Pakistan drives militants into trap

JALALABAD, Afghanistan | Pakistan’s ongoing military offensive in its northwest tribal areas is chasing insurgents across the border, where they are being intercepted by a U.S.-Afghan security initiative, a U.S. commander says.

The level of violence over the past couple of months in the northeastern [Afghan] provinces of Kunar and Nuristan has risen significantly from the same period last year, and is expected to increase another 10 percent to 20 percent in the spring, largely because of the results of operations across the border in Pakistan´s Bajaur region, Army Col. John Spiszer told The Washington Times.

Although Pakistan’s commitment to the campaign against militants has been questioned and some Pakistani troops are reported to have been redeployed to the country’s eastern border with India, the Bajaur campaign was having an impact, Col. Spiszer said.

“Pakistani pressure… has denied [the insurgents] safe havens and led to more contact in Afghanistan,” he said, adding that an increase of Afghan security forces in the region also has contributed to a rise in hostile engagements this winter. “And that´s not a bad thing.”

Col. Spiszer said the trend is likely to continue as additional U.S. forces are deployed to help secure the mountainous terrain that divides the two countries.

Of the 3,500 to 4,000 troops from the 3rd Combat Brigade, 10th Mountain Division, scheduled to deploy in January, roughly 500 will help stabilize his area of operations, which also includes Nangarhar and Laghman provinces, he said. In the near term, a joint initiative known as Operation Lionheart is under way to better coordinate counterinsurgency efforts on both sides of the border through intelligence sharing and border interdiction.

Col. Spiszer said the initiative is “less about synchronicity and more complementary,” with commanders exchanging tactical information daily to prevent insurgents from resupplying and transiting unchecked through traditional filter points.

U.S.-led operations inside Afghanistan will increase as winter progresses to support the Pakistani offensive, he said, adding that the sustained nature of Pakistani operations “has the potential to make some differences.” He added, however, that Pakistan has been focused away from the immediate border, “so we haven’t closed all the gaps on either side.”

Pakistan has faced mounting U.S. pressure to reassert control over its Federally Administered Tribal Areas, which have long served as a sanctuary for Afghan Taliban and al Qaeda.

Since August, the Pakistan Army and Frontier Corps have waged a grinding offensive in Bajaur Agency, a lawless region about half the size of Rhode Island that is suspected to be a hide-out for al Qaeda’s No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahri.

Reports that Pakistani forces are being redeployed from tribal areas to the Indian border — after the deadly Mumbai attacks that India blames on Pakistani militants — suggest that the military is growing frustrated by a domestic counterinsurgency campaign it is ill-equipped to fight, preferring to confront an old and conventional foe.

However, Nadeem Kiani, a spokesman for the Pakistan Embassy in Washington, said reports that Pakistan is moving troops to the border with India are “not true.”

“We have not moved troops from our western borders,” he said. “Security forces are continuing their operations against militants in the tribal areas. Currently an operation is going on in Khyber agency against militants who were disrupting the NATO supply route to Afghanistan.”

Several areas in Bajaur have been subject to “cordon-search and clearance operations,” he said. The “Bajaur operation is progressing well regardless of [the] gathering threat on our eastern borders or harsh winter weather.”

Mr. Kiani added that “all the three valleys and important towns have been cleared of militants.”

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