A USA soldier was killed and two others were wounded Tuesday in fighting in southern Afghanistan, the US military said.
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USA officials said special operations forces were accompanying Afghan forces in Marja when they engaged in a firefight with Taliban fighters. Joint forces from the U.S. and Afghan militaries are fighting the Taliban that is trying to capture the province bordering Pakistan from the Afghan government. One helicopter had to return after taking fire and another was damaged when its rotor blades hit a wall in the compound as it tried to land. Two HH-60 Pave Hawk medevac helicopters responded to assist the casualties.
“My understanding is that there may still be Americans on the ground in this immediate situation engaging with the enemy in support of Afghan forces”, Cook said. “But we are confident that the Afghan national security and defence forces are continuing to develop the capabilities and capacity to secure the country against a persistent insurgent threat”, Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook told reporters yesterday.
Lawhorn says US special forces were advising their Afghan counterparts during the battle.
Marjah is one of several parts of Helmand under control of the Taliban.
A US helicopter was sent to evacuate the casualties but did not immediately take off because of an unspecified problem.
An Afghan security official in Helmand said the operations in which the servicemembers were involved helped open the road between Marjah and the provincial capital, Lashkar Gah, for the first time in two months.
Last month, six USA troops were killed by a suicide auto bomb as they conducted a security patrol near Bagram airfield, the largest US military base in Afghanistan.
One was forced to turn back after coming under fire, Mr Cook said. “But they’re not at a point yet where they are able to operate entirely on their own, which is why United States forces, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation forces are there, assisting and providing this kind of training and assistance to the Afghans”.
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The deployment, in addition to a recent arrival of U.S. special forces in the region, comes a year after North Atlantic Treaty Organisation forces formally ended their combat operations in the country.
