We Can’t Logistically Support A Surge

Pakistan and Taliban battle for key tunnel

The Taliban attacks stretch all the way south from the Afghan border to Karachi, where weapons, ammunition, food and oil supplies arrive at the docks before being transported by road.

More attacks against the Afghan main supply route . Westhawk sez:

Why are the Pakistani government and army only now showing some fortitude against the Taliban? Although Pakistan harbors little affection for the United States, what it fears even more is to be abandoned or written off by America.

Listen to your Loggy Toads. 

They’re trying to tell you your LOC is subject to interdiction.

Jerking Our Supply Chain.

Kuwait, Dubai, and Qatar are too far away and Kandahar and Bagram can only handle so much traffic. We must get cooperation, or quit.

The Pakistan Fuel Connection

if the flow of fuel from Pakistan is completely cut off, American forces could be running on fumes within a fortnight.

Red Ball Express Rides Again?

The beans and the bullets and the go-juice must get through.  Some times it has to be fought through. 

The deal made with Musharraf back in 2001 was “give us overflight, a SPOD at Karachi, and an MSR and we’ll give you billions of dollars worth of bribes, plus F-16’s with which to threaten the Indians.  We’ll let you play us like rubes as long as you keep the LOC open.  Alternatively, we could just nuke you back to the Stone Age.”  Musharaff took that deal.  He’s out, now, and the next deal is still under negotiation.

Putting 30,000 more Western troops at the end of that tenuous cracker line is a bad idea.  Pulling out 30,000 non-essential personnel and caveated salsa dancers to be replaced by 30,000 Police Mentoring Team,  Embedded Training Team,  Operational Mentor and Liaison Team, and Human Terrain Team members, along with USDOJ, USDA,  and DHS Border Patrol augmentees,  would be a better idea. 

 

 

 

 

UPDATE: The Captain’s Journal has more on our vulnerability at Targeting of NATO Supply Lines Through Pakistan Expands and at Logistical Difficulties in Afghanistan