Archive of Sunny in Kabul

Sunny in has written 8 articles at Registan.


ISAF Explains Security Using Schools and Cellphones…and It’s Adorable

by Sunny in Kabul

ISAF‘s stopped releasing it’s monthly numbers, so for the duration of Operation Ready or Not we’re going to be stuck with whatever press releases they deign to unleash upon us huddled masses. Which is what we had here last week. It was yet another plethora of misguided metrics and an apparent misunderstanding of what’s really [...]

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Bing West Writes for the NRO on Afghanistan

by Sunny in Kabul

The National Review Online is widely regarded as a paragon of rational thought and well-reasoned argument. They do not deign to dabble in the petty squabblings reserved for lesser publications like the Daily Caller, but regularly take a moral high ground. Such moral high ground can, at times, be construed as being terribly racist-y, but [...]

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More Fun with ISAF’s Numbers: I Blog for the AAN

by Sunny in Kabul

One of the coolest things I’ve gotten to do in writing about Afghanistan is guest blogging over at the Afghan Analysts Network. It’s run by some of the smartest people around when it comes to Afghanistan, and it’s a no-kidding privilege to be able to write for them on occasion.Before we learned yesterday that ISAF [...]

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ISAF Walks Back Insurgent Attack Numbers, Does Not Understand the Interwebs

by Sunny in Kabul

You may have heard the news that ISAF is walking back what it originally reported in January, that there was a 7% decrease in “Enemy Initiated Attacks” over the course of 2012. You may have also heard the news that said report has been taken down. I’m guessing there’s going to be a webmaster opening [...]

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Big Trouble in Little Wardak: Karzai Kicks the SOF Kids to the Kurb

by Sunny in Kabul

President Karzai on Sunday ordered the removal of all US Special Operations Forces (SOF) from Wardak province within the next two weeks. Coming as it does on the heels of his latest decree that ANSF can’t call for foreign airstrikes, this bodes ill for US plans in Afghanistan in the coming months. It’s one thing for [...]

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In Response to Mark Jacobson’s Karzai-the-Ungrateful Piece

by Sunny in Kabul

Writing for CNN’s Security Clearance, Mark Jacobson, who served as the Deputy NATO Senior Civilian Representative (SCR) in Afghanistan from 2009-2011, posits that the man sitting in the Presidential Palace in Kabul needs to mend his ways lest things go awry. The ungrateful twerp. What’s puzzling is that Jacobson’s analysis, coming as it does from [...]

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If You Build It, They Will…Well, Not Sure What They’ll Do

by Sunny in Kabul

This week on the blog we’ve been looking at the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) and some of Sopko’s recent findings in Afghanistan. An infographic here, an interview there, and now I think, kids, you’re ready for something really scary. Not Lindsay-Lohan-wants-to-open-a-restaurant scary. But scary. One of the keys to ISAF getting out [...]

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General Allen Retires: Needs to Start a Blog

by Sunny in Kabul

We learned today that General John Allen, whose primary responsibilities in Afghanistan included emailing Jilly Kelley and apologizing for killing Afghan civilians, decided that he would retire and not seek the top NATO spot in Europe. It’s rumored that the next SACEUR will actually have his own email account, vs. the telegraph that NATO had [...]

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