The Advisor Role in Afghanistan in 2014

Each ISAF Commander comes into his one year (sometimes a little longer) tour in Afghanistan hoping to carry the football down the road a little further . . . and to shape the war effort as he sees fit. General McCrystal brought in Counterinsurgency, General Petraeus brought with him Population-centric Counterinsurgency and Partnering, General Allen introduced Security Force Assistance, and now General Dunford has now focused ISAF on Functionally-based Security Force Assistance. So what will the small number of troops in Afghanistan be doing in 2014? Well, they will not be doing much fighting (hopefully) and they will be helping the Afghans to be able to sustain their force into the future years as the Coalition presence diminishes even further. A recent blog post spells this out quite clearly for us. See "Future of Advising in Afghanistan", Flashpoint Blog, American Security Project, December 23, 2013.