Taliban

As tens of thousands of NATO troops battle it out with Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan for the seventh year, a handful of soldiers are waging their war armed with little more than slogans, leaflets and loud music. They are the members of the psychological operations, or psyops, teams deployed by Western armies to help sap the will of the enemy and win over the local population without firing a shot.

The top two U.S. intelligence officials traveled secretly to Pakistan this month to press President Pervez Musharraf to allow the CIA greater latitude to operate in the tribal territories where Al Qaeda, the Taliban and other militant groups are all active, according to several officials who have been briefed on the visit.

Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto warned Sunday that "foreign forces" could enter Pakistan unless the government re-establishes control in tribal border areas that have become militant hotbeds since the U.S.-led invasion of neighboring Afghanistan.

Six years ago coalition forces headed into Afghanistan to eradicate the Taliban. Now an international think tank says more than half of the country is under the Taliban's thumb. Meanwhile, an Oxfam report sharply criticized US-led development efforts in the region.

George Santayana rightly said, “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” It is we who will suffer if we do not learn from history. The global monopoly men who make our leaders dance like marionettes ‘swaying to the symphony of destruction’ understand history cunningly and will benefit from it. It is these death merchants who funded and trained the Mujahedeen i.e. ‘those who fight’ to fight a proxy war that the soviets had no chance of winning. The Afghani fighters were trained by CIA and SaS who provided aid and comfort to some of the most malignant thugs known in that region.

The US is considering a plan to create gangs of mercenaries from local population in the border areas of Pakistan to fight al-Qaida and the Taliban, emulating its tactics in Iraq's Anbar province.

Over the past six years, the Bush administration has spent almost $100 million on a highly classified program to help General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's president, secure his country's nuclear weapons, according to current and former senior administration officials. But with the future of that country's leadership in doubt, debate is intensifying about whether Washington has done enough to help protect the warheads and laboratories, and whether Pakistan's reluctance to reveal critical details about its arsenal has undercut the effectiveness of the continuing security effort.

A top Pentagon official on Wednesday said the fate of Pakistan's military arsenal was a "primary concern" after President Pervez Musharraf imposed a state of emergency in his country.

Vladimir Putin’s Russia is growing more authoritarian at home and increasingly aggressive abroad. China’s global clout seems to expand by the day. And in the Middle East, a possible conflict with Iran looms on the horizon. For insights on this dangerous new world, FP turned to Zbigniew Brzezinski, former U.S. national security advisor, author, and all-around foreign-policy guru.

AN elite group of Native American trackers is joining the hunt for terrorists crossing Afghanistan's borders.

The unit, the Shadow Wolves, was recruited from several tribes, including the Navajo, Sioux, Lakota and Apache. It is being sent to Tajikistan and Uzbekistan to pass on ancestral sign-reading skills to local border units.

In recent years, members of the Shadow Wolves have mainly tracked smugglers along the US border with Mexico.