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Subscribe to RSSAll seven Americans aboard the helicopter were killed, including two Navy SEALs. NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reports.
Updated at 3:08 p.m. ET: Seven American troops were killed Thursday when the Black Hawk helicopter they were traveling in crashed in southern Afghanistan, possibly shot down by enemy forces, U.S. officials told NBC News.
Three of the Americans were U.S. Navy sailors – two were Navy SEALS and one was an explosive ordnance disposal sailor.
Three Afghan soldiers and an Afghan interpreter were also killed, bringing the total number of dead to 11, officials said.
According to U.S. officials, the helicopter had just landed in a "hot zone" to insert a small number of combat forces to support an ongoing operation. It was apparently shot down shortly after it took off to depart the area.
The helicopter was totally destroyed on impact.
U.S. officials at the Pentagon and in Kabul tell NBC News that American forces engaged in a shootout with enemy forces on the ground who were trying to reach the crash site.
The crash marked another deadly day for the U.S. in Afghanistan, less than a week after six American service members were gunned down, apparently by two members of the Afghan security forces they were training to take over the fight against the insurgency as international combat troops prepare to exit the country by the end of 2014.
As NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reports, US military officials are investigating whether or not the Taliban was in fact involved in deadly Black Hawk helicopter crash that claimed the lives of seven US soldiers and four Afghan troops.
The recent spike in American deaths and attacks by Afghan allies have stirred fresh doubts about the prospects for the U.S. plan to leave a capable Afghan government in place when most troops depart after more than a decade of war.
Spokesman Brig. Gen Gunter Katz said the NATO coalition is investigating the cause of Thursday's crash in Shah Wali Kot, Kandahar.
Dozens killed in Afghan suicide bomber attacks
The Taliban claimed responsibility for shooting down the helicopter, saying they were able to bring down the aircraft during a raid by the "invaders."
While the Taliban often exaggerate their victories and are quick to claim any incident involving the death of foreign troops, it could be significant that they took responsibility for Thursday's crash hours before NATO announced it.
Ahmad Jamshid / AP
More than ten years after the beginning of the war, Afghanistan faces external pressure to reform as well as ongoing internal conflicts.
"Nobody survived this," Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi told The Associated Press by telephone.
Insurgent hotbed
The area where the helicopter went down is an insurgent hotbed and supply route, lying north of Kandahar city near Zabul and Uruzgan provinces. The insurgents regularly attack police checkpoints around the rural villages of the district and plant bombs in the road to catch passing government vehicles.
Is the Taliban softening its stance on girls' education?
Thursday's crash is the deadliest since a Turkish helicopter crashed into a house near the Afghan capital, Kabul, on March 16, killing 12 Turkish soldiers on board and four Afghan civilians on the ground, officials said.
The Taliban shot down a CH-47 Chinook transport helicopter in August 2011, killing all 38 people on board, including 25 U.S. special operations service members.
The Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk is a medium-lift helicopter that has served as the U.S. Army's workhorse since the 1980s.
Dozens have been killed following a rash of deadly suicide bombings in Afghanistan. NBC's Atia Abawi reports.
The U.S.-led NATO force in Afghanistan has relied heavily on utility helicopters such as the Black Hawk to ferry troops, dignitaries and supplies around the mountainous terrain, thus avoiding the threat of ambushes and roadside bombs.
Afghan bomber kills senior Army leader, 2 majors
Afghanistan's Interior Ministry said this week that the Taliban had not let up on attacks during Ramadan and security forces had stepped up security ahead of the Eid al-Fitr festival, which ends Islam's holiest month.
A half-yearly report by the United Nations last week said 1,145 civilians have been killed between Jan. 1 and June 30 this year as well as 1,954 wounded, representing a 15 percent decline on last year due to a severe winter that hampered fighting.
The search is on for a man in an Afghan Army uniform who killed three US service members. NBC's Atia Abawi joins us live from Kabul with the latest.
Homemade bombs and suicide attacks remain the biggest killers of Afghan civilians and Afghan and foreign troops.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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It always sounds like the U.S. is getting its butt whipped in Afghanistan.
Whatever the overall mission is -- after 11 years it's clearly not achievable.
Look the mission was to kill or capture Binladin well that's done, it was to weaken Al Qida that's done. So now it is time to bring our troops home now not in 2yrs the mission is done its time to go home. No more lives need to be lost...
Seven more brave americans died in some land where we should not have been more than a year or so...
these wild mullas, basically still cavemen, inflict casualties ever since we went there..
We need to change our policy of supporting freaking isrealis unconditionally...
We are in these wars because we created enemies because of isreal..
Isreal wants us over there (just like they want us to jump on iran now) to protect them...while we spend trillions, lose many men in the process.
I do not see no jew fighting and dying in these wars... All isrealis and amemrican jews doing is stir trouble over there with muslims and have US step in as the security guard..
We hear little to nothing from politicians about our forays into Iraq and Afghanistan. We only hear words like " honor our brave men and women." To me, the best way to honor them is to bring them home, the sooner the better. My heart goes out to all who serve and their families. When will we ever learn.
Here is the real reason we are in Afghanistan.
On December 11, a
preliminary agreement was signed in Turkmenistan’s capital, Ashgabat, by
representatives of the four countries to proceed with plans for the American
and Israeli-backed pipeline. Here are the basic points about the TAPI pipeline:
Construction of
pipeline will be completed by 2014 (▼)
1,680 kilometer gas
pipeline will supply 3.2 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day (much of
this gas will come from Israeli/Mossad-owned gas fields in Turkmenistan,
meaning immense profits for the Mossadniks who pulled of 9/11)............►The Obama
administration, elected on the promise to withdraw U.S. troops by July 2011,
now says the U.S. will maintain combat troops in Afghanistan until December
2014. On December 17, the House passed a defense authorization bill (by a
341-48 vote) that authorizes the Pentagon to spend more than $160 billion on
the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2011 without major restrictions on the
conduct of operations. Why are U.S. (and NATO) troops being kept in Afghanistan
for another 4 years? What's really going on there? What is the cost and who is
involved in this game??
The real
reason for the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan is to build and
secure a 1,080-mile long gas pipeline designed to carry trillions of dollars of
Israeli-owned gas from Turkmenistan to Pakistan and India. You could ask how
come Turkmenistans gas could be Israeli-owned, here is the answer:
Following the
break-up of the Soviet Union, Israeli agents sought to gain control of the
strategic assets of the newly independent Soviet republics. In mineral-rich
Turkmenistan, a Mossad agent named Yosef A. Maiman was very successful in
gaining control of the republic's immense resources of natural gas. Yosef
Maiman, born in Germany in 1946, grew up in Peru and studied in the United
States before becoming an Israeli citizen in 1971. As an agent of Israeli
intelligence, Maiman heads a network of Mossad-controlled companies that serve
Israeli interests. As the chief executive of the Merhav Group, Maiman has
controlled the development of Turmenistan's gas resources. Maiman's key
colleagues at Merhav are the former head of the Mossad, Shabtai Shavit, and
Nimrod Novik, chief adviser to Shimon Peres, the current president of Israel.
Maiman was described
as "a leading miner" of Central Asian gas fields by the Jerusalem
Post in 2004. Given their control of the immense gas resources of Turkmenistan,
Maiman, Merhav, and the "Mossad" would all profit if and when the
U.S.-led coalition were able to "pacify" and control Afghanistan so
that the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline could be
built allowing the gas of Turkmenistan to be sold to energy-hungry India . The TAPI pipeline
project would bring billions of dollars into "Mossad" coffers every
year. This is the real reason for the war in Afghanistan and why the
Zionist-controlled Obama administration has increased the war effort in Central
Asia. It has nothing to do with terrorism or 9-11.
Now you
can easily understand why there was need for the "justification" of
this war, which was planned before the 9/11
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1550366.stm). The false-flag terror
attacks of 9/11 were part of a strategic Israeli operation to bring the U.S.
military into Afghanistan on a long-term mission on behalf of Israel’s Turkmen
gas enterprise. The Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline is
the real reason that U.S. soldiers are killing and dying in the southwestern
Afghan provinces of Helmand and Kandahar. 9/11 was just the cover story for
this pre-planned war of aggression - and it is nothing but a complete hoax.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/04/04/the-real-nuclear-outlaws/
obama has no foreign policy at all. he keeps our troops in this rag-head country to be killed each day. for nothing!!! this country will resort to its old means when we leave. i would not want too be a civilian working there.....how can you defend yourself?? time has passed for us to come home. the generals in charge should just bug out with all our troops and come home. it is damn sad day when "1" of our troops get killed. we will never win this war. time too cut and run!
both republicans and democrat presidents and top generals at the pentagon have failed to desimate the taliban from the begining, the ignorant imbesiles( pentagon generals&obama and bush administrations) who decided to hire the enemy to help us fight this war should all be charge for treason. and now russians helping iran get into the gulf of mexico for a month undetected. GOD HELP U.S.I SURE HOPE ROMNEY HA SA BRAIN IN HIS BIG HEAD.
Whoa kimosabi. You cannot fault the Generals. They do what the Commander in Chief sez do. If you have a stupid Commander in Chief you get stupid results. The hands of the Generals are tied by the SecDef and his civilian staff, directed by a Campaigner in Chief. All to them is political, troops be damned.
First and foremost, thank you US military for all that you do & GOD bless the families of those who have lost loved ones there!
Why have we not removed ALL of our fighting women and men. Was Iraq not a learning experience. The bad guys in Iraq are killing the innocent at a greater pace than before we moved in.
If obama had a serious plan to keep our men and women safe, why are they still dropping them into 'hot zones'. I totally understand that lives are lost in a war, and usually for a purpose. We are at a point where there is no purpose, especially when the very people we are training to protect themselves are turning their weapons on our gals and guys.
Please remember and use good common sense when voting this fall.
More importantly, bring our people home!
I hope enough people vote this election to make the election a true reflection of the majority of the people, all the people, of our great country. Another thing, I hope that someday in the not to distant future the hate mongering and accusations, from both sides of the political parties stop and common sense and decency can again prevail.
Time to turn that whole country into a sheet of glass. Duke Nuke em...
Some uninformed folks say all our troops are volunteers therefore we should not care. Once a week I go to Walter Reed Military Med Center and see so many young men returning without arms, without legs, without sight/hearing/ the list goes on.
Obama has in place something called "Stop Loss" this require that folks who served their time but are in critical skills to be retained in the Army against their will.
We should demand to know how many so called "Stop Loss" folks have been wounded/killed. The Nation deserves to know.
Thank you for going and visiting. Thank you for speaking sense in an unspeakable time.
Stop Loss was put into place by Bush in 2003 during the Iraq War. Obama ended the program in 2010. Know the facts or you are just another one of the "uniformed folks" you talk about.
I keep trying to include a link to were to get the information but the site keeps deleting. I'll try one more time.
www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/R40121.pdf
Who cares? We invaded THEIR country! If the Chinese came here and started flying helicopters around telling us what to do I'd most definitely be shooting RPG's at them, and rejoicing if I shot it down.
This isn't a "tragedy". They were soldiers. Combatants. Their job is war. This is part of the risk. They signed up for it. If they don't want to die, don't help invade the second poorest country in the world and pretend like you're doing something honorable.
I rest my case. The Obama crowd could care less how many Americans die. They are political fodder for their cannons.
wakani. OMG, you really believe that?
Roger: Roger that. I do believe. Look at how all of our Special Forces folks were put in clear danger by the wanton leaks about their operation, all for political gain. Most, not all, could care less. When was the last time the Mr. Obama or Mrs. Obama went to visit Walter Reed. Answer: Never.
Lots of them were kids when they signed up. It's a multifaceted tragedy.
Wakani - The Obamas have visited Walter Reed at least once a year since 2009, the last time in June of this year. How many times have you?
As far as Mo is concerned - he sounds like an idiot. I doubt he's ever served or could serve in the military. He should be grateful for the soldiers who do serve and protect his right to sound like an idiot.
How many soldiers make up a troop?
Not enough to bring peace to any country it seams
Who will be the last soldier to die in this useless war?
My condolences to the families and friends of these courageous men and women.
WHY?
70 to 150 130 is a nice number for a Troop.
the taliban doesn't have helicopters we can shoot down.
we take our best soldiers, best equipment, and treasure over to aghanistan and watch the taliban destroy it.
the u.s. is such a chump!
@!$%# you Joe what you know is what the pigeon left on the ROOF!
Afgan police & troops kill our guys and nothing is said. Kill an Afgan and Hillary C will go running to appologize. Obama said he'll bring our troops home, but he forgot to say it will be in body bags. And for this he'll give 10 Billion for ten (10) years. Way to go pres.
{The recent spike in American deaths and attacks by Afghan allies have stirred fresh doubts about the prospects for the U.S. plan to leave a capable Afghan government in place when most troops depart after more than a decade of war.} There is no doubt. No one with an IQ over 20 expects a capable Afghan government. Ever.
I'm heartsick. It's not that US troops "aren't smart" going over there. They are being stoplossed, and do not have a choice, or do not realize they have a choice.
Groups like Iraq Veterans For Peace and Courage To Resist are providing a haven of sorts, and legal help, for soldiers who do not want to be stoplossed back into the war. These are men who have given their lives over and over and they are being treated badly in my opinion. The number of suicides exceeds the number of combat deaths for two years running.
If you disagree with the war policies keeping us there, please contact your representatives and make noise about it. Contact them repeatedly, not just once. Contact your local and state reps. Contact everyone you can. Don't just post comments, we live in a three dimensional world and posting in two dimensional space has little to no effect. It's just noise. Reach out. Help bring them home because peace is patriotic too, and there is a fight for our freedoms here too.
Thank you to all who have given the utmost. I think some soldiers also believe they will not be able to get jobs. There are programs to help them in all of our communities. If there isn't one in your community you can start it. We must work locally to protect and serve those who protect and serve us.
Another 7 cannon fodders who died for nothing because of US policy.
We should have left there after the death of Bin Ladin , I thought that was the reason we went there to start with , the Talibans were not the reason , We can not fight every buddy that supports our enemies or we will be fighting billion people , We can not occupy other countries and stay there , they were no excuse for Mr. Obama to stay there , and why we always fighting in remote areas , what the hell our troops doing in these area where we can not get them reinforcements , I watched a special one night about our troops being in a valley where nothing there and we couldn't get them help if they need it . that's crazy our boys deserve better that , they do not need to guard other countries roads and valleys. we bring them home and guard our borders from Drugs and thieves , and now Mrs. Clinton and McCain , Graham , Lieberman and MR. OBAMA TRYING TO GET US IN SYRIA and we are supporting the same thugs we are fighting in Afghanistan , Just because the Saudis and Qataris wants to , and by the way who's funding these Taliban's , Hell I know the Russians hate them more than we do , Look at the Saudis and Qataris again boys , They were financing Bin Ladin till the day he died , and they were paying the Pakistanis to keep him safe , anybody else have the same thoughts .
Oh for God's sake! What country, what service, what reason, protecting who??? Get the hell out of other people's space. Why the hell do you want to create a vietnam all over the planet? What part of "go back home and mind your own business" don't you understand. Drone here, drone there. What are you doing???
I cannot believe many of you are here talking about how these 7 Americans died (4 Army and 3 Navy) was for nothing. My fiance is a door gunner in a Blackhawk and currently I do not know if he is one of the fallen. These men are doing their jobs to keep you safe and to allow you the freedoms to speak your mind however classless it may be. Show some respect for the fallen men and women of this war that started during the Bush administration, and that Obama is trying to end. You live in a country that you are allowed freedom of speech but your ignorance and disrespect to the families of those with loved ones serving is sad and disgusting. Just because you have these freedoms doesn't mean you should voice them especially at a time like this.
Next time you hear about a news report of fallen American servicemen or women, instead of placing blame on an administration why don't you stop to think about how breath taking it is for the many families of these men and women awaiting to find out if their spouse, parent, child, siblings, significant others, and extended family as they wait either for correspondence from their family member or to be notified of the death. You need to stop and think that these men and women in the military are no different from yourself except they serve their country. Now how would you feel if you had a family killed protecting and serving yet many people focused on something so irrelevant showing no respect for the loss of a human life.
I wonder if any of the surface-to-air missiles that went missing from Libya after we overthrew Quaddafi were used in this attack? It seems only recent - within the past two years - that the Taliban has gained that capability.
Our hard-headed politicians won't quit Afghanistan for fear of being labeled cowards, or worse. The chicken-hawks, who have no skin-in-the-fight, are eager to exploit this fear and continue this senseless war. They won't accept that democracy is not suitable for every country. They won't accept that supporting repressive regimes like Saudi Arabia is counter-productive.
I travel a lot with my job and I see so many of these young people in the airports, going from flight to flight. They are All colors and ethnicities. They appear upbeat but tense, sometimes a sadness about them .
Its an absolute shame that these young kids are dying for nothing, leaving their grieving fathers and mothers do deal with the fact that their kids lives were wasted,
I supported invading this country to get the people behind 9/11 Once we got them on the run out of the country we should have packed up and left and let the locals take over