Ghazni governor pledges continued support as Americans join Poles in contentious province

Photo By Sgt. Mike MacLeod | Polish Brig. Gen. Piotr Blazeusz, commander of Task Force White Eagle in Ghazni province, presents a gift to Col. Mark L. Stock, commander of the 82nd Airborne Division's 1st Brigade Combat Team April 7, 2012, during a transfer of authority ceremony at Forward Operating Base Warrior, Afghanistan. Polish forces have a long history of supporting Afghan National Security Forces in Ghazni province.  

GHAZNI PROVINCE, AFGHANISTAN

04.07.2012

Courtesy Story

1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division Public Affairs

GHAZNI PROVINCE, Afghanistan - The governor of Ghazni province promised the partnership he has shared with Polish forces to an incoming American airborne unit here today.

Gov. Musa Khan traveled from Ghazni city to Forward Operating Base Warrior in southern Ghazni to speak at a transfer of authority ceremony between the outgoing Polish Task Force Bravo, 15th Mechanized Brigade, and the U.S. Army’s 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division.

“The main reason for our achievements in the last two years has been the great cooperation with [Polish Brigadier] Gen. Blazeusz and the generals before him,” said the governor, a former businessman and mujahedeen general during the war against the communists. “We hope to have the same level of cooperation with the Americans in southern Ghazni.”

The American paratroopers are not replacing Polish forces, but rather, taking over what is expected by many to be the last big clearing operation of the war, allowing the Polish Task Force White Eagle to consolidate around the provincial seat in northern Ghazni.

“To secure Afghanistan, you must secure Andar,” said the governor. Andar is both a provincial district and a tribe within the Pashtun ethnicity influenced heavily by the Taliban.

“If you secure Andar, you have secured Ghazni, and you have secured Afghanistan,” he said. “If Afghanistan is secured, the world is secured.”

The governor cited security gains with cooperation from Polish forces that included few civilian casualties and suicide bombers as compared with other provinces, along with successful unilateral Afghan operations against the enemy.

He also said that of the three types of people who join the insurgency – the poor and unemployed, those with grievances against the government, and ideologues – their number are diminishing from the first two groups due to recent efforts.

Three Polish officers spoke at the ceremony, including Brig. Gen. Piotr Blazeusz, the outgoing commander of Task Force White Eagle, incoming commander, Brig. Gen. Tworkowski, and Lt. Col. Waslaw Samocik, the local commander in southern Ghazni.

Each expressed confidence in the Americans and their mission, with Tworkowski reminding those in attendance that the first time U.S. and Polish paratroopers worked together was to defeat the Nazi regime during World War II in Operation Market Garden.

The American unit, 1st Brigade Combat Team of the 82nd Airborne Division includes the legendary 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment. The 504th PIR was a key component of the first major American airborne operation of World War II at Sicily and later at Market Garden.

Brigade commander, Col. Mark L. Stock, praised the Afghan and Polish security forces for holding the line as the insurgency has of late been pressed into the province.

“Now, as the campaign in its final stage shifts focus to Ghazni, the paratroopers of the 1st Brigade stand ready to support our Afghan partners as we drive the enemy from our midst and bring a richly deserved peace to the people of Afghanistan,” said Stock.

Ghazni province is approximately the size of New Jersey, with a population of about one million. It includes roughly 3,000 villages that are chiefly agrarian-based. Southern Ghazni is largely desert.

• Date Taken: 04.07.2012
• Date Posted: 04.10.2012 01:50
• Story ID: 86508
• Location: GHAZNI PROVINCE, AF