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Afghanistan: Nothing But Grim Milestones and Ominous Trends


Aug 21, 2012 by

A U.S. paratrooper pulls security during a combat operation in Afghanistan’s Ghazni province, June 2, 2012. Helicopters delivered fellow paratroopers and Afghan soldiers into the rugged mountain terrain. (Photo DOD)


Milestones are significant events in our personal lives, in projects and in war and peace.

Generally we celebrate those milestones but sometimes they come to symbolize sad and grim stages — especially in war — and they become milestones that we mourn and even fear.

Just a little over two months ago, on June 13, we mourned the tragic milestone of Marine Cpl. Taylor J. Baune being the 2,000th American to die in support of Operation Enduring Freedom — the Bush administration’s chosen name for the war in and around Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks.

Today, the New York Times highlights the lives and, sadly, the deaths of the 1,990th and the 2,000th American service members to die in the Afghanistan War.

The 1,990th casualty is Lance Corporal Buckley, a Marine who, on August 10, was shot by “a man who appears to have been a member of the Afghan forces they were training.”

A week later, with the death of Army Specialist James A. Justice, the United States military reached 2,000 dead in the nearly 11-year-old conflict, according to the Times.

Why the difference in the “milestones” of June and August?

The Times explains that this latest milestone is based on its analysis of Department of Defense records: “The calculation by The Times includes deaths not only in Afghanistan but also in Pakistan and other nations where American forces are directly involved in aiding the war.”

But whether the 2,000th military death in Afghanistan or in Operation Enduring Freedom occurred last week or two months ago, the tragedy lies in the numbers and in the trends.

As the Times points out:

• While nearly nine years passed before we reached the first 1,000 dead in the war, the second 1,000 came just 27 months later…

• In that “second wave of 1,000 deaths,” according to the Times’ analysis, “three out of four were white, nine out of 10 were enlisted service members, and one out of two died in either Kandahar Province or Helmand Province in Taliban-dominated southern Afghanistan. Their average age was 26.”

• The dead have been disproportionately Marines: “At the height of fighting in late 2010, two out of every 1,000 Marines in Afghanistan were dying, twice the rate of the Army. “

• I.E.D.’s have remained a leading cause of death and injury, since at least 2008, along with small-arms fire.

But the most disturbing and, in my opinion, the most infuriating trend has been the increasing number of U.S. military who are being killed and injured by those same Afghanistan security forces — soldiers and police — who we are helping, training, trying to defend supposedly against a common enemy.

The Times only broaches this issue and, then, in a somewhat ambiguous way:

But this year, a new threat emerged: attacks by Afghans dressed in the uniforms of Afghan security forces. In just the past two weeks, at least nine Americans have been killed in such insider attacks, and for the year to date, at least 39 non-Afghan troops, most of them American, have been killed by men dressed as members of the Afghan security forces, the most since the war began.

Ambiguous because of the choice of words, “Afghans dressed in the uniforms of Afghan security forces” and “men dressed as members of the Afghan security forces.”

Similarly, in describing the 1,990th casualty, Marine Lance Corporal Buckley, the Times attributes his death to “a man who appears to have been a member of the Afghan forces they were training.” (Emphasis mine)

In an article today, covering the overnight attack at Bagram Airfield that damaged a coalition helicopter and Gen. Dempsey’s C-17 transport plane, the Wall Street Journal is more to the point:

So far this year, Afghan police or soldiers have been responsible for roughly one out of every eight killings of coalition soldiers in Afghanistan.

At least 38 international troops, mostly Americans, have died at the hands of Afghan colleagues so far this year, with 10 U.S. forces killed in such attacks in the past two weeks alone. Five of those deaths were U.S. Special Operations Forces.

Note that the Journal does not say, “Afghans dressed as members of Afghans security forces,” but rather “Afghan police or soldiers.”

The Journal goes on to describe measures our troops are taking to protect themselves from the Afghan troops they are training and helping, including having “guardian angels” who “have a round in their chambers at all times, ready to shoot if Afghan security forces turn their weapons on members of the U.S.-led coalition.”

And here is another “trend” according to the Journal, a trend that could make the next grim milestone — the 3,000th U.S. casualty — come even faster than the one we just “achieved.”

But insider attacks continue to rise and coalition forces expect the upward trend to persist as the international coalition trains more Afghan security forces, expecting to reach a peak of 352,000 personnel by this fall.

The mother of Lance Corporal Buckley who was killed “possibly at the hand of a purported ally,” recounting “things her son loved — basketball, girls, movies, the beach…” said, according to the Times, “Our forces shouldn’t be there. It should be over. It’s done. No more.”

Edited to add link to the Wall Street Journal article

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17 Comments

  1. dduck
    August 21, 2012 | 10:18 pm

    This green on blue is very disturbing and sad. However, it is a good strategy from the Taliban’s perspective: weaken the enemies resolve at home. I hope added security measures (monitors with loaded weapons) will help, but I am afraid the Taliban is as resourceful as they are evil.

  2. RON BEASLEY
    August 21, 2012 | 11:01 pm

    This is nothing new for those of us old enough to remember Vietnam. Everyone should read Michael Beschloss’

    Barky
    August 22, 2012 | 5:46 am

    Spot on, Ron.

  3. rudi
    August 22, 2012 | 8:41 am

    Mitten’s will raise our involvement and bomb, bomb Iran…

  4. dduck
    August 22, 2012 | 9:54 am

    So how would you guys end Afg/Pak. situation? Just asking, cause I don’t know.

  5. rudi
    August 22, 2012 | 10:36 am

    Just honor the Art Van(SOFA) and get the hell out. Obmama is dragging his feet, but Mitten’s and Bolton are just plain crazy!!

  6. rudi
    August 22, 2012 | 10:37 am

    Afghanistan is a sewer, just flush the crap…

  7. slamfu
    August 22, 2012 | 4:56 pm

    “So how would you guys end Afg/Pak. situation? Just asking, cause I don’t know.”

    I would leave as soon as we could. Nothing tangible is going to change there with us staying. The only changes will come when they see their bodyguards pulling out, maybe then Karzai and his cronies will make an effort to get their house in order. Or maybe they won’t. But as it stands now we are providing muscle to a corrupt government, and creating a great deal of strife in Pakistan as well in order to carry on in Afghanistan. There is no reason not to leave that isn’t as true now as it will be in 2014, the only difference is the amount of American lives that will be lost in the meantime.

  8. dduck
    August 22, 2012 | 6:02 pm

    Okey doakey, thanks.

  9. DORIAN DE WIND, Military Affairs Columnist
    August 22, 2012 | 6:13 pm

    Ron, thanks for your comment.

    I also was “old enough” to remember the Vietnam War. As a matter of fact I served during the Vietnam War (but not in Vietnam) and as a gun-ho Republican I supported it and believed in the “domino theory,” etc.. In later years I came to see the light and now agree with your views on that war and the Iraq war and believe that we have achieved the mission of killing/capturing the leaders of 9/11 and must now extricate ourselves honorably from that war.

  10. popsiq
    August 22, 2012 | 9:00 pm

    Same-side attacks are no new phenomena, they have been happening for years in Afghanistan. And they happened in Iraq before that. What appears different is the frequency of such attacks. To read the media one gets the distinct impression that the war is ‘on hold’ while soldiers fret about being gunned down from behind on patrol, or worse still while resting on base.

    In actuality the war has hardly slowed at all. The attempt to shape the situation to permit the Afghan government to take responsinlity for its own fiasco is still the major objective. The night patrols and detentions, the day patrols and liberal application of air assets, is as much a part of modern Afghanistan as it has been since ‘kinetic’ ws selected as the main mode of reasoning.

    The threat of ‘fraternal’ killing just distracts from the other aspects of on-going failure to win. One might almost start to think they’re the cause of it.

    So while great minds contrive ‘vetting’ procedures that will hold Afghans responsible for what their clients do, the Taliban continue to act as if they’re not outnumbered 50 to 1 by the greatest, most well-equipped armies on earth. That’s the really hard part to wrap one’s mind around, particularly for the military. Those goatherds are inscrutable. And a lot tougher than most people would have thought.

    That they’ve figured a way to ‘catch you with your pants down’ is not “brutal” it’s only to be expected.

  11. dduck
    August 22, 2012 | 10:41 pm

    Nice comments, Pop.

  12. ShannonLeee
    August 23, 2012 | 6:51 am

    As someone that was a supporter of the new, now old, surge in Afghanistan, I have to say that imho, it is time to go. We surged, they ate it and kept coming for more. Kabul has to win this fight, not us. We can support them from the air, but they need to take over operations now. We need to get our men out of day to day combat operations.

    These tribal wars have been going on for centuries. I don’t think we want to spend the next century fight in this one.

  13. DORIAN DE WIND, Military Affairs Columnist
    August 23, 2012 | 9:59 am

    I have to agree with you, SL.

    Someone asked what we should do/how we should get out. I believe you have touched on it.

    IF we feel that our national interests require continued military actions in Afghanistan, IF we feel that there are still 9/11 bad guys around who have to be taken out, we have plenty of very accurate and effective stand-off weapons and drones to do the job, and– as a last resort — special operations forces and teams (a la OBL) to get it done without continuing to have our own troops killed on a daily basis and while minimizing civilian casualties. Note the big “IFs.”

  14. dduck
    August 23, 2012 | 12:16 pm

    So we get out on the next, plane, truck, whatever, is what I am hearing.
    I guess the presidents were all wrong.

    DDW, I guess being an AF guy you think drones (see Wikileaks) and SF can do it all, to a degree. I wonder if the non-political generals would agree with that and I’d love to hear Hillary’s opinion.

    Me, I don’t know since I am not sure why we still have troops in South Korea, Germany, near Japan, etc. There have been enough administrations over the years, is the military industrial complex that powerful. Just asking.

  15. ShannonLeee
    August 23, 2012 | 4:37 pm

    Well, we are in more countries than just those dduck. It isn’t about never leaving, it about maintaining and extended our military power throughout the world.

  16. dduck
    August 23, 2012 | 5:55 pm

    SL, So why not in Afghanistan if that is true.