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Recently deployed to participate in counterinsurgency operations outside of Kabul, 19-year-old Pvt. Robert Welsh told reporters Monday that for as long as he can remember, he has wanted to serve his country by fighting in Afghanistan.

"My most vivid childhood memories are of seeing the war on TV and imagining one day I'd be able to grow up and come over here to fight for my country," said Welsh, who has followed the U.S. struggle against the Taliban for more than half his life and once spent recesses at school make-believing he and his fellow third-graders were fighting the war on terror.

"I honestly never thought I'd get the chance to participate all these years later, but here I am." Welsh went on to say that while he doesn't want to get his hopes up, he remains cautiously optimistic that his own children will one day follow in his footsteps by fighting in Afghanistan.

A year after entering the Swat Valley, Pakistan's army has begun to scale down its operations in the region. One of the big challenges they face now is to reintegrate some of the men, who were once considered the enemy, back into mainstream society. Al Jazeera's Kamal Hyder reports from Swat Valley.

"The resistance is stronger and bolder today," the head of the Taliban civilian administration in Khost said. "A few years ago the Taliban could move only at night. Now we walk around in the middle of the day. We control our lands and our villages while [the Americans] can only come in by air. The government is besieged in its fortresses, and corruption is paralysing it. One of the main reasons for our popularity is the failure of this government."

"The war has changed," says a commander of the Taliban in Quetta. "I used to fear the government wherever I went. Now we move everywhere and carry our guns with us. Two years ago we were just trying to defend our areas. Now we control this area. It is a mistake to call all fighters Taliban. The Taliban are madrasa students and I am a mullah, but most of my fighters are peasants and farmers and students who come from government schools."

"The Americans came and sat here," said a former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan. "They said they needed to talk to the Taliban but could not find them. I said go and look, they are everywhere." The real reason the Americans did not talk was that they had no respect for the Taliban. "I told the Americans to respect their enemy. You cannot negotiate with the Taliban from a position of strength. If you want talks you have to treat the Taliban as equals."

The Taliban called on the US Congress on Sunday to send a "fact-finding mission" to Afghanistan to investigate what they called the lies and propaganda spread by American military chiefs to prolong the war. The statement, addressed to "Messrs American Congressmen," was signed by Qari Mohammad Yousuf Ahmadi, "spokesman of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan."

The statement suggested the Congressional team travel throughout Afghanistan to uncover "ground realities" it said are being concealed by military leaders eager to give the impression of victory. The resistance to the US-led war against the Taliban was indigenous, the group said, contrary to claims by Washington it was influenced from outside the country.

"Can a few militants stand up to armed forces of 40 countries including the strongest countries of the world," the Taliban statement said, referring to the US-NATO alliance. "In fact, the current armed jihad (holy war) is a country-wide resistance against you. Men and women, old and young from every tribe, ethnicity, caste, and area have arisen to oppose you," the statement read.

The Taliban said that if the US government would not provide proof of its claims, "then how about another experiment? Send a team to Afghanistan on a fact-finding mission. The team should have freedom of movement and should be allowed to remain far from the clutches of your intelligence agencies," it said, adding that the US military was unlikely to allow the team to do so.

The Taliban are not in a position where they are being forced to the negotiating table. If anything, it is the US that is being forced to try to find a way out of Afghanistan, because the Taliban are gaining strength. There are other groups rising up that are not even under the control of [Taliban leader] Mullah Omar. The insurgency is spreading.

The former foreign minister for the Taliban, Muttawakil, said what you are seeing is classic guerrilla insurgency: It is starting in the rural areas, spreading to the smaller cities, and going into the district centers. Eventually it is going to hit Kabul. The Taliban will negotiate with the Afghan government, if the US leaves. That is what we heard.

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/10/29/killing_reconciliation_military_raids_backing_of

 

Afghanistan's northern warlords are preparing to rearm their old militias out of fear that their Taliban enemies are on the brink of a return to power in Kabul, former gunmen and commanders told The Sunday Telegraph. Anger is growing in the north of Afghanistan at the prospect of a deal with President Hamid Karzai after emissaries from the rebel group were escorted to Kabul for talks last week.

Northerners whose homes were destroyed in fighting during the 1990s fear that Afghanistan stands at the beginning of a peace process that could erode their own power and eventually return Taliban supporters to the heart of government -- a prospect that fills many with dread. Any deal which shared power with Taliban leaders would greatly alarm Afghanistan's smaller ethnic groups.

http://www.journeyman.tv/60920/documentaries/taliban-behind-the-masks.html