While American white supremacists and ultra-nationalists have been appearing in public and the news more often recently, the heads of the U.S. military have made clear such individuals have no place in the ranks.

The commanders of the U.S. Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps last week issued strong statements condemning intolerance and racism after protests in the city of Charlottesville, Virginia turned deadly. Organizers and participants in the original demonstration espoused racist, white nationalist positions.

That's a crucial message for those in uniform, say some military experts and veterans.

It was important, I think, for the service chiefs to get on record with what had happened and to show that what was being represented in Charlottesville as people standing up for their culture really had no place in our armed forces. It wasn't our [military] culture, said Peter Mansoor, a retired U.S. Army colonel and professor of military history at Ohio State University.

The message was clear, said Steven Leonard, a retired U.S. Army colonel now teaching at the University of Kansas School of Business. If you can't live by the values of our institutions, then you don't have a place in the ranks. Leonard also runs the popular Doctrine Man micro-blog and social media platform, which discusses military and veterans' issues.

The Department of Defense bans actively advocating supremacist, extremist or criminal gang causes. Doing so can result in dismissal from military service.

While the military is one of the most socially integrated communities in the United States, it has had a problem with extremists in the ranks. Some current leaders of racist organizations have served, and veterans have committed several hate and terror crimes in recent years.

The military has acknowledged it has a problem, most notably after Army veteran Timothy McVeigh blew up a federal office building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1995, killing 168 people. The Department of Defense went on a campaign to oust militants.

And it made progress, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks U.S. hate groups; but, in less than a decade, that ground was lost because the military relaxed recruiting standards to meet demand as the U.S. fought wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the center said in reports issued in 2006 and 2012.

The military is a reflection of American society, Mansoor said � which means it has members of all backgrounds and beliefs. You get this sliver that comes in; they may have grown up in a gang culture, or white nationalist culture.

Some criminal gangs and white nationalist groups in the U.S. encourage adherents to join the military, particularly Army and Marine Corps combat, according to Southern Poverty Law Center studies. Some nationalist groups advocate a race war against African Americans, Jews and other minorities, and they want members with weapons and tactical experience.

They've been doing that for years, Leonard said, as have criminal gangs. Where else can you get the skills?

But that creates a challenge. A service member who holds allegiance to a hate group or gang is likely to stay quiet, and remain in place.

If they don't pop up, what can you do? Leonard said.

While DOD training emphasizes tolerance, Mansoor notes that it's not possible to train away unwanted beliefs. You sort of have to live it day to day and model the values and drive it home at every opportunity.

And, it's essential to do so, said Mansoor, who served as a brigade commander in Iraq in 2003. If you have division in the ranks based on the color of one's skin or their religious creed or their gender, it's like a cancer that grows and causes division and eventually will cause a reduction in the combat effectiveness of the unit.

That is why commanders train troops from the very start that they are all one force � to do otherwise weakens it, former commanders said.

While there might be white supremacists in the ranks, overall, the military has become one of the most ethnically mixed segments of the country since it was integrated nearly 70 years ago. Service members of all backgrounds live and work in tight quarters on ships and in barracks, while housing and schools for their families reflect the full range of the nation's population.

We're supposed to be a better example of what it is to be a good citizen, said Margaret Witt, a retired Air Force major who was dismissed because of her sexual orientation. Now a physical therapist for the Veterans Administration in Portland, Oregon, Witt's successful lawsuit over her dismissal paved the way for the DOD decision to allow gays and lesbians to serve in the military.

The military really has made a tremendous effort to lead the way on tolerance, including on the acceptance of gays and lesbians, she said, although it takes time to change attitudes in such a large organization.

The military does adapt to social change, Leonard said, because the measure that matters is how well a service member performs.

Can you do your job and will you do your job when the bullets start to fly? he said. Because if you can't, you start to put people's lives at risk.

Source: Voice of America

STATE DEPARTMENT � President Donald Trump's adjustment of U.S. strategy in Afghanistan will alter the dynamics in the United States' longest war, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Tuesday, because American military commanders will be newly empowered to make decisions based on conditions on the ground, rather than on local politics or other factors.

"The fighting will still be borne by the Afghan forces, by their military and their security forces," Tillerson told reporters in a rare appearance at the State Department briefing room. "We believe that we can turn the tide of what has been a losing battle over the last year and a half or so, and at least stabilize the situation and hopefully start seeing some battlefield victories."

In his discussion of Trump's address to the nation on Monday night, Tillerson praised "the Afghan forces who have fought very bravely, but they've been fighting, I think, with less than the full capabilities that we can give them." He said Trump's Afghanistan strategy differs from those of his two predecessors at the White House, Barack Obama and George W. Bush, in that it does not set artificial timelines or announce troop levels in advance.

U.S. actions in Afghanistan will be based on conditions on the ground, Tillerson said: "This entire effort is intended to put pressure on the Taliban, to have the Taliban understand that you will not win a battlefield victory."

Objective is negotiation

Continuing his remarks, phrased as if they were directed to the Taliban, Tillerson said: "We may not win one, but neither will you. So at some point, we have to come to the negotiating table and find a way to bring this to an end."

Secretary of Defense James Mattis, who was in Baghdad Tuesday, said he had not yet decided how many troops to send to the South Asian country, and would not do so until he had consulted General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

In his address Monday night from a military base outside Washington, Trump said he would not be specific about how many more troops might be sent into Afghanistan, or discuss plans for further military activities. He declared this was part of a "condition-based approach" to defeating terrorism there.

However, U.S. sources who refused to be identified said Trump has already approved sending up to 4,000 more American service members to Afghanistan, to enlarge the current force of about 8,400 U.S. troops.

Most American soldiers in the war zone are advising Afghan forces, but some are tasked with carrying out counterterrorism operations against groups such as the Taliban or the Islamic State's Afghan affiliate. Overall U.S. troop strength is down significantly from seven years ago, when nearly 100,000 Americans were deployed in Afghanistan at the height of the Obama administration's "surge" program to overwhelm the Taliban.

After years of deriding the U.S. war in Afghanistan as a "complete waste," Trump on Monday explained why he now believes it is in the United States' interest to remain committed to the country. His goal, he said, is to stop the re-emergence of safe havens in which terrorists can threaten America and make sure they do not get their hands on nuclear weapons.

Regional approach

Tillerson echoed Trump's statement that the U.S. is seeking a regional approach to solving Afghanistan's difficult problems, including India as well as Pakistan.

Pakistan was sure to be dismayed by president's inclusion of India, its traditional rival, in efforts to resolve the crisis in Afghanistan, as well as by this caution from the top U.S. diplomat: "Pakistan must adopt a different approach, and we are ready to work with them to help them protect themselves against ... terrorist organizations" operating in Pakistani territory.

However, Tillerson added, Pakistan must "begin to end" its efforts in the Afghan border region "that are disrupting our efforts at peace."

"What everybody should be banking on," former U.S. diplomat David Sedney said, "is [that] the United States will be with Afghanistan and make sure that it never again becomes a haven for terrorists. That means that the Taliban are not going to come back. And Pakistan must stop supporting the Taliban."

Sedney told VOA's Urdu program View 360: "Pakistan must take an affirmative test to stop the Taliban leadership from meeting in Pakistan, to stop arms and ammunition and explosives from coming from Pakistan into Afghanistan. Pakistan now knows that it cannot wait out the United States."

William Goodfellow, who is with the Center for International Policy, a public policy research group in Washington, told the same VOA program that he did not see Trump's announcement as a big change in U.S. strategy.

"I think the reason they're adding more troops is because they're worried that the Taliban have the initiative and the American generals were saying, 'Well, we have a stalemate,' " Goodfellow said. "Well, we don't have a stalemate. The American side is losing. And I think adding more troops will try to bring back a situation where you actually have a stalemate and set the stage for a negotiated settlement."

Evaluations differ

Analysts' overall reviews of the president's address were mixed.

"The president failed to define the goals or objectives that would direct the actions of the whole of government approach. The only thing he demonstrated was that his original belief, that you can rip troops out of a combat zone without considering the fallout of that action, was in fact wrong," said Moira Whelan, a partner of BlueDot Strategies and a former senior State Department official.

"Trump repealed his original Afghanistan position, but he failed to replace it with something that will make America safer," she added.

The conflict in Afghanistan began within weeks of the al-Qaida terror network's attacks on New York and Washington on September 11, 2001. At the time, a Taliban administration was in control in Kabul, and al-Qaida had freedom of operations in much of the country. Regular government was restored in Afghanistan and the Taliban was expelled from the capital, but the country's factionalized unity government and systemic corruption have resulted in the war dragging on for almost 16 years.

In an expression of his frustration, Trump said leaders in Kabul must realize that the U.S. commitment to Afghanistan is not unlimited. The American people, he warned, expect "to see real reforms and real results."

Source: Voice of America

LONDON � Fatima's Taliban husband was so controlling that he refused to allow her to bathe and threatened to burn her face if she dared wear makeup, suspicious that his 12-year-old Afghan wife was trying to make herself attractive to other men.

He would not let her step outside their home in Afghanistan's western Farah Province, even when she fell sick, and beat her for burning her hand baking bread, complaining that her mother had taught her nothing to justify the dowry he paid.

"My father sold me to a man at a time when I didn't know anything about the responsibilities of marriage," she told Reuters in a phone interview from the capital, Kabul, where she and her young daughter are hiding.

"He became my lawful husband and began to rape me and beat me every single day for not consenting [to sex]," said the 18-year-old, who would not give her full name.

Child and forced marriage are outlawed but remain common in Afghanistan, particularly among poor families eager for dowries.

Half of all girls are married by the age of 15.

Among the most invisible victims are the wives of Islamist Taliban hardliners who, when in power, barred women from education and most work and ordered them to wear burqas outside the home, before being overthrown in 2001 by U.S.-led forces.

"Being family members of the most dangerous and ruthless fighters who have plenty of enemies among the people makes it difficult for these women," said Shukria Barakzai, a parliamentarian and women's rights campaigner. "They are treated as sex slaves and left completely helpless."

Agonized, emboldened

When their militant husbands die, life often gets worse for young Taliban brides. Their families are too scared to take them in, society treats them as pariahs, and they risk further violent abuse as unprotected single women.

About a year into their marriage, Fatima's 25-year-old husband � she calls him a "veteran criminal" with stockpiles of ammunition in their home � blew up a police officer and was jailed for 18 years.

He was released in late 2016, after serving just four years � a common phenomenon in Afghanistan, where the Taliban often hold influence over the government.

But he never came home.

His brothers told Fatima they believed he had sacrificed himself in a suicide attack and become a martyr.

A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, estimates that several hundred women become Taliban widows each year.

"My brother-in-law was planning to force me to marry him and sell my four-year-old daughter to a Taliban commander," she said, referring to the dowry that would be paid for her child.

"This evil plan agonized me and at the same time emboldened me to run away, regardless of the consequences."

Under the pretext of attending a village wedding with her mother-in-law, Fatima ran away with her child.

Her father would not take her in, but her cousins helped her get to Kabul.

"Every one of my in-laws is a Taliban member and they vowed to slay my whole family to bring justice," she said.

To the Taliban, justice means killing Fatima and her family for the shame she brought by running away from home.

Jihadis in training

Zari, another Taliban widow, who was forcibly married at the age of 14, was not so lucky.

Three years after her husband died in a suicide attack, she remains trapped in southern Afghanistan's Helmand Province, tormented by his cousins who rape her repeatedly and are raising her sons, aged nine and 11, to become jihadis.

The men, who are members of the Taliban, come to the house where she lives with her elderly mother-in-law a couple of times a week to rape her, threatening to kill her if she tells anyone.

"I urge the government to rescue me and my sons as their future is in grave danger," the 26-year-old, who declined to give her real name, said in a phone interview.

"They plan to send both of my sons to Pakistan to participate in jihad. ... They take my elder son for religious indoctrination and training to become a militant like his father."

Neither the government nor rights groups can access Taliban widows living with their in-laws in remote, rebel-controlled territory. Conflict makes it impossible for them to provide for themselves, forcing them to live with their in-laws.

Neither boy goes to school because Zari cannot afford books or uniforms with the money she earns weaving or from her cows.

"I want to escape with my sons, but my family is not ready to accept me and jeopardize themselves," she said, adding that her family did not know they were marrying her into the Taliban.

Afghanistan has about 5 million widows, said a spokeswoman for the women's affairs ministry, Kobra Rezai. It can only afford to provide about 100,000 of them with about $100 a month in financial support and skills training, she said.

None are Taliban widows.

The government does not want to be seen to be supporting them, Rezai said, a position condemned by Barakzai, the parliamentarian.

"Circumstances push [Taliban widows] into a precarious position and compel them to continue their lives as sex slaves in the hands of Taliban," she said. "Even their children have no way out of this vicious trap."

Source: Voice of America

ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN When President Donald Trump announced his long-awaited policy on Afghanistan, his remarks Monday hinted the plan was a compromise between his instinct, to pull out, and advice he received that a hasty withdrawal would create a vac...

In U.S. President Donald Trump's long-awaited strategy announcement on Afghanistan, he put forth a case for staying the course and not allowing the country to become a haven for terrorists who would once again pose a threat to U.S. national security.I ...

Remarks by President Trump on the Strategy in Afghanistan and South AsiaFort MyerArlington, Virginia9:02 P.M. EDTTHE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much.Thank you.Please be seated.Vice President Pence, Secretary of State Tillerson, members of the Cabinet, G...

WHITE HOUSE Following an announcement by President Donald Trump declaring the United States' commitment to Afghanistan, Secretary of Defense James Mattis said Tuesday he has not yet made a decision on how many troops to send to the South Asian country.

Speaking from Baghdad, Mattis said he is consulting with Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and will make the decision based on his plan.

In an evening address from a military base outside Washington Monday, Trump said that he would not talk about numbers of troops or plans for further military activities, unveiling a "condition-based approach" to defeating terrorism in Afghanistan, without going into detail.

Troop levels

The president has approved up to 4,000 more U.S. troops in Afghanistan, according to sources, speaking on condition they not be named.

Currently, there are about 8,400 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Most are advising Afghan forces, though some are tasked with carrying out counterterrorism operations against groups such as the Taliban or the Islamic State's Afghan affiliate.

That number is down significantly from the height of former President Barack Obama's troop surge, which saw nearly 100,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan in August 2010.

After years of deriding the U.S. war in Afghanistan as a "complete waste," President Donald Trump on Monday explained why he now believes it is in the United States' interest to remain committed to the South Asian country.

His goal, he said, is to stop the re-emergence of safe havens for terrorists to threaten America and make sure they do not get their hands on nuclear weapons.

"Conditions on the ground, not arbitrary timetables will guide our strategy from now on. America's enemies must never know our plans or believe they can wait us out. I will not say when we are going to attack, but attack we will," Trump told about 2,000 service members at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall.

Immediately following the president's speech, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson released a statement saying: "We stand ready to support peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban without preconditions. We look to the international community, particularly Afghanistan's neighbors, to join us in supporting an Afghan peace process."

Trump, in his address, however, very publicly and directly put Pakistan on notice.

"We have been paying Pakistan billions and billions of dollars at the same time they are housing the very terrorists they are fighting. But that will have to change and that will change immediately," Trump vowed.

The president's address received mixed initial reviews.

"The president failed to define the goals or objectives that would direct the actions of the whole of government approach. The only thing he demonstrated was that his original belief that you can rip troops out of a combat zone without considering the fallout of that action was, in fact, wrong," said Moira Whelan, a partner of BlueDot Strategies and former senior State Department official.

"Trump repealed his original Afghanistan position, but he failed to replace it with something that will make America safer," Whelan told VOA.

Longest US war

The conflict in Afghanistan � with a factionalized unity government riddled with systemic corruption -- has dragged on for 16 years, becoming the longest U.S. war ever, since the Sept. 11, 2001 al-Qaida attacks on the United States.

Expressing frustration, Trump informed Afghanistan that the commitment by the United States is not unlimited and America's support not a blank check.

The American people, he warned, expect "to see real reforms and real results."

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, at Trump's request, spoke to Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani on Monday ahead of the address.

Tillerson had spoken over the phone with Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj and Afghan Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani, according to the State Department, about how the United States would like to work with each country to stabilize South Asia through a new, integrated regional strategy.

U.S. generals advised Trump to send several thousand more troops to break the stalemate and retake territory from the Taliban, which controls nearly half the country. But Trump, who campaigned on an "America First" foreign policy, has been reluctant to commit more resources to the country.

Reaction

Afghanistan president Ashraf Ghani expressed appreciation for Trump's decision Tuesday.

"Today is a special day because a few hours ago the United States' president delivered his speech," Ghani said. "His message was that after this, there is no limited time or conditions on their support for Afghanistan. America will stand with Afghanistan until the end."

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg expressed support for Trump's strategy, saying the alliance aims to ensure Afghanistan cannot be a terrorist sanctuary.

Ahmad Shah Katawazai, a defense liaison at the Afghan embassy in Washington, told VOA he welcomes the renewed U.S. commitment to Afghanistan.

"We think this will ultimately take us to what we want in the end -- allowing no safe haven for terrorists, helping the Afghan government stand on its own feet and putting more pressure on Pakistan," he said.

A spokesperson for India's Ministry for External Affairs also welcomed Trump's pledge to confront "issues of safe havens and other forms of cross-border support enjoyed by terrorists."

There was no immediate public reaction from Pakistan's government, but Pakistan's Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal told VOA that the government would be issuing a statement, without specifying when.

"There is neither any tolerance nor any safe haven for any terrorist in Pakistan. Pakistan has paid the highest price for (fighting) terrorism. So, we are fighting terrorism not for any country's stake but for our own future and for our country's sake," Iqbal said.

Retired Lt. Col. Daniel Davis said he was deployed to Afghanistan in 2010, "when there were 140,000 U.S. and NATO troops." He said he saw "firsthand that the insurgent and terrorist fighters cannot be militarily defeated."

"Short of a return of major deployments of tens of thousands of U.S. combat troops, this is not a winnable war," Davis told VOA. "No matter what the president said, this war flatly cannot be won militarily. To set a strategy dependent on militarily defeating the enemy is going to fail, just as surely as all other attempts have over the past 16 years."

Source: Voice of America