Suspicion Rises Between Western Advisers, Afghans

By Deb Riechmann

Kabul, Afghanistan - "Shoulder to shoulder" is the mantra of the NATO-Afghan military partnership. Now, after Afghan soldiers and police turned their guns on their foreign partners during outrage over the Quran burnings, even Western advisers — not just combat troops — are looking over their shoulders.

The deepening distrust is jeopardizing the U.S.-led coalition's strategy of training Afghan security forces and helping government workers so that international troops can go home.

The advisers do a variety of jobs. While some focus on the battlefield, others pore over geological surveys, lure outside investors or make sure that key mountain passes are clear of snow. They work closely with their Afghan counterparts to build a government strong enough to fend off threats and attacks from the Taliban and other militants trying to destabilize their country.

There has been lingering distrust for years. Afghan soldiers and police, or militants dressed in their uniforms, have shot and killed more than 75 U.S. and other coalition forces in Afghanistan since 2007.

But tensions soared Feb. 25 when two U.S. military advisers were found dead with gunshots to the back of the head inside the Afghan Ministry of Interior, one of the most heavily guarded buildings in the capital, Kabul.

The two were among six U.S. troops killed by Afghan security forces during a week of demonstrations over the burning of Islamic books and Qurans at a U.S. military base in eastern Afghanistan. President Barack Obama and U.S. military officials say the burnings were a mistake and not intentional.

Hours after the military advisers' bodies were found on the floor of their office, Gen. John Allen, the top commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, took the unprecedented step of recalling hundreds of coalition personnel working in more than two dozen government ministries in Kabul. He said the decision was made "for obvious force protection reasons." Britain, France, Germany and Canada quickly followed suit, putting much of the West's mentoring and advising work on hold.

"It's a declining relationship. It has been for years," said Martine van Bijlert, co-founder of the Afghan Analyst Network in Kabul. "You won't be able to fix that. The big question is 'Will it remain a workable relationship?' I think it's possible. It could settle down, but it won't fully settle down to the old level."

"These advisers are crucial, especially in the security sector when we're talking about transition," said Haroun Mir, director of Afghanistan's Center for Research and Policy Studies in Kabul. "Certainly the Afghan government can function without them, but if they don't return, it will take a toll on the financial situation of the government. Many of these projects financed by donors require the presence of these advisers."

Allen is determined to get the advisers back into the ministries as soon as possible — when he deems it is safe enough to do so, said U.S. Army Lt. Col. Jimmie Cummings, a coalition spokesman. The coalition has not disclosed the total number of advisers who work in the ministries.

Their work has not completely stopped, he said.

"Though they are not physically standing beside them, the advisers are still in daily communication with their Afghan counterparts, as Gen. Allen directed to keep the lines of communication open," Cummings said. "We are committed to our partnership with the government of Afghanistan. ... Tens of thousands of Afghan and coalition troops continue to effectively work together on significant missions every day."

A few dozen advisers critical to the mission have trickled back to work, but with additional security, Cummings said.

A senior Western adviser who oversees advisers in several ministries said that when they go back they probably will be required to wear body armor and travel in groups with armed escorts. The adviser said they also might have to get permission to visit the ministries, reducing day-to-day contact with their Afghan partners.

Some advisers, such as the ones involved in the Afghanistan-Pakistan Hands program, will balk at increased security, the adviser said. The U.S. established the program in September 2009 to create a team of military and civilian experts who could develop close working relationships with their Afghan and Pakistani counterparts.

Contractors who serve as advisers generally are not so eager to rush back to the ministries, and some told the adviser they are ready to head home.

The adviser and all others who spoke on condition of anonymity for this article did so because of increasing tensions in the NATO-Afghan relationship.

Restoring trust between Western advisers and their Afghan counterparts will be challenging.

"If an adviser gets killed and you're an adviser, it's going to be difficult," said Nadia Gerspacher, a senior program adviser for the United States Institute of Peace in Washington.

"Is it going to make people less trusting and feeling more insecure in the ministry? Probably," said Gerspacher, who has been in contact with advisers in Kabul since the killings.

An international security contractor said he could feel the tension when he visited an Interior Ministry office the day after the U.S. advisers were killed. Usually Afghan police there greet him with "Salamou Aleikom," meaning "Peace be with you." This time, 14 or 15 armed policemen standing in a hallway outside the office were silent, he said. The policemen asked an interpreter whether the Western contractor was American or British. He and a colleague soon left.

An Afghan National Police general at the Interior Ministry said he felt ashamed by the killings and would welcome the advisers back.

They are the teachers for Afghanistan's new system of providing security and if they don't return, the work being done to reform the unprofessional and corrupt policemen will collapse, said the general. A lot of work has been suspended since the killings, the general said.

Another official at the Interior Ministry said the Western advisers' morale had been shattered.

When two Western advisers visited his unit a few days ago, he tried to break the tension. Jokingly, he shook his finger at them, smiled and said: "You've been absent for four or five days. Your pay will be docked." He said that he has developed strong bonds with a few of the Western advisers and will consider them good friends forever.

Some ministries aren't so dependent on the advisers, according to an official at the Finance Ministry. He said the advisers were badly needed three or four years ago, but that the ministry was now staffed with talented, well-trained Afghan employees who no longer need the 20 to 25 well-paid Westerners who currently work there. The ministry could hire five Afghans with the salary paid to one Westerner, he said.

Why are Americans Arrested for Videotaping Police in Public Places?

By Noel Brinkerhoff

 

United States - Recording police officers while making arrests has resulted in numerous other arrests … of those daring to tape such actions.

 

In October 2007 attorney Simon Glik was arrested by Boston police after he used his cell phone to capture the arrest of young man who was punched by an officer. Claiming the audio recording of the arrest violated the law, police took Glik to jail. On January 5 of this year—more than four years later—the Boston Police Department finally sent Glik a letter admitting that its officers are acted unlawfully when they arrested him.

 

In Rochester, New York, last year, Emily Good was arrested after videotaping—from her own front yard—the arrest of a man at a traffic stop. The arresting officer, Mario Masic, accused Good of being “anti-police” after she refused to stop recording the arrest. The charge against Good was later dropped.

 

In Illinois, a 1960s-era law is coming under scrutiny as Chicago prepares to host the G8 and NATO summits, which are expected to attract large numbers of protesters and journalists. As currently written, the state law allows police to arrest any citizen on felony charges for recording the conversations of police without their consent.

 

The ACLU argues that the Illinois Eavesdropping Act is out of date and over the top.

 

One state lawmaker, Democratic Representative Elaine Nekritz, has proposed an amendment that would allow for the recording of police on duty in public places.

Anonymous Exposes Intelligence Gap

 Bu Loz Kaye

Over Christmas a busy, secretive group were at work, with their own views on who had been naughty and nice. However it was not Santa's elves, but the amorphous "Anonymous" collective making the decisions. This group of hackers released a vast trove of email addresses, passwords and credit card information belonging to subscribers of the US intelligence company Stratfor – and the hangover has carried on into the new year, with the release of MoD and Nato officials' details.

Stratfor, an authority on strategic and tactical intelligence issues, is considered by some to be a "shadow CIA", and provides intelligence analysis and both private and public briefings on all manner of issues. The release by Anonymous kicked off discussion about how such a breach was possible at a high-profile company specialising in all things security, as well as why it had attracted the attention of Anonymous.

 Many of the thousands of email addresses and personal details belonged to people in sensitive posts within the defence and intelligence communities. Although the publication of email addresses (hardly state secrets) is not a threat in itself, their disclosure can only be extremely embarrassing for a company selling itself as an expert on security, while the release of passwords adds to the alarm.

But it is a mistake to talk of Anonymous's motives as if it were a cohesive whole. The group is a loose collection of people with different aims, involving themselves in different "operations" as they see fit. It is leaderless, it doesn't have a manifesto, it doesn't have a particular direction, nor does it go in only one direction at any one time. Given that membership of Anonymous is based entirely on self-identification, it seems that the only real way of assessing the group as a whole is on the basis of the kinds of actions it carries out. It is essentially a banner under which hacktivists and tech-savvy individuals with a political or social agenda can rally.

So why attack Stratfor? Well, as Anonymous put it, "to wreak unholy havok [sic] upon the systems and personal email accounts of these rich and powerful oppressors. Kill, kitties, kill and burn them down … peacefully. XD XD." Yet, despite the mischievous way it expresses itself, a significant portion of Anonymous's focus is political. It's not just about lulz or showing off any more. The point of these actions is to draw attention to how companies such as Stratfor, or organisations such as Nato are, in its view, "holders of power in a world that has long been governed in accordance with the dictate that might makes right".
The various Anonymous communication channels, and supporters, would point to what they see as moves in the US to restrict liberty, from the Bradley Manning case to the so-called Stop Online Piracy Act, which will give unprecedented web censorship powers; from the treatment of Occupy protesters to the National Defence Authorisation Act opening up indefinite detention without trial. You don't need to be a hacker to think that the US is more deserving of a restraining order than a special relationship.

On this side of the Atlantic a recent government report on what it insists on calling "cyber" security, names hacktivism explicitly as a threat to national security. Yet nowhere is it made clear in the objectives of that report what the Ministry of Defence or Home Office are actually supposed to do about it. The omission may be sinister or merely incompetent. But as the Nato and MoD leaks highlight the porous nature of our online defences, taxpayers are entitled to ask what we are getting for the £650m the national cyber security programme costs. Or maybe not – after all, the lion's share of the spending is going to GCHQ and is secret. For now.

I have pointed out before that if people feel that the usual democratic routes are pointless they will find means of direct action and protest. Many balk at Anonymous's apparent disregard for the potential human collateral in their methods – but there is no denying that its mix of satire and activism is a powerful combination.

As I am writing this, Stratfor's website reads: "Stratfor Global Intelligence. As you may know, an unauthorised party illegally obtained and disclosed personally identifiable information … of some of our subscribers." It looks laughably unintelligent. In one fell swoop it exposes an uncomfortable truth that cyber-security experts would have us pay through the nose to ignore: as long as western governments fail to live up to their ideals and ours, there will always remain those who are equally determined and able to expose their secrets and embarrass those in power. The lulz just got serious.

Pakistani Militant Groups Unite Against NATO.

Islamabad – A cease-fire was pledged to Pakistani security forces from Pakistani fighters on Sunday, but is also joining forces with the Taliban to attack NATO forces in Afghanistan.

Security experts say the agreement, which reunites four major militant factions under the under Taliban chief Mullah Mohammed Omar, was “a dual-purpose tactical move by the Taliban, which has lost hundreds of fighters during a two-year surge of U.S. forces in its Afghanistan strongholds.”

The deal between the groups also swells the Taliban's ranks and allows them the ability to launch more attacks into Afghanistan.

The unification between the groups, which will stop the occasional fighting between them, is very likely to serve the goals of the militants in the long-run.

Fata Research Center's director of research Mansur Mahsud said of the deal "It will take a lot of pressure off the militants, and deepen the tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan. There will be angry complaints by the Americans, and counter-accusations by Pakistan that NATO isn't stopping raids by Pakistani insurgents from Afghan territory."

Update: It should be noted this is happening against the backdrop of the Taliban opening an political office in the country of Qatar.