Taliban attacks Camp Bastion
Reuters reports that just a few weeks after NATO troops abandoned Camp Bastion which is near Kabul, Afghanistan to the ANA, the Taliban attempted a fairly large attack on the base. The Taliban also attacked a guest house for aid workers near the base;
Taliban attacks are intensifying as the U.S.-led coalition prepares to withdraw most of its soldiers by the end of 2014.
At least two people were killed in the second attack in three days on expatriate aid workers’ housing, and authorities fear hostages may have been taken inside the compound in Kabul’s western Karte Seh district.
Gunfire and explosions could be heard late into the evening and police said the building’s second floor had caught fire.
At least two insurgents with suicide vests were also killed, one by his own explosives and the other was shot, Qadam Shah Shaheem, commander of the Afghan army’s 111 Military Corps Kabul, said.
I’m wondering who could have foreseen that the Taliban would get more froggy as our withdrawal deadline got closer? I mean, who, besides everyone with a pair of eyes and memory that lasts more than a few minutes.
Category: Terror War
Let alone, attacking a base we gave up to the ANA. I’m surprised they didn’t sit down and have chai with the ANA Commander and say, “so, you guys can stay here tonight, but tomorrow we’ll be back for the keys, okay?” “Okay, do you want our weapons too?” “Yep, and your chai boys.” “we’ll leave right after morning prayers.”
Plenty of bases in Iraq were handed over and turned into shitholes (literally and more literally) after they were left in charge.
A COP in my sector in Afghanistan was left to the ANA. After we left, it looked like a literal shit-field. The porta-jons stopped getting serviced so they filled up and once they did, the ANA would walk around until they found an open spot to shit and then walked away. Only took about 2 months for it turn into a shithole.
That’s what happens when you stop doing everything for them and make them do it themselves.
Your comments remind me of this:
http://documentary.net/this-is-what-winning-looks-like/
If what is described in the documentary is what all of A-stan is like, it is one fucked up place. Kind of suspect it is.
At any point in our training and developing the Afghan Army did we ever train them effective field hygiene, or how to dig a piss trench, or a improvised shitter, or even issue e-tools to every squad?
Technically, most soldiers who were there never did any of this you are complaining about themselves. Foreign contractors did.
Actually, Bastion is co – located with Leatherneck down in Helmand province. I spent 2 1/2 months out there completing the drawdown and shrinking the footprint. I’ve not even been gone from there 2 months, the Marines and Brits handed it over about a month ago and I hate to see that my prediction that the Taliban would attack that place within a month of handover is correct. Goddammit.
Must be heartbreaking to see this happening.
There’s two different stories going on in this article. Taliban are attacking contractors housing in Kabul AND the Taliban have also attacked Bastion in SW Afghanistan. Not really surprised they’ve attacked Bastion. Too much real estate for the ANA to effectively defend after Brits and Marines turned it over last month. I expect we’ll see more of these stories as we continue to leave the defense of Afghanistan to the Afghan army and police.
So the Afghan National Army, left to itself, is pretty much like the Iraqi Army, left to itself. Who knew?
Can’t tell you how glad I am that I turned down a chance to help train the Iraqi Army.
In my experience between the two countries, I found that there are definitely more Afghans willing to step up and do the right thing. If I was given a choice as to which one to go back to, I’d go to Afghanistan, no question.
Plus, there were far more politicians and people chasing their next higher paycheck in Iraq. And I’m talking about US personnel there, including in the DoS. (Especially in those PRTs where they’d put a 20-year old snot-nosed college boy hipster punk in charge of military personnel as if he knew anything about anything and no one would restrain him.)
Generalismo Hussein’s plan is work as intended.
If you like your base you can’t keep it.