Mazar-e- Sharif, Afghanistan- Several US soldiers were reportedly wounded when an Afghan soldier opened fire on NATO troops. Initial reports indicated that the US soldiers were killed but Operation Resolute Support confirmed there were no US or NATO fatalities.

At least one Afghan soldier was killed and several American soldiers were wounded in an incident at a base in northern Afghanistan on Saturday, a U.S. military official said.

A spokesman for the U.S. military command in Kabul denied reports by an Afghan official that Americans had been killed, but confirmed that an unspecified number of soldiers had been wounded at Camp Shaheen, which is the headquarters of the Afghan army’s 209th Corps in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif.

At least one Afghan soldier was killed and another wounded, the official said.- Reuters

This will be the second insider attack in a week, on June 10th three soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division were killed by an Afghan soldier. In the previous attack, the Taliban claimed responsibility and boasted about having infiltrated the Afghan Army for this purpose. So far, no one has claimed responsibility for the latest attack.

This week, AP reported as many as four thousand more US forces could be deployed to Afghanistan. An official announcement is expected next week.

The Pentagon will send almost 4,000 additional American forces to Afghanistan, a Trump administration official said Thursday, hoping to break a stalemate in a war that has now passed to a third U.S. commander in chief. The deployment will be the largest of American manpower under Donald Trump’s young presidency.

The decision by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis could be announced as early as next week, the official said. It follows Trump’s move to give Mattis the authority to set troop levels and seeks to address assertions by the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan that he doesn’t have enough forces to help Afghanistan’s army against a resurgent Taliban insurgency. The rising threat posed by Islamic State extremists, evidenced in a rash of deadly attacks in the capital city of Kabul, has only fueled calls for a stronger U.S. presence, as have several recent American combat deaths.

The bulk of the additional troops will train and advise Afghan forces, according to the administration official, who wasn’t authorized to discuss details of the decision publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. A smaller number would be assigned to counterterror operations against the Taliban and IS, the official said.

Asked for comment, a Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, said, “No decisions have been made.”- AP via Star Tribune

More information to follow as this is a developing story.

Image courtesy of DoD