KABUL, Afghanistan — A helicopter crash in southern Afghanistan has killed five American service members, officials said Tuesday.

Monday night's crash brought the total number of U.S. troops killed that day to seven, making it the deadliest day for U.S. forces so far this year. Two U.S. special operations forces were gunned down hours earlier in an insider attack by an Afghan policeman in eastern Afghanistan.

The NATO military coalition said in a statement that "initial reports" showed no enemy activity in the area at the time. The cause of the crash is under investigation, the statement said.

A U.S. official said all five of the dead were American. The official said the helicopter went down outside Kandahar city, the capital of Kandahar province. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the information had not been formally released.

The five dead included everyone aboard the UH-60 Black Hawk, said Maj. Adam Wojack, a spokesman for the international military coalition in Afghanistan.

Their deaths make 12 U.S. troops killed so far this year in Afghanistan. There were 297 U.S. service members killed in Afghanistan in 2012, according to an Associated Press tally.

It was the deadliest crash since August, when a U.S. military helicopter crashed during a firefight with insurgents in a remote area of Kandahar. Seven Americans and four Afghans died in that crash.

In March 2012, a helicopter crashed near the Afghan capital, Kabul, killing 12 Turkish soldiers on board and four Afghan civilians on the ground, officials said. And in August 2011, insurgents shot down a Chinook helicopter, killing 30 American troops, mostly elite Navy SEALs, in Wardak province in central Afghanistan.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...n_2857685.html

Afghanistan Insider Attack Leaves 2 U.S. Soldiers Dead

KABUL, March 11 (Reuters) - Two American soldiers were killed in a so-called insider attack when a person in an Afghan military uniform turned his weapon on U.S. and Afghan forces at a joint base in the restive east of the country, coalition forces said on Monday.

Three policemen and two Afghan army officers were also killed in the attack, said a senior police official.

The attack took place as a deadline expired for U.S. special forces to quit the eastern province of Wardak, after Afghan President Hamid Karzai accused them and Afghans working for them of overseeing torture and killings in the area.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0....html?ir=World

U.S. Green Beret among those killed in Afghan attack
Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Two Americans -- one a Green Beret -- were killed Monday when an assailant wearing an Afghan National Security Forces uniform opened fire on the group, U.S. and NATO's International Security Assistance Force officials said.

The shootout in eastern Afghanistan didn't last long, as coalition forces "returned fire and killed the attacker," a U.S. official told CNN.

Two Afghan army personnel also were killed, said Gen. Zahir Azimi, an Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman. A U.S. military official told CNN that at least 10 Americans were wounded as well.

The assailant fired at the victims with a truck-mounted machine gun, Azimi said, after a meeting between coalition and Afghan forces at a military base in the Jalrez district of Wardak province, about an hour west of Kabul. Green Berets and Afghan forces are based there, a U.S. official said.
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/03/11/wo...ack/index.html

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