Advertisement

Afghan forces suffer record losses amid U.S., coalition drawdown

U.S. and Afghan officials told USA Today that Afghan security forces are averaging more than 300 casualties per week.

By Fred Lambert
Afghan policemen secure the site of a suicide attack in Kabul on January 18, 2010. U.S. and Afghan officials in May 2015 said casualties among Afghan security forces had spiked in the first 15 weeks of 2015 to 70 percent over those from the same time during the previous year, as coalition military forces gradually withdraw from the country. File photo by Hossein Fatemi/UPI
Afghan policemen secure the site of a suicide attack in Kabul on January 18, 2010. U.S. and Afghan officials in May 2015 said casualties among Afghan security forces had spiked in the first 15 weeks of 2015 to 70 percent over those from the same time during the previous year, as coalition military forces gradually withdraw from the country. File photo by Hossein Fatemi/UPI | License Photo

KABUL, Afghanistan, May 3 (UPI) -- Casualties among Afghan security forces have spiked this year as the United States and its coalition partners draw down their presence in Afghanistan, officials say.

About 330 Afghan soldiers and police are killed or wounded each week in Taliban attacks, U.S. and Afghan officials told USA Today, and the level of casualties among those forces in the first 15 weeks of 2015 is 70 percent higher than it was during the same period last year.

Advertisement

The spike comes as coalition forces gradually withdraw from the country.

After U.S. President Barack Obama announced plans for U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2011, coalition forces officially handed the security operation to Afghan forces in December 2014.

The president's original timetable called for a reduction of U.S. troops in the country to 5,500 by the end of 2015, but in late March Obama announced the U.S. force would maintain its current posture of nearly 10,000 troops, used for advising and assisting Afghan forces, until the end of the year.

"The specific trajectory of the 2016 drawdown will be established later this year," Obama said at the time. "This flexibility reflects our reinvigorated partnership with Afghanistan, which is aimed at making Afghanistan secure and preventing it from being used to launch terrorist attacks."

Advertisement

The White House plans to leave a small contingent at the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan after 2016, and, with international allies, fund and help equip the more-than 300,000 strong Afghan security force.

USA Today quoted Afghan Interior Minister Nur ul-Haq Ulumi as saying inevitable reductions in coalition close air support and satellite and drone surveillance has allowed Taliban forces greater freedom of movement, albeit in small groups that attack isolated positions, such as when Taliban forces overran a series of Afghan army outposts in the country's Kunduz province last month.

Still, officials said NATO and U.S. forces conducted 52 airstrikes in March to conduct "force protection" for U.S. troops advising Afghan forces in remote parts of the country.

Army Gen. John Campbell, the top coalition commander, told USA Today the coalition is working to improve the effectiveness of local police forces, which commonly suffer horrendous casualties after being sent in small groups, lacking communication capabilities, to defend remote outposts.

Lt. Col. Bakhtulla Bakhtiar, 53, a helicopter squadron commander, told USA Today Afghan security forces have lots of troops but need more helicopters for the Afghan air force, which reportedly only has five working Soviet-built Hinds.

Advertisement

Latest Headlines