Armed to help

Tracy, who asked that her surname not be used for security reasons, is a member of the first Human Terrain Team, an experimental Pentagon programme that assigns anthropologists and social scientists to American combat units in Afghanistan and Iraq. Her team’s ability to understand subtle points of tribal relations has won the praise of officers who say they see concrete results.

Col Martin Schweitzer, commander of the 82nd Airborne Division unit working with anthropologists here, said that the unit’s combat operations had been reduced by 60 per cent since the scientists arrived in February, and that the soldiers were now able to focus more on improving security and health care for the population.

In September, US Defence Secretary Robert M. Gates authorised a $40 million expansion of the programme, which will assign teams of anthropologists and social scientists to each of the 26 American combat brigades in Iraq and Afghanistan. Since early September, five new teams have been deployed in the Baghdad area, bringing the total to six.

Hugh Gusterson, an anthropology professor at George Mason University, and 10 other anthropologists are circulating an online pledge calling for anthropologists to boycott the teams. In Afghanistan, the anthropologists arrived along with 6,000 troops, which doubled the American military’s strength in the area it patrols, the country’s east.

A smaller version of the Bush administration’s troop increase in Iraq, the buildup in Afghanistan has allowed American units to carry out the counter-insurgency strategy here, where American forces face less resistance and are better able to take risks.

Since Gen David H. Petraeus, now the overall American commander in Iraq, oversaw the drafting of the army’s new counter-insurgency manual last year, the strategy has become the new mantra of the military.

In interviews, American officers lavishly praised the anthropology programme, saying that the scientists’ advice has proved to be “brilliant,”...