tagryn | Surge in Afghanistan: easy to say, hard to do

There's an old saying: amateurs study strategy, professionals study logistics. In that vein, a good article from the Captain's Journal blog titled "How Many Troops Can We Logistically Support in Afghanistan?". Of especially cautionary note:

Afghanistan is land-locked, and transportation of supplies and ordnance to U.S. and NATO troops occurs basically in three ways. Ten percent comes into Afghanistan via air supply. The other ninety percent comes in through the port city of Karachi, of which the vast majority goes to the Torkham Crossing (and then to Kabul) via the Khyber pass, with some minor portion going to Kandahar through Chaman.

So the NATO/Coalition presence in Afghanistan is dependent on supply routes going through Pakistan. Something to keep in mind if the Indian-Pakistani cold war turns hot again, and also a limit as to exactly how far we can push the Pakistani government without endangering our Afghanistan mission as well. Furthermore, the Taliban doesn't need to defeat the Coalition in battle: if they can just control the passes into Afghanistan and block the supply convoys, they can win via attrition as the NATO position becomes untenable.