Pakistan’s New War Games

Note: The fol­low­ing is a par­tial repost of my story that ran on Reuters India. TAME­WALI KHARIPUR, Pak­istan (Reuters) — Pak­istan army troops backed by fighter planes con­ducted a mock bat­tle with India in the largest mil­i­tary exer­cise in 21 years, sig­nalling that the old rival remained its biggest secu­rity threat. In a dusty yet impres­sive dis­play of conventional […]

Pakistan’s Civil War Heating Up

In the after­math of this weekend’s assault on the Pak­istani Gen­eral Head­quar­ters in Rawalpindi, the Tal­iban hit again in Alpuri, in the Shangla dis­trict east of Min­gora in Swat. Accord­ing to mil­i­tary sources who asked to remain anony­mous because they weren’t autho­rized to talk to the press, a 13– or 14-year-old boy walked up to an Army convoy […]

Mingora Shrugs Over Rumors of Fazlullah Capture

MIN­GORA, Pak­istan – The Swat Valley’s belea­guered cap­i­tal was tak­ing a wait-and-see atti­tude to the rumors that Maulana Fazlul­lah, head of the Swat Tal­iban which had ter­ror­ized the pic­turesque val­ley for five years, had been cap­tured or killed by secu­rity forces this week­end. The rumors first began appear­ing on Sat­ur­day night, when the NWFP gov­er­nor, Owais […]

Pakistan's New Drones

Hm. Inter­est­ing. Pak­istan is now fly­ing its own drones as it maybe, maybe not ramps up its fight against the Tal­iban. The drone, designed by the Ital­ian com­pany Galileo Avion­ica, is “a medium alti­tude Endurance & tac­ti­cal UAV designed for optronic and elec­tronic sur­veil­lance roles,” accord­ing to World Wide Mil­i­tary. (What appears to be a sales […]

Why Pakistan's Delaying its Waziristan Push

Well, not to say I told you so, but … Pak­istan will need months to pre­pare for a ground offen­sive against the Tal­iban in their South Waziris­tan strong­hold on the Afghan bor­der, a senior army com­man­der said on Tues­day, cit­ing equip­ment short­ages. … “It’s going to take months,” and pos­si­bly beyond the com­ing win­ter, [Lt. Gen. Nadeem] Ahmed said, when […]

Drug Lords Tied to Taliban on US Hit List

KABUL (PAN): As many as 50 Afghan drug traf­fick­ers with proven links to Tal­iban have been placed on a Pen­ta­gon tar­get list to be cap­tured or killed, a lead­ing US news­pa­per reported on Mon­day. The New York Times, refer­ring to a Con­gres­sional report due to be released this week, said big drugs traf­fick­ers with ties to the militants […]

Two AP journalists wounded in Afghanistan

Two AP visual jour­nal­ists were seri­ously wounded in Afghanistan ear­lier today when the con­voy they were trav­el­ing with was hit by an IED. Pho­tog­ra­pher Emilio More­natti and AP Tele­vi­sion News video­g­ra­pher Andi Jat­miko were trav­el­ing with the mil­i­tary when their vehi­cle was struck by the bomb Tues­day. Both were imme­di­ately taken to a mil­i­tary hos­pi­tal in Kandahar. […]

Three U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan - Los Angeles Times

FOXNew­sThree U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan­Los Ange­les Times­Re­port­ing from Kabul, Afghanistan — Tal­iban mil­i­tants killed three Amer­i­can troops in volatile south­ern Afghanistan, US mil­i­tary author­i­ties …‘Spe­cial Report’ Panel on Fight­ing T…

Four NATO troops killed in Afghanistan - CNN International

BBC News­Four NATO troops killed in AfghanistanCNN Inter­na­tion­alK­A­BUL, Afghanistan (CNN) — Four NATO troops have been killed in sep­a­rate inci­dents in Afghanistan since the week­end, mil­i­tary offi­cials said Tues­day. …FACTBOX-Military deaths in Afghanis…

US military deaths in Afghanistan region at 699 - Washington Post

KY3US mil­i­tary deaths in Afghanistan region at 699Washington Post10, 2009, at least 699 mem­bers of the US mil­i­tary had died in Afghanistan, Pak­istan and Uzbek­istan as a result of the US inva­sion of Afghanistan in late …Three Camp Leje­une Marines kill…