Rug Pundits » Felix Kuehn http://rugpundits.com From the other side of the fence Tue, 07 Feb 2012 21:54:52 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3 Taliban and Conflict http://rugpundits.com/2011/04/17/sufilore-9-taliban-et-al/ http://rugpundits.com/2011/04/17/sufilore-9-taliban-et-al/#comments Sun, 17 Apr 2011 10:53:55 +0000 Jakob Steiner http://rugpundits.com/?p=1171 Earlier entries on Taliban at #1 and maths and conflict at #5.

Two reports on the Taliban, one with an Afghanistan, one with a Pakistan focus are found here by Graeme Smith and here by Owen Bennet-Jones.

David Rhode reviews My Life with the Taliban and Decoding the New Taliban and points to the earliest opinionators on this country for the US.

The new studies of Afghanistan are vastly more knowledgeable than the writing that angered Poullada, but they grapple with the same contradictions.

Bellaigue looks at Barfield’s Afghanistan but more so at political possibilities today and wrong judgment based on what Rhode describes.

Bergen did some quantitative asessment on Gitmo detainees who were released and returned to the battlefield or not so.

Linshoten and Kuehn look at how to keep Taliban and alQaeda apart.

Variation of the Frequency of Fatal Quarrels With Magnitude by Lewis F. Richardson in 1984.

Abductive Inference for Combat: Using SCARE-S2 to Find High-Value Targets in Afghanistan by Paulo Shakarian et.al. 2011.

History should be a better guide than maths in this respect … Conflict History.

]]> http://rugpundits.com/2011/04/17/sufilore-9-taliban-et-al/feed/ 0 Which way, Taliban? http://rugpundits.com/2009/12/04/sufilore-1-which-way-taliban/ http://rugpundits.com/2009/12/04/sufilore-1-which-way-taliban/#comments Thu, 03 Dec 2009 23:05:17 +0000 Jakob Steiner http://pakchronicle.com/?p=253 Which way, Taliban?

[Article] Flipping the Taliban. Fotini Christia and Michael Semple, July/August 2009, Foreign Affairs Volume 88, Number 4.

“For many Taliban fighters, insurgency has nothing to do with Islamic zealotry; it is a way of life.”

[Article] Know Thine Enemy – Why the Taliban Cannot Be Flipped. Barbara Elias, November 2 2009, Foreign Affairs (online).

“And there is little reason not to expect flipped Taliban to flip back when it suits their purposes.”

[Video] Transition to What?. Talk at the Halifax Forum, November 21 2009.

“Stick with it brothers, and we’ll topple the government.”

[Blog] A Study of Martyrs. Blog Thread by Mari Saurgo on www.makingsenseofjihad.com

In January 2008, Al-Fajr Media Center, an al-Qaida affiliated media group, released an extensive issue in its series, “Biographies of the Martyrs in the Land of Khorasan.”

*[Book] My Life with the Taliban. Abdul Salam Zaeef/Alex Strick van Linschoten/Felix Kuehn, to be published on January 31 2010.

“…presents a unique insight into the worldview of the Taliban.”

]]> http://rugpundits.com/2009/12/04/sufilore-1-which-way-taliban/feed/ 0 The Life of two foreigners in Kandahar http://rugpundits.com/2009/10/21/the-life-of-two-foreigners-in-kandahar/ http://rugpundits.com/2009/10/21/the-life-of-two-foreigners-in-kandahar/#comments Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:48:35 +0000 Florian Stambula http://pakchronicle.com/?p=128 Most interesting article of two western foreigners living in Kandahar, the heart of Taliban resistance. They report about he boredom of sitting in their flat, because leaving would be too dangerous, but also about the thrill living so close to the “faltline” of history.

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