely to seek security guarantees from insurgents,
militias, or other armed groups. This situation can feed support for an
insurgency. (p 98)"

"Counterinsurgents should not expect people to willingly provide
information if insurgents have the ability to violently intimidate
sources. (p. 120)"

Here's
Stanley McChrystal explicitly stating that COIN doctrine requires you
to protect the population from the insurgents.

Note that all of these statements deal with the importance not just
of the protection of civilians from killings by counterinsurgents, but the
protection of the people in general. Counterinsurgency doctrine
says that people aren't going to switch to your side if they think
they'll get killed for it, no matter how low you drop the rate at which
you cause civilian deaths. In other words, a drop in casualties caused
by U.S. and allied groups is not sufficient for the hoped-for dynamic
to take hold, according to COIN doctrine. It must be paired with an
increase in security from insurgent violence as well.

...

So, even if ... McChrystal and Co. were killing fewer civilians,
they still hadn't managed to increase security for civilians in
Afghanistan as measured by the total civilian deaths caused by the
parties to the conflict. ...Even if McChrystal proved he could drive
down civilian casualties when he puts his mind to it, he's also managed
to prove over the last year that he can't protect the population.

People who claim to actually believe in the efficacy of and the
necessity for actual counterinsurgency in Afghanistan need to start
screaming, right now, about what's going on in Afghanistan under General
McChrystal because their credibility is now unambiguously on the line.
...The problem is, though, that an honest reading of counterinsurgency
doctrine should have indicated that the system was already blinking red
in 2009, but for whatever reason people continued to sing the praises of
Saint Stanley McChrystal and took up gross distortions of COIN doctrine
to do so. Numerous prerequisites for success as articulated by COIN
doctrine remained absent and/or further degraded over 2009, including
host nation government legitimacy and security for the local population,
yet many writers focused on one particular statistic
(casualties caused by pro-government forces) because it let them tell
the story they wanted to tell.

If you see a person crowing about how the new U.N. reports shows
the "strategy is working" and we're on our way to victory, know that
you're looking at a disingenuous snake-oil salesman who's hoping you
can't read.

Nothing to See Here, Folks: Covering Up a Massacre in Afghanistan

By Derrick Crowe

�I want to ask: What does apology mean? We apologize for our mistakes and repeat our mistakes again? What meaning does this have?� --Sayid Mohammed Mal, Vice Chancellor, Gardez University.

Please sign Rethink Afghanistan�s petition calling for an independent, U.N.-led investigation into what happened at Gardez and who tried to cover it up.

The video above shows a survivor of a brutal, botched special forces raid on February 12, 2010, in which U.S. and allied forces killed 5 civilians, including local Afghan officials and pregnant women. If that were the extent of the bad conduct in this incident, it would be devastating enough. Unfortunately, personnel under McChrystal�s command compounded the outrage by tampering with evidence at the scene and then attempted a propaganda job and cover-up of the massacre, which has now blown up in their faces.

Initially, ISAF claimed that "insurgents" �engaged the joint force in a fire fight and were killed.� The release states the special forces then made a �gruesome discovery,� finding �the bodies of three women who had been tied up, gagged and killed� and that the bodies had been �hidden.� They also claim that the �joint force immediately secured the area and requested expert medical support and will conduct a joint forensic investigation.�

Almost every piece of this initial description of the chain of events was later proved to be a lie.

Faced with the persistent, professional reporting of The Times� (UK) Jerome Starkey, multiple witness accounts of the incident and the results of an Afghan investigation, McChrystal�s personnel finally admitted responsibility in an April 4 press release. ISAF wants to pass off their initial lies about the incident as the unfortunate result of �cultural misunderstandings� and �poor wording.� McChrystal has ordered a new investigation, but his personnel�s recent behavior shows exactly why they cannot be trusted to investigate themselves.

Please sign Rethink Afghanistan�s petition calling for an independent, U.N. investigation into what happened and who tried to cover it up.

ISAF�s �aw, shucks� explanation ignores the fact that the original release described a non-existent fire fight and claimed that coalition forces discovered the long-dead bodies of the women hidden in a room when they were, in fact, killed during the raid by U.S. and allied forces. By admitting to killing the women, McChrystal�s forces have implicitly admitted to conveying multiple flat-out lies to the public. Their inadequate explanation and subsequent deletion of the original offending press releases represent a transparent attempt to extricate themselves from a failing web of propaganda intended to shield the personnel involved from accountability without properly acknowledging their role in deceiving the Afghan and American publics.

This brings us back to Sayid�s question above. �What does apology mean? We apologize for our mistakes and repeat our mistakes again?� ISAF apologized to his family, only to turn around on April 19 and do this:

A NATO military convoy in eastern Afghanistan shot to death four unarmed civilians in a vehicle early Monday evening, including a police officer and a 12-year-old student, Afghan officials said Tuesday.

The killings in Khost Province, near the border with Pakistan, led to a dispute almost immediately between local Afghan leaders and NATO officials.

...

NATO described the dead as two insurgents and their �associates.�

ISAF's story didn't hold for long, though:

NATO's acknowledgment Wednesday that the unarmed young men shot to death two days earlier in Khost province were not "known insurgents," as previously alleged, has prompted another military apology and fueled anger over civilian casualties.

...NATO officials said that fingerprints of two of the men killed in Khost had shown up in an insurgent biometric database but that they later decided the data might not be relevant.

ISAF/NATO forces shoot up a vehicle full of people after claiming they thought it was a threat to them. They then examine the bodies in the car and find no weapons. Then, they check their fingerprints to find out if they were in the insurgent database. Now, why in the world, after you�ve discovered the vehicle and the men and children you just shot posed no threat, would you then think about running a biometric test on their bodies to see if they were in a database of �known insurgents?� Are we thinking maybe we can find something to help cover our behinds, perhaps?

Sound familiar? ISAF excuses their killing of a local official and a child with an initial, immediate claim that the victims were insurgents. After a dispute with locals, ISAF has to admit that they weren�t, in fact, insurgents. See a pattern? If not, maybe you should take a look at the statements of one Col. Greg Julian regarding an airstrike in Farah last year that killed more than 100 people.

What does it mean for McChrystal�s people to apologize for killing innocent people and lying about it, only to have them turn around and keep repeating the same behavior? Why should we be moved or lend credulity to such apologies?

McChrystal has ordered another investigation of the incident in Gardez that killed Sayif�s family members, but ISAF�s behavior over the past months makes them the least credible investigators possible, especially when ISAF forces have been accused with tampering with the evidence in the first place. Please take a moment to sign Rethink Afghanistan�s petition for an independent, U.N.-led investigation.

We deserve the truth, not more spin.

NATO Tries to Silence a Truth-Teller in Afghanistan After Killing Pregnant Women

By Derrick Crowe

Q: Why would U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan go out of their way to smear a journalist?

A: Because he told the truth about a night raid that killed Afghan civilians, including pregnant women.

Last week, I spoke with Afghanistan-based journalist Jerome Starkey about his reporting on special forces raids that killed civilians and NATOs surprising--and disappointing--response. This video contains disturbing images, and an even more disturbing story of violence, and an attempt to silence a truth-teller. It shows why its absolutely essential that we keep pushing back against the Pentagon's message machine.

Over the past few months, Starkey exposed two incidents where NATO initially claimed to have engaged and killed insurgents, when they'd in fact killed civilians, including school children and pregnant women. In both cases, when confronted with eye-witness accounts obtained by Starkey that clearly rebutted NATO's initial claims, NATO resisted publicly recanting.

In the first case, NATO officials told him they no longer believed that the raid would have been justified if they'd known what they now know, but no official would consent to direct attribution for this admission.

In the second case, NATO's initially made sensational claims that they'd discovered during the raid the bodies of pregnant women that had been bound, gagged and executed. Starkey's reporting forcefully rebutted this claim. Instead of simply retracting their story, NATO went so far as to attempt to damage Starkey's credibility by telling other Kabul-based journalists that they had proof he'd misquoted ISAF spokesman Rear Adm. Greg Smith. When Starkey demanded a copy of the recording, NATO initially ignored him and eventually admitted that no recording existed. NATO only admitted their story was false in a retraction buried several paragraphs deep in a press release that led with an attack on Starkey's credibility.

Under Gen. Stanley McChrystal, NATO's made a big show of apologizing early and often when civilians are killed in broad daylight. But Starkey's reporting and ISAF's reaction to it shows that their natural inclination to escape accountability remains strong and operative when they think they can get away with violent mistakes under the cover of darkness.

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33 Civilians Killed by NATO Airstrike in Afghanistan

By Derrick Crowe

On Sunday, NATO forces in Uruzgan province in Afghanistan killed more than thirty civilians, including women and children, when an airstrike was ordered on three minivans.

According to the AP story on the incident:

"'This creates an opportunity for the Taliban to use this against the Afghan government and the Americans,' said Mohammed Hashim Watanwal, a lawmaker from southern Uruzgan province, where the strike took place. 'NATO has said that it will take care to avoid civilian casualties, but they don't follow through.'"

Among the dead were a 3-year-old boy and a 9-year-old girl.

But at least we said we're sorry. I know an "aw, shucks" statement would calm my rage if those had been my kids. Yup. Like a charm.

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