Moscow plans to sell helicopters on a commercial basis to NATO in support of International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) operations in Afghanistan. Sources within the Russian aviation industry indicated that the Alliance is interested in procuring civil transport helicopters to enhance prompt and safe troop... MORE

Violence and instability in Afghanistan continue to rage in the form of an organic insurgency shaped by local identities, networks, and interests.  Operating under the nebulous rubric of the Taliban, the insurgents in Afghanistan have evolved in sophistication, lethality, and geographic scope in recent years. ... MORE

While the Western press has been occupied recently with accounts of fraudulent elections in Afghanistan and the alleged role of President Hamid Karzai’s brother as a paid CIA agent, a stranger but perhaps more instructive story was playing out in Afghanistan that reveals the rather... MORE

The recently released 41st issue of the Afghan Jihadi e-magazine al-Somod carried an interview with the Amir of Jihad of Balkh province in northern Afghanistan, Mullah Raz Mohammad bin Sayd al-Haydari. Al-Somod is published by the press center of the so-called Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan... MORE

Lieutenant General Hadi Khalid was the Afghan Deputy Minister of the Interior for Security from May 2006 to June 2008.  He lost his post after a dispute with the Karzai administration last year but remains one of Afghanistan's leading thinkers on regional ethno-political dynamics and... MORE

Lieutenant General Abdul Hadi Khalid was the Afghan First Deputy Minister of the Interior for Security from May 2006 to late June 2008.  Specializing in counter-narcotics, border policing and internal security, he announced the largest drug seizure in history (The Scotsman, June 12, 2008; Daily... MORE

The search for a "safe haven" in the strategic planning of the Salafi-Jihadi movement is a central issue in the intended establishment of the "Islamic State." The safe haven offers a set of strategic advantages, such as security, training camps, a certain degree of centralization... MORE

A German-ordered, U.S.-executed air strike, which killed scores of Afghan villagers on September 4, has caused a political uproar in Germany in the run-up to the September 27 parliamentary elections. The two governing parties are engaged in competitive damage-control. The event underscores the limitations and... MORE

After seven months in exile in Turkey, General Rashid Dostum, the paramount leader of Afghanistan’s Uzbek and Turkmen communities, was given permission by the Karzai government to return to the country. Thousands of his supporters, including many beating drums and chanting “Long live General Dostum!”... MORE

Officials in Helmand say that the military’s U.S.-led Operation Khanjar (Dagger) is completely different from previous operations. Mohammad Davoud Ahmadi, spokesperson for the Helmand governor, says that this time they have launched the biggest operation ever against the insurgents in Helmand province. “This time we... MORE