Taliban propaganda, bases for dismantling…
Rich pickings in the north west?
This will be an strong new angle in Taliban propaganda over the coming months, I suspect; highlighting the “retreat” of international forces. Incidentally, although I suspect the “slapping incident” referred by Ahmadi below almost certainly didn’t happen, the issue of handing over equipment, bases and facilities may also raises the prospect of genuine misunderstanding, issues and even confrontation between the departing ISAF and the Afghan local government/security officials (“someone promised this to us, you can’t take it away”…?). I am sure locals would love to get their hands on some of the valuable assets that ISAF now don’t appear to need…
Invaders abandon and dismantle 2 large bases in Faryab
Qari Yousuf Ahmadi
Monday, 11 Ramadan 1433Monday, 30 July 2012 10:14
FARYAB, Jul. 30 – Officials reporting from northern Faryab province state that on Sunday, foreign invaders abandoned two of their large bases located in the provincial capital and Qisar district and then dismantled them.
Officials add that the stooge provincial police chief (Commander Abdul Khaliq Aqsai) protested the destruction and claimed it Afghan property drawing the foreign invaders to react, slapping him on the face and leaving him humiliated.
Interesting – this may be overlapping the “those NATO/ISAF folks are destroying our infrastructure” messaging recently out http://tinyurl.com/voj-nato-infrastructure (links to non-jihadi source)
Hi Tony. I think that’s a good point. It also links in nicely with their footage of attacks on Coalition bases, perhaps to be fused together with film of Taliban fighters picking through the ruins, posing as the victors. They did that in a video from a couple of years ago with a US base in the east. They had attacked the base, but were beaten off. A subsequent US decision to close the base allowed them to present it as a military defeat inflicted in the US forces.
Cheers
Tim
Good point – they have used the “leaving as defeat” message in a number of previous posts/videos as far back as 2009 ( http://tinyurl.com/wired-nuristan-ex-machine ) – more from other sources on that one here => http://tinyurl.com/wired-nuristan-ex-machine-more
Take care!
Tony
That’s exactly the one I was thinking about…