| Submit your comments on this article |
| Afghanistan |
| Taliban Car Bomb Strikes U.S. Convoy in Kabul |
| 2010-05-19 |
| KABUL, Afghanistan — The Taliban struck here at the heart of the Afghan capital Tuesday, with a suicide bomber steering his explosives-laden Toyota minibus into an American convoy as it moved through the thick of rush-hour traffic. The attack killed 18 people, including 5 American soldiers and an officer from Canada, and wounded at least 47 civilians. The assault, which brought mayhem and carnage to one of the capital's main thoroughfares, comes as Afghan leaders and NATO commanders are preparing to launch a major offensive in the southern city of Kandahar, the Taliban's spiritual home. If nothing else, the attack seemed intended to remind American and Afghan leaders of what the next several months might hold in store as the offensive unfolds. The blast sent a fireball billowing into the air, set cars aflame and blew bodies apart. Limbs and entrails flew hundreds of feet, littering yards and walls and streets. The survivors, many of them women and children, some of them missing limbs, lay in the road moaning and calling for help. The Taliban took responsibility for the attack in a posting on its Web site, saying the group had dispatched a young man named Nizamuddin, a resident of Kabul. The Taliban said that Nizamuddin's bomb weighed more than 1,600 pounds. Bombers who have struck in the past have sometimes cruised the capital looking for targets, holding off on the detonator before they have found their marks. Intelligence officers often receive reports that car and suicide bombers have entered Kabul, some of them with no particular targets in mind. That may have been the case Tuesday morning, when Nizamuddin, if that was his name, steered his minibus into the line of American cars. It was the worst attack in Kabul in weeks. The insurgency is a largely rural phenomenon in a largely rural country, and on most days the capital is calm. The peace in the city, such as there is, is kept almost entirely by the Afghan police and army, with the Americans and NATO standing back. While the Taliban were quick to congratulate themselves for killing the American and NATO soldiers, their statement made no mention of the dead and wounded Afghan civilians. The attack was condemned by the United Nations, NATO and the American Embassy, which accused the Taliban of “callous disregard' for the lives of ordinary Afghans. The bomber struck at 8 a.m., when the streets were filled with traffic. The American convoy, which contained a number of armored S.U.V.'s, was moving down Dar-ul-Aman Road on the southern edge of the city. The road leads up a hill to the Afghan Counterinsurgency Academy, one of the principal centers for teaching tactics to Afghan officers and enlisted men. The school, also known as the COIN Academy, sits just behind the Dar-ul-Aman Palace, a grand building built by King Amonullah, an Afghan monarch, early in the 20th century. In the 1980s, the building served as a club for Soviet military officers. It still sits atop the barren hill, riddled with bullet holes and shell holes, a gutted husk. As the chaos unfolded, ambulances converged on the scene, and a pair of Black Hawk helicopters swooped in to take away the dead and wounded NATO soldiers. |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #1 That thing weighed almost a ton. You'd think someone would have notices something as it went through a checkpoint because a ton is a lot for a minibus. Maybe the brakes were straining when it stopped. Maybe the suspension was low and the tires looked loaded. Maybe the engine was straining when it pulled away. They can stiffen up the suspension and put air in the tires, though. So maybe cars going through checkpoints need to be weighed. Or maybe have the air pressure in their tires checked with a hammer or air pressure gauge. |
| Posted by: gorb 2010-05-19 17:03 |