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Yahoo! My Yahoo! Mail More Yahoo! Services Account Options New User? Sign Up Sign In Help Yahoo! Search web search Home Singapore Asia Pacific World Business Entertainment Sports Technology Australia China India Indonesia Japan Malaysia Philippines Thailand Vietnam Tough road ahead once Afghan assault over AFP - Wednesday, February 24 Send IM Story Print Tough road ahead once Afghan assault over QARI SAHEB, Afghanistan (AFP) - – Until 10 days ago Afghan farmer Mohammad Omar lived a simple life under the Taliban and says he had no complaints about security as his poppy fields flourished. Now his village has been overrun by foreign and Afghan troops who are waging a major assault against Taliban insurgents in one of their last bastions in the opium-producing southern province of Helmand. And Omar is worried. The turbaned farmer, aged in his 40s, said that with the departure of the militants, who for two years ran this corner of the central Helmand River valley, his future and that of his illicit crop is uncertain. "The Taliban spent two years in our village," he told AFP as he stood in the wintery sun of Qari Saheb village in Nad Ali. "Security was perfect under the Taliban. No one could steal and if they did the Taliban would punish him right away." What alternative does the Afghan government have to offer, he wonders. As 15,000 US, NATO and Afghan troops fight to consolidate control over Marjah and Nad Ali in their largest offensive in the more than eight years of war, the bigger battle will be for the trust of residents. President Hamid Karzai and his Western backers have promised to bring security and prosperity, replacing Taliban rough justice and enforced poppy production with accountable government. Related article: Britain warns Karzai over election watchdog "This operation is not about killing so many Taliban," Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak said as the offensive was launched on February 13. "It's to separate the people from insurgents, expand governance and provide the grounds for reconstruction projects." Operation Mushtarak (Together) is a test of US President Barack Obama's counter-insurgency policy, boosted with a troop surge that will take the number of US and NATO troops in the country to 150,000 by August. Related article: US military calls a shura It is an effort to speed an end to the war, now in its ninth year since the overthrow of the Taliban regime in 2001, with a timetable to start withdrawing US troops in mid-2011. Lessons from the past -- when troops would push out the Taliban and then move on, only for the militants to return and take their revenge -- had been learned, Wardak said. But in Qari Saheb village, a complex of mud houses in Nad Ali surrounded by poppy fields recently captured by the combined forces, people have learned from the past, too. "I don't like the police," said resident Khaksar, who would give only one name, referring to a police force regarded as among the most corrupt institutions in the country. "They were stealing from us, they were intimidating our young people, they were taking our motorcycles. Our young people could not leave their homes from fear," he said. "We have suffered at the hands of the police, we don't want them back, they were robbers. The Taliban were far better than the police." The distrust Afghan people have in the police -- and by extension the Kabul government -- will be difficult to shift, said analyst Haroun Mir. "The inability of the Afghan government to establish and consolidate good governance in remote towns and villages was one of the main reasons for the re-emergence of Taliban," said Mir, director of Afghanistan's Centre for Research and Policy Studies. A US-backed programme to end poppy production -- which senior US officials admit was a failure -- was a factor in the popularity of the Taliban among farmers who depend on the crop in the poppy belt, experts say. "Everyone grows opium," said Khaksar when asked if he was worried about poppies being destroyed. "Yes, I'm very concerned," he said, lowering his voice as soldiers passed by. "The Taliban didn't have anything negative to do with our opium. They were in fact encouraging us to grow opium." Afghanistan produces most of the world's opium, the raw ingredient of heroin, much of it in Helmand, in an industry worth 2.8 billion dollars a year. "We definitely have plans to eradicate opium in Marjah and Nad Ali once security and government authority is established," said Zalmai Afzali, a spokesman for the counter-narcotics ministry. Farmers regularly clash with police trying to wipe out their poppy crops, most recently last week in Helmand's Nahri Sarraj district, where six counter-narcotics police were killed. "Its obvious that 2,000 Taliban fighters could not resist a joint assault by 15,000 well-trained US, NATO, and Afghan troops but the faith of the war largely depends on the aftermath of this military assault," said Mir. 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