U.S. Marines in Helmand Focus on Security for Afghan Civilians

What's going on here is that the Taliban are simply retreating into the hills in order to regroup and preparing to make attacks on other areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan. an analogy would be squeezing a soft balloon: it gives where there is pressure and expands where there is less pressure.

The trick to defeating the Taliban and other Islamic terrorist groups is to squeeze so hard and so fast that the balloon bursts. Incremental efforts are bound to failure, similar to the ultimate loss of South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.

Barack Barry Soetoro Hussein Obama's plan may look good now, but will come back to bite him (and all the lost innocents) when the Taliban rise up in other areas.

FROM BLOOMBERG.COM:

U.S. Marines in Helmand Focus on Security for Afghan Civilians
By Tony Capaccio

July 8 (Bloomberg) --

The Taliban has largely fled Helmand province in the face of a combined Marine Corps, Afghan and NATO operation that’s focusing on improving the security of the population, the offensive’s top commander said.

There haven’t been any civilian casualties after seven days and about 20 engagements with Taliban forces that now have largely left the area in southern Afghanistan, Marine Corps Brigadier General Larry Nicholson told reporters today at the Pentagon. The military operation is now focused on cementing relations with the population, he said.
Foot patrols from among the force of 4,000 Marines and about 650 Afghan security personnel are canvassing villages and talking to elders about their needs, Nicholson said in a telephone news conference from Afghanistan.

“It’s heavy work, it’s hot work, but it’s important work,” Nicholson said of the small-group interactions aimed at improving relations with civilians in Helmand, a Taliban stronghold and the center of the illicit opium trade that funds the insurgency.
“That will start with that first cup of tea,” Nicholson said. “I tell my guys, ‘Be prepared to drink a lot of tea and eat a lot of bread,’ because this is a long haul and we’re going to have to build their confidence one cup of tea at a time.”
U.S.-led troops and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization are stepping up the offensive against Taliban militants in an effort to stabilize the country before national elections on Aug. 20.

The Obama administration has made combating Taliban and al- Qaeda extremists in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan a priority and shifted the emphasis from the war in Iraq.
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