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Subscribe to RSSFour U.S. troops fighting with the NATO-led alliance were killed in another suspected "insider" attack in southern Afghanistan. NBC's Atia Abawi reports.
Updated at 12:05 p.m. ET: Four U.S. soldiers fighting with the NATO-led alliance were killed in an apparent insider shooting in southern Afghanistan on Sunday, the Pentagon confirmed.
A Pentagon spokesman did not have further details, including which branch of services the Americans belonged to, Reuters reported.
The shooting took place in Zabol, a southern province where U.S. forces are based, and came a day after two British soldiers were shot dead by an Afghan policeman while returning from a patrol in southern Helmand province — a stronghold of the Taliban-led insurgency.
Local authorities also told NBC News that the four killed were Americans.
An International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) statement described the incident as "an insider attack suspected to involve members of the Afghan police."
What's leading Afghan troops to turn on coalition forces?
One attacker who was wearing an Afghan National Police uniform (ANP) was also killed in the fighting, a source told Reuters.
At least 51 foreign military personnel have been killed in "insider" attacks this year, attacks which have put a heavy strain on trust between the coalition and Afghanistan as they move towards handing security responsibility to Afghan forces by the end of 2014.
Related:
- Two NATO soldiers killed by gunman thought to be Afghan police officer
- Deadly week for US in Afghanistan
- Two US Marines killed in attack on NATO base
- US suspends training for some Afghan recruits after 'insider' attacks
The rise in such attacks has led to the training of new recruits to the Afghan army and police being suspended.
The Taliban indicates that deadly attacks on U.S. personnel in Afghanistan were in response to an anti-Islam video. NBC's Atia Abawi reports.
With foreign combat troops withdrawing from the increasingly unpopular and expensive war, the enormous cultural divide that still separates Afghans and their allies after 11 years of conflict has become more of a concern than ever.
The NATO-led coalition and its Afghan counterparts have created a special Joint Casualties Assessment Team to investigate every attack, which number at least 37 this year.
In more than half of cases, attackers are either killed or escape and the motive never emerges, making it more difficult for the coalition to stem the surge.
Adding to the toll of coalition deaths caused by insider attacks over the weekend, two were killed and nine wounded in Friday's attack on Camp Bastion, one of the worst attacks on a NATO-operated base all year.
Six Harrier jets were destroyed and two were significantly damaged in the raid on the camp airfield, carried out by 15 insurgents wearing U.S. Army uniforms and split between three teams, a NATO statement said on Sunday.
U.S. suspends training for some Afghan recruits after 'insider' attacks
Three refueling stations were destroyed and six aircraft hangars were damaged. Britain's Prince Harry was at Camp Bastion at the time of Friday's attack, but was unharmed.
US forces based at Kabul International Airport in Afghanistan take part in a memorial service marking the 11th anniversary of the September 11 attacks. NBCNews.com's Dara Brown reports.
All but one of the attackers were killed, with the remaining fighter taken into custody by coalition forces.
ISAF said the attack was "well-coordinated". A statement said: "The insurgents, organized into three teams, penetrated at one point of the perimeter fence. The insurgents appeared to be well equipped, trained and rehearsed. Dressed in U.S. Army uniforms and armed with automatic rifles, rocket propelled grenade launchers and suicide vests, the insurgents attacked coalition fixed and rotary wing aircraft parked on the flight line, aircraft hangars and other buildings."
With foreign combat troops withdrawing from the unpopular and expensive war by the end of 2014, the enormous cultural divide that still separates Afghans and their allies after 11 years of war has become more of a concern than ever.
The NATO-led coalition and its Afghan counterparts have created a special Joint Casualties Assessment Team to investigate every attack.
In more than half of the cases, attackers are either killed or escape and the motive for the incident never emerges, making it more difficult for the coalition to stem the surge in incidents.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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- Suspected anti-Islam filmmaker questioned by feds
- Lebanese hope pope can 'bring peace' to the region
- NBC's Jim Maceda answers questions about the Mideast protests
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If you look up the word “Explosion” in an Arabic dictionary, it means “A call to Prayer”. This is a way of Llife and Mentality, for the Muslims and people from the Middle East. It's all they know. These Whack Job Extremist use "Religion" as a front and an excuse to carry out their "Evil Agendas”.
Sick and tired of you sorry ass people sitting behind your computers complaining and whining about our President. First of all do not forget why we are here. 911 dummies. secondly, if we would have just concentrated on Afghanistan instead of Iraq, this war would have been won long time ago. Third, if you patriots have the guts to come here and support the President to win this war then come on. Mitt has not served, his five sons have not serve and the majority of you have not served. Iraq was not a threat but you sorry asses supported Bush with open arms. The President is the Commander in Chief, bottom line up front, get over it.
When you are you going to get it thru your head that the people that attacked WTC did not have Afghan Visa's. They were Saudi's. Why would we have attacked A'stan if we were looking for one person?
its a shame romney has 5 adult sons and not one has served. how dare he try to be commander in chief
As much as I hate to agree with you Voodkokk, you're on the mark about Saudi Arabia being the country, if any, that attacked America.
T opcat, and Obama served and most of his advisors as well???????? Get over it yourself!!!
Romney is a draft dodger, just like Dubya. Obama is not. John Kerry is a war hero. Truth hurts, eh righties?
Well Shame on Obama for not joining the military, it's a two way street Gary
Leroy, so was Clinton and I bet you never served either,
leroy brown
Get your head out of Obama's ass. "Dubya" was in the National Guard. The same kind of unit so many of the folks who serve so honorably today are in. Are you saying something about their honor and fidelity?
Sounds like more liberal scum ideas from people who have never served or have friends the like of Billy Ayers, Bernadette Dohrn and the rest of the SDS and weatherman crowd - just to name a few of the America hating scum who are Obama's friends.
Dubya went awol on a drunken cocaine binge because he was too much of a coward to fly a few bombing missions in Vietnam, a war he agreed with and believed in. Cheney is also a pathetic coward, but the two of them sure were quick to send OTHER young men to their deaths in their pointless, idiotic, immoral, unethical, and illegal invasion of Iraq. These two pathetic coward war-mongers should have been hung right beside Saddam. Supporting these scumbag war criminals is what makes you "America hating scum."
Leroy you are a pu##y, I bet you can't even serve on jury duty.
leroy brown
You are out of touch and using distorted and revisionist bull @!$%# in your comments. Romney and many, many Americans in the Viet Nam era used legal deferments. The use of legal deferments cannot and should never be an issue. They were a fact of life and exercised by most if available.
How hypocritical can you liberals be? Let me educate you or at least remind you that your idol’s (Obama) cohort Joe Biden took five student deferments. When those ran out, he got his status changed to a medical deferment based on asthma in his youth. This, despite of his claims of great athletic prowess during the same period. So to review the bidding, Romney is a draft dodger, but Biden is not?
Perhaps this is all comparable to you having the option of taking exemptions on your income tax to pay less in taxes. It is your option to do so and it is not required. Are you less honest, generous or less patriotic because you take the exemption? Again the liberal view seems to be if you are Romney and take legal exemptions it is bad, if you are Obama, Reid, Kerry, etc, it good to do so.
Regardless, receiving student, religious, health, hardship or other legal deferments is not the equal of "dodging the draft." That is unless your are a conservative then, even belonging to the National Guard is draft dodging (your words).
Dodging the draft is more of a liberal American pursuit and tradition, akin to refusing to serve, conscientious objector status, going to Canada, etc. Let's use Mr. Obama's friends like Bill Ayers and others, who joined the terrorist anti-American Weathermen/SDS cabal, involved himself in terrorist attacks and
crimes against the US, then went underground as a criminal. Now that was, and if we did not have Democrat president, the liberal ideal. He certainly avoided any service to America didn’t he?
With regard to military service, Romney, his sons or anyone legally deferred or not subject to required service such as Obama, had no obligation to serve. Get it, Romney’s sons nor the president served and none were obligated to serve.
Unbelievable, a hero for what? He discredited and questioned his own service, the actions and behavior of his comrades in arms and his own government’s motivation, role and conducting of the war. Didn’t Kerry also publicly and with great show throw away his military awards/decorations? Maybe he is a war hero to you and your ilk, but not to real Americans. To real American he is a bull shirt artist, conman and anything but a hero.
This is one crazy war. Thank god no one I know (including myself) is fighting and dying over there.
and you are lucky you don't believe me, the stress will bring you to your knees
Worst and worst everyday. Media has gone pretty much sillent, They don't report any negative news about obama so that means we have to talk about the kardashans.
Sigh
Why don’t we just “Bomb” da Middle East with Sarah Palin Books and Empty Chairs…lol.
You BetCha……Fer Sure.
That's the problem. That 'empty chair' in the 'white'house.
Time to get completely out or pissed off and blow them right to the 72 virgins that awaits them
I am a bit confused on the "virgin" thing. Once they go through 72 virgins, do they get 72 new virgins?
Jatty - the 72 virgins are all males.
Perry: Good one! Nevertheless, I don't care if they are sheep. I still need an answer.
Jatty
Nope, it is a one time good deal. Imagine the problem of spacing them out so they last an eternity. What is 72 divided by eternity? That is a tought one, but maybe allah gave the answer to Mohammad. Quick, someone check the koran before the test.
Let the buggers go back to banditry, opium, and weaving the occasional carpet...
Nothing to go back to . The only real change has been, they have added killing Americans to their repertoire. They are the same evil and worthless scumbags they were before.
I guess the Jihad sympathizer policeman look just like the regular Islamic believers. Really? Wow! - isn't that a novel concept? Just speed up the withdrawal and get the hell out. How can we be so stupid as to try to train their loyal peace keeping puppet government cops???
PS: RON T.-3837640 we need more smart people like you!!!
Prime Minister David Cameron hasn't set out publicly how many will quit in 2013, but warned in July about raising "false hopes" of a major drawdown.
Britain will confirm its strategy after November's U.S. election.
Even Britan is bailing on Obama.
This is a sad day for the United States of America and if you want the US in a total freefall re-elect Obama.
Voodkokk
I dont like either candidate. I'm voting for whomever isn't already holding office. I say fire the lot of them and get a whole new crew in there. So, I'll hafta hope and pray Romney isn't the fool he's made himself out to be lately. The 'change' we need in this country should start in Washington D.C..
Totally agree, with a little over 314 Million people in the United States and the only choices we have are obama and romney. I guess the best way to minimize the damage is to keep them moving and that includes the house and the senate. Imagine all the lies that politicians told their folks and the corruption that no one even knew anything about prior to the internet. We know the newpaper folks alway's tell the truth, wink, wink.
and fire all the judges too
Don't worry. We're coming home by the end of 2014. The almighty Dali Bama has told us so.
No we aren't. The plan is to leave 10-20,000 troops there. We left 10,000 in Vietnam in 1973. How'd that work out for us during the fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975. You'd think non-veterans could at least learn from history.
Bush and Obama have spent billions of our taxpayer dollars on these Muslims. In addition our young men and women are killed daily. For what? These people do not want us there and hate us. Obama says we are respectful of all religions. What a joke. How can you respect a religion that teaches hate?
One other point. Obama's party has claimed Republicans have a war on women. What a disgrace to say that when ignoring the way women are treated by men in the Muslim world. These politicians are the biggest hypocrites.
First you say that we should stop caring about the muslim extremists and get out, then you want us to do something about the way they treat their women. Which is it? The republican's are trying to take away reproductive rights from AMERICAN women. The Christian extremists in America who the republicans pander to may not be as bad as the muslim extremists, but they are going down the road of subjagating women too. Why do you support them over the democrats?
My gawd this Door Mat in Chief just last week stood up in from us all on national T.V. spiking the football proclaiming that Al-Queda was all but defeated.
Drone strikes a raving success??? NOT. Now you just killed the very people who could have been interrogated for actionable intel and stop attacks. But, this President does not want to deal with all those pesky human rights issues and justice questions, so he just simply kills them.
Now we have an Embassy directly attacked on the eve 9/11 no less with the Ambassador sodomized and killed by Al-Queda, joint base Leathereck infiltrated by Al-Queda and four people including Marines killed.
Our people can not even sleep for fear that Al-Queda is going to come and pop a cap in their brain.
Over 1300 of our people have been killed in the last three and half years compared to 625 in the eight years under Bush. Al Queda and the Taliban control %70 of Afghanistan.
Mr. President, you can not tell who our Ally's and Enemies are, worst yet, you can't even tell THAT WE ARE LOOSING!
Morning Pubicus, good to see you up spewing your idiotic right-wing nut-job extremism again! Here, have a donut...
Truth hurt you that bad. Typical liberal reply when confronted with facts.
How about disputing post my post? You can't, so you don't.
Lol, funny how you actually think your idiocy is worthy of a response. Here, have an extra donut and an extra large coffee, sugar and caffeine both sharpen the mind. Think you can handle a whole dozen donuts and a gallon of coffee?
Leroy has a blank mind, really has nothing to say
Stocks are up and so who really cares....
Believe it or not, some people care about more than just themselves.
That's right, Wall Street does very well with Obama's trickle up policies. Obama's Wall street top donors are reeling record profits at our expense and driving the DOW 13000 with profits from China, banking, and Big Oil.
Obama's trickle up does not do much for main-street. Major cities from San Jose to Providence and 31 States are declaring themselves bankrupt in the face of huge debts and declining revenues. The great Patriot Paul Ryan has tried to work with Democrats and the President and has warned of impending doom.
31 States Now Officially Bankrupt: $37.8 Billion Borrowed From Treasury To Fund Unemployment; CA, and, NY Worst:
California
Michigan
New York
Penn.
Ohio
Illinois
N.C.
Indiana
New Jersey
Florida
Texas
S.C.
Kentucky
Missouri
Connecticut
Minnesota
Georgia
Nevada
Mass.
Virginia
Arkansas
Alabama
Colorado
R.I.
Idaho
Maryland
Kansas
Vermont
S.D.
Tennessee
Virgin Islands
Delaware
...and the President isn't one of them.
Tennessee operates under budget?
Are you middle class?
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2012/sep/14/romney-says-middle-income-between-200-and-250k/?partner=popular
Thank you Yank, I will correct the data. Republican Governor Haslam is doing a great job there.
State Constitution requires a balanced budget (to be paid for). No deficit spending. Mr. Haslam is one of the children of a wealthy oil distributor, inherited money and position. So far he seems level-headed and even asked the majority Republican State Legislation last year to quit introducing so many bills. His office secretary, however, is a muslim who wears the head scarves, etc., to the dismay of the state. Another example of a lost job taken by a immigrant.
The more states with balanced budgets, the better. I don't care who the governor is. Odd you slight and even suggest something disparaging about coming from success.
That would even make the Kennedy's evil.
Success should passed to ones children. That is what we as Parents work for.
Ah,you have to love it..the idiot libs always making it political,to take the focus off the failures and ineptitude of the narcissist in chief....must be election time.....a four year "campaign",and no progress indicates a miserable buffoon at the helm...
I do not support our troops in this invasion. Get out.
I hope you're willing to re-word that. We should always support our troops. It's not them making the decisions. They fight for us and many die for us and to them it's all about survival and watching out for each other in a combat zone. When I came back from Vietnam, I had hippies throwing dried dog poo at me in the airport and calling me names. I didn't think up that war, and we were winning when I left. Same applies today. You can't blame the troops. You wanna blame someone, blame these corrupt and incompetent politicians.
Our troops deserve the support of America and I have always said that, they need to come to a country that is proud of them, something the soldiers coming home from Vietnam didn't get, Sorry Perry I was just a kid when that war was going but I am thankful to ALL vets no matter what war that fought
Who Americans think is better at handling foreign policy:
Obama 51%
Romney 37%
These are the same idiots who voted for him for positive change..think about it..theyre still stupid..
Leroy Brown, dumbest man (Man?) in the whole damm town.
HAHA, good one trouble
Leroy, Where was that poll taken ? San Francisco or the DNC ?
lol
Why do we always believe that we can expect other people and other cultures to play by our rules? It is possible to look at the history and culture of Afghanistan and figure out that trying to superimpose a western culture upon them is unlikely to succeed. Afghanistan is a country of shifting tribal alliances, ruled by religion and war lords. Its primary economy has been based on the opium trade. The vast majority of its population has lived for centuries in grinding poverty.
There are multiple tragedies present in Afghanistan. The first tragedy is the fact that the opportunities that exist for economic progress are highly unlikely to be utilized. Afghanistan is a beautiful country. But it is also a harsh environment. The options for agriculture are limited by geography and climate. The options for industrialization are limited by culture. The opportunities for social evolution are limited by the lack of education. The opportunities for cultural evolution are limited by religion and tyranny.
Afghanis live in fear of religious retaliation and tribal retaliation. It is akin to having the US ruled by the Russian mafia. You might want to side with the legal system, but to do so would put everything you hold dear at the mercy of vicious retaliation. People living in those circumstances put their heads down and try to escape notice. It is not a question of justice but a question of survival. So expecting them to behave as though they were living in a free society is naive. They live in a society that is ruled by fear and terrible consequences for those who would defy the tyrants.
It is difficult to judge those who live in that kind of a society because we do not have to live there and we are not forced to choose between the survival of our children and the survival of our honor. Think about it.
At any future presidential debate,i suspect there will be little talk about foreign policy,immigration,the economy,stimulus,terrorism,gas prices,joblessness,budgets,deficits or even abominable gay "marriage" from Barry..but i suspect the entire debate will be directly related to Bin Laden...therefore,the debate should last roughly 5 seconds...well wait...we must prior to that,list the myriad of Barrys other accomplishments..wait...still 5 seconds..
and 4-minute commercials
Four years ago the US was shedding over a half a million jobs a month, every month.
No, unemployment statistics are only unemployment claims. They are dropping because the benefits have run out.
Want to know the truth ? Watch this video if you have an open mind.
You Tube :"the truth about what caused the housing crisis"
Why is the Left using this war for political gain? Really, it has little value for political points since, like all wars, it's poor people vs. poor people, whom no else one cares about. So cool it, Lefties. Romney/Ryan 2012!!!
If we ever leave that God foresaken hole, we should leave them something to remember us by. Like turning the place into a parking lot.
Leroy Brown a few more weeks like this and your numbers will be backwards.
Romney 51%
Obama 37%
It is not looking good for Obama. Our men being killed by our "friends" gas going up, food going up. It looks like Jimmy Carter #2
Care to lay a wager on that Scotty?
Does China now share a border with Afghanistan?
Stop Whining !!! Join the military, request to go to Afganistan and make a difference.
Getting capped in the head while you sleep by a so called "Ally", is not making a difference, or dying for anyone's freedom, it is simply murder.
If Obama would spend half the time he does golfing, vacationing and campaigning on our problems, we would be out of this nightmare but no we're stuck in Obamaville and it's not pretty