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Afghanistan Weekly War Update: The Latest Sarposa Jailbreak

April 25, 2011 | 1904 GMT

Jailbreak in Kandahar

Some 500 inmates escaped from Sarposa Prison in Kandahar between 11 p.m. local timeApril 24 and 3 a.m. April 25 through a tunnel reportedly 360 meters (about 394 yards) long

constructed over the course of some five months. A jail break this long in the making andof this scale seems improbable without at least considerable numbers of prison guards

willfully ignoring the escape. This is the most recent reminder of the inherent problemswith indigenous forces being compromised. Though official government and Taliban

claims regarding the number of escaped inmates differ (the government put the number at476, while the Taliban said 541 prisoners, including 106 important commanders,

escaped), the gravity of the break reportedly from the prisons political section isundisputed. Only a handful of escapees have been recaptured.

Sarposa is known for repeated prison breaks; both tunneling and frontal assaults have led to

breaks at Sarposa in the past decade. All 1,100 inmates at the facility broke out during a2008 complex attack that included a large, suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive

device. While the security of the prison has improved, the siting of the facility is inherentlypoor. There is little standoff distance, rendering it vulnerable to the tactics of tunneling and

assault.

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Because of this vulnerability, the most consequential prisoners are either sent to the Pol-e-

Charkhi facility in Kabul, the countrys main prison, or the U.S. detention facility at thesprawling Bagram airfield north of the national capital. No one on the American Joint

Prioritized Effects List (the capture or kill list of high-value targets being hunted inAfghanistan), for example, was likely to be among the escapees at Sarposa. Even the 2008

incident, in which the entire prison was emptied, had only limited effects, particularlystrategic effects.

However, there will consequences to the prison break. Prisons the world over can becomeforums for radicalization and the sharing of criminal or operational expertise, and Sarposa

is unlikely to be an exception. So while the Taliban have every incentive to play up thesignificance of this prison break, there are undoubtedly motivated and willing fighters

among the escapees, and it is possible that some escapees have bombmaking expertise ortactical leadership experience.

After the 2008 break, Taliban fighters reinforced by the escapees seized several

villages in the Arghandab district north of the provincial capital. The April 24-25 break wasconsiderably smaller in scale, and U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF)

operations have ramped up considerably in Kandahar province and neighboring Helmandprovince. However, the break comes during a critical phase of the U.S.-led

counterinsurgency-focused strategy; ISAF and Afghan forces are spread thinly across thecountrys restive southwest and are attempting to push forward not just aggressive security

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but also development goals. Escapees are unlikely to be quick converts to recent, tentativepolitical shifts, and an escape of this magnitude certainly does nothing to facilitate Kabuls

goals.

One important aspect of the April 24-25 jailbreak is perception. It is a noteworthy

propaganda coup for the Taliban at a time when ISAF is attempting to demonstrate progressand momentum and highlight degraded Taliban capabilities. The Taliban already seethemselves as winning, and even anti-Taliban Afghan elements have grown weary of a

decade of occupation. Furthermore, facilitating the rescue of incarcerated comrades hasbeen a longstanding priority for jihadists not just in Afghanistan but in Iraq and Yemen, and

even in the continental United States. The Sarposa jailbreak will give further credence tothe Talibans pledge to their fighters that they will not be forgotten if they are captured,

which has rhetorical value for their efforts at maintaining existing cadres and forrecruitment.

The worst of Afghanistans detainees have not escaped. While the Sarposa break will have

tactical repercussions, the fundamental problem is the battle of perceptions. That the porousAfghan judicial system managed to convict and incarcerate some prisoners who later

escaped has consequences in terms of the broader Afghan perception of rule of law.(Increasing numbers of low-level detainees have been pushed by ISAF to the Afghan

judicial system, in accordance with counterinsurgency goals to build indigenous civilinstitutions.) It is ultimately this perception that ISAFs current strategy seeks to change.

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