NATO troops hope to introduce appropriate government after ending Marja offensive: NYT

KABUL - The American-led NATO troops are departing from past tradition in launching their latest offensive on the Taliban stronghold in Marja, southern Afghanistan.

In what is being touted as a “New War Model”, the the American and Afghan troops have decided to clear Marja of all insurgents.

This is a departure from the offensives launched in the previous eight years, reports the New York Times.

In the past, American and NATO forces mounted large military operations to clear towns and cities of Taliban insurgents, and then, almost invariably, they cleared out, never leaving behind enough soldiers or police officers to hold the place on their own.

This, almost always, allowed the Taliban to return, and, after a time, necessitated the return of both American and NATO troops, to clear the places all over again.

This time, in Marja, the largest Taliban stronghold, American and Afghan time commanders say they will do something they have never done before — bring in an Afghan government and police force behind them. American and British troops will stay on to support them.

“We’ve got a government in a box, ready to roll in,” the NYT quoted top American commander Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, as saying here.

More than at any time since 2001, American and NATO soldiers will focus less on killing Taliban insurgents than on sparing Afghan civilians and building an Afghan state.

“The population is not the enemy. The population is the prize - they are why we are going in,” Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson, the commander of the Marines in southern Afghanistan, told a group of troops this week.

To realize their goals, the Americans and their allies want to capture the area with a minimum amount of violence.

American commanders say the attack on Marja is intended to be nothing like the similar size assault on the city of Falluja, Iraq, in November 2004.

Sparing civilian life may not be easy, especially in the close-quarters combat that lies ahead. Hundreds of Taliban fighters are believed to be in the area. And the American-led force may yet get bogged down - by the network of irrigation canals, built by the United States in the 1950s, or by the hundreds of homemade bombs that Taliban fighters have planted in the roads and trails.

The chief worry among both American and Afghan commanders is that if a large number of civilians are killed, the Afghan government - including its president, Hamid Karzai - could withdraw its support.

The Americans are hoping, too, that the largely Afghan composition of the invading force - about 60 percent of the total - will give Karzai’s government sufficient cover if anything goes wrong.

But at some point the operation will end, and when it does General McChrystal has set goals for the Americans and the Afghans that are less dramatic, but far more ambitious, than fighting.

For the first time, NATO and Afghan officials have assembled a large team of Afghan administrators and an Afghan governor that will move into Marja the moment the shooting stops.

More than 1,900 police are standing by.

Setting up a government in this impoverished country is no small task. Across Afghanistan, the Afghan government and its police are reviled for their inefficiency and corruption.

“We want to show people that we can deliver police, and services, and development,” said Lt. Gen. Mohammed Karimi, the deputy chief of staff of the Afghan Army.

“We want to convince the Afghans that the government is for them.” (ANI)