US Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan Cost $6 Trillion, NATO Soldier Killed, October 27, 2010

Study: US-led Afghan war costs trillions

Press TV, Wed Oct 27, 2010 7:23PM

US-led soldiers in Afghanistan While 75 percent of Afghan forces being underequipped, the annual cost of the war in Afghanistan has reportedly exceeded USD 200 billion for the first time since 2001.

Washington has allocated USD 15 billion this year to strengthen more than 100 of its military bases and 36 notorious detention centers across Afghanistan.

The Red Cross has confirmed the existence of several secret detention facilities at the US airbase in Bagram.

This is while Afghan 75 percent of Afghan police forces lack the means for conducting field operations.

The overall cost of the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could climb high with more US troop deployments planned for Afghanistan and no concrete date offered by President Barack Obama's administration for a complete withdrawal of forces from the two countries.

The reports come days after a study by Nobel Prize winner for economics Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard University Professor Linda Bilmes found that the combined costs for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq surpassed USD 6 trillion.

Despite the massive spending, the 150,000-strong foreign presence in the country has so far failed to stabilize Afghanistan.

Over 600 foreign troops have been killed across Afghanistan in 2010 in what has become the deadliest year for the US and NATO forces.

This is while anti-US sentiments are on the rise with Afghanistan and regional countries condemning US-led operations which claim the lives of civilians on a daily basis.

The invasion of Afghanistan was launched with the official objective of curbing militancy and bringing peace and stability to the country.

JR/AKM/MMN

NATO: Bomb kills service member in Afghanistan

By Katharine Houreld, Associated Press Writer –

Wed Oct 27, 2010, 6:22 am ET

KABUL, Afghanistan –

A bomb killed a NATO service member in northern Afghanistan on Wednesday, bringing the monthly death toll of NATO troops to 56, the coalition said.

The north, traditionally considered one of Afghanistan's safer region, has seen an upsurge in attacks and bombings in recent months. A Dutch aid worker and his Afghan driver were kidnapped in northern Afghanistan on Monday and their whereabouts are still unknown.

Coalition and Afghan forces have been pushing into Taliban strongholds in the south but insurgent attacks in other parts of the country have shot up.

So far, 596 members of the international coalition have been killed in Afghanistan this year. NATO did not give further details on the death or provide the nationality of the service member.

NATO also said its forces captured on Tuesday a man who is a facilitator for the Haqqani network responsible for moving bomb components into the capital Kabul. The Haqqanis are a mainly Pakistan-based Taliban faction closely tied to al-Qaida.

The arrest follows Monday's capture of a Taliban leader in Kandahar accused of constructing suicide vests and planning and directing bomb attacks.

Afghan and coalition forces say they have killed or captured many insurgent leaders in recent months but it is unclear whether the operations are having a major effect on quelling the insurgency.

In other developments, intense negotiations continued between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the international community over the Afghan government's Dec. 17 deadline for ridding the nation of private security guards.

The U.N.'s top representative in Afghanistan said in a Wednesday statement that the international community is supporting the "principled stand" the Afghan government has taken on private security companies. Negotiations are still under way about how fast it can be implemented.

Staffan De Mistura said the international community is committed to carrying out the decree with a "fixed timetable" and accepts that it "must respond promptly to President Karzai's long-standing concerns about the conduct of private security countries."

Karzai has said that the companies commit human rights abuses, pay protection money to the insurgency and undercut the national armed forces by offering higher wages.

The ban has threatened to shut down millions of dollars of development projects.

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