CIA Wants to Use Afghans to Win European Consent

A CIA analyst suggested that Afghan women’s fear of a Taliban return must be voiced to instigate European support, including the French, to NATO’s mission in Afghanistan, according to a document issued by a web site.

“Afghan women could serve as ideal messengers in humanizing the ISAF role in combating the Taliban” to influence the European public opinion, including the French, said the analyst in the document hosted on the site WikiLeaks.org, specializing in sensitive content.

Ideally, he continued, Afghan women could talk about their “aspirations for the future, and their fears of a Taliban victory.” When contacted, the CIA refused to authenticate the document. Yet Wikileaks has already won prominence by publishing governmental and private sector documents.

A U.S. intelligence expert brings forth his idea of how to win back the wavering popularity of the Europeans’ offensive.

“The tone of previous debate suggests that a spike in French or German casualties or in Afghan civilian casualties could become a tipping point in converting passive opposition into active calls for immediate withdrawal” of troops, he insists in the text of March 11.

The German and French troop contributions are respectively the third and fourth largest within the coalition in Afghanistan.

The CIA analyst said the approach he advocates would have the advantage of “leverage French (and other European) guilt for abandoning” the Afghans.

“The prospect of the Taliban rolling back hard-won progress on girls’ education could provoke French indignation, become a rallying point for France’s largely secular public, and give voters a reason to support a good and necessary cause despite casualties,” concludes the text.