Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
ABC; CNN
June 24, 2008 World News With Charles Gibson (ABC), 6:30 PM
ELIZABETH VARGAS: While Iraq remains a dangerous place for U.S. forces, the danger is even greater these days in Afghanistan. According to an ABC News analysis, American troops are more than four times as likely to be killed there as in Iraq. Our senior foreign correspondent Jim Sciutto has been traveling with U.S. forces throughout eastern Afghanistan.
MAJ. GEN. JEFFREY SCHOLESSER [Commander, 101st Airborne Division]: You know, we’re flying at 12,000 feet. We’ve got mountains towering above us.
JIM SCIUTTO: Flying with the commander of coalition forces here, we saw the imposing landscape of the eastern front. Seven years after the U.S. invasion, the border remains a refuge for a dangerous mix of the Taliban, al Qaeda, and Pakistani militants.
SCHOLESSER: We’ve got to make sure that they don’t become a coherent larger group that has one goal and, you know, one modus operandi. So that’s what we’re (fighting ?).
SCIUTTO: One ominous sign: terror attacks up 40 percent from last year. U.S. commanders placed part of the blame on Pakistan for negotiating peace deals with militants on the border.
Inside the command center at the U.S. base in Ghazni, we get the latest incident report.
SOLDIER [U.S. Base in Ghazni]: A possible ID down by the southern area sector by (unintelligible).
SCIUTTO: Coalition forces are going into places where they’ve never been before. Where this base is located, there were no coalition troops just 18 months ago and the Taliban had complete freedom of movement. At each new base, the 101st Airborne places equal emphasis on security and development, doling out millions of dollars to Afghans for hospitals, farms, and roads.
SCHOLESSER: And where the road goes, you start to have economic development. You have linkages to governance, and most importantly you have better security.
SCIUTTO: The push on the eastern front is stretching coalition forces – 22,000 troops now patrol an area the size of New Mexico and Arizona.
Do you have enough? Do you have what you need?
SCHOLESSER: This is a large country. The population is larger than, say, in Iraq and we have less soldiers. So as a commander I’m going to tell you that I would like to have more troops, for sure. And I think I could put them to good use to speed up our progress here.
SCIUTTO: France will send 700 Special Forces troops here in July, but the vast majority of soldiers will remain American. And for now, it’s up to the 101st Airborne to keep the east from becoming a terrorist haven again.
Jim Sciutto, ABC News, with the 101st Airborne in eastern Afghanistan.
LOU DOBBS: Good evening, everybody. New evidence tonight the war in Afghanistan is escalating, and our troops are facing what could be a long and difficult campaign. A top U.S. general in Afghanistan today said attacks in the eastern part of the country have risen by 40 percent from a year ago.
Meanwhile, the war in Iraq is at a pivotal point after a big reduction in attacks and the end of the surge. The Pentagon says attacks in Iraq have fallen by at least 40 percent since the surge began last year. Jamie McIntyre has our report from the Pentagon -- Jamie.
JAMIE MCINTYRE: Lou, when the new U.S. commander took over in Afghanistan, he predicted this summer could be worse than last. It turns out, he was right.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) MCINTYRE: On a supply route just south of the Afghan capital Kabul, smoke billows for trucks torched by attackers on motorcycle. At least one person was killed and some 40 trucks carrying food, water, and fuel, damaged or destroyed. It's just the latest evidence of a dramatic increase in Taliban fueled-violence. A 40 percent over the same period last year, according to the top commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.
MAJ. GEN. JEFFREY SCHLOESSER: They're burning schools and in fact they have attacked 43 in our sector ever since school started here in Afghanistan in late March. They're also killing teachers and they're killing the students.
MCINTYRE: While the U.S. says the attacks are increasingly aimed at intimidation, the upward spiral of violence is taking a greater toll on the U.S. and its NATO allies. For the second month in a row the death toll for NATO troops in Afghanistan, which includes U.S. has eclipsed the American death count in Iraq, and the U.S. has well over twice as many troops in Iraq while the latest report to Congress claims in Iraq all violence indicators are down between 40 percent to 80 percent. In Afghanistan the trends are clearly headed the opposite way as CNN Nic Robertson witnesses firsthand when a NATO airport in Kandahar came under Taliban rocket attack.
NIC ROBERTSON: We heard an explanation and then a burst of -- a big pillow of smoke rose up which very quickly burst into flames. There were some big flames coming up that are still burning now, almost an hour later.
MCINTYRE: There has been fierce fighting around Kandahar since this month's jail break in which some 400 Taliban prisoners were freed. Over the past two days, NATO and Afghan forces claim to have killed more than 60 militants in counter attacks. (END VIDEOTAPE)
MCINTYRE: The Taliban's tenacity underscores that the U.S. is going to have to make good on its pledge to send as many at 10,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan next year, something that senior Army leaders tell CNN will be next to impossible unless continued progress in Iraq makes further troop draw downs there a reality -- Lou.
DOBBS: Jamie, who is supplying those armaments, the rockets that are being fired by the Taliban and our troops in Afghanistan?
MCINTYRE: Well there are various lines of supply that are going into there. Some of them are coming in through Pakistan. Some are coming from Iran. Some are arms that are purchased on the black market. But there's no shortage of small arms in Afghanistan or even in Iraq for that matter.
DOBBS: All right, Jamie. Thank you very much -- Jamie McIntyre reporting from the Pentagon.
The number of our troops in Afghanistan is now at the highest level of the entire war. In January of 2002, a few months after the beginning of that war, there were just over 4,000 of our troops in Afghanistan. Now, there are 33,000 of our troops there including 3,000 Marines who are due to leave the country later this year. Four hundred and forty-eight of our troops have been killed in the war in Afghanistan; 18 of them this month.
June 24, 2008 World News With Charles Gibson (ABC), 6:30 PM
ELIZABETH VARGAS: While Iraq remains a dangerous place for U.S. forces, the danger is even greater these days in Afghanistan. According to an ABC News analysis, American troops are more than four times as likely to be killed there as in Iraq. Our senior foreign correspondent Jim Sciutto has been traveling with U.S. forces throughout eastern Afghanistan.
MAJ. GEN. JEFFREY SCHOLESSER [Commander, 101st Airborne Division]: You know, we’re flying at 12,000 feet. We’ve got mountains towering above us.
JIM SCIUTTO: Flying with the commander of coalition forces here, we saw the imposing landscape of the eastern front. Seven years after the U.S. invasion, the border remains a refuge for a dangerous mix of the Taliban, al Qaeda, and Pakistani militants.
SCHOLESSER: We’ve got to make sure that they don’t become a coherent larger group that has one goal and, you know, one modus operandi. So that’s what we’re (fighting ?).
SCIUTTO: One ominous sign: terror attacks up 40 percent from last year. U.S. commanders placed part of the blame on Pakistan for negotiating peace deals with militants on the border.
Inside the command center at the U.S. base in Ghazni, we get the latest incident report.
SOLDIER [U.S. Base in Ghazni]: A possible ID down by the southern area sector by (unintelligible).
SCIUTTO: Coalition forces are going into places where they’ve never been before. Where this base is located, there were no coalition troops just 18 months ago and the Taliban had complete freedom of movement. At each new base, the 101st Airborne places equal emphasis on security and development, doling out millions of dollars to Afghans for hospitals, farms, and roads.
SCHOLESSER: And where the road goes, you start to have economic development. You have linkages to governance, and most importantly you have better security.
SCIUTTO: The push on the eastern front is stretching coalition forces – 22,000 troops now patrol an area the size of New Mexico and Arizona.
Do you have enough? Do you have what you need?
SCHOLESSER: This is a large country. The population is larger than, say, in Iraq and we have less soldiers. So as a commander I’m going to tell you that I would like to have more troops, for sure. And I think I could put them to good use to speed up our progress here.
SCIUTTO: France will send 700 Special Forces troops here in July, but the vast majority of soldiers will remain American. And for now, it’s up to the 101st Airborne to keep the east from becoming a terrorist haven again.
Jim Sciutto, ABC News, with the 101st Airborne in eastern Afghanistan.
LOU DOBBS: Good evening, everybody. New evidence tonight the war in Afghanistan is escalating, and our troops are facing what could be a long and difficult campaign. A top U.S. general in Afghanistan today said attacks in the eastern part of the country have risen by 40 percent from a year ago.
Meanwhile, the war in Iraq is at a pivotal point after a big reduction in attacks and the end of the surge. The Pentagon says attacks in Iraq have fallen by at least 40 percent since the surge began last year. Jamie McIntyre has our report from the Pentagon -- Jamie.
JAMIE MCINTYRE: Lou, when the new U.S. commander took over in Afghanistan, he predicted this summer could be worse than last. It turns out, he was right.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) MCINTYRE: On a supply route just south of the Afghan capital Kabul, smoke billows for trucks torched by attackers on motorcycle. At least one person was killed and some 40 trucks carrying food, water, and fuel, damaged or destroyed. It's just the latest evidence of a dramatic increase in Taliban fueled-violence. A 40 percent over the same period last year, according to the top commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.
MAJ. GEN. JEFFREY SCHLOESSER: They're burning schools and in fact they have attacked 43 in our sector ever since school started here in Afghanistan in late March. They're also killing teachers and they're killing the students.
MCINTYRE: While the U.S. says the attacks are increasingly aimed at intimidation, the upward spiral of violence is taking a greater toll on the U.S. and its NATO allies. For the second month in a row the death toll for NATO troops in Afghanistan, which includes U.S. has eclipsed the American death count in Iraq, and the U.S. has well over twice as many troops in Iraq while the latest report to Congress claims in Iraq all violence indicators are down between 40 percent to 80 percent. In Afghanistan the trends are clearly headed the opposite way as CNN Nic Robertson witnesses firsthand when a NATO airport in Kandahar came under Taliban rocket attack.
NIC ROBERTSON: We heard an explanation and then a burst of -- a big pillow of smoke rose up which very quickly burst into flames. There were some big flames coming up that are still burning now, almost an hour later.
MCINTYRE: There has been fierce fighting around Kandahar since this month's jail break in which some 400 Taliban prisoners were freed. Over the past two days, NATO and Afghan forces claim to have killed more than 60 militants in counter attacks. (END VIDEOTAPE)
MCINTYRE: The Taliban's tenacity underscores that the U.S. is going to have to make good on its pledge to send as many at 10,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan next year, something that senior Army leaders tell CNN will be next to impossible unless continued progress in Iraq makes further troop draw downs there a reality -- Lou.
DOBBS: Jamie, who is supplying those armaments, the rockets that are being fired by the Taliban and our troops in Afghanistan?
MCINTYRE: Well there are various lines of supply that are going into there. Some of them are coming in through Pakistan. Some are coming from Iran. Some are arms that are purchased on the black market. But there's no shortage of small arms in Afghanistan or even in Iraq for that matter.
DOBBS: All right, Jamie. Thank you very much -- Jamie McIntyre reporting from the Pentagon.
The number of our troops in Afghanistan is now at the highest level of the entire war. In January of 2002, a few months after the beginning of that war, there were just over 4,000 of our troops in Afghanistan. Now, there are 33,000 of our troops there including 3,000 Marines who are due to leave the country later this year. Four hundred and forty-eight of our troops have been killed in the war in Afghanistan; 18 of them this month.