The present-day U.S. military qualifies by any measure as highly professional, much more so than its Cold War predecessor. Yet the purpose of today’s professionals is not to preserve peace but to fight unending wars in distant places. Intoxicated by a post-Cold War belief in its own omnipotence, the United States allowed itself to be drawn into a long series of armed conflicts, almost all of them yielding unintended consequences and imposing greater than anticipated costs. Since the end of the Cold War, U.S. forces have destroyed many targets and killed many people. Only rarely, however, have they succeeded in accomplishing their assigned political purposes. . . . [F]rom our present vantage point, it becomes apparent that the “Revolution of ‘89” did not initiate a new era of history. At most, the events of that year fostered various unhelpful illusions that impeded our capacity to recognize and respond to the forces of change that actually matter.

Andrew Bacevich


Thursday, January 26, 2012

War News for Thursday, January 26, 2011

The DoD is reporting the death of an ISAF Marine who died from a a non-combat related illness somewhere in the U.S. on Sunday, January 22nd.


Thousands of Nato trucks in Pakistan backlog

IED attacks in Afghanistan set record


Reported security incidents
#1: A suicide car bomber targeting a NATO-sponsored reconstruction team killed four Afghan civilians, including a child, and wounded 31 on Thursday in southern Afghanistan, officials said. Three civilian international members of the aid team — two men and one woman — were among the wounded, said Daud Ahmadi, a spokesman for the provincial governor. He said their injuries were not life threatening and did not know their nationalities. The bomber detonated his explosives-laden vehicle Thursday morning as a convoy of a NATO Provincial Reconstruction Team passed by in Lashkar Gah, capital of Helmand province, Ahmadi said. The blast ripped through the convoy of armored vehicles, knocking at least one over and charring others. The explosion also shredded nearby storefronts and damaged at least 17 civilian cars nearby, a provincial statement said.

#2: Pakistani officials say gunmen have attacked a military checkpoint in southwestern Baluchistan Province, killing six soldiers. The officials said about a dozen gunmen attacked the post of the paramilitary Frontier Corps in the district of Dera Bugti, about 400 kilometers southeast of the provincial capital, Quetta, before dawn on January 26. After killing the soldiers, the gunmen are reported to have taken the soldiers' weapons and escaped.

#3: Twenty-two Pakistani forces were injured during an assault by a group of militants in the Jogi area of the northwestern Kurram tribal region, near the Afghanistan border, security officials said. The officials said security forces fought back and killed 20 militants in the incident. The death toll could not be independently verified and militants often dispute official accounts.

#4: Militants attacked a paramilitary checkpost in the Barandem area of the northwestern Bannu district, killing a soldier, intelligence officials said.

#5: According to local authorities in southern Afghanistan, at least four militants were killed following armed clashes with the Afghan National Police forces in southern Helmand province. The officials further added, at least two Afghan police service members were also killed during clashes with the armed militants, which lasted more than 8 hours. District Security Chief for Nad-e-Ali Omer Jan confirming the report said, the clashes started on Wednesday evening. Mr. Omer Jan further added, at least eight other militants were also injured during the clashes.


DoD: Capt. Joshua C. Pairsh

MoD: Signaller Ian Sartorius-Jones

2 comments:

Dancewater said...

Insurgents stepped up attacks around Iraq on Thursday, killing 17 people around the country, including 10 in a bombing attack on a house of two policemen and their families in central Iraq, police and hospital officials said.

At least 190 people have been killed in a wave of attacks by since the beginning of the year, raising concerns that the surge in violence and an escalating political crisis might deteriorate into a civil war, just weeks after the U.S. military withdrawal. Most of the dead in the wave of attacks have been Shiite pilgrims and members of the Iraqi security forces.

Two bombs planted at an entrance to a popular cafe in predominantly Sunni district of Sadiyah in southwestern Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 17 others, police officials said. A police officer was shot dead in the same neighborhood.

In Yarmouk, a mostly Sunni district in western Baghdad, gunmen killed a real estate agent and two clients, police said. They did not know the motive for the attack.

Earlier Thursday, insurgents blew up a house where two policemen brothers lived with their families in Hamia area, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) south of Baghdad, a police officer said. The house was leveled when insurgents detonated bombs they had planted around it at 1:00 a.m.

Both policemen, two infants and four women were among the dead, he said. A doctor at a nearby hospital confirmed the casualties.

Link here

Dancewater said...

Although there were no massive bombings in Iraq today, insurgents were still able to kill at least 31 Iraqis in new violence. Another 36 people were wounded. The most significant attack occurred south of the capital where bombs killed 10 family members at an intelligence officer’s home. Meanwhile, one of Iraq’s top clerics asked the Iraqiya party to return to parliament.

The rest here.

It seems to me that a bomb that levels a home with 10 people in it is pretty massive.

Imagine how that would be in the US media if it happened here.