KABUL — U.S. troops in Afghanistan have been ordered to significantly scale back operations with Afghan military and police forces after a spike in fratricidal “insider attacks” that has seriously undermined U.S. trust in their local allies.
The decision, officials said Tuesday, is also linked to concerns that American field troops have become more vulnerable to attacks because of Muslim outrage over a controversial anti-Islam video.
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The orders from Gen. John R. Allen, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, represent a major shift from the long-stated U.S. philosophy that American and NATO troops are here to work “shoulder to shoulder” with their Afghan partners.
The fundamental U.S. strategy is to prepare some 350,000 Afghan forces to take over the country’s security by the end of 2014 so that the United States can pull out its combat troops.
Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta said he was concerned by the ongoing treacherous attacks by Afghan forces on their U.S. and NATO counterparts, in which 51 foreign troops have died so far this year. But he downplayed suggestions that the U.S. strategy for withdrawing from Afghanistan would be hampered by the decision by U.S. commanders to sharply limit training and joint operations.
“We are concerned with regards to these inside attacks and the impact they are having on our forces,” Panetta told reporters in Beijing after meeting with Gen. Liang Guanglie, China’s defense minister.
“I rely on General Allen to take the steps that he believes are necessary to protect our forces, and at the same time I remain convinced that General Allen will continue to pursue efforts to implement the plan he has put in place so that we can complete the transition to Afghan security and governance and complete our drawdown by the end of 2014.”
The U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force said in a statement Tuesday that “most partnering and advising” would now be done at the battalion level and above. Lower-level joint operations will be “evaluated on a case-by-case basis” and must be approved by regional commanders.
As the morale-sapping insider attacks on the troops have escalated over the past two months, Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on Sunday described them as “a very serious threat” to the war effort.
Over the weekend, six international troops — four Americans and two Britons — died after Afghan forces opened fire on them, bringing the death toll in such attacks to 109 since 2007, when the phenomenon began. The shootings are also called “green on blue” to reflect the military’s designation of Afghan government forces as green and foreign allied forces as blue.
Although military officials have said it is too soon to tell whether the inflammatory “Innocence of Muslims” video has sparked an increase in shootings, an earlier statement from the coalition pointed to the video as one impetus for the new orders.
“Recent events outside of and inside Afghanistan related to the ‘Innocence of Muslims’ video, plus the conduct of recent insider attacks, have given cause for ISAF troops to exercise increased vigilance and carefully review all activities and interactions with the local population,” the coalition said.
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