« War Crimes and Those Who Endorse Them | Main | SOFA agreement snags on details »

July 13, 2008

Heavy Fighting in Afghanistan

By BJ

The BBC is reporting that at least eight US soldiers have been killed in fighting in the north-east of Afghanistan. The Times Online reports that it was an attempted, (and possibly successful), overrun of a small US outpost.

US troops were killed when Taliban insurgents attempted to overrun an American base as bloody fighting was reported in several parts of Afghanistan today.

Nato reported that the small American Combat Outpost in Dara-I-Pech district of Kunar Province, on the border with Nuristan Province in the east of the country, came under heavy fire at around 4.30am local time. Heavy fighting continued throughout the day with US forces calling in artillery, fast jets and Apache helicopters.

. . .

The fighting is close to where US forces were accused of killing 15 civilians in an airstrike nine days ago. The governor of Nuristan, Doctor Hazrat Hazratin Noor, told The Times: "The Taliban attacked the US base yesterday and the American planes bombed the area. After the attack, the US troops decided to move their base to the district centre of Wanat and they tried to build shelters there in the bazaar overnight. Now the Taliban have attacked again."

I figure the portion I highlighted has some relationship to the attack, as does this recent airstrike. Since the "boots on the ground" presence in Afghanistan has always been on the light side, there has been far greater dependance on air strikes to maintain the coalition's tactical supremacy. Of course, such strikes result in far higher civilian casualties, which enrages the local population, giving the insurgents both the recruits and cover they need to launch attacks like the one above.

And so the cycle continues.

http://www.newshoggers.com/blog/2008/07/heavy-fighting.html

TrackBack

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d8345f80b469e200e553b5e0648834

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Heavy Fighting in Afghanistan:

Comments

The comments to this entry are closed.



------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------

Use an online petition to get help in promoting your cause

------------------------------------------




-----------------------------------------

------------------------------------------

-----------------------------------------

Click here to visit
Powell's Books!

----------------------------------------

Follow Us On Twitter

Steve

Dave

Ron

John


-----------------------------------------

Google

Powered by TypePad

The Monster: How a Gang of Predatory Lenders and Wall Street Bankers Fleeced America--And Spawned a Global Crisis
By Michael W. Hudson
Read Ron's Review

The Collapse of Complex Societies
By Joseph Tainter
Read Ron's Review

Crossing Zero: The Afpak War at the Turning Point of American Empire
By Elizabeth Gould and Paul Fitzgerald
Reading Now

Thinking Points: Communicating Our American Values And Vision
By George Lakoff
Read Steve's Review

Invisible History:Afghanistan's Untold Story
By Paul Fitzgerald & Elizabeth Gould
Read Ron's Review

The Day We Found The Universe
By Marcia Bartusiak
Read Ron's Review

Science as a Contact Sport: Inside the Battle to Save Earth's Climate
By Stephen H Schneider
Read BJ's Review

Ayn Rand And The World She Made
By Anne C. Heller
Read Ron's Review

The Greatest Show On Earth: The Evidence For Evolution
By Richard Dawkins
Read BJ's Review

The Vanishing of a Species? a Look at Modern Man's Predicament by a Geologist
By Peter Edward Gretener
Reading

Thomas W. Benton-Artist/Activist
By Daniel Joseph Watkins
Read Ron's Review