BREAKING! *More than 160 US, NATO vehicles burned in Pakistan* (could choke supply route)

[KoKo]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081207/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan_16

More than 160 US, NATO vehicles burned in Pakistan
By RIAZ KHAN, Associated Press Writer Riaz Khan, Associated Press Writer 58 mins ago

PESHAWAR, Pakistan – Militants blasted their way into two transport terminals in Pakistan on Sunday and torched more than 160 vehicles destined for U.S.-led troops in Afghanistan, in the biggest assault yet on a vital military supply line, officials said.

The U.S. military said its losses in the raid near the northwestern city of Peshawar would have only a "minimal" impact on its operations against resurgent Taliban-led militants in Afghanistan.

However, the attack's boldness will fuel concern that Taliban militants are tightening their hold around Peshawar and could choke the supply route through the famed Khyber Pass.

Up to 75 percent of supplies for Western forces in landlocked Afghanistan pass through Pakistan after being unloaded from ships at the Arabian sea port of Karachi. NATO is already seeking an alternative route through Central Asia.

The attack at the Portward Logistic Terminal reduced a section of the vast walled compound to a smoldering junkyard.

Terminal manager Kifayatullah Khan said armed men flattened the gate before dawn with a rocket-propelled grenade, shot dead a guard and set fire to a total of 106 vehicles, including about 70 Humvees.

An Associated Press reporter who visited the depot saw six rows of destroyed Humvees and military trucks parked close together, some of them on flatbed trailers, all of them gutted and twisted by the flames.

Khan said shipping documents showed they were destined for U.S. forces and the Western-trained Afghan National Army.

The attackers fled after a brief exchange of fire with police, who arrived about 40 minutes later, Khan said.

The nine other guards who were on duty but stood helplessly aside put the number of assailants at 300, Khan said, though police official Kashif Alam said there were only 30.

At the nearby Faisal depot, manager Shah Iran said 60 vehicles destined for Afghanistan as well as three Pakistani trucks were burned in a similar assault.

It was unclear if one or two bands of gunmen were involved.

The attack was the latest in a series that have highlighted the vulnerability of the supply route to the spreading power of the Taliban and other Islamic militants in the border region.

More at:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081207/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan_16

[malaise]

1. There will never be a pipeline built through Afghanistan

Get the hell out

[spanone]

6. i agree..make like the russians and get the hell out.

[dysfunctional press]

15. it would require a constant military presence along it's ENTIRE route.

it's a pipe-dream.

[coalition_unwilling]

2. Why does this remind me of

the French in Vietnam ca. 1954???

[ChairmanAgnostic]

3. "we do not fear the Russians, but we do fear their helicopters."

a famous quote from an Afghani insurgent leader pleading for more Stinger missiles, food, guns and ammo. More than 20 years ago.

[spanone]

4. as we exit iraq we will continue another USELESS war in afghanistan

[Are_grits_groceries]

5. Cut the supply lines and it will be over.

Classic strategy. Also, don't outrun them. ie Rommel.

[KoKo]

7. "don't outrun them?"

:shrug:

[Are_grits_groceries]

8. Don't move your troops so fast

that you aren't connected to your supply lines. Rommel was known for moving his units quickly, but he left his supply lines. They weren't constantly connected.

"General Cunningham did, as Rommel had hoped, decide to withdraw the Eighth Army to Egypt, but Auchinleck arrived from Cairo just in time to cancel the withdrawal orders.<33> The German attack, which began with only 100 operational tanks remaining,<34> stalled as it outran its supplies and met stiffening resistance. The counterattack was criticised by the German High Command and some of his staff officers as too dangerous with Commonwealth forces still operating along the coast east of Tobruk, and a wasteful attack as it bled his forces, in particular his remaining tank force. Among the Staff officers who were critical was Friedrich von Mellenthin, who said that "Unfortunately, Rommel overestimated his success and believed the moment had come to launch a general pursuit.".<34> In Rommel's favour, the attack very nearly succeeded, with the British Eighth Army commander ordering a withdrawal, and only Auchinleck's timely intervention prevented this.<33>"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erwin_Rommel

[KoKo]

9. Thanks...interesting.

[SpiralHawk]

10. "Don't worry. I'm in charge - I'm The Decider." - Commander AWOL (R)

[underpants]

11. Gee sounds like they should hire that out to private firms

If you don't think there is a move to clean the slate in the next two months you are kidding yourself.

[Liberal_in_LA]

12. ooops. I started a dup thread before I saw this one.

[Pavulon]

13. It is CLEAR this will be the focus of this administrations

war on terror. We are not leaving Afghanistan, we are increasing troop levels.

Now we have people there who are willing to fight a CI war.

The strategy will need to be directed towards pulling pakistan into the conflict on our side and killing the right people.

Obama was clear on MTP he is not walking away from this.

This conflict will not be won with pure force alone.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

14. And, the geniuses are sending more troops to fight another lost war.

With same advertising as the two other lost wars.

"We have to fight them there so we don't have to fight them here."

I'm still waiting for the Vietnamese to storm the beaches of California.

[Mari333]

16. yes, if this was Bush calling for escalation

people would go ballistic.
bring them home now.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4604234

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

18. Well, it's now chic and PC to be hawks.

Because "our" politicians are waving the flag and dispatching the cannon-fodder to "protect" us.

[Mari333]

21. Its a puzzlement

I have been on DU for a long time, and I watched many many DUers scream bloody murder about Bush and his occupations. Now, all of a sudden, Obama condones a troop buildup and its all okey dokey to send our sons and daughters into an unwinnable occupation. of course, its never their sons or daughters.
and i feel like I am in some kind of bizarro world now.
but, i call them as i see them :chickenhawks. I dont care what party they belong to.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

22. Indeed. Principles, ethics, even common sense take a backseat to Party.

"I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever, in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else, where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent. If I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all." --Thomas Jefferson to Francis Hopkinson, 1789.

"Were parties here divided merely by a greediness for office,...to take a part with either would be unworthy of a reasonable or moral man." --Thomas Jefferson to William Branch Giles, 1795.

“Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost." --John Quincy Adams

[FarCenter]

17. don't go fighting with your land army on the mainland of Asia

"The US has broken the second rule of war. That is, don't go fighting with your land army on the mainland of Asia. Rule One is don't march on Moscow. I developed these two rules myself."

Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, in the House of Lords on American policy in Vietnam, 1962.

[martymar64]

20. Monty was a showboater, but on this he was right.

[martymar64]

19. Afghanistan is where empires go to die

Just ask the British and the Russians.

[KoKo]

23. Has CNN covered this one yet? As of Noon today...no Cables were covering

the story...and even Josh Marshall over at TPM didn't have it up on his "Newswire." Did they deep six the story? :shrug: