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Subscribe to RSSAfghan security forces turned their guns on U.S. and NATO troops, killing four American soldiers and two British troops. NBC's Richard Engel reports.
Most joint U.S.-Afghan military operations have been suspended following what authorities believe was an insider attack Sunday that left four American soldiers dead, officials told NBC News.
“We’re to the point now where we can’t trust these people,” a senior military official said. So far this year, 51 NATO troops have been killed in these so-called blue-on-green attacks. Sunday's attack came a day after two British soldiers were shot dead by an Afghan policeman, Reuters reported.
Four NATO soldiers killed in Afghan 'insider' attack
"It's had a major impact on our ability to conduct combat operations with them, and we're going to have to back off to a certain degree," the official said.
The suspensions of the joint operations are indefinite – according to one official, they “could last three days or three months.”
The escalating violence — including a NATO airstrike that killed eight Afghan women and girls gathering firewood — is straining the military partnership between Kabul and NATO as the U.S. begins to withdraw thousands of troops sent three years ago to rout the Taliban from southern strongholds.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the airstrike; the U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force later extended its regrets over those deaths.
The U.S. training mission and joint combat patrols are "critical" to the U.S. plan to withdraw all combat forces by as early as the middle of next year and almost all U.S. military from Afghanistan by the end of 2014.
In May, President Barack Obama announced that he and Karzai signed an agreement that would see the removal of 23,000 U.S. troops from Afghanistan by the summer's end.
“As our coalition agreed, by the end of 2014 the Afghans will be fully responsible for the security of their country," Obama said at the time. But the president was clear that the U.S. would stay engaged into the future.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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- NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin in Benghazi answers questions about attack
- In Niger, child marriage on rise due to hunger
- Obama: US has 'profound respect for people of all faiths'
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Time to release the Army Staff Sergeant, who allegedly shot and killed 17 Afghans, on personal recognizance bail until his trial.
No Gerald Ford's, telling the State Department to bring any Afghan's employed back to the USA and their relatives for the next 37 years.
We already know from Iraq's behavior that the outcome will be that they will trade with Russia or China and not the USA.
Flag waving mental midgets.. bone headed bullies.. silly sympathisers..
such drivel.. get us out they cry.. bring em home they bawl... slam down their fists of rage.
This little bit of nastiness in this nasty little country is solely brought to you .. not by any American President or any American Political Party.
One has only to look at who PROFITS from these nasty little incursions into other peoples cultures, lives and countries.
The profiteers of war and arms sales that provide the money for politicians and their corrupt ilk are the culprits of all of the strife our so called enemies are suffering and the suffering of the families of our own.
If you truly want to stop this mindless exercise in futility.. look to the profiteers.
That is where culpability lies.. and that is where it must end.
and .. I might add .. Halliburton was only a minor player.
General Atomics, Raytheon, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, GE, General Motors and too many others to list.
Profits and stockholder satisfaction drive this war and many others.
Wake up America
Time to pack it in and GET OUT! Nobody will ever conquer nor tame that country.Nobody!
Should of never gone there in the first place.
exodus 413 Exactly!
Unfortunately as much as I would love to say lets pull them all out and let the Arabs kill themselves off. The scenario is like giving a loaded gun to a kid. Arab countries have shown how violent and stupid they are and are true sheep to the point they don't give a damn who they kill as long as they THINK they have religious backing over it. Sucks to say this but to give them power now would seriously bite the US in the behind. And I'm not talking about oil interest, in a way it goes further then just oil. It also goes to them using those nukes and possibly causing greater conflict by nuking another country or any other countries who "Defile their religion" Bleh, it sucks when you have to deal with so much stupid, empty hatred.
Maybe next time we reach out to help people, we should help people that appreciate us for our generosity. These people seem to hate everyone that doesn't bow down to their deity.
Screw them and their deity.
Get out of there now and next time we need to bomb them, we bomb them and forget about it.
All the resources we have invested over there is a huge waste and should not continue another second.
We were not trying to help them. They know that. We were trying to change them into Global Market partners and exploit everything we could in their country. Oil,Lithium,Gold,many precious resources, cheap labor etc. Get them hooked on Hardees,McDonalds,CocaCola,Big Pharma all of it. Just like America.
Very little of any of it is to Help Anyone. Just like America.
Never let a crisis go to waste said Bobo's former Chief of Staff Emmanuel. This is a time when our country needs and calls all flag waving troop supporting pseudo patriotic elected politicians to become a troop surge to stand together with Bobo and Company with his Afghan bros. This would solve many problems. If they all perish we'll just nuke what's left and save the fuel on bringing the politicos home for burial. Nobody goes to jail here and they're all gone. Perfect!
I agree with the majority sentiment on this forum. Bring the troops home, fast, with as much hardware as can be recovered.
As for Israel and Iran, do whatever can be done to keep them talking, but if the shooting starts, gotta back Israel.
Yeah and they want ton drag the US right in with them.So far the joint chiefs of staff are telling them NO!
Nothing like being stupid enough to start WW3.
Still, between the two, and a choice will HAVE to be made, gotta back Israel as opposed to appeasing the Muslim world.
Not that Israel is by any means a light in the desert, mind you.
No we don't. In fact they're on their own JUST like how they left us to fend for ourselves in Iraq and Afghanistan. Do you know how many IDF troops they sent into battle along side of us during both those wars?
Just take a wild guess.
Guess yet? No? Well here's the answer ... ZERO.
They can go fu** themselves for all I care. There's nothing there that we care about and if you EVEN say that the holy land is important well... feel free to head over there and fight along side of them. Loose your life just as hundreds of thousands have throughout history over a piece of land that doesn't mean jack shi* to those who actually get it...
Don't you get it? If the US get's drag into their conflict,that's the start of WW3,and Israel will go right down the toilet.
This is Netanyahoo's war,he's egging everybody on and wants to drag Israel right under the bus.
This guy is dangerous,and has always been a war monger,forever.
Sheesh, Borderlands, give it a rest.
The LAST thing we would ever have wanted would be for Israel to have sent troops to fight alongside us in ANY predominantly Arab-speaking land. Our ENTIRE position would have been de-legitimized.
Sorry, but Israel's survival is in our national interest. That is NOT to say that everything that Israel does deserves or warrants our support, including their EXPANSIONISM or AGGRESSIVENESS, but their survival does.
Ya think? Because sending in Christian troops wasn't a relapse of the Crusades for many of the Arab countries ESPECIALLY since we now know that most of these countries actually believe that there is a direct assault on Islam itself given the latest riots we have been witnessing and people from those countries actually giving loud and clear statements that because the US and other allied countries are in the ME... it's a direct attack on Islam.
Sending in any IDF troops would have done nothing to quell their belief that their religion is now in direct attack. Do you know what that breeds? MORE enemies... tens of thousands of them... if not hundreds.
Israel sat idly by while we supported their borders indirectly and kept the Arabs busy. AND built bases both East and West of Iran.
Nah, there's nothing about Israel I would protect but maybe its people. And even then I would fly them out of there and glass the place over...
By the way please tell me other than CIA operations and political diplomacy how Israel is important to us?
Israel is important because they are our responsibility. We created the Israeli state after WWII due to the atrocities of the holocaust. So, like the extremists claim, it's all our fault. If we weren't going to back Israels' play then what was the point of creating their nation.
Most expensive pipeline never built. Thanks Dick.
I'm sorry, was there some meeting that I must have missed where high ranking officials said, "No no no everyone has these people misunderstood let's continue operations...."
WOW so you just realized that you can't trust these people? Was that before or after thousands of our own sons and daughters were sent to the slaughter in a country that housed Al-Qaeda and has created some of the most ruthless terrorists and enemies of the United States?
You go in... you go in all the way. And you don't stop until we have built a fuc***g Disney Land right smack in the middle and the entire country is speaking English and converted to Western ideologies by the end of the decade. Otherwise admit defeat which according to this article... we already have.
Bring our children home... they don't deserve to lose their life among a sh*t hole populace that has the education of a 3rd grader and would strap a bomb to their chest because a fictional invisible character told them they would gain 72 virgins and instant passage to a made up afterlife that NONE of them can prove exists.
Politics is to blame for this BS and religion is blamed for the lives lost to such a asinine cause. Either we carpet bomb the shi*hole or we bring our children home...
The real mission in Afghanistan was to gain closer ground to Iran.
This is what Russia was trying to do, Britain, and other countries.
We have the long range technology now to go ahead and abandon them.
And we have Israel as a buffer.
And Israel is about to kick their ass.
Ahhhh someone who actually understands the bigger picture. When folks argue with me about these wars I simply tell them to look up the Middle East on a Map (that is if they don't know the region which wouldn't surprise me given the level of education within our country) and notice where Iran sits...
It's simple Art of War. We have bases and the REAL pipeline to our troops and guess who's sitting in the middle.... IRAN.
Tactics alone it was brilliant. Putting Iran in a position of defense and giving Israel more strength in airspace alone.
But this has gone m for far too long. We either finish right, once and for all, or we bring our children home and let the ME implode on itself.
For some reason I totally disagree this was a brilliant location tactic. Don't look at some map on a wall. It shows nothing. If we were minding our own business instead of scheming, no one would bother us. There would have been no 9/11. No, we have to be out there medling, scheming,occupying,exploiting, buying, selling, telling everyone we have a deal they just can't refuse.
Why can't we just mind out own business.
Did ANYONE at NBC copy edit this story? It's "green-on-blue," not the other way around.
Does NBC have copy editors at all?
At any rate, it's more compelling evidence the U.S. needs to get the heck out of Afghanistan.
Does anyone think that these bush monkey's ever liked us?
"It's had a major impact on our ability to conduct combat operations with them, and we're going to have to back off to a certain degree," the official said.
lol. U @!$%#s in washington need to get it straight...the american ppl are finished with this war.
let them come into our country and try to create terrorists acts..we are ready for them...even tho our government is not prepared.
get our soldiers out now.
I hope to hell they bomb the capital building first. Would be a great step forward for Americans.
Finally!!!!!!! Finally! Long overdue.
Bring these young warriors home and let's start rebuilding our country for the next 100 years. For 11 years we have tried to "help" the Afghan people. The effort was noble but Rome is burning on the home front and we need all hands on deck to help rebuild what use to be the world's pillar if hope!
Let's all agree that the U.S. had no defined mission after 9/11/2001 with the exception of killing bin Laden and dis-assembling Al Queda. What we have discovered is that hate among the ignorant is a fuel that becomes a self perpetuating lubricant of the hate engine. In other words, we have learned that the people who hate us are going to hate us regardless of our well intended actions. It's time leave the 13th century behind and fight the militants from the clouds. The hate will never subside. It will continue to grow. It's time for us to change strategy to self preservation.
Listen, if the U.S. is seen as weak worldwide (which we are), then we cannot lead. We need to be strong on the home front and that strength will grow to other countries that work towards progress. We cannot continue to spend another decade trying to teach the unteachable and we need to focus on helping "my fellow Americans": for the next decade. Of course, we will ALWAYS have the eye in the sky on the radical elements to protect ourselves.
We cannot spill another ounce of American blood in a battlefield that is confusing even to the highest ranking men in our military. Don't ask soldiers to become crossing guards!
Screw them, and screw radical islam.
Abraham was the Father of Israel, Arabs(&Islam), and Chistianity. They all have the OLD TESTAMENT in common. Sharia is straight out of Moses's laws and is alot like the attitude of "modern day"Fundamental Christians. The bitterness between the family ties is a strange phenomenon, but the traditions of war are too deep and too old. We should all just mind our own business but that'll Never happen. Any Muslim who vows to destroy all Israel will start WWIII and none of us will survive. Why rush it though....Get Americans Out of Afghanistan.
I spent my time 1969-1971 USMC & I thought there would never be another Vietnam. Why oh why again? I am starting to feel bad like I did after I came home from SE Asia. Feeling bad for those that died & coming home to emptiness & shame. Then I get ticked off so bad at the way politics plays with lives keeping their sons home. It's all rotten. Got to get away & go somewhere there is peace & serenity not hearing of war. How many more wars? Hasn't the world had enough of them?
Thank you for your service sir... and I apologize my generation didn't learn from our past. Hopefully we can educate our children better this time around...
And unfortunately no. We as a species are just barely out of the jungle. War is who we are it is what we do best. It's innate, instinctive, and of course masked by political ideologies and religion. The only outcome is economics, where resources are gained to sustain a massive populace. The goal is simple, to have more than them. We are a species of consumption. That's how we evolved over time. We consume... everything. We're even taught that the things we want, we need, through marketing. Constant.. barrage of marketing 24/7 365 days a year. We consume... that's who we are.
You don't have to apologize, politics makes war. Some say war to end wars, but some endings make another war. It's all in the History books. In the 1960's it was to stop the spread of Communism & now it's terrorism? I believe it is more then that. Maybe it's religion or oil or all of the above. But at the rate the USA gets into war is not cool at all. We don't know how to get out of them.
Muslims get a higher place in heaven if they kill "Unbelievers", no matter how much they helped them. They even "Honor kill" family members to save them from becoming "unbelievers" or for not following the barbarian Muhammads commands, supposedly from Allah.
No matter how much they are helped, they are forbidden by the Quran, to be real friends of unbelievers, and are committed to convert or kill unbelievers until there are only Muslims or people subjected to them, "dhimmiis" left on earth.
Our care and foriegn aid is totally a wasted on all Muslims, they are totally intolerant. Muslim-Islam is a form of barbarian government, where Allah, through the Quran, is to be obeyed. When they control a country, there is no free speech, criticism is treason, punishable by death. Killing is less grevious than not obeying. Christian Churches are burned, clergy killed, congregations terrorized.
It seems impossible that our military, government, and public are so ignorant.
If the US Gov. would let us fight like we did in WW II we
would had been home 10 years ago, you can't win a war with your hands tied behind
you
Once we lost our reputation to be as fair and just as humanly possible in enforcing our rules of engagement, once we just stopped counting the relatively innocent bystander casualties, once we had a well respected NCO running amok and killing like terrorists himself, well, this outcome was inevitable.
We can sugar coat it however we like. Give Karzai a "red line" to fix the problem, do training with Afghans coming to us and only using training weapons, whatever, but after a while just to let things chill, we should then get out.
“We’re to the point now where we can’t trust these people,”
- Military genius!!!
Like we should ever trust them! What we don't understand is the terrorist mentality. These are the same people that pass themselves off as Joe normal citizen and fly Airplanes full of innocent people into tall buildings full of innocent people. If they can't keep their end of the bargain, then we should have enough guts to be done and just leave early. To hell with the 2014 withdrawal!
Obama - grow a pair...
Pack and go now!
The war lovers and Military Industrial Complex controls America's war policy. They are psychopath and sociopath who want to stay in Afghan and Pakistan to kill men, women and children under the guise of global war on terrorism.
They have fabricated the existence of WMD and delayed the announcement of Osama bin Laden's death for nearly a decade in order to perpetuate the slaughter of innocent civilians and prolong their pleasure of killing people. Apparently, human bodies torn apart, cut open like a torn paper bag, gets their adrenline flowing.
Despite the war lovers and MIC's pressuring the politicians to expand the wars, the foreign occupation force will not last long. The Afghan people will ultimately prevail just as in the past war with the former USSR. They will slowly bleed the Americans to death just as surely as with the Russians.
Don't forget the numerous black sites throughout Afghanistan,Iraq,Egypt,Poland and all over which are 1000x worse than GITMO. American Freaks who love to torture and watch people helpless. If I had a drone, those would be my first target.
America can't trust Afghanistan/Pakistan because they can't trust US. Is over. Get all Americans home.
It's about time. It's taken the U.S. government nine years to learn what the British learned in 1842 and the Soviets in 1989. That the Afghans are a primitive, xenophobic people who hate outsiders, especially infidels, and will fanatically fight any attempt to alter their culture.
“We’re to the point now where we can’t trust these people,” a senior military official said.
These people don't trust each other either. I traveled there years ago and the one thing I figured out that has held true is that in the muslim world they don't like each other at all and they think less of us.
These idiots could not secure the the street in front of their house. Kill them all on the way out.
Get our people out with whatever they can evac quickly and booby trap or destroy anything left behind.