Taliban defeat, maybe, um, ah, sort of... and that’s the news

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The attack on the jail earlier this week apparently provoked some sort of response, but it’s like a Bold and Beautiful script. Whatever’s happening might be interesting, but try and figure it out. Ever.

Yahoo!/Reuters, referring to the claim by Afghani sources:

But a spokesman for NATO's Afghan force was more cautious, saying he could not confirm that hundreds of Taliban who infiltrated into the Arghandab district of orchards and farms had been driven out.

Kandahar provincial governor Assadullah Khalid told a news conference the district just to the northwest of Kandahar city was clear. The Defence Ministry also said it had been retaken.

"The Taliban have been cleared totally from Arghandab district," Khalid said.

"They have suffered hundreds of dead and wounded and many of their casualties are Pakistanis," he said, adding that troops were searching the area for militants who could be hiding in villagers' houses.

In other words, have a good guess.

The Taliban may have overextended themselves, in directly engaging NATO and Afghani forces. They’re more effective as a guerrilla force than as conventional troops. The NATO forces involved are believed to be Canadians, backing up Afghani security forces.

NATO does admit there is an offensive going on, which is awfully sweet of it. But the level of information leaves a lot to be desired in a world which could be forgiven for wondering where the War on Terror has gone.

From a purely news perspective, what’s happening appears to depend on who you speak to, in what context, and when.

Corroborative information appears to be a bit lacking. There’s a really ancient theory that if something happens, there might be evidence of it.

The Taliban “could not be reached for comment,” according to Yahoo!. Maybe they should be having a chat show instead of a war.

Whoever or whatever is on the ground there to find the corroborative information could be forgiven for not wanting to go swanning around with a camera in the middle of a battle.

It’s unlikely that whatever news is coming from official NATO sources has been cleared yet, anyway.

Which leaves us with the interesting question that if one of the world’s top news agencies, with people on the spot, can’t find out what’s going on, who can?

Afghan Wars, dating back to Alexander the Great, have been pretty difficult things.

Alexander did win, partly by marrying one of the local girls.

Er, George…?

If you’ve got nothing planned…?