With winning hearts in mind

tool name

tool name

U.S. boosts troops for training

With the Taliban on the offensive and gaining ground, the U.S. military has taken major steps to boost the training of the Afghan policeforces, particularly since American Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal arrived in June to command the U.S. and NATO forces.

The U.S. now is using larger units attached to full brigades to train the police. Second Lt. Hans Beutel's platoon of about 25 men is tasked with mentoring the 180-man national police force in Kandahar province's Zhari district. It's part of a brigade of more than 3,000 82nd Airborne Division soldiers from Fort Bragg that doubled the number of troops mentoring Afghan security forces when it arrived in late August.

Using full brigades as trainers provides more direct control over assets such as intelligence gathering and supplies than the previous system did, which had 12-man units reporting to a centralcommand.

U.S. military putting higher priority on training Afghan police

KOLK, Afghanistan — With the Taliban on the offensive and gaining ground, the U.S. military has taken major steps to boost the training of the Afghan police forces, particularly since American Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal arrived in June to command the U.S. and NATO forces.

The U.S. now is using larger units attached to full brigades to train the police. Second Lt. Hans Beutel's platoon of about 25 men is tasked with mentoring the 180-man national police force in Kandahar province's Zhari district. It's part of a brigade of more than 3,000 82nd Airborne Division soldiers from Fort Bragg, N.C., that doubled the number of troops who were mentoring Afghan security forces when it arrived in late August.

Using full brigades as trainers provides more direct control over assets such as intelligence gathering and supplies than the previous system did, which had 12-man units reporting to a central command.

5 Americans killed in wave of attacks in Afghanistan

Five Americans were killed Saturday amid a wave of bombings, ambushes and killings that swept across Afghanistan and seemed to emphasize the ability of the Taliban and other insurgents to carry out attacks in most parts of the country.

At least 39 Afghan civilians and members of the Afghan security forces were also killed in attacks that struck the north, the south and the east on Friday and Saturday, Afghan officials said.

Three U.S. service members were killed in western Afghanistan when they were attacked with a roadside bomb and then came under small-arms fire, said Chief Petty Officer Brian Naranjo, a press officer for the U.S. military command in Kabul.

Troops seize tons of bomb material

With fertilizer bombs now the most lethal weapons used against U.S. and NATO soldiers in southern Afghanistan, the bomb-making operation in Kandahar was something close to astonishing.

In a pair of raids on Sunday, Afghan police and U.S. soldiers discovered a half-million pounds of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer that is used in the overwhelming majority of homemade bombs here. About 2,000 bomb-making devices like timers and triggers were also found, and 15 Afghans were detained.

With a typical homemade bomb weighing no more than 60 pounds, the seizure of that much fertilizer - more than 10 tractor-trailer loads - may have removed thousands of bombs from the streets and trails of southern Afghanistan, officials said.

U.S. Marines launch offensive on Taliban in Afghan province

KABUL, Afghanistan — U.S. Marines early Thursday launched an operation in southern Afghanistan's Helmand province with the goal of driving the Taliban out of the country's major opium-producing area.

The offensive, called Operation Khanjar, or "Strike of the Sword," includes roughly 4,000 Marines and 650 Afghan security forces.

Besides securing one of Afghanistan's most dangerous provinces, the operation also is intended to signal a renewed effort here by U.S. forces under its new commander, Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who arrived last month. The military's hope is that the operation will enable it begin building local governance.