is debatable. they seem to be operating a kind of tap on, tap off system, how much pressure they want to put on western troops. you can suddenly see a surge of people coming and then it will dry up for a while. the other point worth considering is that the taliban don t control all of the checkpoints. some of them are in the hands of other islamist groups. there are people who have been turned away from those checkpoints. people are disappeared at the checkpoint. the taliban and the islamists have got their own particular agenda albeit the taliban at least want to see western forces out and are not directly carrying out and are not directly carrying out any acts against them. as you