ISAF Video Tele Conference

Interview with Maj. Gen. Battisti (IT)
Deputy Chief of Staff Support

MODERATOR: General, good morning, from NATO Headquarters in Brussels. Thank you very much for being with us today. We have six journalists with us today. I'm not going to introduce them. I'll let them introduce themselves before we start and we'll just go from left to right in a second so you know who you're speaking to and then we'll hand over to you for some introductory remarks and then we'll go into question and answer.

If you're happy with that, sir, then I'll start with the introductions to the journalists.

MAJOR GENERAL GIORGIO BATTISTI (Deputy Commander in Charge of Logistics, ISAF): Yes. Yes. It's okay.

Q: Andreu Missé from El País, Spain.

Q: I'm Paul Ames from the Associated Press.

Q: Brooks Tigner, Defense News.

Q: Franz Boogaard,  Dutch newspaper, Algemeen Dagblad.

Q: Bouke Bergsma, Dutch News Agency, ANP.

Q: Ahto Lobjakas, Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty and the Estonian Daily.

MODERATOR: Thank you very much. General, the floor is yours.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Good morning, again. I'm Major General Battisti. I'm coming from the Italian army. It's my third tour of duty in Afghanistan. In this moment I'm the DCOS support of the HQ ISAF. That means that I take care of the support business, support issues that can provide the best logistic items to our forces that are in Afghanistan.

Thanks. I'm very glad to be here, to have the possibility to explain to you what is the ISAF role in this moment in Afghanistan and I'm ready to answer all of your questions.

Q: General, good morning. Since you're responsible for support and logistics I wanted to ask you a question about the uniforms. It's not... probably not a hundred percent your responsibility, but yesterday there was an attack by Taliban militants who were wearing ANA... Afghan army uniforms, and by doing so they could enter or come close to a NATO base, and I was wondering if you have any sight on how you could better control the uniforms of the Afghan arm?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: It's a very good question, because this problem is not in the ISAF matters, but as you know also in Europe you can buy uniforms like that are using the Afghan army, so it is very easy for people, for tourists, for instance or also for Italians in my case to have some kind of uniform.
Most are common enough, especially outside of Afghanistan. In Afghanistan I believe it is a matter of government of Afghanistan to check this, but as I said before is a problem probably coming outside of Afghanistan. As I said, Europe there are a lot of shops in Italy I know a lot of shops in Italy that sell this kind of uniform, or other uniforms.

Q: You're saying it's a responsibility for the Afghan government, but there were 11 NATO soldiers wounded so I figure you would be interested in improving, checking these uniforms as well.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Thank you for your suggestion. Of course, we take more care about this issue. But I said before, this uniform may come from outside of Afghanistan. Of course now we will... after the attack of yesterday, we'll send more detailed guidance in order to control this in accordance with the government of Afghanistan.

Q: Yes, Brooks Tigner, Defense News. I was just wondering to what extent, if any, globally you rely on outsourced logistics providers? In other words, do you deal only with other military or government suppliers, or do you rely... you know, the Americans and the Brits to a certain extent, use private logistics providers, and have you had any problems or have you any particular view about the utility of that? Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: The task of DCOS support is to coordinate all the logistic activities. Part of this logistic business, of national business, of national issue, other are coming are NATO issue or as ISAF issue. Of course we have some private contractors that supply us in different fields. This contractor... we receive this contractor from our higher chain of command. I mean, from Brunssum or form SHAPE. So our task is to coordinator these contractors and the control, if they perform their support in the way that has been arranged before by Brunssum or by SHAPE.
At this moment we have no problem with this civilian contractor. As you know Afghanistan is not a country like Italy or like Belgium or like France where there are a lot of lines of communication, a lot of airports and so on. We have... normally we have to face problems facing the state of the status of the roads, problems concerning the winter weather, problems like in this period of floods and so on.
But I can affirm, I can state in this moment our civilian support is suitable, is... there will be no main problem with them.

Q: Does this also apply to... Brooks Tigner, Defense News again. Does this also apply to the privatized part of security services? Do they have any relationship to the logistics business in Afghanistan? I don't know much about this, so perhaps you could educate us there.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Do you mean security companies?

Q: Yes.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Unfortunately is not part of my field. Civilian companies is not part of my field. I believe that... I don't know if ISAF are dealing with them. Probably is another business, completely apart from ISAF. But I'm not sure of this.

Q: Yes, Chris just gave me a good example of Brown & Root and Halliburton and others. Often these large companies have a finger in many different kinds of activities on the battlefield. Sometimes that can be securing the lines of logistics or the delivery of logistics even, so I was just wondering, to your knowledge, are they involved in... is there an interface there between those two and what you do?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: These two private companies in my knowledge are not a part of ISAF contractors. We have other contractors that I said before, coming from SHAPE and from Brunssum.  But these two are not on our list.

Q: Thank you.
Q: General, at this moment I think there are 40,000 troops in Afghanistan, the NATO. It is force enough for your necessity?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Is not my first issue, this one. In this moment ISAF forces are around 40,000 troops. These forces are provided by nation, by political government decision and ISAF has to deal with this... has to do our best, our best with these forces.

Of course, from the soldier's point of view, soldiers forces are never sufficient, because in order to complete our task. Probably you know if you compare the number of forces that we have in Afghanistan to other European theatres in the past the relation is not so good or positive for Afghanistan. I mean, for instance, if you take Kosovo, in Kosovo or in Bosnia, there were more forces than we have now in theatre. But as I said before, I do not complain of this, because we are happy because our government, our national government, decided this level of forces and we have to deal with this number.
We are doing our best in order to employ in a best activities our soldiers.

Q: Paul Ames from the Associated Press. General, can you tell us what are the main problems you face from the logistics point of view in Afghanistan? We hear a lot about the lack of helicopters, transport helicopters. Is that your main problem and how are you working to overcome those difficulties?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: The main problem that I'm facing in this moment is concerning the line of communication, because I... as you know there is only one road... ring that pass through Afghanistan. There's only one road that may interrupt by environment problems, especially during the winter time, especially in the centre, in the north part of Afghanistan there are normally a lot of snow, metres of snow that sometimes the snow can broke, can interrupt the line of communication.
We have also problems with the line of communication coming from Pakistan, for instance. Not even for insurgent, but probably also for the terrain conditions, the floods...  (coughs), sorry, we had in the recent past and so on.

Concerning helicopter is a different issue. Is more operational issue, that support issue. For support field we use aircraft for the strategic lift, I mean, from outside Afghanistan to Afghanistan. In theatre we use several C-130, C-160 that each nation provide for support troop all around the country.
In my point of view this air support is sufficient, is good, to support our troops all around the country. We have no problems. There are a lot of airfields that can accept this kind of aircraft.

Q: Ahto Lobjakas, Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty. I'm not fully clear on how far your agreement runs, but I understand that it includes PRTs, and I was wondering if you could say a few words on the topic of how PRTs specifically are able to function in the south of the country, comparatively speaking say, I understand things in the north are much calmer. Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: I'm dealing normally with the PRTs in order to provide the best support to them. As you know, I believe that PRTs is a national business, each nation provide and support PRTs. We, as ISAF support, we provide communication to PRTs, fuel to PRTs, sometimes some other material that has been... that is provided with our aircraft in theatre.

For the other problems PRTs are an operational problem or a national problem.

Of course in south there will be... there are at this moment more problems due to the operational situation, but... if you compare to the north. But from the support side we are able also, in south, to assure our best communication, our best logistics support to them with our in theatre aircraft. Because close to every PRT there is an airfield that can accept all of our aircraft.

Q: Franz Boogaard from the Dutch daily Algemeen Dagblad. Our government, and especially our Minister of Defence, is complaining from time to time about the difficult working conditions in Oruzgan. Trucks and other materials are suffering a lot and as a consequence there are a lot of costs.
Initially he thought to spend 350 million euros and now maybe it's three times more, it's more than a billion. Do you have comparable figures for other participating countries, or maybe for ISAF as a whole?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Sorry, I don't have any visibility about this problem because, as you said before, these are national problems. Every nation, I believe can try to provide the best support of their troops as ISAF does the same. But unfortunately I am not able to answer because is a national business. It's out of the ISAF... of my field of activities.

Q: Yes, Brooks Tigner, Defense News again. I'd like to follow up on my colleague's question because that's something I was just mulling myself. He touched on a very important issue, with any kind of coalition operation, something that's afflicted the Alliance for many, many years, which raises the cost always of allied operations, and that is, there's a tendency by each nation to control its own logistics and not to share logistics in order to go for... to bring down the costs.

Have you seen any progress or any willingness of the allies and the other non-allied participants, to at least try and consolidate the most mundane kind of logistics? I'm not talking about strategic lift etc. that's too sensitive, but certainly on food, fuel, etcetera, has this been consolidated, or do you see any trends for the future to try and come up with some solutions? Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Yes, I see several progress in this field because a part of strategic lift or in theatre lift that is provided by each nation, that means very good starting point for a more common logistic.

We, as ISAF, we provide, for instance, fuel for all countries, or all units that are in Afghanistan. That is another good point, because we can optimize our cost, our movement inside the theatre.

Of course another point maybe are the airfield that we are try to... we are manage the most important airfield in Afghanistan in order to obtain the best result with the all... with merging all the resources that each country can provide.

Food is another good point that can be used by... can be provided by ISAF. Then you know other... the most part of this logistic, if you take apart aircraft, fuel, food, is related to the kind of equipment that each unit, each nation has in theatre.

Q: Ahto Lobjakas, Radio Free Europe. Maybe to follow on from this, you said ISAF supplies the fuel in theatre, yet in Kandahar, for example, I understand the air operations are heavily dependent on fuel imported via Pakistan, which seems to leave the entire set-up very vulnerable. Very early in the year I remember there was an attack on a convoy and there were some... which forced alterations to flying schedules and whatnot. I was wondering if you could say why that is? Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: In this moment we have no problem with the fuel. In Kandahar too, because we don't receive only fuel from Pakistan. We receive fuel also from other countries that are in the north side of the border of Afghanistan.
So now we are able to manage in advance, to foresee the request for fuel, also in Kandahar... (coughs), sorry, when we have the most use of fuel.

Of course, it may happen at some time in this year, only one time does some column of fuel may have some attack from insurgent, but is only occasional situation. We have no problem in this case.
As I remember before, only one time happened this year.

Q: Yes, Paul Ames again from Associated Press. Just following up on that. How does it work when convoys are brought across the border from Pakistan? How's the cooperation with the Pakistani authorities? Do they provide security up to the frontier and then ISAF takes over once it passes over? And how is the... on the Afghan side of the border how would you characterize the development of the security situation with regards to your communication lines? Is it something which is stable? Is it getting better? Is it getting worse? Are you having to deploy more security to protect convoys? How is that developing?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: At this moment normally we have no problem with Pakistani border police or Pakistani border people that control the incoming convoys in Afghanistan. As we have no problem normally in Afghanistan. 

Each company provide by each themself force protection and security. This is inside of the contract that Brunssum and SHAPE state with them.

I can affirm that apart some occasional situation at this moment also in the south we have no main problem or we have no problem about this problem. We receive normally fuel. We are able also foresee this situation without any particular problem.
In the last year we had a problem due to the, normally due to the weather and to the status of the road.

Q: Sorry, another follow-up. Ahto Lobjakas, Radio Free Europe. When you say that the companies delivering the fuel provide their own security, that must mean that they must be able to draw on some fairly impressive resources, especially around Kandahar, if they don't need ISAF help or presumably they don't need ANA help either. I was wondering what kind of resources they might have then to actually secure their passage from the border through Kandahar, past Kandahar to the airfield. That seems quite a challenge given the environment? Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: ISAF doesn't provide any kind of transportation to these companies. They provide themselves the security in accordance with the government of Afghanistan, with the border police, with other police of Afghanistan that can provide this (inaudible)... secure status along the road. I cannot... I don't have any other visibility about this problem because is not the main problem.
For instance,  our contractors convoys are not the only convoys that are moving around the country. There are other companies that provides support to UNAMA, for instance, or other international agencies. In the same... the problem... the issue from UNAMA and other agencies are manned by themself, without ISAF request to support security.

Q: General, when you consider the future, what do you (inaudible) the next year, for example? What is the best situation for you in the next year?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Do you mean the general situation of the country?

Q: Yes.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: If I'm here with our other 40,000 my colleagues or comrades, we believe that the future of Afghanistan will be more and more positive because ISAF is doing its best to provide safe and secure environment in order to permit other partners.

You know, of course, that ISAF is not only the... the only partner that is here in Afghanistan to provide or to try to improve the security and the safe environment of the country. Of course, we can create the basic situation in order to permit other international partners like UNAMA, like European Union and other international partners, to do their job in a better way. We cooperate all together and I believe the future of Afghanistan I believe, it's my personal opinion, will be better and better.

Of course, it takes time. If you compare this situation with the other situation, take for instance a country that is very close to Italy, like Bosnia or like Kosovo. Do you mean that Kosovo now is stabilized after eight years of international or NATO presence or international presence is better in Kosovo? I believe that Kosovo now is become more and more so-called normal country. But it takes time. Kosovo now that is a very small country with more forces than in Afghanistan, now is going to become, as I said before, a normal, so-called normal country.

And if you take, for instance, that more than 60 percent of Afghanistan is calm and stable you can have a good picture of the situation. Of course, Afghanistan, it's very important to know the historical situation of Afghanistan.

Since Alexander the Great Afghanistan has been in the eyes of foreign (inaudible), but at this time we are here not foreign troops, we are here because under the United Nations mandate and under the invitation of the legitimate government of Afghanistan.

As I said before, I'm very positive... I'm thinking positive way for the future of Afghanistan. Of course it'll take another times, other years, but we are doing... we are trace the best way for this kind of future.

Q: General—Brooks Tigner, Defense News, again—I assume that all of our supply depots in Kabul are highly secured and that's not a problem, but I'm just wondering, do you keep any supply depots out in the country side in order to supply PRTs, etcetera, and are they vulnerable to attack or have they been attacked? I haven't heard of this and I was just wondering, once you move away from Kabul, what the situation is in the Hinterland of Afghanistan concerning logistics, whatever the supplies are.
Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: This moment, as I know, in my knowledge, in my background, no one of the PRT depots has been attacked since now. Probably because they are inside of PRTs, or probably because PRTs are doing a very good job, because PRTs are very close to the local population because, as you know, of course, PRTs are supporting the social, economic and civilian development of the local population.

And probably the tasks, the mission of the PRTs is the best force protection for them. So this could be a good result because no one of the PRTs has till now attacked by so-called insurgents.

Q: Paul Ames from the Associated Press. You mentioned earlier that soldiers are never content with the strength of their force. If you had a shopping list that you could present to the governments of NATO for more equipment or more personnel that you would like, what would be your priorities to improve your current operation?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: This is not my task because I'm from support. As I said, before the national government have decided for these forces, and we are happy of this. We must deal with this force. We must deal with this force. I don't have any list, any potential list of other unit or other equipment to ask to our nations because I believe that our nations now are doing their best for to support us in this situation.

Q: Ahto Lobjakas, Radio Free Europe. General, you said a few seconds go, if I understood you right, that providing development is the best kind of force protection you can have for PRTs in Afghanistan. I was wondering how this ties up with, for example, with what you can see in Helmand where the British officers, officials freely and openly say that whatever they do needs to have absolutely no links, no symbols linking them... linking the project to foreign aid, otherwise it gets blown up. Why they need to provide that development completely sort of under the water level, as it were, they need to hide the fact that they help Afghanistan.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Can you say again, please, because I'm... I did not understand very well your question. Sorry, is my English, is not your English.

Q: Sorry, it's the way I explained it, I'm sure. It's just... the little experience that I have of Afghanistan, in the south, especially, seems to suggest that instead of force protection, aid openly identified with the west would actually attract attacks rather than protect any of the projects or the PRT even. So the experience seems to be exactly the opposite of what you said holds in Afghanistan.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: I believe that PRT are (inaudible) in order to support the Afghan local population. Of course, soldiers must... sometime must defence by themself because you know in the south there are still some insurgents there are try to attack the legitimate government of the legitimate institution of the Afghan government.

But we are, in this moment, ISAF try to push away this insurgent in order to create the basic condition to improve the capacity of PRTs doing the best job. I don't have any result that PRTs at this moment have been attacked by insurgents. Sorry I don't know if that is the right question... the right answer, but I believe that is the situation.

Q: My apologies. It's just... what I'm getting at is actually something quite specific and that is, that in Helmand if the PRT there builds something for a local community, say a bridge, a new building for a school possibly a hospital, whatever, as long as it has... or when it has a British flag on it or any kind of symbol suggesting it was built with western help apparently it becomes a target, immediately a target for insurgents.

So in order to keep these projects intact there needs to be absolutely nothing to link them to western aid. They need to be anonymous to remain intact. That seems to run counter to what you said earlier that development identified with the PRTs helps the PRTs, helps them keep safe, if you see what I mean. Thank you.  

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: I understand now, your question. I don't believe that if someone or sometime the western sign were destroyed it can prove that PRT don't do the best job. You know that in Helmand there are some activities, as I said before, some operation activities in order to create this secure environment. Of course when this insurgent will be pushed away we'll be forced to withdraw from Helmand, for instance, probably this western sign will remain intact, will not be destroyed.
But if you take, for instance, also in Italy we have sometime some public sign that are destroyed by tourists, by vandals and so on.

Q: Franz Boogaard, again,  Algemeen Dagblad. A few minutes ago, answering a question of my Spanish colleague, you were rather positive on the future of Afghanistan. Do you think ISAF can really make progress as long as the poppy problem has not been resolved?  Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Poppy problem is a problem of the government of Afghanistan. ISAF supports... gives indirect support of government of Afghanistan in terms of strategy, in terms of training of police. Of course, the poppy is a part of... one part of the problem, but in this moment I cannot give further answer because it is not ISAF matter to take care of this problem.

Q: Ahto Lobjakas, Radio Free Europe. I very much suspect this is outside your remit, but I'll ask the question anyway. To the best of your knowledge, does ISAF have lines of communication with the Taliban?  At any level?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: If I understood well, we don't have any contact. Of course, with the Talibans. That's your... that's the meaning of your question or I understood bad?

Q: That was my question and I'm asking... why I'm asking is because the German weekly Der Spiegel this week ran a story saying Germany, for example, had had... or had made attempts to talk, to negotiate with the Taliban, had flown somebody over to Germany, under, obviously, under intense secrecy. And other nations may have made similar attempts. I was wondering if ISAF was aware of anything of that nature?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Personally as an ISAF officer I cannot any visibility about this problem. Probably you have to ask to the Germans or to the local government to the north if there is some kind of (inaudible). I don't believe that there will be any kind of this communication between these two sides.

Q: Just going back on a general issue, you stated it's going better in Afghanistan. It will take time, but it's going better in Afghanistan. And you're also saying we have to live with 40,000 soldiers, we have to do it and we will do it like that.
The question I wanted to ask is how come your colleague, Major General... the German Kasdorf, I think his name is, stated this week in the German press that... He warned for the return of Taliban in Afghanistan, and if there would not be sent more soldiers to Afghanistan.

That seems very opposite to what you have stated today. Can you explain that?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Well, in my personal opinion, as I said, before we can do our best and the progress of Afghanistan situation is good. Of course, if we receive... if ISAF receive more soldiers instead of take, for instance, just for example, eight years, we can reach our... the same result in four years, for instance.

But I believe this is the meaning of my colleague General Kasdorf, because probably he was... it was his personal opinion and so on.

Of course, as I said before, more soldiers can support us to do our... better and better our job. But we can deal with this number of soldiers in now and also soldiers can... means, can... seems not a lot of as the other general told the last two week, I believe we are able to reach anyway our result.

Of course, I said before, we take more years than in other situation. But this doesn't mean that soldiers are not well-employed or are not sufficient in this moment, for our present task.

Q: Yes, Brooks Tigner, Defense News again. Back to logistics. ISAF flies an awful lot of its supplies into the country. Flies. Emphasis on that word. Two questions. Could you, in general, tell us what percentage of all of the supplies, whether it's fuel, food, uniforms, whatever, what percentage if flow into Afghanistan, versus trucked in from wherever.

And second question, NATO's new coordination... well, it's not NATO's, but it's joint EU-NATO coordination centre for air and sea lift over in the Netherlands is mulling the idea of trying to set up a large transport ship devoted exclusively to delivering supplies to Pakistan. This would consolidate goods from all the allies and it would run back and forth between Europe on a regular basis, between Pakistan and Europe.

Do you know anything about this and is this something you would support and think it's a good idea?
Thank you.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Sorry, I don't know anything about this. I can give you that in this moment that we normally flew more than 500 hours per month in order to support our soldiers inside of Afghanistan. This number, more than 500 hours, are sufficient for to support our soldiers without problem.
Sorry I cannot... I'm not able to answer for the other part of the question.

Q: Follow-up, thank you. But my que... fine, we can drop the sea lift question, but my question... 500 hours per month, fine, but can you define what that represents as a percentage of all the logistic supplies that are necessary to keep operations going; i.e. how much of the total comes in from Pakistan by land versus what comes in by air?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: As I said before, the most part of the logistic equipment are national business. So every nation can provide by themself to support their units. From Pakistan sure we receive part of our fuel by road and I cannot tell you the percentage of this fuel. But at least more or less the 50 percent of our needs. And that is sufficient because the other part arrive from other countries that border in Afghanistan.

Q: Yes, just can you tell us what the other countries are, where the fuel comes from? Is it mainly from Uzbekistan in the north or are there other places from which the fuel comes in?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Yes, mainly... let me check the map, because sometime I make a confusion from the five countries or four countries that are bordering from the north to Afghanistan. We receive, of course, from... maybe Uzbekistan or, sorry, Turkmenistan more than Uzbekistan.

Q: Paul Ames again. Nothing comes in from Iran, right?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: Is a very good question, from Iran. At the moment we don't receive anything from Iran. I understand what is your back question.

Q: I just... different subject. To what extent... I know it's communications and things like this are part of your field as well. To what extent do you coordinate with the Afghan National Army? Do you provide support, communications support and back-up for them for their operations? Is that a major operation for you helping them, or are they working on their own?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: We are... we give support to the Afghan National Army with also a specific command that is provided. This support, that is the task for training and equip the Afghan army thanks to the donors from foreign countries.

Of course, ISAF can provide some... can provide for coordination, can provide sometimes support early for to move Afghan units from one side to another side of the country. But as I said before, there is a specific command that is tasked to take care of this important issue, because probably the end state of the ISAF mission, probably one of the end state is to have an army, and a police, of course, that are able to take care of the security by themselves.

Q: General, before you compared the situation between Afghanistan and Kosovo and Bosnia. Could you compare the situation between Afghanistan and Iraq?

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: I believe that there is no possibility to make any comparison because I'm... I've never been in Iraq. I know about Iraq the same thing that you know from newspaper, from the media. I'm in Afghanistan for the third time and I can give you my personal vision, my personal picture of Afghanistan.

In Afghanistan we are here under the UN mandate. We are here after more than 20 years of war. Population want a better future, peaceful future. ISAF is one of the partners that are here in order to build up this better future, as I said before. Sorry for the Iraq, but I'm not able.

Q: Ahto Lobjakas, Radio Free Europe. I'm sorry, I missed the initial round of introductions, but if I understand correctly, you're based in Herat. You speak from Herat? No. Kabul. You're not based in Herat? Okay that takes care of my question. Thanks.
(LAUGHTER)

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: No, I'm in Kabul, of course, where there is the HQ ISAF.

MODERATOR: General, I think people are confused because they saw the Herat room, which I know you're briefing from.

I don't think there are any more questions. Thank you very much for your time and your frank answers. I think it's been really interesting. I certainly don't know much about the logistic side. I've learned quite a bit today.

Thanks for taking time out of your busy schedule. I know the operational tempo keeps everyone on their toes in Headquarters ISAF. We appreciate it and thank you for our colleagues for coming in.

General, the normal form is that we allow our colleagues here 24 hours to file their stories and with your permission we would then propose to put this video news conference on the NATO website, so unless you have any headaches with that, you can let us know through the public information chain if you have any heartaches with that, but we will assume that you have no problem unless you tell us so.

And if that's okay with our colleagues around the table.

MAJ. GEN. BATTISTI: For me, no problem. Thank you for this opportunity.