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Afghanistan
3,200 Taliban killed in Afghanistan in 90 days
2010-12-02
Via Michael Yon, who adds:

Last night I emailed to Colonel Erik Gunhus who is the Public Affairs officer for General Petraeus. I asked:
Erik,
Is there truth to this? A report that we have killed 3,200 Taliban in last 90 days? If so, that would go far in explaining why our casualties are far lower than I expected.
Colonel Gunhus just emailed back that it's true.
London, Dec 1 (IANS) Secret operations of British and US troops have led to the death of nearly 3,200 Taliban militants in just around 90 days in Afghanistan, a media report said Wednesday.

Of the killed or captured Taliban militants, 387 were top level commanders, The Sun reported.

These figures were handed to SAS official Andy McNab at a top-level briefing in Afghanistan capital Kabul.

McNab, however, said some commanders were worried that younger, more radical Taliban fighters will take the place of dead leaders.
Posted by:Glenmore

#13  worried that younger, more radical Taliban fighters will take the place of dead leaders

Iin the Pacific turned once the Japanese lost their skilled pilots (and we made ours); WWII in the Atlantic turned once the Germans lost their skilled U-Boat people. I suspect the top 20% are more valuable than the other 80% in any activity that requires skill. Remove the trainers and the trainees have to learn by making all their own mistakes - not an easy thing to survive.
Posted by: Glenmore   2010-12-02 19:29  

#12  

some commanders were worried that younger, more radical Taliban fighters will take the place of dead leaders.


That same thought occurred to me. When you take out the competent leadership that has risen through the ranks over the years, they are often replaced by less competent, more emotional hotheads. They tend to do more damage in the short term but tend not to live long in that position. Sort of like a final flaring before the flame goes out.

Posted by: crosspatch   2010-12-02 16:54  

#11  "New. World. Record!"
-- Bull Durham
Posted by: mojo   2010-12-02 16:02  

#10  Afghanis are tribal, and so many of the "Taliban" commanders are local small time tribal leaders that managed to talk 10-15 of their tribe's hotheads into following them. So a lot of what is happening now is that we are weeding out the local gang leaders for the Afghanis, and letting the uneducated tribal gunnies mill around.
Posted by: Shieldwolf   2010-12-02 15:59  

#9  I thought Andy Mcnabb was retired.
Posted by: chris   2010-12-02 15:59  

#8  They are also targeting to maximize high value targets hit, not bodycount.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2010-12-02 15:23  

#7  When any formation larger than a platoon invites a hail of smart bombs on your position, the officer corps tends to flatten radically.

Also, hill-country insurgencies tend by their nature to be somewhat decentralized. "War bands" sounds like a better description than platoons, now that I think about it... it all adds up to a lot of little franchises about as organized as biker gang chapters. Which means a swarm of commanders with less than twenty followers to get their heads blown off trying to go "over the top" in the presence of angry Westerners with superior weaponry.
Posted by: Mitch H.   2010-12-02 15:14  

#6  387 top level commanders? That's either a very top heavy organization or a very broad definition of top level.

Is every squad leader in the army a "top level" commander?
Posted by: Alan Cramer   2010-12-02 14:15  

#5  Seems that Petreaus is getting the job done.
Posted by: Ominens tse Tung9155   2010-12-02 10:59  

#4  McNab, however, said some commanders were worried that younger, more radical Taliban fighters will take the place of dead leaders. ?

So, how did that work in Iraq? The younger, the less experience, the easier to kill. Just work your way through it. I suspect the' worrying' is being done by those who falsely believe they could 'negotiate' with the older but traditional radical element.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2010-12-02 10:42  

#3  Is that 180 friendlies killed, or killed and injured?

I suppose the Taliban are either killed outright or they run away uninjured, so there are not so many injured?
Posted by: gorb   2010-12-02 10:27  

#2  Killed the equivalent of an enemy brigade in 90 days.

Among friendly forces, casualties for Sept-Nov 2010 are 180. Averaged out, for that quarter, that is an over 17.7-to-1 kill ratio.
Posted by: Anonymoose   2010-12-02 08:38  

#1  Go joes!
Posted by: Jeremiah Flainter9609   2010-12-02 08:28  

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