The Afghanistan Surge is Working; Now We Need Pakistan’s Full Effort

Lisa Curtis / December 17, 2010

The long-awaited White House Review on Afghanistan demonstrates that General Petraeus’ counterinsurgency strategy is beginning to pay dividends. The additional U.S. troops deployed to Afghanistan have helped the U.S. and coalition forces begin to uproot the Taliban from some of their traditional strongholds in southern Afghanistan. The most important task now is to gain greater Pakistani cooperation.

There has been less progress on standing up civilian government in the areas cleared of insurgents, however. While the U.S. and coalition forces have shown they are capable of clearing Taliban from their strongholds, they have yet to demonstrate that Afghan civilian leaders can hold these areas once military operations subside. This will be a key benchmark to watch over the next six months. (more…)