Foreign Policy Blogs

Afghan Rodeo

Quick little round up…

McKiernan officially out, McChrystal officially in as the top US and overall commander of forces in Afghanistan.  McChrystal, known for his special ops strategic strikes in Iraq, has been hammering the point that protecting Afghan civilians is what will bring a change in the conflict’s direction.  He is already reviewing troop placement with this idea in mind.

In accordance with the growing Americanization of Afghan conflict (that’s what tens of thousands of troops added on one side with barely nothing from the other side will do) NATO ministers have acquiesced to new command structure with the US clearly taking a dominant role.  The most interesting aspect of the change is the separation of military and training operations.

The Afghan Presidential election is off to the races (Karzai opens at a 100-1 favorite).

The FPA has had some interesting pieces regarding Afghanistan as well:

Daniel Markey’s ‘From AfPak to PakAf: A Response to the New U.S. Strategy for South Asia

The PBS one hour special ‘Afghanistan and the War on Terror

David Anderson takes a three religion approach to analyzing ‘Radical Islam