Remember the combat outpost attacked a few days ago, and almost overrun?
It looks like we’ve been pushed out of that district in Nuristan, because US and Afghan troops are pulling out. Carlotta Gall of the NYTimes (*heart!*) mentions this in the above-linked story:
“The American and Afghan army soldiers had moved into the base at Wanat just days before, after abandoning another base higher up a side valley where they had come under repeated attack from insurgents.”
I’m not exactly clear who is behind this attack, but it shows a lot of sophistication — sneaking up under cover of darkness, striking isolated parts of the base, and especially, clearing out the villagers before the attack. As Gall points out, this was why no locals were killed in the battle, although parts of the village of Wanat must look a bit like Falujah, or Lashkar Gah a few years ago before the Royal Marines pulled out. Ghosts of Alexander has a very timely post on the importance of Nuristan in the guerrillas’ strategy, mirroring comments from the recently-deposed governor of Nuristan in Gall’s article that the area was a logistics highway for insurgents.
I’d bet good money that our establishment of this Combat Outpost in Wanat was an attempt to strike at those logistics, and the insurgents recognized this, and put their best people on the job.
So where does that leave “the grand narrative” — i.e. what the heck is going on?
Well, we’re pulling out, and theoretically the elders of Wanat (and presumably the district) are still with us, according to the local police chief. (incidentally, he was also airlifted out, along with the garrison). We’ll continue to patrol the area, says the ISAF spokesman quoted by the BBC piece, but we’ll have no permanent presence. We’ll still be a part of the local political landscape, but we’ll pretty much be on the sidelines.
This could be a good thing, if we soon return in larger numbers (is that really possible here? what other parts of Afghanistan would be stripped of troops?). This way, we don’t wind up in the same situation as the British “Platoon House” in Lashkar Gah, in Helmand did, where weekly clashes keep us pinned down in the fort, level the village, and we become an intolerable presence to the locals. We’ll be saving political capital, so to speak.
US commanders are probably taking solace in the elders’ support, if the local ANP chief’s desperate-sounding protestations are a clue. We might build on this when we come back, they’re thinking. One problem, though, as Giustozzi points out, is that a) local leadership has been seriously gutted by the last 20 years of fighting, b) village mullahs are just as influential, if not more so, and c) these mullahs are frequently the pillars of support for the Taliban. I haven’t heard one way or the other who is behind the attack, but it’s a good thing to keep in mind.
(If you’re interested in Afghanistan and haven’t read his book, don’t come back until you have. He’s kind of this war’s Tom Ricks)
So, we’ll see. We’re on our back foot in Nuristan right now…
Update: Josh Foust, at Registan, has this to add, confirming my suspicions about Salafi village mullahs, and adds some background info about the US presence in Nuristan.
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