Report cites Afghans' collusion in attack that killed 9 U.S. soldiers
The U.S. military account says at least two officials aided insurgents in the concentrated, lengthy assault that also injured 27 American soldiers and four Afghan troops.
Reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan, and Istanbul, Turkey -- A U.S. military report released today said at least two local Afghan officials were believed to have colluded in a July attack by insurgents on a remote outpost in eastern Afghanistan that killed nine U.S. soldiers.
The intense, hours-long assault by an estimated 200 Taliban fighters, in which the lightly manned outpost was nearly overrun, represented the largest single loss of life suffered by American troops in a land battle since the start of the Afghan war in 2001.
The July 13 firefight, in which 27 U.S. soldiers and four Afghan troops were injured, illustrated the challenges faced by coalition troops deployed at small outposts in rugged, desolate parts of Afghanistan.
As a matter of policy, U.S. forces seek to cultivate contacts with local residents near their bases and outposts. At the same time, the troops are well aware that villagers and Afghan officials are vulnerable to intimidation by insurgents and may provide information that will help the militants.
Divided loyalties also can be an issue, as has been shown in several recent attacks on American troops by members of the Afghan security forces.
The internal military investigation of the July attack on the base in Wanat, in Nuristan province, concluded that the district police chief and the district governor had aided the insurgents who staged the assault, and recommended that they be removed from their posts and perhaps prosecuted.
But a military statement accompanying the report noted that "ultimately Afghanistan is a sovereign nation, and the U.S. military neither appoints or removes government officials."
Afghanistan's Defense Ministry refused to comment on the findings, as did provincial officials in Nuristan. It was not clear whether any action against the officials in question was pending.
The 20-page document, authored by an unidentified Army colonel, was declassified so that the military could give a full accounting of events to the families of the slain soldiers, officials said. Details of the internal review were reported earlier this week by the New York Times, and a redacted version of the report was made public today.
Soldiers manning the small base had received repeated warnings of an imminent attack, the report noted, but the investigation did not fault them for any lack of preparedness. It said that commanders had anticipated a possible "probing" attack, the typical pattern in such instances, rather than the large-scale and well-coordinated frontal assault that occurred.
