Fighting the Afghan insurgency

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The commander of foreign troops in Afghanistan, US Army General Stanley McChrystal, says the American military now understands counterinsurgency better than it ever has, and has made it a centerpiece of the new Afghanistan strategy. Reporter Ben Gilbert has been embedded with American forces in Afghanistan. On today’s show he is taking a look at how the counterinsurgency doctrine is being implemented on the ground in Afghanistan. Download MP3 (Photo: Tauseef Mustafa/AFP/Getty Images)

• Background brief:Taliban insurgency
• President Obama’s Afghanistan plan
• BBC coverage of the Afghanistan conflict