Pakistan influence on Taliban commanders helped Afghan breakthrough

[Doktor]

NATO training and equipment, however, are new ;)

[Agnostic Muslim]

And Pakistan can do shit all to stop it!

Why would Pakistan want to stop the negotiations - Pakistan has been calling on the US and Taliban to negotiate for years now.

[Agnostic Muslim]

NATO training and equipment, however, are new ;)

Mostly small arms and the training means nothing without a cohesive ANA.

Heck, the US is scrapping its MRAP's because they consider them 'too complicated to be maintained by the ANA'.

[Doktor]

Actually US is considering giving away MRAPs and other equipment to "allies", among other things.

Cohesive ANA? How cohesive was NA? Backing wont stop.

[Agnostic Muslim]

If the Pakistanis/Taliban can't get through Karzai, who actually belongs to the reconciliatory camp ...

As the Guardian article and some op-eds posted previously indicate, Karzai's motivations and commitment to 'reconciliation' are suspect. If the allegations that he is trying to maneuver his loyalists into taking power in the next elections are correct, then any kind of broad based reconciliation with the Taliban involving their participation in the coming elections would undermine his own position, which in turn would imply that Karzai has little interest in any sort of 'peace deal' with the Taliban before the next Afghan elections.

[Agnostic Muslim]

Actually US is considering giving away MRAPs and other equipment to "allies", among other things.

Cohesive ANA? How cohesive was NA? Backing wont stop.

The reports I have read indicate that even Pakistan is not too keen on obtaining used US MRAP's because of the high maintenance and operating costs, and that the US has already started scrapping them. Other equipment might be provided to 'US allies' in the region.

The NA was also beaten back significantly by the Taliban - at best there will be a stalemate in case of another Afghan civil war, with the Taliban holding on to most of the Pashtun provinces and the NA controlling most of the non-Pashtun provinces, hardly the scenario OoE is alluding to with his comments about 'an end to NATO ROE's'.

[Blademaster]

Actually, our only concern were that you don't nuke each other.

And you keep falling for this stupid trick every time Pakistan starts unilaterally threatening India with nukes when India responds with conventional means. That is no excuse.

[Officer of Engineers]

And you keep falling for this stupid trick every time Pakistan starts unilaterally threatening India with nukes when India responds with conventional means. That is no excuse.

Don't think we ever threatened India with nuclear retalliation if she nuked Pakistan.

[antimony]

Taliban attack NATO supplier's compound, kill 7 | ksl.com

Taliban attack NATO supplier's compound, kill 7

By Amir Shah, Associated Press

July 2nd, 2013 @ 9:52am

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - Taliban attackers set off a truck bomb early Tuesday and killed five security guards at a NATO supplier's compound in Kabul, the latest in a series of bold attacks on high profile targets in the Afghan capital.

The attacks have driven home that the Taliban have no intention of ending the violence, even though they have indicated they are willing to talk peace and have opened an office in Qatar for that purpose.

Well, I really don't know what to say.

I would have expected some sort of ceasefire during the peace talks, guess that is too much to ask, especially when this asshole says this

"This (attack) has no link to the peace process," Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid told The Associated Press in a telephone call. Attacks "will continue all over the country occupied by the foreigners," he said.

OOE,

If the Taliban are in a bind as you say and if they continue to be dicks like this, why does the USA even bothers? Just let the ANA off the leash

[Agnostic Muslim]

Taliban attack NATO supplier's compound, kill 7 | ksl.com



Well, I really don't know what to say.

I would have expected some sort of ceasefire during the peace talks, guess that is too much to ask, especially when this asshole says this



OOE,

If the Taliban are in a bind as you say and if they continue to be dicks like this, why does the USA even bothers? Just let the ANA off the leash

Please see James Dobbins comments in his press conference in India on the subject of continued violence in Afghanistan while the 'talks' take place:

Ambassador Dobbins: You don’t hold peace talks after the war, you hold peace talks during wars. The Taliban haven’t asked us to stop fighting and we don’t expect them to stop fighting just because they’re talking. The objective of the talks obviously is a diminution of violence and ultimately an enduring peace, but we’re not naďve enough to think that’s going to come quickly and it’s certainly not a precondition for just talking.

Frankly, I anticipate that the Taliban will continue to try to negotiate from a position of strength. They’ll continue to mount attacks as will we and as will the Afghan government. The attacks that the Taliban have mounted over the past several months have been fairly severe and they’ve almost all failed. The Afghan armed forces are now taking the lead in combat operations. We’re no longer leading in combat. They are increasingly reliant on their own resources. And they’re performing well.

But I don’t think that’s going to lead to an immediate diminution in violence. I think the Taliban probably want to continue to put pressure on. They want to continue to make it look like the United States is retreating as a result of that pressure rather than as a result of its success in building a viable Afghan capacity for self-defense. And NATO, the United States, and in particular the Afghan Security Forces are going to continue not just to defend themselves, but to mount offensive operations against the Taliban, and not only seek to hold territory but to reclaim territory.

So I don’t anticipate that the beginning of negotiations will end the war. I do hope that negotiations will ultimately contribute to an end to the war. But that’s by no means certain. It’s simply something that’s worth trying.

Press Conference in New Delhi

[anil]

If the Taliban are in a bind as you say and if they continue to be dicks like this, why does the USA even bothers? Just let the ANA off the leash

Because the pashtuns won't give up. Afghanistan is their land and the taliban movement is a patriotic pursuit. The uzbeks, tajiks, hazaras are on pashtun territory.

The taliban movement cannot be defeated. So the americans want them on the negotiating table so that they can extract a kind of guarantee out of them to prevent global jihadi groups from plotting attacks on the western world, in return for some kind of withdrawal or the US looking the other way as they did before 9/11. The paks want the taliban to dominate in afg because it restricts india from afg.

The ethnic warfare is afg will never end. The north always invades the south.

[antimony]

Please see James Dobbins comments in his press conference in India on the subject of continued violence in Afghanistan while the 'talks' take place:

Let's not be fallacious here, if you going to use a diplomat's (whose job is to keep feathers unruffled) words and view as gospel truth, then I really do not know what to say to you.

You know as well as I do that in most if not all cases there is an official or unofficial ceasefire or truce while talks progress. There was one between India and Pakistan earlier this year.

[Tronic]

As the Guardian article and some op-eds posted previously indicate, Karzai's motivations and commitment to 'reconciliation' are suspect. If the allegations that he is trying to maneuver his loyalists into taking power in the next elections are correct, then any kind of broad based reconciliation with the Taliban involving their participation in the coming elections would undermine his own position, which in turn would imply that Karzai has little interest in any sort of 'peace deal' with the Taliban before the next Afghan elections.

It doesn't end with just Karzai and the Taliban. You need to take one look at the men sitting opposite Karzai. I'm willing to place my bets that if Karzai pulls something similar to the last elections, it's going to be lights out for him, and it's not the Taliban he needs to worry about. Karzai is looking at the Taliban to bail him out... He's only peeved because he's being sidelined in the talks, where he crucially needs to be seen as the one pulling the shots if he wants to survive.

Either way, Karzai won't last long, and the men likely to be replacing him have a bloodlust for the Taliban.

[Tronic]

If they're getting desperate then why has it taken this long ? Who has been running after who ?

Bear in mind the Taliban do not want to talk to Karzai until ISAF leave.

Who is the more desperate of the two here btw ?

It's a toss between Karzai and the Taliban. Both want to talk sitting in a higher position, and both know they need to reconcile if they are to survive the onslaught the opposition will bring against them both, politically and militarily.

[Firestorm]

Stupidity knows no bounds. They could have left this equipment for the ANA.

'Pakistan to get first call on US military leftovers in Afghanistan'

Washington believes it is obligated to Islamabad for bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table at Qatar, for discussions aimed at reducing violence in Afghanistan, which would smoothen the American troop drawdown this year and the next.

An earlier report in The Washington Post had estimated that the US military would leave behind some $7 billion worth of defence equipment, one-fifth of what is deployed in Afghanistan. US military officials tell Business Standard that aircraft, heavy weapons, vehicles and equipment are likely to be repatriated to the US. Much of what Pakistan will benefit from will be ammunition, vehicles, construction material, air-conditioners, etc.

Much more could be left behind if the situation deteriorates; Taliban resistance would determine what could feasibly be transported. Sceptics in New Delhi point out that Pakistan controls the spigot of violence.

Who's willing to bet at least a portion of this equipment will magically appear in the hands of the Taliban?

And what's this business about NATO ROE's somehow reigning in the ANA and "letting the ANA off the leash after the US leaves"? What is the ANA going to do that NATO couldn't or wouldn't? Burn villages? Kill civilians? Take the fight into Pakistan? More likely that they are going to be overwhelmed by the Taliban after the US troops leave. These peace talks are simply a tactic to quicken the US exit. The NA couldn't defeat the taliban till they got US airpower (and eventually, troops). Before that they were on the defensive and their most important commander was assassinated by suicide bombers. There were no ROE's reigning them in back then. The ANA is unlikely to be any more effective.