The enemy succeeded in killing nine of our soldiers in a mass assault on a base in Afghanistan:
An insurgent raid that penetrated an American outpost in eastern Afghanistan, killing nine soldiers, has deepened doubts about the U.S. military's effort to contain Islamic militants and keep locals on its side.
I didn't comment initially because I wanted to read more. I was only sure that the press would paint this as a major defeat and a sign of our imminent defeat in Afghanistan--yet again. I wasn't ready to panic at the first report.
One thing that has amazed me about both Iraq and Afghanistan is the almost total absence of enemy attacks that overrun our outposts or patrols. As bad as this attack was, it did not overrun the post:
Moving in darkness before dawn Sunday, some 200 fighters surrounded the newly built base in a remote area near the Pakistan border without being spotted by the troops inside, said Gen. Mohammad Qasim Jangalbagh, the provincial police chief.
He said people in the adjacent village of Wanat aided the assault. About 20 local families left their homes in anticipation of the raid, while other tribesmen stayed behind "and helped the insurgents during the fight," Jangalbagh said. ...
The militants showered the small base — which had been established just three days earlier — with machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortar shells, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the information.
Some of the militants breached the wall and got inside, killing nine American soldiers and wounding 15 others, he said.
Other American soldiers managed to drive out the attackers and called in air support. Attack helicopters swooped over the battlefield, and in hours of fighting dozens of insurgents were killed and about 40 were wounded, the NATO official said.
The official described the militant raid as "serious," but also said it was a rarity for insurgents to get inside a base.
Strategypage also comments on the battle:
A newly established American-Afghan base near the Pakistani border in northeastern Kunar province, was attacked by the Taliban, and the battle left over a hundred dead, and many more wounded, in several hours of fighting. About a third of the dead were U.S. and Afghan troops. A large Taliban force attacked from nearby buildings, including a mosque. U.S. and NATO warplanes responded quickly with smart bombs and missiles. Spectacular, but futile, attacks like this are mainly playing to the Western media.
So we know this was a new base on the frontier. It was not yet tuned in to the local region. And it probably wasn't fully set to detect enemies. The enemy was able to hit this forming outpost, possibly by crossing the border with heavy weapons, at least in part.
A couple hundred enemy troops attacked what I assume was a company-sized US-Afghan outpost (100+ troops).
Local residents from sympathy or fear assisted the jihadi attackers.
The enemy penetrated the perimeter but the Coalition defenders rallies and ejected the attackers.
Our air power than savaged the enemy, which could not stay close enough to our troops to keep our air power at bay.
The enemy lost twice as many men as our side did, but the price they paid got the result they wanted--pants-wetting reporting from our press that depicted an attack that failed as a great victory.
I still want to know how the enemy approached the base in such strength and managed to penetrate the perimeter. That could have been very bad. But our troops held the line, and in the end won the victory. Don't be surprised if some major medals are awarded from this action. It sounds like it was probably touch-and-go for a while.
With more outposts established on the border, the problem of Pakistan sanctuaries will risk further such battles as the enemy crosses into Afghanistan to hit us. We can't invade Pakistan and Pakistan won't control their border areas.
But there is a third option to guard against such attacks.
UPDATE: The outpost garrison seems smaller than I assumed (though there could have been other services present in small numbers to bring it up to 100) and we really didn't have full defenses up or situational awareness established, according to this report:
Sunday's assault occurred just three days after 45 US soldiers, likely from the 173rd Airborne Brigade, and 25 Afghan troops established a new combat outpost in the town of Wanat. The troops had little time to learn the lay of the land, establish local contacts, and build an intelligence network. The fortifications were not fully completed, according to initial reports.
And 200 enemy is at the lower end of the estimate. Another week of settling in and this wouldn't have happened. But the enemy was able to pounce quickly. If those weapons and a lot of the attackers came in from Pakistan to exploit the early stages of the outpost, the importance of operating inside Pakistan as i linked above is more important than ever.
