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| Afghanistan | ||
| 165 insurgents killed in Afghanistan | ||
| 2007-09-26 | ||
| KABUL, Afghanistan - Two battles killed more than 165 Taliban fighters and a U.S.-led coalition soldier in southern Afghanistan on Wednesday as President Hamid Karzai prepared to discuss the escalating violence with President Bush in New York. One of the clashes began Tuesday when several dozen insurgents attacked a joint coalition-Afghan patrol with machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades near the Taliban-controlled town of Musa Qala in Helmand province, with Taliban reinforcements flowing in all day, a coalition statement said.
Taliban militants overran Musa Qala in February, four months after British troops left the town following a contentious peace agreement that handed over security responsibilities to Afghan elders. Musa Qala has been in control of Taliban fighters ever since. Situated in northern Helmand province, Musa Qala and the region around it have seen the heaviest fighting in Afghanistan this year. It is also in the middle of the country's poppy-growing belt. In neighboring Uruzgan province, more than 80 Taliban fighters attacked a joint Afghan and coalition patrol from bunkers near the village of Kakrak in a six-hour battle Tuesday night, the coalition said. Coalition artillery and air support bombarded Taliban positions, killing more than 65 insurgents, it said. Three civilians were wounded in the crossfire, it said. No Afghan or coalition forces were hurt.
...and now, the AP spin. The huge clashes come as Karzai prepared to meet with Bush in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York. Bush is seeking assurances that Karzai is dealing with Afghanistan's soaring drug trade and security problems. Afghan opium poppy cultivation hit a record high this year, fueled by Taliban militants and corrupt government officials, a U.N. report found last month. The country produces nearly all the world's opium, and Taliban insurgents are profiting. More than 4,500 people have died in insurgency-related violence this year, according to an Associated Press count based on figures from Afghan and Western officials. Most were militant but at least 600 civilians were among those killed. On Tuesday, about 400 villagers blocked a major highway during a protest after two civilians — a father and son — were killed by international forces who were conducting a search operation in the Zhari district of Kandahar province, villagers said. Spokesmen from both NATO and the coalition said they had no reports of any search operations or civilian deaths in Zhari. Habibullah Jan, a lawmaker from Sanzari village, said NATO forces surrounded the village and killed the father and son. He warned that if international forces continued to target civilians, villagers would turn against them. In the past week, international forces "arrested innocent villagers from three homes, calling them Taliban. Everyone knows that we don't let the Taliban into our area," said Karim Khan, one of the protesters. Yeah...everybody. | ||
| Posted by:tu3031 |
| #19 i hope they can't rest in peace i hell |
| Posted by: sinse 2007-09-26 19:26 |
| #18 I don't think the person who wrote this nor the one that edited it know what the word "escalation" means. |
| Posted by: Deacon Blues 2007-09-26 18:46 |
| #17 <<<<<<<<< cracks open a tinny...This what I call Natural Law. Maybe the Score Card needs wider advertising, like a few bill boards in the madrassa. |
| Posted by: rhodesiafever 2007-09-26 18:02 |
| #16 #3 *speechless* Posted by: trailing wife LMAO!! /btw, way funny Mr. wxjames |
| Posted by: Red Dawg 2007-09-26 16:10 |
| #15 ...and the administration keeps hiding the fact that our voluntary mercenaries are being outsmarted and overwhelmed by the righteous freedom fighters in ther brutal Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Wintertime offensives... Oh the USA is a Kruel Kapitalistic Kountry!! It's Just Like Vietnam when we cBS took North Vietnam's side and declared victory for Ho! |
| Posted by: cBS 2007-09-26 16:04 |
| #14 wxjames #2: That's some masterful baiting, just don't get caught! ;-) |
| Posted by: gorb 2007-09-26 14:37 |
| #13 King Arthur: Look, you stupid bastard, you've got no arms left! The Black Knight: Yes, I have. King Arthur: Look!!! The Black Knight: Just a flesh wound. |
| Posted by: Justrand 2007-09-26 13:50 |
| #12 Outstanding contact-to-targeting time. "Wanna meet my leetle friends?" |
| Posted by: Bugs Grang9248 2007-09-26 13:48 |
| #11 Doc and #10. But what about Paradise keeping up the pace? That's almost 12,000 virgins needed for just two battles. |
| Posted by: GK 2007-09-26 13:42 |
| #10 the Talibunnies can't keep this up. Sure they can. Plenty more just over the border in Pakistan. You could run trucks day and night for weeks and not make a dent in the population of Pakistani males who want to die fighting in Afghanistan. |
| Posted by: gromky 2007-09-26 12:47 |
| #9 Dontcha love how "escalating violence" is usually massive losses for the enemy? The implication is that things are bad. But dead enemy is GOOD (notwithstanding "sophisticated" COIN thinking to which at least lip service is so fashionable today, esp. among some military officers). As I recall this was a frequent media phenomenon in Iraq - "uptick in violence" "surging attacks" "bold insurgent attacks", etc. - and you'd read down a few paragraphs and see the enemy got waxed, harvested, slaughtered. Pathetic on the part of the editors who shape the narrative .... |
| Posted by: Verlaine 2007-09-26 12:29 |
| #8 wxjames is waxing poetic this morning. |
| Posted by: Ebbang Uluque6305 2007-09-26 11:30 |
| #7 Are these talibunnies like %90 Pak origin? |
| Posted by: 3dc 2007-09-26 11:26 |
| #6 rest in pieces b*tches....... |
| Posted by: Broadhead6 2007-09-26 10:48 |
| #5 No, Chuck. But we appreciate and value your service. ;-) |
| Posted by: lotp 2007-09-26 10:42 |
| #4 CJTF-82 reports 61 killed in the first attack, and 65 in the second. I can't even get up for a cup of coffee without having to add to the Terrorist Death Watch. Can I complain we're killing them too fast to count? |
| Posted by: Chuck Simmins 2007-09-26 10:39 |
| #3 *speechless* |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2007-09-26 10:37 |
| #2 Here's the deal, at night they stake a female goat out in the kill zone, and come morning jihadis of every stripe are converging on the nervous animal. Carefully placed snipers and mortar squads beat back the hoards and call in air to help rescue the goat. Fifty cals mow down the scattered jihadis as the rangers cover her sensitive parts and usher her clear of the kill zone. The great part is you don't even have to train the goats. |
| Posted by: wxjames 2007-09-26 10:21 |
| #1 Oh yeah! These are great ratios. I hope some videos from these battles surface -- asploding insurgent videos are fun. |
| Posted by: Captain Lewis 2007-09-26 09:59 |