4 ms·

Afghanistan Loses 42k Troops in Crackdown on 'Ghost Soldiers'

tyingq 7y ago
Total Afghan troops are supposedly in the 300 to 400k range. So that's a pretty significant ~10+% fudge. Somewhat surprised it wasn't expected and prepared for. Guessing there was some financial reward for recruitment targets. People optimize whatever you reward them for.
- onetimemanytime 7y ago
  at about $300 a month https://www.reuters.com/article/us-afghanistan-army-desertions/desertions-deplete-afghan-forces-adding-to-security-worries-idUSKCN0UW1K3 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-afghanistan-army-desertio... . Plus equipment, food supplies etc that can be sold on the black market. Some generals must be very rich. This is a well known and common trick in corrupt countries. Usually the no-show employees keep half or whatever agreed to and hand the rest.
  - tyingq 7y ago
    That's on top of any reward for meeting targets... Given the dire need, with US withdrawals, I suspect the meeting target rewards weren't trivial.
    - onetimemanytime 7y ago
      No personal knowledge but I'd be surprised if they didn't protect drug shipments as well in exchange for cash. Probably thousands of Afghani leaders have milked the war to make millions and even hundreds of millions. USA spent hundreds of billions to trillions...
      - tyingq 7y ago
        It's a sort of hustler's paradise I imagine. Probably makes the "War Dogs" movie look amatuerish in retrospect. Or perhaps "American Gangster" is a more apt reference.
- londons_explore 7y ago
  Is all this paid for with large loans from the USA?
mothsonasloth 7y ago
[ I am not a General or Diplomat] I think ISAF should look to the Northern Alliance for more responsibility. The South detests them but less than the Americans. Like the Kurds they have a bit more get up and go about them. They keep their region safe, encourage foreign involvement and contribute to the ANAs recruitment. It's in their best interests that the Taliban don't expand.
- hindsightbias 7y ago
  The NA was known more as weekend warriors during the Soviet occupation which was one reason the ISI wanted the jihadi groups to get most of the Cyclone money.
- stevenjohns 7y ago
  > Like the Kurds they have a bit more get up and go about them. The idea that "Kurds"[0] are somehow more motivated or more trustworthy is literally just racist State-sponsored propaganda that has been used and abused by all sides, including from other Kurds, for various reasons over the last 150 years. Rather than picking and choosing arbitrary, loosely aligned militias to control regions, the US needs to take a more holistic view towards the region and stop participating in the Saudi-Iranian proxy war if it wants to resolve the situation. [0] I'm putting the word in quotation marks because they are a group of 40 million people with differing religions, alliances, identities, political views and geographical locations around the world
  - wtdata 7y ago
    > The idea that "Kurds"[0] are somehow more motivated or more trustworthy is literally just racist State-sponsored propaganda. Kurds aren't a race. Giving special credit to a group of people because of their different culture (even agreeing with you that in this case it seems propaganda), is not necessarily racist.
    - krageon 7y ago
      They are a distinct ethnic group, which we usually call a race. Seeing as race is a fundamentally arbitrary distinction, I don't see why using it in this way can be called wrong.

Total Afghan troops are supposedly in the 300 to 400k range. So that's a pretty significant ~10+% fudge. Somewhat surprised it wasn't expected and prepared for. Guessing there was some financial reward for recruitment targets. People optimize whatever you reward them for.

onetimemanytime 7y ago
at about $300 a month https://www.reuters.com/article/us-afghanistan-army-desertions/desertions-deplete-afghan-forces-adding-to-security-worries-idUSKCN0UW1K3 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-afghanistan-army-desertio... . Plus equipment, food supplies etc that can be sold on the black market. Some generals must be very rich. This is a well known and common trick in corrupt countries. Usually the no-show employees keep half or whatever agreed to and hand the rest.
- tyingq 7y ago
  That's on top of any reward for meeting targets... Given the dire need, with US withdrawals, I suspect the meeting target rewards weren't trivial.
  - onetimemanytime 7y ago
    No personal knowledge but I'd be surprised if they didn't protect drug shipments as well in exchange for cash. Probably thousands of Afghani leaders have milked the war to make millions and even hundreds of millions. USA spent hundreds of billions to trillions...
    - tyingq 7y ago
      It's a sort of hustler's paradise I imagine. Probably makes the "War Dogs" movie look amatuerish in retrospect. Or perhaps "American Gangster" is a more apt reference.
londons_explore 7y ago
Is all this paid for with large loans from the USA?

mothsonasloth 7y ago

[ I am not a General or Diplomat] I think ISAF should look to the Northern Alliance for more responsibility. The South detests them but less than the Americans. Like the Kurds they have a bit more get up and go about them. They keep their region safe, encourage foreign involvement and contribute to the ANAs recruitment. It's in their best interests that the Taliban don't expand.

hindsightbias 7y ago
The NA was known more as weekend warriors during the Soviet occupation which was one reason the ISI wanted the jihadi groups to get most of the Cyclone money.
stevenjohns 7y ago
> Like the Kurds they have a bit more get up and go about them. The idea that "Kurds"[0] are somehow more motivated or more trustworthy is literally just racist State-sponsored propaganda that has been used and abused by all sides, including from other Kurds, for various reasons over the last 150 years. Rather than picking and choosing arbitrary, loosely aligned militias to control regions, the US needs to take a more holistic view towards the region and stop participating in the Saudi-Iranian proxy war if it wants to resolve the situation. [0] I'm putting the word in quotation marks because they are a group of 40 million people with differing religions, alliances, identities, political views and geographical locations around the world
- wtdata 7y ago
  > The idea that "Kurds"[0] are somehow more motivated or more trustworthy is literally just racist State-sponsored propaganda. Kurds aren't a race. Giving special credit to a group of people because of their different culture (even agreeing with you that in this case it seems propaganda), is not necessarily racist.
  - krageon 7y ago
    They are a distinct ethnic group, which we usually call a race. Seeing as race is a fundamentally arbitrary distinction, I don't see why using it in this way can be called wrong.