David Kilcullen

Wednesday

David Kilcullen

For answers to the Afghan-Pakistan conflict, ask: what would Curzon do?

David Kilcullen, the influential counter-insurgency strategist, seeks inspiration in Curzon’s experience as Viceroy of India to assess what Pakistan must do to deal with the extremist threat — and how Nato can help drive the ‘steamroller’ Britain’s eyes this week are on southern Afghanistan. US Marines have doubled Coalition troop numbers in Helmand and are moving to clear Taleban base areas as part of Operation Khanjar. A major British offensive is also underway: Operation Panchai Palang, an effort to extend Coalition control along the Helmand River valley, one month ahead of the Afghan presidential elections currently scheduled for 20 August.

Wednesday

David Kilcullen

If we lose hearts and minds, we will lose the war

Sir Olaf Caroe — a legendary figure of the Raj, ethnographer of the Pashtuns and last administrator of the North-West Frontier of British India — wrote in 1958 that ‘unlike other wars, Afghan wars become serious only when they are over; in British times at least they were apt to produce an after-crop of tribal unrest [and] constant intrigue among the border tribes.’ Western leaders would have been wise to consider his words after the ‘stunning defeat’ of the Taleban, whose ramshackle theocratic tyranny crumbled in less than ten weeks’ fighting after 9/11. On 7 December 2001, as the last Taleban stronghold fell at Kandahar, only 110 CIA and a few hundred Special Forces officers were inside Afghanistan.