Again And Again And Again – Securing Barge-e Matal

September 27, 2011

A combined military operation between Afghan National Security Forces and International Security Assistance Forces, launched July 12, secured Barge Matal, in eastern Nuristan province.
July 13, 2009

Senior military officials had hoped to be out of Barge Matal in about a week, but the deployment has stretched on for more than two months as U.S. and Afghan forces have battled Taliban insurgents.
September 21, 2009

The militants held the district center for a few days, but by early Tuesday it was again occupied by the Afghan commandos and the Americans, said Col. Shirzad, deputy chief for criminal investigations for Barg-e-Matal.
June 1, 2010

On July 25, Afghan commandos retook control of the Barg-e-Matal district center from the Taliban; just the day before, the Taliban had overrun the district center following a two-week-long siege.
…
Control of Barge-e-Matal has shifted back and forth between the Afghan government and the Taliban four times since the end of June.
July 25, 2010

Soldiers from 1st and 2nd Commando Kandaks and Special Operations Task Force – East made significant gains in the formerly insurgent-held Konar River Valley, Barg-e Matal district, Nuristan province, during a three-day combined clearing operation May 1-3.
May 4, 2011

Commandos killed an estimated 70 insurgents during clearing operations in Pol-e Rostam and Alwagal villages, Barg-e Matal district, Sept. 16.
…
The Commandos and coalition SOF team secured the district center after the operation.
September 17, 2011

To me this is a sign of insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Why not try something new like leaving the town alone?

Posted by b on September 27, 2011 at 10:51 UTC | Permalink

Comments

I guess even after all of these campaigns and surges, they still haven’t completely destroyed the town yet. They won’t have saved it until they’ve destroyed it, so they can’t stop yet.

Posted by: Maxcrat | Sep 27 2011 12:02 utc | 1

Well, they have to make it look like they’re doing something, and that their presence is needed. You cannot judge success in these endeavors by traditional benchmark measures. If contained chaos is acceptable, then what we see transpiring in this case, and many more such cases, makes more sense. The thinking is “it’s our chaos and that trumps someone else’s Order or someone else’s Contained Chaos. Soldiers and Civilians alike are mere pawns in this chess game strategy.

Posted by: Morocco Bama | Sep 27 2011 12:13 utc | 2

Not even the military can avoid the import of the repeated lessons of decades in the field. These “mistakes” are not actually mistakes, they are deliberate tactics to stimulate further excuses for killing poeple, for buying more guns and ammo (and less butter), for enriching the already rich, empowering the already powerful, and suppressing everyone else.
Anyone who is still swallowing the idea that this is a case of mistakes or of an inability to learn from past mistakes, is seriously deluded. This is a long-running strategy.

Posted by: ScuzzaMan | Sep 27 2011 13:38 utc | 3

” Soldiers and Civilians alike are mere pawns in this chess game strategy.”
And so it goes in Pipelineistan $ elsewhere. Discusting.

Posted by: ben | Sep 27 2011 14:04 utc | 4

It’s easy to forget that the “official” (media) version of Yankee fake wars is mostly stuff made up by non-combatant back-room PR spin doctors in Washington. It’s very boring work and sometimes they probably forget that they’ve already made up something about a particular town or village, and do it again.
On the other hand, I thought it was common knowledge that protection of the Yankee circle-the-wagons (base & bunker) strategy absorbs circa 90% of ALL personnel deployed in the war zone. The result is that there aren’t many active-duty feet on the ground combat personnel and they don’t actually DO much at all – except the occasional patrol and a bit of terrorising of the inhabitants of small rural villages.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Sep 27 2011 15:31 utc | 5

It has always been complete madness.
As this here is b.’s moon of alabama place I recommend “Mother
Courage” learning that it is a certain type of people who always loose in a war.

Posted by: somebody | Sep 27 2011 18:32 utc | 6

@ 6.
Too true.
Lying and bullying are the classic hallmarks of cowardice.
If you’re ever in two minds about what the Yankee’s next move might be, just ask yourself “What would a coward do?”
And you’ll never be very far off the mark.
They’re the perfect partners-in-crime for the ‘heroic’ Israelis.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Sep 28 2011 2:53 utc | 7

“Why not try something new like leaving the town alone?”
Every time they do, it’s retaken by the Taliban. In a NUT shell, a classic case of not having enough (by a long shot) troops to do what they’re supposedly trying to do, like, clear and HOLD. So in that respect, they surely are “insane” for expecting a different result – like the Taliban won’t come back and re-take the area if we are off to re-take another area. Unless of course, other agenda’s are at work.
Certainty, all parties involved must be very aware of how all this works – as the situation appears to have reached a kind of perfect symmetry and balance, whereby there are just enough troops/resources to do the clearing (which is what the military really only wants to do anyway) but not enough to hold any given area, yet always generating enough “hope” to keep the whole thing funded – against the Taliban who are practicing their own “just enough” losses to gains ledger to be an effective counterbalance to the occupation’s ability to finalize any gains, while also minimizing losses. And at the same time sucking funds from the geo-political allies, sympathetic cultural sources, and even the occupation itself through protection (supply lines) money.
This is probably why no one ever “wins” in Afghanistan and is famous for being the graveyard of empires, firstly, because there is actually nothing tangible (like oil) to win, secondly because no one is willing to expend the necessary resources to “tame” the ingeniousness/tribal population without any net gain to exploit and then constantly secure, and thirdly only a war can put its geo-strategic potentials (or wishes) into play as a desirable option – especially attractive to the empire minded.

Posted by: anna missed | Sep 29 2011 8:55 utc | 8

@anna missed – the folks from the Afghanistan NGO Safety Office called the situation a “perpetual escalating stalemate”. Quite fitting to my view as weapon type and use always seem to increase.

Posted by: b | Sep 29 2011 17:33 utc | 9

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