The U.S. military commander in Afghanistan is considering pulling American troops out of some remote outposts on the mountainous eastern border with Pakistan, where local guerrillas are allied with the Taliban and al-Qaida, U.S. officials told McClatchy Newspapers.
Abandoning U.S. forward outposts, and possibly turning them over to Afghan forces, would be a tacit admission that the presence of American troops has fueled insecurity by embroiling them in local feuds and driving some local tribes to align with the Taliban.
"These (outposts) are costly and dangerous and not doing much to bring security to the people or connect the people to their government," said a U.S. official familiar with the region. "The terrain is too rugged, the infrastructure and especially roads do not exist and couldn't be built on short order, and the population is too low and too dispersed."
American commanders had hoped that sending more troops to the border area, coupled with a new Pakistani drive against the militants on its side of the border, could deprive al-Qaida and the Taliban of a sanctuary and end infiltration from Pakistan.
However, two senior U.S. officials said, there's no sign the Pakistani military is prepared to move against the militants, and as one of them put it: "There's no point swinging a hammer if there's no anvil there."
I'm all on board the hammer and anvil analogy for the border, but interdicting the border to stop jihadis and supplies from entering Afghanistan becomes even more important without Pakistan's help on their side and if we beat down the Taliban inside Afghanistan with our current offensives.
