Crush the Enemy:CIA Covert Forces Expand Afghanistan Mission

Far from being drawn down as US military forces are being augmented in Afghanistan under the President's new South Asia Strategy,the CIA's Special Activities Division/Special Operations Group paramilitaries are reportedly also expanding their role in a conflict that has spanned more than sixteen years.It is said that President Donald Trump and his CIA director,Mike Pompeo,are determined to make the most of the Agency's paramilitary capability in hopes of quickening the end of the Taliban militants and other Islamist extremist elements who are trying to wreck the emergent democracy,such as al-Qaida,the Haqqani Network and ISIL-Khorasan.Speaking at the University of Texas in October,Mr.Pompeo said:
This is unforgiving,relentless.You pick the word.Every minute,we have to focus on crushing our enemies.If we are not out pushing the envelope,the Agency will not succeed.*
Immediately after the 9-11 attacks,the CIA was first on the ground in Afghanistan in the form of a small paramilitary team codenamed JAWBREAKER.This team and its follow-ons linked up with the indigenous resistance,the Northern Alliance,under Ahmad Shah Masood,gathering HUMINT on the Taliban and their al-Qaida guests and conducting joint operations with US and British military SOFs and the NA to eject the Taliban from cities such as Kabul and Mazar-e-Sharif.Once the Taliban had been thrown out of power in Afghanistan,however,the SAD Ground Branch settled into the role of training Afghan forces and collecting HUMINT,while the Air Branch struck targets inside Pakistan with armed Predator drones.*
The Agency's paramilitaries,be they recruited from the Armed Forces' Special Operations Command or from within the CIA,are trained for proficiency in:
sabotage;abduction;bomb damage assessment;personnel and material recovery;hostage rescue;and counterterrorism.That's not surprising,what with them being the heirs of the World War II Office of Strategic Services.
Typically operating in teams of six or less,they may even be tasked with solo missions.On the other hand,they have been frequently sent on joint operations with the Pentagon's SOFs and the Afghan National Defence and Security Forces.This is the joint role they are moving into now,as leaders of hybrid Counterterrorism Pursuit Teams with Pentagon SOFs detailed to the CIA under the Omega Program and ANDSF members.They are to range across the country seeking to quash Taliban bomb-makers in particular,as the mainline US SOFs and Afghan commandos focus on recapturing Taliban territory.The Taliban IED factories are a rising threat as the militants turn more to destabilising bombing campaigns,unable to make headway against the greatly improved ADNSF and their US advisors.
The CPTs will also include Afghan intelligence officers from the National Directorate of Security as well as CIA contractors.The SAD Air Branch was trying to expand its role to include an armed drone campaign within Afghanistan itself,not just striking militants in neighbouring Pakistan,but it isn't known if that was finally approved.