Can Afghan government regain lost valley?
By Philip Smucker McClatchy Newspapers GONDALABUK, Afghanistan — As their American trainers shouted out the drill, 15 bearded young Afghan police officers marched back and forth with their U.S.-issue fake guns at an American outpost in the foothills of the Hindu Kush mountains, preparing for the dread day when they return to their valley, which the Taliban control. At a meeting close by, however, the top police official in Nuristan province was offering a solution to the loss of the Doab valley. “The answer is to kill at least two of the senior insurgent leaders,” Gen. Mohamed Qasim told the U.S. commander of the Provincial Reconstruction Team. Qasim offered to recruit an assassin, but he said he’d need American money “to carry out the killing.” It wasn’t the first time the issue had arisen, but in Afghan guerrilla country, Navy Cmdr. Caleb Kerr, who’s from Little Rock, Ark., responded carefully: “Actually, that is not the coalition policy. We do not hire mercenaries to go and kill pe
