Today’s insider attack, also known as green-on-blue attack, is the second of its kind in the past week, and the third reported so far this year. The attack took place on a base that was overrun by Taliban fighters two months ago.
The attack that killed the three soldiers will only benefit the Islamic State, an enemy of the Taliban, by temporarily halting offensive operations in Nangarhar province. There have been two recorded insider attacks so far this year.
The commander of police at the airport confirmed that a guard killed the three contractors. The green-on-blue or insider attack is the first of its kind recorded so far this year.
Three ISAF soldiers were killed in a suicide attack in Kabul, while another soldier was killed after an Afghan soldier opened fire on military trainers at a base in Farah province.
The Taliban described Rafiqullah, the Afghan soldier who killed Major General Harold Greene, deputy commanding general of Combined Security Transition Command – Afghanistan, as a “martyr.”
In the reported first insider attack since Oct. 26, two Coalition troops were killed by two men in Afghan military uniforms, and several civilians were injured by crossfire.
ISAF confirmed that at least seven of the 88 prisoners at Bagram that the Afghan government plans on releasing were involved in attacks that killed Coalition forces.
The attack took place in Paktika province, a stronghold of the Haqqani Network. There have been four such attacks against ISAF personnel in less than a month.
Mohammed Roozi, who wounded three Australian soldiers and two Afghan troops in an attack in Uruzgan, was killed in the northern province of Takhar.
Afghan soldiers “turned his weapon” on US troops in Paktika, killing two soldiers and a civilian adviser. The attack is the seventh of its kind so far this year.
The two ISAF soldiers were killed in western Afghanistan. So far this year, there have been six such attacks, which account for 13 percent of ISAF’s deaths.
An Afghan National Army soldier opened fire on Lithuanian soldiers in an armored vehicle at an ANA control post, less than two months after security responsibility for the district was turned over to the ANA.
An examination of the factors that lead to insider attacks and tensions in the volatile district and across Afghanistan.
An Afghan Local Policeman opened fire on a US Special Forces base in Wardak. The attack is the second of its kind in four days.
A Taliban operative who was responsible for the death of an American soldier in May 2012 died along with an associate in a precision airstrike in Kunar’s Ghaziabad district. ISAF had claimed it killed the operative last September.
Two Afghan soldiers opened fire on Spanish troops; no one was hurt in the attack. There were 44 reported insider, or green-on-blue, attacks in 2012.
An Afghan policewoman assigned to the “gender and equality department” at the Interior Ministry is said to have shot an American civilian adviser in the head at close range.
An ISAF soldier was also wounded in the insider, or green-on-blue, attack. There have been 42 such attacks this year, resulting in the deaths of 60 ISAF personnel.
A Taliban official responsible for insider, or green-on-blue, attacks in Afghanistan’s southern and western provinces claims that Taliban infiltration is behind the great majority of attacks this year, and details the operations of the committee sponsoring them.
As green-on-blue attacks spike, US and Afghan military officials have taken increasingly strong measures to combat attacks on their forces by Taliban infiltrators and disgruntled Afghan troops. In 2012, green-on-blue attacks accounted for 15% of ISAF deaths.