Nearly three years ago, the United States thought it had bombed the Taliban into oblivion in the rocky mountains and dry valleys where the extremist group made its last stand. But the violence continues. In those same mountains and valleys, US troops are playing cat-and-mouse with replenished ranks of Taliban fighters, and not always coming off best. Fuelling the fight is the prospect of Afghanistan’s first national democratic election, due on Oct 9 and which the Islamists have vowed to disrupt.As the violence intensifies, Washington is looking to Afghanistan’s feeble government for help, and it has come from what was previously a widely derided quarter: the Afghan national army (ANA).Recruited from the country’s myriad militias and trained by the US, the newly-formed ANA had been considered Afghanistan’s Dads’ Army, if perhaps slightly less hungry for action than the original. Desertion rates are high, with up to half the first units trained last year hightailing it back to their villages. And the Afghan troops, casually swinging their Kalashnikovs or drinking tea at checkpoints, cut a desultory figure beside the beefed-up US soldiers.The army is still small, with just 13,700 of a planned 70,000 troops in service. In contrast an estimated 85,000 militiamen, loyal to the country’s warlords, roam almost unchallenged.But in recent months the ANA has begun to improve on its weedy image, taking on a more confrontational role. Afghanistan’s meddlesome warlords are also feeling the heat of the ANA’s new zeal.Still, nobody doubts the ANA has a long way to go before becoming the lean, mean machine envisaged by its US mentors.Khan Mohammed, 23, was a baker in the south-eastern city of Gardez before signing up with the ANA eight months ago. “By now Afghans are very tired with fighting. So when the ANA started I decided to serve my country,” he said proudly over a bowl of rice in the unit’s mess tent.Beside him, Mujahid, 23, recalled his earlier days of soldiering in the Northern Alliance faction of Amanullah Guzar. “It was like a wild army. The enemy was very dangerous and we had no training or discipline,” he said.Next week’s election will be the ANA’s greatest test yet, with up to 10 million Afghans potentially looking for their first taste of democracy.Excerpted from a Kabul despatch by Declan Walsh on October 1, The Guardian
