The situation in Afghanistan is indeed grim. The vignette emerging from various reports shows the map of Afghanistan totally covered with the the Taliban. Two years ago the areas adjoining Pakistan were in the control of the 37 insurgent groups known as the “Taliban” in the West. Today the areas farthest away from the Pakistani border near the Amu Darya and Turkmenistan are in the control of the Anti-Occupation forces. There is almost no area in Afghanistan which does not have a Taliban presence.
This malaise in the Hindu Kush and the Pamirs is reflected in the increasingly paranoid statements of the current US Ambassador in Pakistan, Ms. Anne Paterson. The resurrection of the ghosts of the so called “Quetta Shura” is a smoke and mirrors attempt to obfuscate the situation in Afghanistan and try to lead the public’s attention away from the defeats in the battlefields.
The American public is now against the war in Afghanistan. Finding a new scapegoat is another attempt to blame the failure on others.
The ISOC report in only one of the few reports that have recently emerged showing the total annihilation of the US, NATO and ISAF forces in Pakistan.
The Taliban now holds a permanent presence in 72% of Afghanistan, up from 54% a year ago. Taliban forces have advanced from their southern heartlands, where they are now the de facto governing power in a number of towns and villages, to Afghanistan’s western and north-western provinces, as well as provinces north of Kabul. Within a year, the Taliban’s permanent presence in the country has increased by a startling 18%.
THIS MAP SHOWS TALIBANISTAN in 2007
Talibanistan: 2007 Afghan map showing Taliban control
Three out of the four main highways into Kabul are now compromised by Taliban activity. The capital city has plummeted to minimum levels of control, with the Taliban and other criminal elements infiltrating the city at will.
THIS MAP SHOWS TALIBANISTAN in 2009
Talibanistan: 2009 Afghan map showing Taliban control
Through its research platform in Afghanistan, ICOS determined the Taliban’s presence across the country using a combination of publicly recorded attacks and local perceptions of Taliban presence. One or more insurgent attacks per week in a province constitutes a “permanent Taliban presence” according to ICOS (see full methodology).
Kabul under control of Taliban and others
Report Content:
1. The Taliban are back: Situation update December 2008
2. Advance of the Taliban: maps
3. Full Methodology for the Afghanistan and Kabul Maps
4. Taliban Tactics: The Secret of Their Success
5. Inverting the Pyramid: New Architecture Counter Insurgency Theory
KABUL: A resurgent Taliban has a significant presence across virtually all Afghanistan, eight years after a US-led invasion ousted the radical regime from power, a think-tank said Friday.
The International Council on Security and Development (Icos) said the Taliban had widened their reach across Afghanistan since last November and now had a ‘permanent presence’ in 80 per cent of the country.
‘The unrelenting and disturbing return, spread and advance of the Taliban is now without question,’ said Norine MacDonald, president of the London-based policy research group.
Icos released a map showing the spread of Taliban influence to previously peaceful regions in the west and the north, particularly Balkh and Kunduz provinces that lie on the Uzbek and Tajik borders.
Kunduz was the scene last week of a Nato air strike on Taliban militants who hijacked fuel trucks and where insurgents the following day kidnapped two journalists with the New York Times, one of whom was killed in a rescue raid.
Icos said another 17 per cent of Afghanistan is seeing ‘substantial’ Taliban activity, and added: ‘Taken together, these figures show that the Taliban has a significant presence in virtually all of Afghanistan.’
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It defined ‘permanent’ presence as an average of one or more attacks a week and ‘substantial’ as one or more attacks in an average month.
The report comes as Afghanistan awaits results in August 20 presidential and provincial council elections, tainted by allegations of fraud with hundreds of thousands of ballots being quarantined and recounts ordered.
We are running the risk of replicating the fate of the Soviets” Mr. Brzezinski 
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Results released gradually show President Hamid Karzai leading the count so far with more than 54 per cent against his main rival, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, who has less than 30 per cent.
Preliminary results are due to be released on Saturday, with the international community urging officials to ensure a clean process that gives legitimacy to the victor and brings an end to the political uncertainty.
Admiral Mullen is still wrong 
The rude Admiral Michael Mullen is wrong on Afghanistan
Icos expressed concerns about a power vacuum in the case of a run-off, which could drag the process out for another six months or more.
‘This raises the possibility of both a lack of legal authority in the presidency and resulting political instability and government paralysis dragging on for many months,’ said MacDonald. Dawn. Taliban across ‘virtually all’ Afghanistan: report, Friday, 11 Sep, 2009
McChrystal malarkey on Afghanistan hides incompetence of NATO, ISAF & US forces 
“Taliban’s Winning Strategy in Afghanistan”: Overcoming “culture of poverty” 
The US occupation has not brought security to Afghan women 
Afghanistan’s Bravest Woman Malalai Joya: “Taliban are logistically & militarily growing stronger as each day dawns.” “Afghan women and men are not ‘liberated’ at all”
The present war in Afghanistan is a carbon copy of Vietnam where the U.S. bases were surrounded by the Viet Cong guerillas and elements of the Vietminh or army of North Vietnam. The U.S. forces were safe while in their fortified bases, but once outsidr they were sitting ducks.
The Viet Cong could attack those bases any time they wanted and that is why Da Nang fell. But, the techniques used by the U.S. in Vietnam were already tried by the Kuomingtan forces in Manchuria, where Mao Zedong’s Communist forces starved them out one by one and captured their forts.
Bith the U.S. forces and ISAF are now in the same position and cannot move their forces too far out of their bases.
So in effect they are of no use in defeating the Taliban. The situation in Afghanistan is now the same as when the Soviet army was there, and even the Soviets were finally boxed-in with no where to go.
It’s time that the U.S. counted its losses and made a speedy withdrawal as they did in Vietnam in 1975, or they will jave their army trapped like rats, with no means of escape. The choice is still the U.S.’s and they are in no position to set the terms for the withdrawal pf their forces. Shades of the British 1842 should come to mind, and decisions should be made based upon it.
Its too sad that enither Oxbridge nor Eatharrow teach the words Gandawak and Maiwand to their students. To the United kingdom Ayub Khan was a Paksitani president. American think tanks don’t know why there are so many Ayub Khans in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The Anti-Occupation forces cut the supply lines to the Soviets. According to a recent Russian news sources, half of the supplies sent to Kabul are lost, or stolen. Evidence of this can been seen in Darra, Landi Kotal, Peshawar and Kabul-where every imaginable US military item can be purchased for the right price. Many claim that US soldiers also make money on the side by selling arms and ammunitions.
The US has lost the war in Afghanistan–it should declare victory and leave.