| Afghanistan's mounting body count no measure of success AFP
07/09/2006
By Bronwen Roberts
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KABUL - Near-daily battlefield death tolls released in Afghanistan are no measure of the success of US-led operations, can be misleading, and often deflect attention from real achievements in the war-torn country, experts and officials say. Official numbers of "enemy" killed in battle can be staggering: 100 in Panjwayi, 60 in Musa Qala, 10 every other day. Loosely worded statements on "estimated" dead or "enemies of Afghanistan" are often picked up by international media desperate for news from inaccessible battlefields but with little way of verifying details. The Taliban also issue battle tolls but these are usually so wildly out of line with the more credible Afghan and coalition accounts that they are generally regarded with even more suspicion than the official figures. The US-led coalition says it issues death tolls after significant operations in order to ward off questions from the media. But coalition officials admit the figures can be misleading and inaccurate, and are no measure of success in a struggle that is more about winning the support of ordinary Afghans than killing people. "It is an obvious question we always get," coalition spokesman Colonel Tom Collins, of the US military, said. "Anytime we conduct an operation we try to provide some result of what happened." The force has not kept an overall count of enemy casualties since the arrival of the coalition in late 2001 to topple the Taliban government for sheltering the Al-Qaeda terror network. The US military abandoned the use of a "body count" after the Vietnam War, when the sometimes-inflated tallies were discredited and called into question the military's credibility. "It is not about how many enemy are killed or captured," said Collins. "Ultimately what we are doing is much bigger than that." Efforts include building capacity within the Afghan government and security forces so they can better take on militants and criminals whose activities ensure Afghanistan remains unstable. For the Canadians it's about winning over the ordinary Afghans who sit on the fence between the Taliban and the coalition and government, Lieutenant Commander Mark McIntyre said. "As Canadian forces we don't use a body count as a measure of success or progress," he said. "Firstly it can be so inaccurate. Secondly our primary mission is not to kill people. We certainly fight if we have to, but that kind of lethal force is one of the measures of last resort." In a drawn-out insurgency, death tolls are an important part of what is becoming an increasingly intense propaganda war. But the high tolls of rebel dead also suggest the militants can draw on more and more recruits, giving the impression that the post-Taliban insurgency is more organised than ever. Sources said the "big show" -- inflating figures to give an impression of strength -- had also been a feature of the jihad, or religious war against the 1980s Soviet occupation. "When the Russians were attacking an area, at the end of the day they were announcing that they had killed 200 rebels," said political analyst Waheed Mujda. "Myself, inside the jihad, could see that that was not true. Big-showing is part of the job in any military and in any part of the world. And it's because they want to legitimise their expenses," he said. Around 15,000 Russian troops were killed, and thousands of Afghan fighters also lost their lives. The Soviets, with their superior firepower, killed about a million civilians and mujahedin, yet were defeated. Today's insurgency was not going to be won through attrition with the size of the impassioned rebel force unknown and "terrorist factory" madrassas, or religious schools, in Pakistan churning out as many militants as needed, a high-ranking Afghan defence official said. "As many Taliban fighters die, that many new Taliban are produced," he said requesting anonymity. "If one Taliban fighter dies, there is his brother, cousin and uncle taking up his arms." "Taliban can't be eliminated by war.... Strengthening basic infrastructure, improving people's life and fighting corruption is the only way to rid Afghanistan of the current violence," he said.
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