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U.S. General Is Killed in Attack at Afghan Base, Officials Say Afghan Kills U.S. General; Others Injured
(about 4 hours later)
KABUL, Afghanistan — An Afghan soldier shot a United States Army major general to death and wounded a German brigadier general and at least 14 other foreign and Afghan military service members on Tuesday at a military training academy on the outskirts of Kabul, officials of the American-led coalition said Tuesday. The major general appeared to be the highest-ranking member of the American military to die in hostilities overseas since the Vietnam War. KABUL, Afghanistan — For the first time since Vietnam, a United States Army general was killed in an overseas conflict on Tuesday when an Afghan soldier opened fire on senior American officers at a military training academy.
The Pentagon declined to identify the general by name, but military officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, identified him as Maj. Gen. Harold J. Greene, a veteran acquisitions officer, who was only assigned to Afghanistan in January to help the Afghan military establish a professional system for managing soldiers and weaponry. The slain officer, Maj. Gen. Harold J. Greene, was the highest-ranking member of the NATO-led coalition killed in the Afghanistan war, and his death punctuated the problems vexing the Americans as they attempt to wind down the 13-year-old conflict, contending with a political crisis that has threatened to splinter the Afghan government and leave it unable to fend off the Taliban.
The coalition officials said a senior Afghan commander also was among the wounded. The identities of the other victims and the gunman were not disclosed, but a Pentagon spokesman told reporters in Washington that he had been killed. The general was among a group of senior American and Afghan officers making a routine visit to Afghanistan’s premier military academy on the outskirts of Kabul when an Afghan soldier sprayed the officers with bullets from the window of a nearby building, hitting at least 15 before he was killed.
The Pentagon spokesman, Rear Adm. John Kirby, also said officials believed the gunman was “a member of the Afghan national security forces,” but he had no other details about him or the circumstances of the shooting. Though American officials said General Greene was not believed to have been specifically targeted, his violent death at the hands of an Afghan soldier, not an insurgent, was a reminder of the dangers faced by even the highest-ranking — and best protected — officers in Afghanistan.
Admiral Kirby also said the shooting, the first so-called insider attack in months in Afghanistan, was an inherent risk of the war, calling it “a pernicious threat and always difficult to ascertain.” Driving home the threat, an Afghan police officer opened fire on American soldiers visiting the governor of Paktia Province in eastern Afghanistan soon after the shooting at the military academy, Afghan and coalition officials said. The policeman was fatally shot; none of the Americans were wounded.
The German military confirmed that one of its brigadier generals serving in Afghanistan was among 15 coalition-led troops wounded in the shooting, described as “presumably an internal attack.” The general was being treated for his injuries, which were not life-threatening, the Germans said in a statement. There was no indication that either of the attackers were members of the Taliban, or that their acts were coordinated. The insurgents did not claim the attackers as their own, instead hailing them as hero soldiers. American officials said they had no reason to suspect the gunman at the military academy was anything but an ordinary Afghan soldier whose motivations remained a mystery.
Other details of the shooting were sketchy, and the coalition, in an official statement, would only confirm that one of its service members had been killed in what it described as “an incident” at the Marshall Fahim National Defense University in Kabul. The coalition declined to specify any further details, saying it was still working to notify the family of the deceased. But scores of these so-called insider attacks have plagued the American military in recent years, and Afghan and American commanders believe the vast majority have been carried out by Afghan soldiers and police alienated and angered by the protracted war in their country, and the corrupt and ineffectual government that the United States has left in place. Few of the attacks are believed to have been the result of coordinated Taliban plots.
Tensions at the military academy ran high in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, which took place around noon, and foreign troops appeared to be on edge, fearful of another attack. Rear Adm. John F. Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, said officials believed the gunman was “a member of the Afghan national security forces,” but he had no other details about him or the circumstances of the shooting.
Massoud Hossaini, a photographer for The Associated Press, said that he arrived at the camp’s gate ahead of other journalists, and just as coalition armored vehicles were pulling out of the compound. A coalition soldier manning the roof-mounted gun on one of the vehicles shouted for Mr. Hossaini to “get away,” and then fired an apparent warning shot. Still, Admiral Kirby maintained on Tuesday that the insider attack, the first in months, would not change the Obama administration’s plans to leave a residual force in Afghanistan after most American forces are withdrawn at the end of the year and the NATO combat mission here formally concludes.
“I don’t know what he fired. It was fired near our car,” he said, adding that he left the scene straight away. Admiral Kirby emphasized the progress that Afghan forces had made in recent years, citing as examples their role in limiting violence in the presidential election in April and the June runoff vote.
In images of the incident released by the AP, the coalition soldier appeared to be firing a warning flare. “They have had a good year, securing not one, but two, national elections and stopping or minimizing the impact of countless numbers of attacks throughout the country — even in Kabul,” he said.
The Afghan Defense Ministry said in a statement that a “few people were wounded” in the shooting, and that they had been immediately evacuated to a hospital. It described the attacker as “wearing Afghan National Army uniform,” which has long been a standard description offered after Afghan troops attack their foreign counterparts. Yet the shooting was a blunt reminder that discipline and vetting remain a challenge, and rogue Afghan soldiers and policemen remain a threat, despite a sharp drop in insider attacks since 2012, when the violence peaked and dozens of coalition service members were killed by Afghan counterparts.
Other Afghan and coalition officials said they believed the gunman was an Afghan soldier. The coalition, in its brief statement, said the incident had involved “local Afghan and ISAF troops,” using the initials for the International Security Assistance Force, the formal name of the NATO-led coalition. With foreign troops having largely ceded their front-line role to Afghan forces in the past two years, training and advising Afghans is one of the few crucial roles still played here by the coalition. American soldiers largely stay out of the Taliban’s line of fire, but they must still maintain close contact with Afghan soldiers and policemen. Foreign forces have few options for protecting themselves, short of cutting off contact with the Afghans.
Sher Alam, an Afghan soldier guarding the entrance to the academy, located at Camp Qargha, said that senior Afghan and coalition officers had been meeting there on Tuesday, and that reports from inside the camp indicated that a number of the foreign officers were shot in the attack. He said that soon after the shooting, coalition helicopters landed inside the academy to evacuate the victims. But that would make the training mission impossible, as General Greene, 55, most likely knew.
Until Tuesday, no officer in the American military of major general rank or higher had been reported killed by hostile action abroad since the Vietnam War. According to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial database, Maj. Gen. John Albert B. Dillard Jr. was killed on May 12, 1970 when his helicopter was shot down. Rear Adm. Rembrandt Cecil Robinson, the Navy’s equivalent of a major general, was killed on May 8, 1972, when his helicopter crashed. Five other American officers of comparable rank were killed earlier in the war, all in air crashes, whether accidental or caused by hostile action. He was one of the most senior officers overseeing the transition from a war led and fought by foreign troops to one conducted by Afghan forces. His specialty was logistics — he was a longtime acquisitions officer — and he was dispatched to Afghanistan to help the Afghan military address one of its most potentially debilitating weaknesses: inability to manage soldiers and weaponry.
Compared with the infantry grunts who did tours of duty in the Taliban-infested hinterlands of Afghanistan, General Greene’s assignment appeared to carry far less risk. Yet on Tuesday, he became one of the more than 2,300 American service members killed in Afghanistan.
Admiral Kirby said his death reflected an inherent risk of the war, calling insider attacks “a pernicious threat and always difficult to ascertain.”
“Afghanistan is still a war zone,” he said.
The political crisis that has gripped Afghanistan in recent months has increased the doubts among many here about the American project to rebuild the country. The crisis grew out of a presidential election runoff in June marred by widespread fraud. President Obama had to personally intervene last month when it appeared that powerful supporters of Abdullah Abdullah, one of the two candidates, were poised to seize power in what would have amounted to a coup.
Secretary of State John Kerry was dispatched to Kabul, and he brokered a deal between Mr. Abdullah and the rival candidate Ashraf Ghani to audit all 8.1 million votes cast in the runoff and to form a unity government after a winner was declared. But the audit quickly became mired in squabbles between the rival campaigns, and there has been almost no progress in negotiating details of the unity government.
Still, the audit finally appeared to be making progress this week, providing a respite from troubling developments for American and Afghan officials — until Tuesday’s shooting.
The attack occurred around noon, and sent shock waves through the coalition command and Afghanistan’s defense establishment, bringing nearly all other work to a halt. In the immediate aftermath, Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., the commander of coalition forces, ordered all foreign advisers and trainers out of Afghan government ministries and back to their bases.
At the military academy, foreign troops appeared on edge, fearful of another attack.
Massoud Hossaini, a photographer for The Associated Press, said he had arrived at the camp’s gate ahead of other journalists, and just as coalition armored vehicles were departing. A coalition soldier manning a roof-mounted gun on one vehicle shouted for Mr. Hossaini to “get away,” then fired what apparently was a warning shot.
“I don’t know what he fired. It was fired near our car,” Mr. Hossaini said, adding that he quickly left the scene.
In images of the incident released by The A.P., the gunner appeared to be firing a warning flare.
“I haven’t seen anything like this since 2010,” when an American and a Canadian colonel and two American lieutenant colonels were killed in suicide car bombing, said an American official in Kabul. There was “more than a little shock and numbness” at coalition headquarters.
Another coalition official compared General Greene’s death to the killings of American advisers at Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry by an Afghan government employee in 2012, an attack that led many Western officials here to question the viability of their purpose here. That attack came amid a wave of anti-American violence over burnings of Qurans at Bagram Air Field, a sprawling base north of Kabul.
There was no similar incident before Tuesday’s shooting. The general and the other Afghan and American officers were standing by a water purification tank when the Afghan soldier opened fire without warning, a senior Pentagon official said.
Afghan forces responded quickly, gunning down the assailant, and the shooting was over nearly as quickly as it began, Afghan and coalition officials said.
A German brigadier general and a senior Afghan commander also were among the wounded, Afghan and coalition officials said, though they declined to identify any of the Western victims by name. The identity of the gunman was not disclosed either.
Late into the night on Tuesday, many details of the shooting were sketchy, and the coalition, in an official statement, would only confirm that one of its service members had been killed in what it described as “an incident” at the Marshal Fahim National Defense University in Kabul.
Until Tuesday, no officer in the American military of major general rank or higher had been reported killed by hostile action abroad since the Vietnam War.
According to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial database, Maj. Gen. John Albert B. Dillard Jr. was killed on May 12, 1970, when his helicopter was shot down. Rear Adm. Rembrandt Cecil Robinson, the Navy’s equivalent of a brigadier general, was killed on May 8, 1972, when his helicopter crashed. Five other American officers of comparable rank were killed in the war, all in air crashes, whether accidental or caused by hostile action.
Lt. Gen. Timothy L. Maude, who was the Army’s deputy chief of staff for personnel, was killed during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the Pentagon, according to the Army War College in Carlisle, Pa.Lt. Gen. Timothy L. Maude, who was the Army’s deputy chief of staff for personnel, was killed during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the Pentagon, according to the Army War College in Carlisle, Pa.
Insider attacks in Afghanistan, in which Afghan troops open fire on unsuspecting coalition forces, at one point posed a serious challenge to the war effort, sowing distrust and threatening to upend the American-led training mission that is vital to the long-term strategy for keeping the Taliban at bay.
Though the number of attacks has dropped sharply since 2012, when dozens occurred, they remain a persistent threat for coalition troops serving alongside Afghan forces. “It’s impossible to completely eliminate that threat, particularly in a place like Afghanistan,” Admiral Kirby said.
Afghan and American commanders have said that they believed most of the insider attacks that had taken place were the work of ordinary soldiers who had grown alienated and angry over the continued presence of foreign troops here, and not carried out by Taliban fighters planted in Afghan units.
The Taliban, which often takes credit for insider attacks, did not assert responsibility for the Tuesday shooting. But Zabiullah Mujahid, a spokesman for the insurgents, said in an emailed statement that the gunman was an “Afghan hero soldier who turned his weapon against foreign invaders.”