Japanese counterinsurgency 'force multiplier' may have been targeted.
Initial reports said [the between one and five] car bomb[s] that tore through Kandahar Tuesday, killing at least 40 and injuring more than 60 civilians, was "against a[n] office of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA)." [North India Times] This was quickly denied by CIDA official Lucas Robinson, who "said CIDA has its headquarters at the Canadian military base in Kandahar...Robinson said the confusion might have arisen because the abbreviation for the Japanese construction company that was hit by the attack was similar to that of CIDA's." [Monsters and Critics]
Taliban spokesperson Qari Yuosef Ahmady denied and condemned the attack, one of the largest since the 2001 invasion, stating "Whoever carried out the explosion, they are the enemies of the Afghan people, the enemies of the Muslims, and enemies of Islam.”
The New York Times reports that the Japanese construction company is Saita Afghanistan, an affiliate of Japan's Saita Corporation (according to AP, see their video report), whose headquarters were "flattened" by the blast. Even though "the explosion appeared to be from a single truck bomb outside the building used by Saita," Japanese officials denied that their office was targeted. "People related to the Afghan authorities suspect that the target was the facilities of the National Directorate for Security and not the Japanese company," said Foreign Ministry Press Secretary Kazuo Kodama.
The Times report states that Saita is "engaged in reconstruction efforts," a description that obscures their actual role in the Afghan war, which is akin to what Anthony James Joes calls "counterinsurgent force multipliers," which leaves open the question of whether or not they were targeted by the attackers. As the AP's Noor Khan reported, Saita "had recently taken over a contract to build a road through an insurgent-held area."
In his The History and Politics of Counterinsurgency, Joes writes, "In addition to good governance, timely intelligence and air transport serve as counterinsurgent force multipliers. So does road construction. The Romans held their empire together with a system of excellent roads...They help conventional forces overcome the guerillas' advantages in mobility and serve to cut up guerilla territory."
For several years, Saita has designed and constructed USAID's 'Southern Strategy Road,' (SSR) "to ensure a long-lasting transportation corridor between Kandahar City and the district center of Arghastan."
Illustrating Joes' point, The SSR "was declared by the U.S. Secretary of State, the U.S. Ambassador, and
the Commander of NATO forces as strategic to the success of the NATO
mission in Afghanistan." The "anticipated impact" of the road includes "benefit[s to] the continued effort to control AGE forces in the southern areas of Afghanistan along the Pakistan border."
From 2006 to 2007, Saita worked on the road via a USAID grant to the UN's interventionist, for-profit contracting arm, UNOPS. In 2007, the contract was given to another private contractor Louis Berger/Black & Veatch (part of a $1.4 billion joint venture), who kept Saita on "for the purpose of minimal disruption of ongoing progress."
Updates as they emerge...