Those Wiley AQT

So like pretty much every regular military commander before him faced with a guerilla war (in this case, commanding the Brits in Afghanistan against the “Al Qaeda/Taliban “AQT”) Brigadier Roger Lane has complained that the AQT are “not showing a predisposition to reorganise and regroup to mount offensive operations against us”. They just won’t come out to play.

Spotting “Taliban targets” is apparently difficult. Some sources say the current Operation Condor began when the Americans bombed a wedding party that was shotting its AK-47s into the air as a salute and now, of course, you’ve got pissed-off Afghans and Westerners hunting each other through the mountains.

Anthony Loyd, the Times correspondent, concluded recently that if you carry a weapon in the wrong part of Afghanistan and point it at one of the coalition special forces, you will inevitably die quickly and once you’ve been shot, you are AQT by definition. Given that half the male Afghan population is armed, and used to using weapons liberally, there is ample scope for shooting shepherds.