war in Afghanistan

[10/1/12] KABUL, Afghanistan » A suicide bomber driving a motorcycle packed with explosives rammed his bike into a joint Afghan-American patrol this morning in eastern Afghanistan, killing at least 14 people including three U.S. troops and their translator, officials said.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the blast, which came a day after the U.S. death toll in the war in Afghanistan reached 2,000 troops. Such joint patrols are considered key to the training of Kabul's security forces but have been cut back by a string of insider shootings of international troops by their Afghan allies.

[8/21/10] A majority of Americans see no end in sight in Afghanistan, and nearly six in 10 oppose the nine-year-old war as President Barack Obama sends tens of thousands more troops to the fight, according to a new Associated Press-GfK poll.

With just over 10 weeks before nationwide elections that could define the remainder of Obama's first term, only 38 percent say they support his expanded war effort in Afghanistan — a drop from 46 percent in March. Just 19 percent expect the situation to improve during the next year, while 29 percent think it will get worse. Some 49 percent think it will remain the same.

The numbers could be ominous for the president and his Democratic Party, already feeling the heat for high unemployment, a slow economic recovery and a $1.3 trillion federal deficit. Strong dissent — 58 percent oppose the war — could depress Democratic turnout when the party desperately needs to energize its supporters for midterm congressional elections.

A majority of Americans do welcome Obama's decision to end combat operations in Iraq. Some 68 percent approve, a number unchanged from earlier this year. The last American combat brigade began leaving Iraq on Thursday, ahead of Obama's Aug. 31 deadline for ending the U.S. combat role there.

Seven years after that conflict began, 65 percent oppose the war in Iraq and just 31 percent favor it.

[8/8/10] KABUL, Afghanistan — Their last meal was a picnic in the forest in the Sharrun Valley, high in the Hindu Kush mountains of northern Afghanistan.

Returning home from a three-week trek on foot to deliver free medical care to the remotest regions of the country, the aid workers — six Americans, a Briton, a German and four Afghans — had just finished eating when they were accosted by gunmen with long dyed-red beards, the police said.

The gunmen marched them into the forest, stood them in a line and shot 10 of them one by one.

The police found their bodies, seven men and three women, on Friday, the Badakhshan Province police chief, Gen. Aqa Noor Kentoz, said Saturday.

The attack, the largest massacre in years of aid workers in Afghanistan, offered chilling evidence of the increasing insecurity in the northern part of the country and added to fears that the insurgency has turned even more vicious in recent months.

[7/8/10] KABUL, Afghanistan — NATO pilots mistakenly attacked Afghan soldiers who had laid a trap for Taliban militants and killed at least five of the soldiers on Wednesday, a devastating case of friendly fire in a conflict still troubled by miscommunication among allied forces, Afghan officials said.

The attack in the Andar district of Ghazni Province, about 100 miles southwest of Kabul, suggested a serious lack of coordination between NATO troops and Afghan forces battling militants who hold sway in part of the district known as Rahim Khiel.

The Afghan soldiers “had made an ambush for the enemy” when they were attacked early Wednesday morning, said Gen. Zahir Azimi, the spokesman for the Afghan Ministry of Defense. He said the “air force” had “bombarded” the Afghan soldiers; a NATO official later said a helicopter had fired a single rocket into the formation of Afghan troops.

“We condemn this incident,” General Azimi said. “Unfortunately this is not the first time this has happened, but we hope this would be the last one.”

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[4/21/10] A NATO military convoy in eastern Afghanistan shot to death four unarmed civilians in a vehicle early Monday evening, including a police officer and a 12-year-old student, Afghan officials said Tuesday.

The killings in Khost Province, near the border with Pakistan, led to a dispute almost immediately between local Afghan leaders and NATO officials. Deaths of civilians from shootings by NATO forces near convoys and at checkpoints have emerged as a particular flash point with the Afghan public and government.

At least 35 civilians have been killed since last summer by NATO and American troops in such incidents — but military officials say that in no instance did the victims prove to be a danger to troops.