Taliban suicide assault team strikes in Afghan capital

The Taliban claimed credit for a suicide assault on a police station in the Afghan capital of Kabul today.

A heavily armed three-man-strong suicide assault team dressed in military uniforms attacked a police station in the 1st district in Kabul, near the Finance Ministry, killing nine people. The attack began as a suicide bomber detonated his vest at a barrier outside the police station in an attempt to breach the security cordon. The two other attackers entered the compound and opened fire. They were engaged by Afghan police, who shot and killed the fighters during a gunfight.

Three policemen, an intelligence official, and five civilians were killed during the heavy fighting, according to Pajwhok Afghan News.

In a statement released on their propaganda website, Voice of Jihad, the Taliban claimed the attack and said the three suicide bombers were from Khost and Paktika, two areas under the influence of the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani Network.

“The three martyrdom-seeking Mujahideen of the Islamic Emirate are Hafiz Ibrahim the resident of Khost, Hafiz Muhammad Amin and Hafiz Muhammad Harees the residents of Paktika province,” the Taliban statement read.

The Taliban asserted that “dozens of the enemy soldiers have been killed or wounded,” but the group grossly exaggerates the casualties as a result of their operations on a daily basis. The Taliban claim scores of Coalition and Afghan troops are killed and dozens of “tanks” are destroyed each day.

The attack was likely executed by the Kabul Attack Network, which is tasked with hitting the Afghan government and Coalition forces in and around the capital. The network is made up of members from the Haqqani Network, Hizb-i-Islami Gulbuddin, the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and al Qaeda. A Haqqani Network commander known as Daud, or Dawood, co-leads the Kabul Attack Network along with a Taliban commander known as Taj Mir Jawad. The Kabul Attack Network was formed with the help of Siraj Haqqani, the operational leader of the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani Network.

Today’s attack is the first in Kabul since May 21, when a suicide bomber detonated his vest at a hospital that is used to treat Afghan soldiers. Six people were killed in the blast.

Prior to the May 21, the last major attack in Kabul took place on April 2, when a suicide assault team attempted to storm Camp Phoenix, a NATO base. The suicide bombers were defeated by US troops guarding the perimeter.

Also today in Afghanistan, the Taliban launched a series of attacks against ISAF’s supply lines in the southeast and the west. The Taliban killed five security guards in Nimroz province and four more in Ghazni province. Fifteen trucks transporting fuel to ISAF forces were destroyed in the attack. Also in Ghazni, insurgents who are thought to be “Taliban who came from Pakistan” attacked 26 villages today. And eight Pakistani Taliban fighters were reported to have been killed during fighting in Ghazni yesterday.

Bill Roggio is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Editor of FDD's Long War Journal.

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8 Comments

  • gitsum says:

    Lame! Cowardly! Defeatist tactics of a bunch of has-beens.

  • David says:

    Pakistan protests cross-border raid by Taliban? WOW, that takes the Chutzpah Prize, probably for the next millenium…

  • mike Burk says:

    Will Karzai squeak up about civilians killed by terrorists or does he save his rhetoric for the infidels

  • Civy says:

    Just wanted to say Thank You to all the life-takers and heart-breakers doing the heavy lifting in the sandbox on Father’s Day. This seemed like a good place to do so. You’re not forgotten. You’re appreciated. Keep at it.

  • Soccer says:

    AQC (Al Qaeda core, or Al Qaeda Central) has lost nearly 100 percent of it’s original leadership since 9/11.
    It’s a shame that AQ’s tactics still seem to be red hot in the Central Asian war theatre. This attack literally screams Al Qaeda; they were the first thing I thought of when I first saw the headline.
    Most likely, the attack was done by the Kabul Attack Network, and the Taliban extremists that took part in this attack were most likely thoroughly trained by Arabs in the field of commando assault tactics as well as suicide bombing (“martyrdom”) assaults. The AQ network is one of many groups that form the nexus of the Kabul Attack Network.
    It may just be me, but this also has the scent (stench) of Al Qaeda in Iraq on it. Although I doubt they had anything to do with this, these types of attacks are similar to what AQI now does in Iraq to attack whatever police or government installations they can. The method and the execution of the assault is identical to AQI’s recent escapades.

  • BullsEye says:

    @ Soccer:
    That’s an interesting possibility concerning the AQI connection to attacks in terms of strategy.
    Al-Qaeda Central today is a different beast to the one pre and just post 9/11. What is actually making AQ still relevant is the support of a state and military that is bent on draining money and aid from the same source that it secretly hates and wants to destroy.
    Pakistan is a split-state, in government and military. They have no qualms about openly heaping praise on their Chinese friends while waging a secret war on the US with terrorist groups.
    Al-Qaeda ultimately came within the gravitational pull of the Pakistani ISI after 9/11 and one wonders how much future historians will write about that.

  • JackAnts says:

    Unfortunately I think the situation in the Middle East will never change if it is not the same people to change … we need a new mentality, more free and open to the West. Only in this way this terrible series of murders will end

Iraq

Islamic state

Syria

Aqap

Al shabaab

Boko Haram

Isis