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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| US training Pakistanis to head into North Waziristan |
| 2005-04-27 |
| Americans have been training Pakistanis in night flying and airborne assault tactics to combat foreign and local fighters in the tribal areas of Pakistan near the Afghan border, the United States commander here, Lt. Gen. David W. Barno, said Tuesday in an interview. It is the first time the American military has acknowledged the training. The presence of American troops in Pakistan is regarded as extremely delicate. General Barno said he had visited the Special Services Group headquarters at Cherat, near the Pakistani city of Peshawar, on Saturday and watched a display by the units trained by the Americans in their new Bell 4 helicopters. Pakistan's chief military spokesman, Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan, said there were no American military trainers at Cherat and that General Barno had probably been referring to joint military exercises between the two countries. "The Pakistan Army has been training with many countries of the world," General Sultan said in a telephone interview. "We have also been conducting joint military training with the U.S. Army many a time earlier. They benefit from each other's experience. They learn from each other. That's what has been happening, and nothing else." The comments came as the Pakistani Army is gearing up to go into what is considered one of the last redoubts of Al Qaeda and foreign fighters, the tribal area of North Waziristan near the border with Afghanistan. Last year the Pakistani military moved against foreign militants in South Waziristan, killing some 300 fighters and losing about the same number of their own soldiers. The remnants of the foreign and local militants made their way into North Waziristan. According to some reports, the Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden, and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri may also be in the region. "They are working this hard," General Barno said of the Pakistani military. "It's too early to say that there is a new offensive, and I don't know what direction this is going to take, but there is no question, from the vice chief of the Army staff down, that they very much intend to determine how to best get at the enemy." General Barno, who leaves next month after 18 months in Afghanistan, said Pakistan had successfully disrupted militants financed by Al Qaeda in South Waziristan. He predicted that the Taliban would suffer a major schism in coming months and expected many, including some senior commanders, to join a government reconciliation program and give up their insurgency, leaving only a small hard core still fighting. Part of that core, a network loyal to the former Taliban commander Jalaluddin Haqqani, is in North Waziristan and continues to attack American troops across the border in Afghanistan, the general said. "They are still working to some degree at the behest of Al Qaeda and are financed by Al Qaeda to run operations here to disrupt activities here in Afghanistan," he said, "and they operate on both sides of the border." Foreign fighters were among them, he added, and some Arabs who were largely in the background providing money. The fighters have shown an ability to adapt and have shifted to new areas, using the winter to regroup, reorganize and re-equip, and were conducting some training "very quietly," the general said. "If you were to look back five years ago, you would see large training camps and a large footprint," he said. "And now it's more very, very small groups - of three or four or five. They spend a short time getting some training here and then maybe move to get some training somewhere else. "It's very difficult to be able to pinpoint this activity even going on, much less to get and find it, disrupt it and capture or kill these guys." A coordinated string of attacks along the border on March 22, the day the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, was making a state visit to Pakistan, was a sign that the insurgents were capable of a large operation. General Barno said he had seen fighters who were well equipped, with rations and with weapons and radios in good condition. "There's clearly a flow of funding that comes through the Al Qaeda network," he said. "It probably ebbs and flows a bit, but there's funding out there." |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #4 "Avon calling..." |
| Posted by: Elmoting Chonter5318 2005-04-27 8:27:57 PM |
| #3 Even if we were to teach them everything, it takes a certain worldview as well as the physical skills to develop into a Western/American style Army unit. I would love to hear from Rantburg's experts on this, but I would expect the units' abilities to deteriorate fairly rapidly once our guys stop pushing them. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2005-04-27 11:59:03 AM |
| #2 Agreed - never show 'em your full hand. |
| Posted by: Raj 2005-04-27 10:02:12 AM |
| #1 I don't feel comfortable training people to do what we do best, when they could very easily become our enemy with a well placed bullet in Musharev's head. I hope we aren't teaching them everything. |
| Posted by: plainslow 2005-04-27 9:28:32 AM |