If you are one of those Americans who believes we have stayed in Afghanistan too long and should get out as quickly as possible, the past week has produced some dark days.
The Afghans’ inability to secure their nation and keep the Taliban at bay is in serious question after a quick series of incidents, particularly the massive prison break on Monday in which 480 inmates, many die-hard Taliban militants, escaped from one of the country’s largest correctional facilities.
The Saraposa prison, the largest secured facility of its kind in southern Afghanistan, was the scene of a mass-escape in a story that would probably be rejected in Hollywood as a highly unbelievable script that movie-goers would not accept.
Taliban militants inside and outside the prison spent five months digging a 1,000-foot-long tunnel, complete with electric lighting and an air filtration system, but were never detected by prison guards or officials.
The escape, aided by Taliban sympathizers on the prison payroll who released inmates from their cells, took 4 ½ hours.
But, according to one report, the prison guards did not notice anyone was missing until hours after the last escapee exited the tunnel.
Yet, this is just the latest incident that suggests corruption, apathy, incompetence, substance abuse and illiteracy have produced a culture Afghan security forces that makes them incapable of maintaining order or discipline.
Some others:
* A 20-year veteran of the Afghan Air Corps, after getting into an argument with U.S. troops on Tuesday during a military meeting, opened fire on the group from close range and methodically killed nine Americans. The Taliban claimed the shooter was an insurgent who gained access to the secured area with the help of insiders. According to ABC News, the shooting marked the seventh time this year that coalition soldiers or Afghan security forces have been killed by members of the Afghan security force or insurgents impersonating them.
* Among several Associated Press reports out of Afghanistan, on April 18 an insurgent killed two Afghan soldiers and an officer at the Afghan Defense Ministry.
* On April 16, six American troops, four Afghan soldiers and an interpreter were killed when an Afghan soldier detonates an explosive vest at Forward Operating Base Gamberi in Laghman.
* On April 15, a suicide bomber impersonating a policeman blows himself up inside the Kandahar police headquarters complex, killing the top law enforcement official in the southern province.
* On April 4, two American military personnel are shot and killed by a man wearing an Afghan border police uniform.
* In February, an Afghan solider shoots nine German soldiers, killing three and injuring six.
* In January, one Italian soldier is killed and another is wounded after an Afghan soldier opens fire on them.
