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


Monday, December 24, 2012

War News for Monday, December 24, 2012

The DoD is reporting the death of a sailor previously unreported by the military. Cdr. Job W. Price died from non-combat related injuries in Uruzgan Province on Saturday, December 22nd. News reports this is a possible suicide.

NATO is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from an insurgent attack in an undisclosed location in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, December 24th.


Reported security incidents
#1: An Afghan policewoman shot and killed an American adviser outside the police headquarters in Kabul on Monday, the latest in a rising tide of insider attacks by Afghans against their foreign allies, senior Afghan officials said. The killing of the American, who worked as a contractor with the NATO command, was the first known insider attack by a woman in Afghanistan.

#2: In a separate incident, at least five local policemen were killed by another officer in northern Afghanistan. a local policeman killed at least five colleagues in the remote Khosh Tepa district in Jowzjan province. Afghan officials say the policeman escaped after the shooting and fled to join the Taliban, taking the weapons of his colleagues with him.  spokesman for the Taliban told the BBC the rogue policemen in Khosh Tepa had been a Taliban infiltrator for some time.

#3: Meanwhile, three Polish soldiers with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) were wounded during a militant attack in the southern province of Ghazni, Warsaw said on Sunday. The soldiers injured on Saturday morning when their routine patrol came under attack in the southwestern part of the province, the Polish defence ministry said. A statement from the ministry said unidentified gunmen opened fire on the soldiers, wounding three of them. They were airlifted to a Ghazni City hospital, where they are being treated by Polish doctors.
#4: Five people were killed two separate security incidents in eastern Nangarhar and northern Faryab provinces, officials said on Sunday. A child, a driver and his assistant were killed in a militant attack on a logistic convoy of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) on Torkham-Jalalabad highway in Batikot district of Nangarhar province, the district chief, Mirza Mohammad Nasrat, told Pajhwok Afghan News. The attack was followed by a one-hour clash between the attackers and police, said witness Dr. Amin, who had no further details of the incident. A member of Junbish-i-Mili Islami party, Ghebullah, was killed along with his 22 years old son by unidentified gunmen in the Shirin Tagab district of northern Faryab province. Provincial police chief, Maj. Gen. Nabi Jan Mullahkhel, said the victim came under fire on his way home in Rahmatabad area on Saturday evening.

#5: A blast ripped through a school in Badakshan province on Monday, casualties feared, spokesman for provincial administration Abdul Marouf Rasikh said.


DoD: Cdr. Job W. Price

Posted by whisker at 5:01 AM

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