US troops killed in Afghan attack, 2 wounded

The soldiers were targeted as they moved through a village near Bagram Airfield, the largest USA military facility in Afghanistan, NATO and Afghan officials said.

An NYPD detective was among the six American service members killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan on Monday, Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said in a statement.

The next 48 hours passed without incident, but on December 11, a house near Spain’s embassy in Kabul, was attacked by gunmen, suicide bombers, and a auto bomb, leaving at least seven injured and two dead.

“We will continue to work together to promote peace and stability in Afghanistan, just as we will not relent in our mission to counter the threat of terrorism that plagues the region”, spokesman Josh Earnest said in a statement. But the Afghan security forces are hard-pressed and suffer deficiencies in a variety of areas from logistics to the lack of any significant air power of their own.

Some 12,000 foreign soldiers are deployed in the country as part of the Nato-led Resolute Support global coalition, which is meant to underpin Afghan security forces. One is focused on assisting and training Afghan forces, and the other on counterterrorism.

The attack occurred about 1:30 p.m. when a motorcycle – apparently loaded with explosives – detonated near the troops. The death toll claimed by the Taliban does not correlate with that given by Brig.

The head of the provincial council, Muhammad Kareem Atal in Helmand, said 2,000 Afghan security forces personnel had been killed in the state this year.

All but two of Helmand’s 14 districts are effectively controlled or heavily contested by Taliban insurgents, officials said.

The fall of Helmand would deal another stinging blow to Afghan forces who have struggled to rein in the ascendant insurgency without the full backing of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation forces, who ended their combat mission a year ago.

Quoted by the Associated Press, he said casualties among Afghan security forces were high but he gave no figures.

Sangin was once the centre of operations for worldwide forces in Afghanistan, a key district that linked Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, to the province’s northern districts. In the Sangin district, most government buildings are now in Taliban hands.

Helmand province is familiar to thousands of British service personnel; the town of Sangin having a special symbolic significance.

The attack came as Taliban insurgents in Helmand were closing in on the strategic district of Sangin, tightening their grip on the volatile southern province.

A total of fourteen US troops have died in Afghanistan this year, only four of those in combat, according to the Defense Department.

Fighting was still underway Tuesday in Helmand.