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


Tuesday, July 19, 2011

War News for Tuesday, July 19, 2011

The British MoD is reporting the death of a British ISAF soldier from an IED blast in the Nahr-e Saraj (South) district, Helmand province , Afghanistan on Monday, July 18th. Here's the ISAF release.

NATO is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from non-combat related injuries in an undisclosed location in northern Afghanistan on Monday, July 18th.


Reported security incidents

Mahaweel:
#1: A roadside bomb blew up, wounding three policemen late on Sunday in Mahaweel, 60 km (35 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.


Sulaimaniya:
#1: Shrapnel from Iranian artillery shelling that targeted bases of the Kurdish rebel group PJAK on the Iran-Iraq border wounded an Iraqi woman on the northern outskirts of Sulaimaniya, 260 km (160 miles) northeast of Baghdad, a Kurdish official said.


Kirkuk:
#1: An Iraqi civilian has been killed by unknown gunmen in northern Iraq’s oil-rich Province of Kirkuk on Monday, a Kirkuk police director reported. “A group of unknown gunmen opened fire from a fast car on the citizen Woria Hamsuddin on the main road between Sargran and Altun-Kurpri townships of Kirkuk Province on Monday, killing him on the spot,” Lt-Brigadier, Sarhad Qader told Aswat al-Iraq news agency. He said the victim had been a member of Sargran township’s police force, who had quit his job few months ago.


Mosul:
#1: Three gunmen were killed and two policemen were wounded during a raid in western Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.

#2: A gunman was killed and two others were arrested by police after they opened fire at a police security checkpoint in western Mosul, police said.



Afghanistan: "The Forgotten War"
#1: Mortar shells fired from across the border in Afghanistan hit a Pakistan military border post killing four soldiers, Pakistan security officials said Tuesday. Two other soldiers were wounded in the attack in South Waziristan tribal district, they said, in the latest in a series of deadly cross-border incidents that have raised tensions between the neighbouring countries. "Four soldiers were killed and two others were wounded in this cross-border attack," a senior security official in Peshawar told AFP. "More than 20 mortar shells were fired from across the border. Three shells slammed into a paramilitary Frontier Corps checkpost in Angoor Adda area," he added.

#2: AN Afghan official says seven police officers have been poisoned and shot dead at a checkpoint in southern Afghanistan. Daoud Ahmadi, a spokesman for Helmand province, said today that the policemen were killed yesterday by one of their colleagues near Lashkar Gah. The city is slated to transition to Afghan-led security this month. Ahmadi says the assailant escaped in a police vehicle loaded with weapons from the checkpoint.

#3: Pakistani security forces killed 10 militants in Kurram Agency, a tribal region in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), during a clash. One soldier was also killed during the offensive, said security officials. The Pakistani Army launched a military offensive against miscreants July 1 in Kurram Agency.

#4: In the other incident, a roadside bomb killed four suspected militants and injured three others in South Waziristan, a tribal region bordering Afghanistan. The incident occurred in Shakai area, a former stronghold of Pakistani Taliban, when a vehicle carrying militants was passing through the area.

#5: Eight Pakistani employees of a US-based aid organisation are missing and feared kidnapped in Pakistan's volatile southwest bordering Afghanistan, a senior Pakistani government official said. The employees of The American Refugee Committee (ARC) were returning after distributing food items from an Afghan refugee camp in Pishin, 50km from Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province, on Monday evening when they went missing. "They distributed some relief goods among the refugees and were probably kidnapped on their way back to Quetta," Mansoor Kakar, Pishin's deputy commissioner, told Reuters.

#6: Two Afghan policemen, including the police chief of Rigistan district in Kandahar province, 450 km south of the capital city of Kabul, were killed as a roadside bomb struck their vehicle on Monday, deputy to provincial police chief Shir Shah Yusufzai said. "The gruesome incident happened at around 09:00 a.m. local time, as a result Wali Mohammad, the police chief of Rigistan district, along with another police, was killed," Yusufzai told Xinhua.


MoD: Lance Corporal Paul Watkins

DoD: Spc. Daniel L. Elliott

DoD: Sgt. 1st Class Kenneth B. Elwell

DoD: Pfc. Tyler M. Springman

Fr/MoD: Petty Officer Benjamin Bourdet

Fr/MoD: Brigadier Clement Kovac

Fr/MoD: Lieutenant Thomas Gauvin

Fr/MoD: Warrant Officer Lawrence Marsol

Fr/MoD: Warrant Officer Emmanuel

Fr/MoD: Warrant Officer Jean-Marc RGP Gueniat

Fr/MoD: Master Corporal Sébastien Vermeille

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