(Read Part I here)

The Musahe District, southwest of Kabul on the border of Logar province, is dotted with small villages in the valleys low, rocky mountains.  The Directorate of National Security says that the Taliban uses it is as a staging ground for attacks on Kabul.  District police officers report Taliban activity ranging from criminal extortion to planting bombs on the roads to target Afghan security forces and ISAF coalition forces.

As part of the Validation Transition Team's assessment of the 1st Battalion, 111st Afghan National Army Divsion, they wanted to ride along on a mission in Musahe District.

The VTT is NATO/ISAF's internal reviewer of the readiness and operational abilities of Afghan Army units.  When Congress and think-tanks release reports on the state of the Afghan National Army, they are largely based on the work of the VTT.

The upcoming reviews of President Obama's strategic plan for Afghanistan, which relies on increasing the size of the Afghan security forces, will use the work of the VTT.

To properly assess a unit the VTT follows them on a mission from beginning to end--from the planning phase to the after action review.

On the afternoon when the Battalion Commander, Colonel Zalmat Nbard was supposed to review the mission with the VTT it became very obvious that the planning phase had never even been considered.

Col. Nbard, MAJ Gries, MAJ Johnson and Wally

The Musahe District is within Nbard's area of operations.  He is tasked by his higher headquarters with patrolling the area no less than once a week.  Heading out to Musahe is a routine operation and hardly worthy of a full blown process.  Many American units have regular operations and just update the plan with the latest intelligence.  Majors Gries and Johnson understood how this was a regularly scheduled patrol and tried to get the Colonel to walk them through the basics--which should have been pretty easy since he did it every week--it wasn't.

Colonel Zalmat Nbard, former Mujahadeen fighter, commander in the Northern Alliance and now Battalion Commander in the Afghan National Army did not know the basics of planning a mission and did not know how to read a map.  Which makes him the personification of the Afghan way of war.

Colonel Nbard could not plot a grid.  If he had to tell another unit where to go or to call in his location he would use descriptive terms which he did in the planning, "about two kilometers past the turn in the road by the school."

Back to the basics of putting together a patrol

Colonel Nbard's inability to read a map did not give the Soviets much of an advantage.  The Taliban, not exactly well known for literacy beyond the Koran, aren't grid plotters either and they have been frustrating US/NATO/ISAF forces for years now.

Map reading skills are not required for the Afghan way of war which has been to lay an ambush or engage in a large fire-power battle in a valley or mountain pass.  The style of war for officers of Nbards vintage was, compared to the current insurgency, a force on force conventional combat.  In Nbards experience, war is straight forward; there is the enemy, fire!  The Soviets drove around in armored personnel carriers.  The Taliban and Northern Alliance were of different ethnic groups and could not hide from each other in plain sight.  The US/NATO/ISAF soldiers drive around in huge armored vehicles.

Knowing how to read a map is not required when a small group is ambushing a large group.

Once the two American Majors started getting back to basics they asked about the purpose of the patrol to Musahe.

Every military mission, every patrol, should have a defined purpose, a commander's intent with at least a few measurable objectives and milestones.

The way of war for the modern Afghan National Army reared its head at this point and summed up exactly why the war here has been such a struggle.  There was no purpose to the patrol--unless the patrol was to determine the presence of enemy improvised explosive devices by driving around until you got blown up.  Nbard and his higher headquarters can be forgiven for their error because numerous US units still drive around for no other apparant reason than to get blown up.

Mounted patrols, also known as driving around in Humvees, MRAPs, M-ATVs, are useless wastes of human life, time and diesel fuel.  They are often called "presence patrols" and are devised by fools who have no clue how to fight a war.  Sometimes these fools have read a little Army doctrine and then call these patrols 'movement to contact' or 'meeting engagement'--fancy terms for driving around until the enemy blows you up.

Mounted patrols, like the one Nbard was to lead us on through Musahe gather no intelligence, they do not protect the population from the Taliban, they do not perform anything close to the essential functions of an infantry unit--namely to seek out, locate, close with and destory the enemy.  Nbard himself at one point told the American officers that the patrol was pointless, and that he was only doing what his commander ordered him to do.

After a few rounds of frustration a route was settled on and step off was scheduled for 0730.

Final preparations for the patrol

I went on the patrol riding in the back seat of a brand new MATV which is the latest super armored monster vehicle used in Afghanistan.  I honestly can't say much about the mounted patrol itself because, I was trapped behind 4 inches of hardened steel ballistic glass.  (I'm going to write a review of the MATV soon.)

We did stop at a small combat outpost manned by a company of Col. Nbard's soldiers and have lunch.  From what I could determine the soldiers at the combat outpost just hang out on the outpost itself, their mere presence behind the chain link fence and concertina wire suposedly being a major deterrent to Taliban activity.  Nbard can be forgiven here too, because a lot of US officers seemed to have the same mentality in Iraq before the Surge.  [In the Kabul base cluster complex (there is an obvious word missing) is thousands of US service members and Federal Employees who never, ever leave the wire.]

Afghan officers having lunch.  After recently recovering from a bout of distress up in Bamiyan, I opted for and MRE.

The patrol returned to base thankfully without accomplishing its mission of getting blown up by an IED.

Nbard had passed one crucial test at least--he actually went out on the patrol driving around waiting to get blown up.  Never let it be said that Col. Zalmat Nbard, a loyal subordinate to the Masood 'The Lion of the Panjushir' a fighter of Soviets and the Taliban was afraid to drive around in an armored humvee.

The assessment by the VTT continued for two more days but the results were shaping up quickly.  The 1st Battalion, of the 1st Brigade, 111st Division was going land right in the middle of the pack with a readiness definition level at or slightly above Amber.  The Battalion displayed insufficient ability to operate without assistance from ISAF Coalition partners.  The officers and NCOs called it exactly as they saw it and had hard evidence and solid arguments for their points.

The top level, Green, is when a unit is effective with advisors.  No Afghan unit at this point is ready to fully go it alone without any assistance or advisors.  But they do not need to be totally proficient to prevail.  In Iraq quantity, when combined with quality COIN tactics by US Forces, prevailed.  When fighting an insurgency there is a lot to be said for a cop or soldier on every street corner.

A large part of the challenge is not in getting ANA units trained up to a Western standard, that is a fools errand.  The challenge is just getting enough to do a few of the basic things right and to employ a few basic counter insurgency techniques.

Which brings the greatest challenge.

The ANA officer corps is made up former Mujhadeen commanders like Col. Nbard and former officers of the Communist government who were trained in Soviet tactics and doctrine.

Getting them to be effective counter insurgents will be a herculean task but once they start fighting effectively the war will be over quickly.  No one has exactly figured out how to do that.  Some say it cannot be done, but Westerners can lead Afghans.  Josiah Harlan, a quaker from Pennsylvania--the real life Man Who Would Be King--led the Afghan Army in the 19th century.  British Officers in what is now Pakistan successfully led corps of Afghans.  Special Forces Teams and private logistics/security contractors mold effective Afghan units.

The Western way of war is standardized so that any person with the right training can fill a slot.  A Western infantry unit is like a franchise--people can rotate in and out and as long as the procedure and doctrine are followed the unit will function.

The Afghan way of war is personality based.  It requires a strong leader, a true Alpha who derives his authority from his bravery, strength, guile and charisma rather than rank.

Col. Nbard's western advisor/mentor/trainer is a Lieutenant in the Massachusettes National Guard.  The young LT is good officer and is trying hard, but has been set up to fail by a system that does not fully grasp the Afghan culture.  A few days ago the special inspector general for Afghanistan released a report critical of the the training of the Afghan security forces.  The recommendations of the IG, even if fully implemented will not make much of a difference because the major flaw is not in the systems, checklists and tasks of training but the people doing the training.

Nbard can no doubt get his men to fight.  The task of getting Nbard to fight with the tactics that work will require him to be advised by a US officer who successfully commanded an infantry battalion in combat and is willing to give the ANA the freedom to operate by running interference with the Ministry of Defense.  [The Ministry of Defense often seems like it has only a passing interest in defeating the Taliban.]

That means partnering Afghans with men like Mark Gurganus, James McGrath, Pat Frank, Valery Keaveny, Shawn Gobin, Brian Ducote, Steve Russell, Jim Crider, Bob Cain and other larger than life officers.

The battle against the Taliban will be won when Afghans are trained, mentored and inspired by fighters who can work with and through the Afghan way of war.

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