Look, Ron! I'm riding a furry tractor!

I'll be highlighting some very thought-provoking alternatives to population-centric counterinsurgency in Afghanistan over the next few days. But first, I want to ask a question first posed by one of my readers: how hard is it to train teenage girls and bears? If you could only train one, which would be more deadly and which one would be more cost effective? Because I think we might have stumbled upon two potential solutions to Islamist militants...

SRINAGAR: It seems these are the worst of times to be a militant in Kashmir. First, a Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist was axed to death by a teenage girl in Rajouri roughly a month ago. Now, a bear has mauled two Hizbul Mujahideen militants to death as they hid in its cave in Shopian, South Kashmir.