Free Range International

Fighting season is now on. This year the villains strategy appears to involve deliberate attacks on aid projects and let me tell you something we (the outside the wire aid community) are getting hammered.  In the last week a majority of us have had to deal with murders, intimidation, shootings, IED’s, kidnappings and attacks [...]

In the Helmand Province, this year’s fighting season has started off with a whimper.  On May Day (as predicted) the only action was in Paktika Province where a child suicide bomber violated the latest Taliban  public announcement by blowing himself up in a police station.  The Taliban had just announced they would no [...]

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is never pleasant to observe, especially when it is  an  American President doing the snatching.  President Obama was  running strong:    1. He just announced The Dream Team taking over the Afghan campaign,    2. He launched a unilateral direct action mission deep into Pakistan to kill [...]

The ISAF (International Security Assistance Force)  has taken  an unusual step by issuing a warning to all internationals, alerting of coordinated “spectacular attacks”,   kidnapping of internationals, suicide bombings, and all manner of general mayhem  to  kick off  Sunday, 1 May.  To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time ISAF [...]