At Least 140 Killed in Taliban Assault on Afghan Army Base

[TomSea]

At Least 140 Killed in Taliban Assault on Afghan Army Base

ISLAMABAD —

An overnight Taliban suicide raid on a major military base in northern Afghanistan is reported to have left at least 140 people dead, mostly soldiers, in the deadliest attack on Afghan forces since 2001.

Witnesses said a group of 10 heavily armed suicide bombers aboard two army vehicles and disguised as government soldiers stormed the Afghan National Army’s 209th Shaheen Corps Headquarters Friday in Mazar-i-Sharif, the capital of the northern Balkh province.

Local television stations quoted an unnamed security official and regional politicians Saturday as saying that “at least 140 soldiers were killed in Friday afternoon’s attack … and at least 100 soldiers were also wounded.”

Continued: http://www.voanews.com/a/more-than-100-killed-in-taliban-assault-on-afghan-army-base/3821184.html

[don-o]

They cannot secure their own perimeter?

And we still have Americans in this gong show?

Is there even a hint of an end game?

[don-o]

O'CONNELL: I believe we've been trying to help them out of the tragic story of Afghanistan for 15 years. Americans are big-hearted people. The United States is the wealthiest and most powerful country in the world. But there is still space to reason what the appropriate amount of blood and treasure is to spend on a mission that seems to be in stalemate at best, backsliding at worst.

I think we have pretty good evidence now, both from Iraq and Afghanistan, that the massive assembly-line attempt to produce capable, professional national security forces has not worked well, and it's been at tremendous cost. And for all those who say we should just keep doing what we're doing in Afghanistan, let me explain why that's not sustainable. Every year, between a quarter and a third of the Afghan army and the police desert. Now, these are people that we have armed and trained. We've given weapons to them. We've given them basic military training. And every year, a third of them disappear.

INSKEEP: With the guns.

O'CONNELL: With the guns. That's not sustainable for us economically, and it's certainly not sustainable for the Afghan people to just fill the hills with armed militias.

INSKEEP: Aaron B. O'Connell is the editor of a book of essays called "Our Latest Longest War." Thanks very much.

O'CONNELL: Thank you.

INSKEEP: O'Connell just left a post on the National Security Council and is becoming a university professor. His former boss, national security adviser H.R. McMaster, has been in Afghanistan this week considering what to do now.

http://www.npr.org/2017/04/19/524654637/historian-says-the-u-s-is-losing-hearts-and-minds-in-afghanistan

[Fishrrman]

don-o ponders:
"Is there even a hint of an end game...?"

There is not and can never be "an end game" so long as muslims remain in control there.

The end game occurs when the country is force-converted to Christianity, and islam meets it's "end"...

[truth_seeker]

Unless the West is willing to kill a lot more muslim civilians than up to now, it is clearly a long term situation for which we run out of people before they do.

Simply stated; the West lacks the stomach for the measures necessary to prevail.

[TomSea]

A few developments here, the head of the Afghan army resigned;

SOD Mattis has gone to Afghanistan:

Pentagon chief visits Afghanistan after deadly Taliban attack
AFP | Published — Monday 24 April 2017

US Defense Secretary James Mattis consoles outgoing Afghanistan Defense Minister Abdullah Habibi who resigned his post earlier in the day in the wake of the deadly attack on the Afghanistan base ....

KABUL: US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis arrived in Afghanistan on an unannounced visit Monday, hours after his Afghan counterpart resigned over a deadly Taliban attack that triggered anger and left the embattled army in disarray.

Mattis, making his first visit to Afghanistan as Pentagon chief, met top officials including President Ashraf Ghani, less than two weeks after the US dropped its largest non-nuclear bomb on Islamic State hideouts in the country’s east.

He arrived as Afghan security forces, already paying a heavy price against the resurgent Taliban ahead of the spring fighting season, faced chaos with the resignations of Defense Minister Abdullah Habibi and army chief Qadam Shah Shaheem.

Continued: http://www.arabnews.com/node/1089626/world

Unfortunately, the death toll here is more than the MOAB incident in the past few weeks but you can't really compare the two I guess.

[don-o]

A few developments here, the head of the Afghan army resigned;

SOD Mattis has gone to Afghanistan:
 

I sincerely hope Mattis can ID the problems there (rampant corruption and desertion rates, for starters from my reading) and get us on some semblance of a rational plan.

[Fishrrman]

don-o writes:
"I sincerely hope Mattis can ID the problems there (rampant corruption and desertion rates, for starters from my reading) and get us on some semblance of a rational plan."

The only "rational plans" worth considering:
1. Going in with 50 divisions, overthrowing the Afghan government, killing every member of the Taliban and isis found without trial, defrocking all the imams, demolishing every mosque and madrassa, installing a military government, writing a new Constitution, force-converting the country to Christianity.
2. Pulling every last American outta there and let them have at each other.
3. Nuking the entire country into a parking lot.

In one of the above, lies victory!