War Is Boring

The South Carolina National Guard general in charge of a training task force in Afghanistan sees native forces evolving into a dual system combining large “static” local police forces and a small, highly mobile national army.

Brigadier General Robert Livingston, commander of Task Force Phoenix with 17 contributing nations, says that the new model for Afghan forces represents a change from previous thinking. “The initial emphasis was on the army, because of the intensity of the combat and the need to protect the border.”

During that period, Afghan police were trained “in a central facility then returned to their homes – and not in sufficient quantity to fight the counterinsurgency fight we’re fighting now.”

As of last year, 60,000 Afghan soldiers and police had been fully trained, according to the Pentagon, compared to the several hundred thousand Iraqi soldiers and police who have been trained since 2003.

Now that the Taliban have mostly given up large scale assaults in favor of smaller surprise incursions and urban suicide bombings, lightly armed but more numerous police are a more useful defense than army formations. The police – which Livingston describes as a “stationary force” – would serve as tripwires for army redeployments. “The army is the mobile reinforcing force.”

“Police get intelligence from the people around them,” Livingston explains. “That will tell them where Taliban are massing, so we can maneuver in heavier forces – SWAT teams, if you will. The whole key to that piece is getting all the police districts fully operational in their communities so that the community feels comfortable talking to the police on a daily basis.”

But the Afghan police aren’t yet up to the task.

“The emphasis has shifted to the police [but] we have some police districts that are not adequately equipped and not adequately trained.”

To remedy this, the coalition has launched a stop-gap “auxiliary police” training program to provide basic law enforcement and combat training to local Afghan militias in remote provinces. The five-week course prepares and equips militia fighters to man checkpoints, search suspects and provide basic emergency medical care.

“It’s a stop-gap method to get rudimentary training for outlying districts so that they can at least defend themselves. There will be further training down the road to convert them into actual, normal uniformed police.”

Auxiliary police trainees bore the brunt of the fighting in a pitched battle with hundreds of Taliban in rural Uruzgan province two weeks ago. Dutch Lieutenant Colonel Gino Van Der Voet, commander of international forces in the province, praised the trainees’ courage and stamina in that fight. But in spite their ferocity, they were badly outgunned by Taliban forces wielding rockets, mortars and machine guns.

Livingston says more and heavier weapons are on the way. Last week, Congress authorized $1.6 billion in assistance to Afghanistan including military aid to the army and police.

Cross-posted at Military.com

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