Blog posts tagged "Nato"

June 14, 2011 12:06 pm 1 Comment

"NATO appears to have run out of targets in Tripoli, but the Brother Leader is still here, playing chess with his friend Kirsan Illuyzhinov, the President of the World Chess Federation,a man who claims to have been briefly abducted by space aliens in 1997."

November 19, 2010 7:12 pm 5 Comments

Our Chief Correspondent, Alex Thomson, asks what the NATO summit in Lisbon can possibly do or say about the war in Afghanistan that hasn't already been said and done.

August 4, 2010 2:13 pm 3 Comments

Alex Thomson blogs on a remarkable film on Channel 4 News filmed by freelancer Paul Refsdal about life on Afghanistan's frontline with Taliban fighters.

July 2, 2010 10:45 am 1 Comment

Every night so far, it’s happened at least twice. A distant thud you might just catch, followed by a screech of sirens. A rocket attack. This should come as no surprise, given how this is Kandahar airfield, from where Nato’s make or break operation to retake the Taliban’s heartland will launch. But the audacity and [...]

June 28, 2010 5:38 pm 4 Comments

The head of the British army, General Sir David Richards, and the head of the CIA, Leon Panetta, were asked in separate interviews over the weekend about the notion of talking to the Taliban as part of Britain and America’s exit strategy from Afghanistan. Their answers were so different that they point to potentially the [...]

June 1, 2010 8:31 am 3 Comments

Britain's mission in Afghanistan will change, perhaps radically, in the coming months. That's pretty clear from the smoke signals emerging from NATO and the new Cameron government.

March 2, 2010 9:00 pm No Comments

Go out just beyond the walls of the Grenadier Guards' fort here at Shawqat and it is possible to get a glimpse of what Nato's exit ticket from Afghanistan could look like. Could, possibly, maybe and perhaps - with quite a few ifs too.

March 1, 2010 9:27 am 1 Comment

Alex Thomson is stopped by an IED in the road ahead in Afghanistan.

February 23, 2010 10:25 am 1 Comment

It is set to be a momentous fortnight for Nato, who at last appear to have wrestled the “narrative” of the insurgency from the Taliban’s hands. In a nutshell, here is their good news: an assault on their stronghold and the capture now of four senior Taliban commanders, apparently with the help of the Pakistanis. There [...]

February 15, 2010 7:56 am 5 Comments

Alex Thomson on the challenges facing NATO and the Afghan government on keeping the Taliban out of areas of Helmand cleared during Operation Moshtarak.