The latest in a long line of “green-on-blue” attacks took place today in the Paktia Province, where two uniformed Afghan army personnel opened fire on US troops, killing one and wounding two others before escaping into the countryside.
Officials have not offered any details on the attack, beyond that it took place. The Taliban issued a statement praising the shooting and saying that the attackers have joined them.
This is the 27th NATO soldier to have been killed so far this year in attacks by Afghan security forces, and the 272nd killed overall. The Taliban’s statement claimed that nine US soldiers were actually slain, but this does not appear to have been the case.
Many of the past attacks have taken place when Afghan forces decided to defect to the Taliban, but some have been the result of unrelated arguments with occupation forces. So far it isn’t clear what caused this fight.
icasualties is reporting a second incident today August, 7, where Afghan soldiers killed two ISAF soldiers. Nationality of the soldiers was not revealed. Also at least three separate incidents resulted in three more ISAF, International Security Assistance Force, soldiers for a total of six NATO soldiers reported killed Tuesday, August 7, 2012.
The identification of NATO troops as International Security Assistance Force soldiers when the result of their operations provide only death and insecurity with no assistance is truly Orwellian.
Good man…really lerned how to solve the problems. Used US way of reasoning: PREEMTIVE MURDER !!! peter czech
When these attacks began the NATO/Owned Media line was always "A man or men wearing Afghan police/army uniforms killed x number of NATO troops." After 272 deaths and countless woundings the empire has been forced to concede that the shooters are in fact members of the Afghan army and police. This does not bode well for the handover of responsibility.
I checked over at iCasualties and only found this above green on blue incident yesterday (8/7) which killed one soldier and wounded two others. This was the only one reported. ISAF press releases often don't mention the nationalities for a while, and sometimes never. In this particular case, the fact that the troops involved were American seems to have gotten leaked sooner than usual.
There were two reports. One identified the American soldier and the other just said an ISAF soldier was killed. There have been so many casualties in the last few days it is difficult to keep them all straight. Today, August 8, three U.S. soldiers were killed in a suicide blast in Eastern Afghanistan, and three more ISAF soldiers were reported in another incident or maybe that is duplication of the same report. As many as 12 NATO soldiers have died in the last two days.
There are always two reports; one from the ISAF, and then usually from the soldier(s)' country. Sometimes a third report from NATO, Generally, the US takes the longest to verify the soldiers belong to them. Countries such as Italy, Germany, UK, etc. are the quickest to acknowledge. I've always been of the opinion that the US is hoping nobody will notice another dead soldier if they take long enough to respond.
The Vietnam parallels come to mind as the wars seem to expand out and out… Remember Laos and Cambodia [ Somalia… Yemen… Syruia and the Neocon's Jackpot… Iran??? ] and the secret bombing of those places……….. Remember “Vietnamization”…??
“Vietnamization” [It was] A plan to encourage the South Vietnamese to take more responsibility for fighting the war. It was hoped that this policy would eventually enable the United States to withdraw gradually all their soldiers from Vietnam. It sought increase the size of the ARVN, A mobilisation law was passed that called up into the army all men in South Vietnam aged between seventeen and forty-three"]
Trying to run a puppet led (occupation) army of conscripted natives may look good on paper, but there are peer dynamics which make such policies unwerkable and even dangerous…. as we see!
It is a telling decision, that our leaders turn to the same solution they attempted unsuccessfully , to rescue their ultimate failure and loss in their Vietnam debacle-cum-rout. Mr. Lind points out the [operational?] liabilities of “Afghanization” but just think what sort of intellectual fecklessness it illustrates… to even contemplate the exact same policy that cost so us so dearly in our last big military disaster.. Is it that America can’t learn from the past..??
SEE: Unfriendly Fire http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/u….
How the Taliban mastered the operational art of modern war
By William S. Lind • June 27, 2012
Here are a few excerps:
"What passes for NATO’s strategy is to train sufficient Afghan forces to hold off the Taliban once we pull out. The Taliban’s response has been to have men in Afghan uniform— many of whom actually are Afghan government soldiers or police—turn their guns on their NATO advisers. That is a fatal blow against our strategy because it makes the training mission impossible. Behold operational art in Fourth Generation war."
"The Taliban know this technique is operational, not just tactical. They can be expected to put all their effort into it. What counter do we have? Just order our troops to pretend it is not happening—to keep trusting their Afghan counterparts. That order, if enforced, will put our soldiers in such an untenable position that morale will collapse."
"The greatest intellectual challenge in Fourth Generation war—war against opponents that are not states—is how to fight it at the operational level. NATO in Afghanistan, like the Soviets three decades ago, has been unable to solve that riddle. But the Taliban appears to have done so."
"So powerful is this taste of Taliban operational art that Washington may fear the example it sets. During a recent visit by Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to Afghanistan, no American soldiers were allowed to get near him with loaded weapons. Might the Pentagon be worried that our own troops could learn from the Taliban? Were I an American soldier who had been told to hand over or unload his weapon before approaching Secretary Panetta, I would certainly have read it that way."
The entire article is here: "Unfriendly Fire" http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/u…. More and more we see what a death trap Afghanistan is, has always been and will ever be….. Think what we would do if the Afghans invaded and occupied US…………. TGW 8/8/12