Early Wednesday, the base came under a "significant Taliban attack," during which the Canadian and American soldiers were killed, Vernon said.
At least five coalition forces were wounded, including three Canadians and an American soldier, officials said. At least 12 Taliban militants also were killed.
But most heartening is that we are not passive targets:
Coalition aircraft and artillery fire were used to repel the Taliban forces, which fled into the desert wilderness. At least 20 militants were killed during the chase and two compounds at a Taliban base were destroyed, the U.S. military said.
"The capturing of these two compounds with boots on the ground produced significant intelligence and allows us to continue to put pressure on the enemy," U.S. Brig. Gen. Anthony J. Tata said.
Large caches of weapons, bombs and ammunition were discovered at the Taliban compound. All were blown up, "causing multiple secondary explosions and destroying the compound and all enemy military equipment inside," the U.S.
military said.
We were hit. We killed more than we lost in repelling the attack. And then we counter-attacked and pursued the enemy, killing more, capturing and destroying their base, and gathering intelligence material for more follow-up work in the future.
I sometimes worry that we might go passive in a misguided effort to minimize casualties by hunkering down. Such a strategy only works for a short time and in the end we'd lose more. I'm glad we aren't tempted in Afghanistan anyway to follow that short-sighted strategy.
Hunt the enemy down and kill them.
