Campaign In Afghanistan Research Articles

Anorectal injury in pelvic blast

The signature injury of the Afghanistan campaign has, amongst other things, included an increased incidence of destructive anorectal injury. There is no significant body of evidence about this type of...

Book Reviews

87 Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies Vol. XXXVI, No.4, Summer 2013 Book Reviews Edited by Nadia Barsoum South Asia, China Turkey and the Middle East ROUTES AND REALMS: The Power of Place in the Early Islamic World by Zayde Antrim, published by Oxford University Press 2012, pp. 212. This volume explores the ways in which Muslims expressed attachment to land from the ninth through the eleventh centuries. The author challenges a widespread tendency to underestimate the importance of territory and to over-emphasize the importance of religion and family to notions of community and belonging among Muslims and Arabs, both in the past and today. FROM KABUL TO BAGHDAD AND BACK: The U.S. at War in Afghanistan and Iraq by John R Ballard, David W. Lamm and John K. Wood, published by the Naval Institute Press, Annapolis MD, 2012, pp. 367. This volume compares and contrasts the two very different campaigns from a national strategic perspective, measuring the impact of fighting the Iraq War on the success of the United States campaign in Afghanistan, the counterinsurgency campaign styles unique to each conflict , and the leadership of Senior American officials in both theater of war. Standing at the intersection of military necessity and political intrigue, the authors analyze the early achievements of the US in Afghanistan highlighting the most important elements of successful 2001 campaign to oust the Taliban. FALLUJAH AWAKENS: Marines Sheikhs, and the Battle against Al Qaeda by Bill Ardolino, published by the Naval Institute Press, Annapolis MD, 2012, pp. 290. The author recounts events from both American and Iraqi perspectives, he tells the story of the remarkable turnaround that began to take place in 2006-2007, Ardolino explains how local tribal leaders and U.S. Marines forged a surprise alliance that helped secure the famous battleground. Circumstances combined with smart leadership enabled marines to build relationships with members of a Sunni tribe. 88 EVOLVING IRAN: An Introduction to Politics and Problems in the Islamic Republic by Barbara Ann Rieffer-Flanagan, published by Georgetown University Press, Washington DC, 2013, pp. 259. This volume presents an overview of Iran since the Islamic revolution, state, society , economy and polity. Flanagan analyses the domestic politics and the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic, while the analysis is solid the prose is accessible and free of cumbersome jargon, it serves as a corrective to the mainstream media’s often superficial and sensationalist accounts of Iran. IMPOSSIBLE CITIZENS: Dubai’s Indian Diaspora by Neha Vora, published by Duke University Press 201, pp.234. Vora research in Dubai’s Indian-dominates to downtown to explore how Indians live suspended in a state of permanent temporariness. While their legal status defines them as perpetual outsiders, Indians are integral to the Emirati nation-state and its economy. Indians—even those who have established thriving diasporic neighborhoods in the Emirate—disavow any interest in formally belonging to Dubai and instead consider India their home. PUBLIC POLICY AND POLITICS IN INDIA: How Institutions Matter by Kuldeep Mathur, published by Oxford University Press 2013, pp. 295. Mathur addresses the wider scenario of policy making in India, as well as specific policy. This volume covers issues such as environment, education, Parliament, liberalization, and governance. The overall analysis shows that the process of policymaking is inherently political and complex . The volume aims not only to provoke a debate but also to encourage more systematic studies in the area. AFGHAN ENDGAMES: Strategy and Policy Choices for America’s Longest War edited by Hy Rothstein and John Arquilla published by Georgetown University Press, Washington DC. This volume brings together some of the finest minds in the fields of history, strategy, international relations, anthropology, ethics, and mass communications to assess the prospects for peace and security in Afghanistan and to debate what would best serve US interests. SOUTH EAST ASIA IN THE NEW INTERNATIONAL ERA by Robert Daley and Clark D. Neher published by Westview Press 2013, Boulder Co. 80301, sixth edition, pp. 346. The book explores both the diversity and the commonalities characterizing the nations of the region. It highlights the dramatic political events sweeping a dynamic region populated by more than 500 million people. It represents the greatest...

Cables from Kabul: the inside story of the West’s Afghanistan campaign

Cables from Kabul: the inside story of the West’s Afghanistan campaign

What Use Overwhelming Air Superiority? A Tale of Two Campaigns

Longer wars between mismatched opponents often end with the militarily weaker side showing unexpected strengths. This article tests this tendency in two short wars in which overwhelming force superiority was applied in massive air attacks. Operation Enduring Freedom (the 2001 American campaign in Afghanistan) and Operation Cast Lead (the 2008–2009 Israeli campaign in Gaza) both began with air offensives that shifted to air-supported ground combat, but Enduring Freedom (a Type A operation) gave priority to aerial attack, while in Cast Lead (Type B) air operations primarily paved the way for ground combat. Neither campaign was fully decisive, suggesting that the residual capabilities of weaker combatants apply to short as well as protracted hostilities. The Type A attack was decisive against the Taliban, but not against al Qaeda. The more intensive Type B case, Cast Lead, did not lead to greater decisiveness than its counterpart, with Israel emphasizing force demonstration to enhance deterrence of attack, yet not seeking to destroy Hamas's residual military capability. The problem of translating large military superiority into decisive war results is also evident recently in more common, stretched out, and restrained airpower use supporting higher-priority ground combat, as in NATO's 2011 intervention in Libya and the aerial drone campaign in Pakistan supporting NATO war making in Afghanistan.

The relation of headache and depression in veterans suffering traumatic brain injury (TBI) in the OEF/OIF campaigns in the Afghanistan and Iraq wars

The relation of headache and depression in veterans suffering traumatic brain injury (TBI) in the OEF/OIF campaigns in the Afghanistan and Iraq wars

British Muslims, British soldiers: Cultural citizenship in the new imperialism

The discursive positioning of Muslims as a ‘security threat’ or ‘enemy within’, in government policies and the media, has cast young Muslim men in particular as criminalized anti-citizens. Meanwhile, since the inception of the Afghanistan campaign, the soldier has become increasingly prominent as a figure of militarized citizenship in the public sphere. This article juxtaposes accounts from Pakistani Muslim youth in the West Midlands with those of soldiers and family members involved with the Hero Net online community, attending to the notion of cultural citizenship – namely, the everyday subjective experience of national belonging beyond its legal–political aspects. Our research suggests that, for both groups, mindful critique or dissent are central to the process through which individuals are brought into being in relation to the nation-state. However, we demonstrate that formations of cultural citizenship in Britain continue to be informed by the logics of race and orientalism. The article offers insights into how gendered and racialized formations of citizenship conjoin with imperialism and militarization.

WESTERN MILITARY CULTURE AND COUNTERINSURGENCY: AN AMBIGUOUS REALITY

Contemporary campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan once again have demonstrated that conventional armies experience many problems in adapting to counterinsurgency operations. This article seeks an explanation for those problems by exploring the conceptual background of both Western-style conventional armies and counterinsurgency. In essence, Western military culture is about fighting large-scale decisive battles with armies of other states. This contrasts strongly with counterinsurgency, which is about outbidding the insurgents for the favour of the people with a minimised use of force. The article analyses the further consequences of this conceptual clash between Western military culture and counterinsurgency in the reality of counterinsurgency warfare. It is explained that the contrast between both concepts leads to an ambiguous reality in which soldiers are aware of the specifics of counterinsurgency theory, but refer back to Western military culture for fighting counterinsurgency campaigns.

The Pattern of Paediatric Trauma on Operations

ObjectivesRecent military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan have resulted in the treatment of children in British Medical facilities. In order to determine how care for children may develop in the...

Counterinsurgency, Legitimacy, and the Rule of Law

Law features more prominently in warfare today than at any time in memory. Stories about the legality of detaining unlawful combatants or unprivileged belligerents in Guantanamo Bay appear in the headlines weekly. Questions of venue, a question usually considered one of the most technical questions in legal procedure, have reached the American popular consciousness in the form of debates over whether to try suspected terrorists in civilian courts or military commissions. The current set of conflicts may prove to be the most heavily litigated in human history. The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have witnessed an even greater expansion of law's role in war--law as a means of warfare. Much of the important front-line action in both theaters has been borne by teams of lawyers and development specialists. Both the military and US civilian development agencies have embraced these ostensibly legal activities--referred to generally as of law--for their contribution to our campaigns. For instance, in 2010, civilian and military rule of capabilities were dramatically expanded in Afghanistan with the appointment of Ambassador Hans Klemm as the Coordinating Director of Rule of Law and Law Enforcement at the US Embassy Afghanistan and the establishment of the Rule of Law Field Force-Afghanistan (ROLFF-A) to provide greater capability to conduct rule of operations in nonpermissive environments. The commitment to rule of as part of the Afghanistan campaign appears to be increasing, with the expansion of ROLFF-A into the multinational NATO Rule of Law Field Support Mission in the summer of 2011. Law's ascendance as a means of warfare is tied to the ascendance of counterinsurgency as a form of warfare. Counterinsurgency, as a contest between opposing groups to be recognized by a particular population as their legitimate government, places the host nation government's at the center of the conflict. the rule of law, then, is important to counterinsurgents because of its contribution to a government's legitimacy. The rule of features prominently in the growing stability operations doctrine as well. Not only are stability operations central to counterinsurgency, but the value of the rule of in providing stability goes beyond counterinsurgency to stability operations conducted in other contexts. (1) Although legitimacy is the main objective in counterinsurgency, the counterinsurgency and stability operations doctrines both lack a meaningful definition of and a model for how the rule of contributes to legitimacy. (2) Counterinsurgents are hardly the first to address the problem, though. Questions about how and operate together have long been studied in jurisprudence and social psychology. The two fields approach the question quite differently, but both offer insight into what means to counterinsurgents and how it can be integrated in a counterinsurgency campaign. Counterinsurgency, Rule of Law, and Legitimacy It would be hard to overstate the role of in counterinsurgency doctrine. The Counterinsurgency Field Manual mentions of law 30 times, including an entire section on Establishing the Rule of Law. (3) Given its importance in current operations, it is no surprise that the of law has received attention. As defined by the Army: Rule of is a principle under which all persons, institutions, and entities, public and private, including the state itself, are accountable to laws that are publicly promulgated, equally enforced, and independently adjudicated, and that are consistent with international human rights principles. It also requires measures to ensure adherence to the principles of supremacy of law, equality before the law, accountability to the law, fairness in applying the law, separation of powers, participation in decisionmaking, and legal certainty. …

Sherard Cowper-Coles: Cables from Kabul – The Inside Story of the West’s Afghanistan Campaign

Sherard Cowper-Coles: Cables from Kabul – The Inside Story of the West’s Afghanistan Campaign

How Afghanistan has Strengthened NATO

Despite the doom and gloom about the Afghanistan campaign, in political and military terms NATO may yet emerge as a leaner and more effective organisation.

Book Review: Premediation: Affect and Mediality after 9/11 Richard Grusin Palgrave Macmillan, 2010 Iisbn 978-0-23-024252-4

Premediation: Affect and Mediality After 9/11 is primarily an account of the American media experience of the 2001 terrorist attacks and the subsequent military campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. Richard Grusin situates his analysis in the United States sociopolitical context during the Bush administration years. The book begins by precisely analyzing the different ways in which the significance of this media event has been elaborated, taking on arguments from Baudrillard, Zizek, and David Simpson. The main criticism Grusin raises against these accounts is that by focusing on the event's spectacular dimension and its derealization effects they exclude 'the materiality or agency of mediation' (19), as well as its historic specificity

Consensus Statement on Decision Making in Junctional Trauma Care

Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) cause 60% of all UK fatalities in the current campaign in Afghanistan. Shorter evacuation timelines now deliver patients at the edge of the physiological envelope of...

Secret Government

Secret Government Abraham R. Wagner (bio) William O. Walker III . National Security and Core Values in American History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009. xiv + 351 pp. Select bibliography, notes and index. $90 (cloth); $24.99 (paper). Christopher H. Pyle . Getting Away with Torture: Secret Government, War Crimes, and the Rule of Law. Washington: Potomac Books. xiii + 403 pp. Notes and index. $29.95. Harold H. Bruff . Bad Advice: Bush's Lawyers in the War on Terror. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2009. 403 pp. Notes, bibliography, and index. $34.95. Abuse of executive power and government secrecy has been a recurring theme for much of American history. The Founders spent considerable time debating a more viable plan for democratic government, and the first years of the Republic were characterized by a series of weak presidents presiding over a very small federal government, which faced issues that grew increasingly grave with the Civil War and afterwards. Following the 9/11 attacks, the nation embarked on military campaigns in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere, as well as a "Global War on Terror," attempting to deal with threats both at home and abroad, some real and others largely imagined. The George W. Bush administration undertook several secret operations to obtain information considered vital to national security. For all its efforts to run a secret government, however, most operations came into public view with astounding speed and were subject to investigation and scholarly inquiry. Much of what is done for national security is necessarily secret, as disclosure threatens sources, methods, and the success of operations. Too often these protections have been used to avoid legitimate oversight and run roughshod over the Constitution. President Bush's efforts to run a secret government failed quickly, with the result being a veritable cornucopia of newspaper and journal articles as well as books on all aspects of programs undertaken during his presidency. Of particular concern have been the detainment of foreign nationals at Guantanamo and elsewhere, torture of prisoners, and domestic [End Page 549] surveillance programs. Seeking to put these events in perspective have been journalists, insiders, and scholars. 1 William O. Walker's exploration of national values and security from colonial times through the Bush presidency, in National Security and Core Values in American History, offers an outstanding interpretation, in the tradition of William Appleman Williams, of America's evolving role abroad. His overriding concern has been to explore the relationship between "American core values and U.S. security policy," with the major premise that the nation became an imperial power in the 1890s and has increasingly become unable to protect the principles of liberty and individual freedom. Although these made America distinctive in the colonial era, Walker questions whether basic values, rights, and liberties—"having been compromised in the name of security throughout modern American history"—can endure in the twenty-first century (p. xiii). Walker is joined by a number of writers who see the U.S. as a nascent imperial power, while Dimitri Simes offers a more conservative analysis, concluding: Whether or not the United States now views itself as an empire, for many foreigners it increasingly looks, walks and talks like one, and they respond to Washington accordingly. There is certainly no reason for American policymakers to refer to the United States as such in public pronouncements, but an understanding of America as an evolving, if reluctant, modern empire is an important analytic tool with profound consequences that American leaders should understand. 2 The notion that the U.S. became an imperial power in the 1890s is open to debate. Growth of the U.S. through 1867 was the result of both land purchase and military campaigns involving Mexico, various European nations, and Native Americans. Following the Alaska purchase, the U.S. was not on an expansionist path or in search of an empire. The 1898 Spanish-American War can be seen as either a fluke or a publicity stunt that got out of control, rather than a search for American empire. Revolts against Spanish rule had been endemic for decades in Cuba, and American public opinion reacted to reports of Spanish atrocities. After the mysterious sinking of the American battleship Maine in...

The rise and fall of American's freedom agenda in Afghanistan: counter-terrorism, nation-building and democracy

The US invasion of Afghanistan, in the aftermath of 11 September 2001, was originally conceived in narrow strategic terms. However, what began as a counter-terrorism policy, based on eliminating and eradicating al-Qaeda and the Taliban regime, led to increasing calls for nation-building and the establishment of a democratic state. This ‘mission creep’ was increasingly associated with the Bush administration's Freedom Agenda, and consequently the democratisation of Afghanistan became a central US security objective. In spite of this, however, the Bush administration was never able to reconcile the tensions between countering terrorism and promoting democracy. This was exacerbated by policy decisions that generated greater insecurity in Afghanistan, which amounts to a disturbing picture of mishandling and negligence. As such, when the Obama administration inherited the Afghanistan campaign, the situation was worse than that which had been seen at the start of the war. This has resulted in the Obama administration abandoning the notion of democracy promotion in favour of transferring power as quickly as possible to an illegitimate Afghan government. This article details the ebbs and flows of US–Afghan policy as it relates to the Freedom Agenda, whilst highlighting the contradictions and problems that the US has faced over nearly a decade of war.

A Case of Failed Counter-Insurgency: Anti-Partisan Operations in Yugoslavia 1943

This article examines operations “Weiss” and “Schwarz,” two of the largest anti-guerrilla sweeps conducted by the German Wehrmacht during the entire Second World War. Four reinforced divisions with ca. 65,000 German soldiers and up to 100 aircraft took part in what is regarded as the most ferocious fighting of the whole war in Yugoslavia. Although conducted with maximum effort in material terms, they were doomed to failure because of the Third Reich's neglect of guerrilla warfare and the resulting lack of a sound counter-insurgency doctrine. Remarkably, operations “Weiss” and “Schwarz” are almost unknown to the public in the West, despite their sheer size. As the founding myths of socialist Yugoslavia, they were extensively written about, almost always from a Partisan perspective. This is the first article to describe the events from the German point of view, and to analyze the Wehrmacht's conduct of these operations in some depth. With the ongoing COIN campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, examining the lessons from the past can prove enlightening. “Black” on “White”: Operations in Yugoslavia, January – June 1943

THE LIMITS OF INFLUENCE

Even during periods of significant leverage, Washington has not had the power to stop and reverse Pakistan's nuclear trends. Pakistan's nuclear establishment has successfully deflected unwelcome US diplomatic initiatives and has been able to draw the line between necessary adaptation to, and rejection of, external pressures. Pakistan's national security managers clearly perceive that Washington's highest priorities in bilateral relations relate to the US military campaign in Afghanistan and efforts to combat terrorist groups with global reach. They presume that nuclear issues will continue to take a backseat to ongoing military campaigns in which Pakistan's assistance is crucial for America's success. This correlation of pressure and response might well change if Pakistan's nuclear activities again become front-page news. Absent this, US-Pakistani relations do not lend themselves to effective, near-term suasion by Washington on nuclear issues, whether via the 2010 US Nuclear Posture Review or other means. Pakistani leaders remain sensitive to US initiatives because Washington sets the international tone on nuclear issues. Nonetheless, Pakistan's concerns over Indian nuclear capabilities and intentions trump Washington's powers of persuasion.

Campaign disconnect: operational progress and strategic obstacles in Afghanistan, 2009-2011

Success in war depends on alignment between operations and strategy. Commonly, such alignment takes time as civilian and military leaders assess the effectiveness of operations and adjust them to ensure that strategic objectives are achieved. This article assesses prospects for the US-led campaign in Afghanistan. Drawing on extensive field research, the authors find that significant progress has been made at the operational level in four key areas: the approach to counterinsurgency operations, development of Afghan security forces, growth of Afghan sub-national governance and military momentum on the ground. However, the situation is bleak at the strategic level. The article identifies three strategic obstacles to campaign success: corruption in Afghan national government, war-weariness in NATO countries and insurgent safe havens in Pakistan. These strategic problems require political developments that are beyond the capabilities of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). In other words, further progress at the operational level will not bring ‘victory’. It concludes, therefore, that there is an operational-strategic disconnect at the heart of the ISAF campaign.

Iraq, Afghanistan and the future of British military doctrine: from counterinsurgency to Stabilization

The campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan have had profound effects on both the British and US militaries. Among the most important is the way in which they have challenged traditional assumptions about the character of unconventional conflict and the role of the military within comprehensive strategies for encouraging sustainable peace. In the UK, the most important doctrinal response has been JDP 3–40 Security and Stabilisation: the military contribution. Security and Stabilisation is an ambitious attempt to synthesize elements of counterinsurgency, counterterrorism, peace support and state-building within a single doctrine that reflects the lessons learned from recent British operational experience. This article examines the purpose, impact and potential value of this important innovation in British doctrine. To do so, the article explores the genesis of Stabilization; analyses its impact upon extant British doctrine for counterinsurgency and peace support; discusses its relationship with the most important related US doctrines, FM 3–24: the counterinsurgency field manual and FM 3–07: the stability operations field manual; and debates the function of doctrine more broadly. It concludes by summarizing the primary challenges Security and Stabilisation must overcome if it is to make a serious contribution to the theory and practice of such complex interventions.

Historical Analogies, Military Surges, (and Economic Crises): Who Should be Consulted?

“The economics profession both sanctioned and rationalized a business model of society which supported a minimally supervised rule of markets. As a consequence, the failure of markets has marginalized economics itself. It is left on the sidelines as politicians try to salvage something from the breakdown of the market order.” Robert Skidelsky, 2009“When I was in college, I majored in political science. But if I were going through college today, I’d major in economics. It possesses a rigor that other fields in the social sciences don’t—and often greater relevance as well. That’s why economists are shaping national debates about everything from health care to poverty, while political scientists often seem increasingly theoretical and irrelevant.” Nicholas D. Kristof, 2011Foreign policy decision makers tend to rely on historical analogies. The “surge” in Afghanistan, for example, was inspired in part by the “surge” in Iraq. Processes for dealing with foreign policy issues involving the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were substantially different from those processes in the Bush and Obama administrations aimed at dealing with economic crises in 2008 and 2009. The latter processes were influenced extensively by economists, especially in the Obama administration. The decisions to send additional troops to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan involved relatively few political scientists. More substantial input from political scientists in the decision making process about the surge in Afghanistan might have produced more knowledgeable and informative analyses of relevant historical and political data in the form of structured focused comparisons of the wars and counterinsurgency campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as analyses and interpretations of data on larger numbers of cases pertaining to broader phenomena of which the US interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan are examples. Perhaps political scientists deserve a role within foreign policy making processes more similar to that reserved for economists in processes focusing on economic issues.