Is there a bigger story behind the Bergdahl exchange?

Top CIA Officer in Afghanistan Mistakenly Named by White House

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House inadvertently included the name of the top CIA official in Afghanistan on a list of participants in a military briefing with President Barack Obama that was distributed to reporters on Sunday, the Washington Post reported.  

The newspaper said the official, identified as "Chief of Station" in Kabul, was named as being among those at a briefing with Obama during the president's trip to Bagram Air Base near the Afghan capital.

The list of names was sent by email to reporters traveling with Obama on his surprise Afghanistan visit and included in a "pool report" shared with correspondents and others not on the trip.

The Post said the White House issued a revised list deleting the CIA official's name after it recognized the mistake.

Read the full story at Reuters.

O'Reilly: President Obama and war

Can Afghan Republic Survive After U.S. Withdrawal?

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By AWR Hawkins 

As the Obama administration gets closer to pulling all U.S. troops out of Afghanistan, questions still exist about what kind of country we will leave behind and whether the Afghan republic will be able to survive once we are gone. 

Conservative talk show host David Webb and former Navy SEAL Team Six assault team leader Chuck Pfarrer traveled to Afghanistan last week to get a firsthand look at what we are doing there now, as well as indications of what it might be like once we leave. 

Speaking with Webb on Fox News, Pfarrer said there is not much to teach the Afghans about light infantry because "they are masters of the world at that." However, he stressed that they must have an air force that can support the infantry in missions "that are going to be necessary... to continue to prosecute a counterinsurgency war." 

Webb agreed and speculated that in "our history we've seen military aviation become the development of commercial aviation" and help to spread more and more "commercialism, capitalism, and dare I say it, the growth of a nation."

His point was clear. If we leave Afghanistan too soon or if we leave them without the right skills and equipment in place, then we may be contributing to the collapse of a nation instead of the advance of one. 

Pfarrer said this is exactly what needs to be stressed and that it forms the work General John E. Michel is doing in Afghanistan right now, explaining, "[Michel] is not only manufacturing Afghan aviators, he is helping to put forth a new breed of Afghan citizens... [Persons] connected to the world, [persons] not burdened down by religious prejudices; these are the kind of young leaders -- men and women aviators -- that General Michel is working with [and] that are really going to be the future of Afghanistan."

Karzai security pact gambit aimed at keeping US money filling his pockets

By Jim Miklaszewski, Chief Pentagon Correspondent, NBC News

Afghan Presidency via Reuters

Afghan President Hamid Karzai, left, meets with U.S. National Security Adviser Susan Rice in Kabul on Nov. 25.

Behind a seemingly never-ending game of brinkmanship with the United States over a bilateral security agreement, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has a simple goal, according to U.S. military officials: Ensure that billions of dollars in aid from Washington continues to flow to feed the cycle of corruption that keeps him in power.

ANALYSIS

“It’s all about the money,” said one senior U.S. official, who like the others spoke with NBC News on condition of anonymity. 

The poker game over an estimated $4 billion to $6 billion a year in U.S. and NATO aid that would be expected to continue to flow into the country if a new agreement is signed is playing out on the stage of international diplomacy, but U.S. officials say financial considerations are driving Karzai’s negotiating tactics. Those considerations reportedly include bags of cash he collects from the CIA.

It took well over a year for the United States and Afghanistan to hammer out the bilateral security agreement approved last weekend by the Loya Jirga, an assembly of Afghan elders.

But Karzai promptly raised the stakes again this week, telling National Security Adviser Susan Rice that he would not sign the bilateral security agreement with the U.S. unless the Obama administration agrees to a new set of last-minute demands:  That it take a role in peace talks with the Taliban and release 17 Afghans held at the Guantanamo Bay detention center.  

The White House pushed back, with Rice essentially telling Karzai to sign the agreement by the end of December, or the U.S. would pick up its troops -- along with the billions in future financial aid  -- and go home by the end of 2014. 

The second part of that threat undoubtedly got Karzai’s attention, U.S. officials say, because the U.S. aid is crucial to his future as Afghanistan heads toward a presidential election on April 5, 2014 – a campaign for which Karzai is not eligible due to term limits.

The Afghan government and large segments of society have become heavily dependent on U.S. aid over the past 12 years. But corruption is rampant in Kabul and U.S. officials believe it can never be eliminated.

“It’s a cost of doing business in Afghanistan at every level,” said one official.

Keep reading at investigations >>

Karzai: Obama Administration Said Taliban 'Not Our Enemies'

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By William Bigelow 

Afghan President Hamid Karzai says before he signs a Bilateral Security Agreement with the United States, he has two demands: that “the Americans should stop attacks against Afghan homes” and that there be “peace in Afghanistan.” In an interview tih RFE/RL's Akbar Ayazi, Karzai said:

I have demanded an end to all American attacks against Afghan homes and the beginning of a realistic peace process. Whenever the Americans meet these two demands of mine, I am ready to sign the agreement. And when these two demands are implemented, this agreement is in Afghanistan's interests.

Asked whether Susan Rice, the U.S. national security adviser, told him the U.S. would stay out of the Afghan elections coming up in April, Karzai responded that he had talked to her, but he wasn’t entirely trustful in the U.S. not interfering:

I briefed her about how America and other Western nations interfered in the previous presidential election, how they delayed the election, how they maligned the first round ballot. Keeping in view that experience, and as the president of Afghanistan today, it is my duty not to allow foreigners to either malign Afghanistan's next presidential election or stretch the process so that they can manipulate it. She assured me that this time there will be no interference in our election. So for now, I have her assurance. But I am watching them to see whether they interfere in the election or not. And I will talk about it then.

Karzai confirmed that the Obama Administration actually told him that the Taliban, which provided al Qaeda its base of support for September 11, was not an enemy of the U.S. He said:

Last year, during my visit to Washington, in a very important briefing a day before I met U.S. President [Barack Obama], his national security adviser Tom Donilon, and senior White House officials, generals, and intelligence officials, the national security adviser met with me. He told me: "The Taliban are not our enemies and we don't want to fight them."

Kuwaiti Newspaper: Obama Negotiating with Hezbollah Terrorists

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By Joel B. Pollak 

The Obama administration has entered secret talks with the Hezbollah terrorist group, mediated by Great Britain, according to a report in the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Rai, as relayed by the Jerusalem Post Wednesday.

The State Department lists Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. Thirty years ago, Hezbollah bombed a U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, killing 241. Hezbollah is currently helping to prop up the Assad regime in Syria, in a war that has claimed over 100,000 civilian lives. The organization is also dedicated to Israel's destruction.

According to the report, President Barack Obama opened the "secret indirect talks" to discuss "the fight against al-Qaida, regional stability, and other Lebanese political issues." Hezbollah is supported by Iran and has been involved in terrorism throughout the world. It has also been active in other conflicts, laundering money through the trade in illicit diamonds the fueled the civil war in Sierra Leone in the 1990s, for example.

Afghanistan opium production hits record despite billions spent to combat trade

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AP Photo / Rahmat Gul

By Aarne Heikkila, Producer, NBC News

KABUL – Afghanistan produced record levels of opium in 2013 – despite nearly $7 billion spent by the U.S. to combat the problem, according to a sobering United Nations report out Wednesday. 

Propelled by strong demand and an insurgency that has become more hands-on in the trade, cultivation of opium poppies, which are processed into heroin, rose 36 percent, amounting to 209,000 hectares.

Afghanistan remains the world's largest opium producer – last year accounting for 75 percent of the world's heroin supply. This is despite more than a decade worth of international efforts to persuade poppy farmers to switch to other crops such as wheat.

"The narcotics issue in Afghanistan acts as a virus festering on a low immunity system of governance," said Jean-Luc Lemahieu, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime representative for Afghanistan. "The region and international community share responsibility in this."

Poppy cultivation, historically concentrated in the southern and western parts of the country, has spread to the north, which had been largely poppy-free. Two provinces, Faryab and Balkh, are noted in the U.N. report to have lost their poppy-free status.

At $160 to $200 for one kilogram of dry opium, compared to 41 cents for one kilogram of wheat, farmers are making a strictly economic decision when they decide to go into the trade, said Shafeek Seddiq, president of the Afghanistan Justice Organization.

"If farmers are being offered no other financial alternatives, no services, no way out of poverty, they're going to continue to go back to planting poppy every time," Seddiq said.

With 60,000 U.S. forces left in Afghanistan – down from a peak of 100,000 – insurgents have fought hard to reclaim lost ground in poppy producing areas and have used opium production to help finance terrorism, security analysts say. 

"The drug economy plays a direct role in severely destabilizing the region," said Wadir Safi, political science professor at the University of Kabul. "Poppy crop sales make it increasingly difficult for the Afghan government to establish control in an ever-increasing part of the country and opium continues to make its way to neighboring countries and Europe."

Kerry: Peace talks with Taliban need to ’get back on track’ after delay

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Jacquelyn Martin / AP

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry walks through the airport with
Ambassador Ibrahim Fakhroo, Qatari Chief of Protocol after
being greeted on arrival in Doha, Qatar on Saturday.

By Catherine Chomiak, Akbar Shinwari and Daniel Arkin, NBC News

Secretary of State John Kerry said Saturday that the U.S. wants to see proposed peace talks with the Taliban “get back on track” after being thrown into doubt this week amid a diplomatic dispute with the Afghan government.

“We need to see if we can get back on track,” Kerry told a news conference in Qatar. “I don’t know whether that’s possible or not.”

Peace talks between U.S. and Taliban representatives were thrown off course Wednesday after irate Afghan President Hamid Karzai  suspended his involvement due to a dispute over a recently opened Taliban office in the Qatari capital of Doha, which had been established in anticipation of the proposed talks.

In a statement, Karzai accused the U.S. of a "contradiction” after a sign that was placed over the Taliban office bore the name of the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan” – the country’s title during the Taliban regime of the 1990s.

Amid a diplomatic kerfuffle, the State Department on Wednesday announced that the Qatari government removed the sign board bearing the disputed name.

Related: Kerry calls Afghanistan's Karzai to ease anger over Taliban office

"The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs has issued a statement clarifying that the name of the office is the Political Office of the Afghan Taliban and not the Political Office of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, and that it had the sign with the incorrect name in front of the door taken down," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said. 

Kerry on Saturday warned that the Taliban office may need to be shuttered if peace talks do not resume as planned.

“If there is not a decision … to move forward by the Taliban in short order, then we may have to consider whether or not the office has to be closed,” Kerry said.

The Taliban has offered to deliver the only known American prisoner of war from the 12-year-long conflict in return for five senior operatives held at Guantanamo Bay, Taliban sources told NBC News.

Related: Taliban offers to swap American POW for five Gitmo detainees

U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, 27, from Hailey, Idaho, has been held in captivity since 2009 after disappearing from his base in Afghanistan. His exact location is unknown, but he is believed to be held in Pakistan by the Haqqani network.

The negotiation's conditions require the Taliban to sever ties with al Qaeda, put an end to violence and accept the Afghan constitution, in particular protections for women and minorities, Obama administration officials told NBC News.

State Dept. Unsure if Taliban Still Considered Terrorists

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By Meredith Dake 

State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki said she was "not sure" whether the Taliban is designated as a terrorist organization when a reporter pressed her on negotiations between the United States and the Islamist group during Tuesday's press briefing. 

These talks come on the heels of the Taliban opening offices in Qatar, allegedly to aid the Afghan government's progress toward stability without a U.S. presence. 

The international coalition recently gave primary responsibility for Afghanistan's security to the country's army and police. Now the Taliban have opened offices in Qatar to facilitate talks for a political solution.

From the Associated Press:

In a major breakthrough, the Taliban and the U.S. announced Tuesday that they will hold formal talks on finding a political solution to ending nearly 12 years of war in Afghanistan but President Barack Obama warned the process won't be quick or easy.
The comments came on a day in which Afghan forces took the lead from the U.S.-led NATO coalition for security nationwide, marking a turning point for American and NATO military forces, which will now move entirely into a supporting role. It also opened the way for the full withdrawal of most foreign troops in 18 months
After months of delays, the Taliban opened a political office in the Qatari capital of Doha, paving the way for talks to begin. The decision was a reversal of months of failed efforts to start peace talks while Taliban militants intensified a campaign targeting urban centers and government installations.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has halted these talks with the United States "to protest the way the Americans are reaching out to the Taliban in efforts to find a political solution to the war." Karzai expressed his disappointment with the U.S. government for holding direct talks with the Taliban before bringing Afghan officials into the negotiations.

When reminded that the Taliban was once labeled a terrorist organization by the U.S., Psaki said that she was "not sure how they’re defined at this particular moment." 

QUESTION: I’m going to carry on with what Matt’s question is about – negotiating, the legality of it. I mean, in the eyes of the U.S., is Taliban a terrorist group?
MS. PSAKI: Well, I’m not sure how they’re defined at this particular moment.
QUESTION: Yeah.
MS. PSAKI: But the important thing here is that we’ve long said that moving toward a reconciliation process, of which they are a key part – the President has said this, the Secretary has said this – is an important part of moving towards a more stable Afghanistan. That’s why we support these efforts. That’s why we’ve been so engaged, why the Secretary has been so engaged, at every level of the government.

Psaki made this statement within hours of a Taliban attack that killed four American soldiers stationed in Afghanistan.

From the Associated Press:

The Taliban claimed responsibility Wednesday for an attack in Afghanistan that killed four American troops just hours after the insurgent group announced it would hold talks with the U.S. on finding a political solution to ending the nearly 12-year war in the country.
The deadly attack underscores the challenges ahead in trying to end the violence roiling Afghanistan through peace negotiations in Qatar with militants still fighting on the ground.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said the insurgents fired two rockets into the Bagram Air Base outside the Afghan capital, Kabul, late on Tuesday. American officials confirmed the base had come under attack by indirect fire -- likely a mortar or rocket -- and that four U.S. troops were killed.

US, Taliban to meet in Qatar for ’key milestone’ toward ending Afghanistan war

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By Jim Miklaszewski, Courtney Kube and Erin McClam, NBC News

U.S. and Taliban representatives will meet soon for the first time to begin what are expected to be long and complex negotiations for a peaceful settlement to the war in Afghanistan, senior Obama administration officials said Tuesday.

The officials told NBC News that the meeting will take place in the next several days in the Qatari capital of Doha. The Taliban will open an office there for the purpose of negotiating directly with the Afghan government, the officials said.

"This is a key milestone on the way to the complete transition of responsibility for security to Afghans by the end of next year," a senior U.S. administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said via conference call after the announcement was made.

The negotiating conditions require the Taliban to break their ties with al Qaeda, end the violence and accept the Afghan constitution, especially the protections for women and minorities, the officials said.

But because of deep distrust between the Afghan government and the Taliban, the process will be “complex, long and messy,” one official said. The United States "will have a role in direct talks, but this is a negotiation that will have to be led by Afghans," a senior administration official said.

The disclosure came on the same day that international forces, led by the United States, handed control of Afghan national security to local forces — a milestone after almost 12 years of war. Most foreign combat troops will leave the country by the end of 2014.

Obama administration officials also told NBC News that the U.S. is pursuing a prisoner exchange with the Taliban to secure the release of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, held for several years by the Haqqani network, considered a dangerous element of the Taliban.

NBC News' Elizabeth Chuck contributed to this report.

Afghans take over national security from US-led forces

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Jawad Jalali / EPA

Afghan President Hamid Karzai, left, shakes hands with NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen prior to Tuesday's ceremony in Kabul.

By Akbar Shinwari and Sohel Uddin, NBC News

KABUL, Afghanistan – U.S.-led international troops handed control of Afghanistan’s national security to local forces Tuesday -- a historic day marred by a suicide attack in another part of Kabul.

The formal transfer of responsibility is a major milestone in the process of withdrawal from the country, 12 years after the NATO-led mission began its mission to end Taliban rule.

Most foreign combat troops will leave the country by the end of 2014, but international funding and humanitarian aid will continue - prolonging the political headache for President Barack Obama over America's involvement in the conflict.

In another tentative step forward, Afghan President Hamid Karzai announced he is sending a team to the Qatari capital, Doha, for peace talks with the Taliban in a bid to end insurgent attacks.

Afghans are now responsible in all districts of Afghanistan's 34 provinces, completing a transfer of power from NATO that began in 2011.

Anja Niedringhaus / AP

More than ten years after the beginning of the war, Afghanistan faces external pressure to reform as well as ongoing internal conflicts.

Launch slideshow

“Is a great day for us, not only for the Afghan government but also for the Afghan nation,” said Janan Mosazai, spokesperson for the country's ministry of foreign affairs. “It is a big day of honor.”

However, a botched car bomb in a different part of Kabul killed at least three civilians just before the official handover, raising renewed questions about how the country’s 352,000-strong security forces will tackle the militant insurgency.

The target was prominent lawmaker and Shia Muslim cleric Mohammed Mohaqiq, police at the scene told The Associated Press.

Massoud Hossaini / AFP - Getty Images

The site of a suicide attack in Kabul on Tuesday that targeted Afghan lawmaker Mohammad Mohaqiq.

Gen. Mohammad Zahir, chief of the Kabul Criminal Investigation Division, told the AP three people were killed by the bombing and another 30 were wounded — including six bodyguards. Mohaqiq survived the attack, Reuters reported.

The security handover means the remaining US-led forces will play only a supporting role, providing help if needed but no longer taking the lead in tackling insurgent attacks.

"We will continue to help Afghan troops in operations if needed,” NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said at Tuesday’s ceremony. “But we will no longer plan, execute or lead those operations. And by the end of 2014, our combat mission will be completed. At that time, Afghanistan will be fully secured by Afghans.”

The U.S. military is by far the single biggest group within ISAF’s steadily-shrinking force of about 100,000 foreign troops [PDF link here.]

In January, President Barack Obama said announced that more than half of the approximately 66,000 U.S. troops still in Afghanistan will return home in 2014.

The Afghan army has suffered a sharp rise in casualties since it began slowly assuming greater control of security, the BBC reported.  By comparison, international coalition casualties have been steadily falling since 2010, it said.

Among the problems faced by Afghanistan is a high desertion rate among recruits to its local police forces, meaning thousands of new recruits are needed each month.

“It is a good decision that the Afghan forces are taking the responsibility because it is their own country and they are the one who should be responsible for the security,” said Kabul restaurant owner Mohammad Faried.

However, he added: “I still have doubts. If they do not have good weapons it will be hard for them to keep peace and stability in the country especially in the villages.”

The U.S. and its allies have yet to decide exactly how long troops will remain in Afghanistan beyond 2014, and what their role should be.

In March, Karzai publicly criticized the American presence in his country, causing embarrassment to U.S. defense secretary, Chuck Hagel, during his first visit to Kabul in the new role.

U.S. Has Given Afghan Army More than $1 Billion in Ammo

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www.aco.nato.int

By AWR Hawkins 

A new oversight report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction shows that the U.S. government has provided the Afghanistan National Army (ANA) over $1 billion worth of U.S. taxpayer funded ammunition.

The actual number is $1.03 billion; this cost is in addition to the $288 million in ammunition that the U.S. has also provided to the Afghan National Police (ANP).

In addition to bullets for both the ANA and the ANP, the U.S. has spent $3.4 billion for "equipment and transportation" for the ANP alone. Of this, $366,079,788 was used for weapon purchases, while over $2.6 billion was used for transportation purchases.

U.S. taxpayers have funded nearly $900 million worth of weapons purchases for the ANA as well.