US-led airstrike obliterates friendly Afghan unit in another ‘tragic’ mishap

A joint Afghan-US contingent has used NATO air support to ‘suppress’ enemy combatants – which turned out to be a misidentified group of government security forces. This is the second such incident in less than a month.

An intense battle erupted while a joint American-Afghan contingent was on patrol mission in Kunduz province on Wednesday. The clash was so fierce that it forced the unit to call in air support to “suppress the onslaught of machine gun fire,” Army Colonel David Butler, a spokesman for US Forces Afghanistan told Task & Purpose.

However, once the ‘enemy’ was suppressed, the US command realized that the machine gun rounds were fired by “another group of Afghan security forces,” Butler said. The raid left a number of Afghan security personnel killed, the spokesman said, without specifying how many. No American troops were killed or wounded in the incident.

“This operation was extensively planned and coordinated with US and Afghan security forces to prevent an event like this from occurring,” Butler said, expressing “regret” over the loss of life.

Less than a month ago, on May 16, US airstrike in Helmand province killed at least 17 local police officers and wounded over a dozen others, after an Afghan unit confused friendly forces with Taliban fighters. Similar incidents of “friendly fire” have happened repeatedly in the past.

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