WASHINGTON -- Five U.S. special operations troops were wounded in the past week during combat with Islamic State fighters in eastern Afghanistan, the senior U.S. commander in the country said Thursday.
It appeared to be the first reported instance of U.S. troops being wounded in fighting against the Islamic State in Afghanistan. U.S. military spokesmen in Kabul said they were researching the question of whether there have been previous casualties in combat with the regional Islamic State branch, which is present mainly in the country's eastern regions. Islamic State bases in the eastern province of Nangarhar, which borders Pakistan, are currently being targeted by an Afghan military offensive, backed by U.S. troops.
The Afghan offensive began Saturday, hours after the Islamic State claimed responsibility for a suicide bomb attack in the capital, Kabul, that killed more than 80 people.
Gen. John Nicholson, the top commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, said the five wounded Americans were hit by small-arms fire or shrapnel during a combat operation conducted with Afghan special operations forces to clear areas once controlled by the Islamic State in Nangarhar.
He did not say exactly when the injuries happened. The Pentagon later issued what it called a clarification, saying one of the five was wounded Sunday and the other four on Monday.
"There was not one incident or specific firefight, but these service members were wounded over the course of the clearing operations General Nicholson described," a Pentagon spokesman, Adam Stump, said in a statement. "As General Nicholson indicated, we're not able to discuss further specifics at this point of the counterterrorism operation."
Speaking to reporters at the Pentagon from his headquarters in Kabul, Nicholson said none of the wounds is life-threatening. Three of the soldiers have been evacuated to a U.S. military hospital in Germany, he said. "They're in good spirits," Nicholson said. "They've talked to their families. We expect a full recovery."
The other two wounded have been returned to duty in Afghanistan, he said.
Nicholson said the casualties happened during a counterterrorism operation in which Afghan forces have recaptured ground previously held by the Islamic State, after U.S. airstrikes.
Thus far, operations have been successful, Nicholson said.
"We have helped the Afghan security forces to reclaim significant portions of the territory that was previously controlled by Daesh," he said, using an alternative acronym for the Islamic militant group. "We have killed many Daesh commanders and soldiers, destroyed key infrastructure capabilities, logistical nodes, and Daesh fighters are retreating south into the mountains of southern Nangarhar as we speak."
He said the number of Islamic State fighters in Afghanistan has declined from an estimated 3,000 at the start of this year to between 1,000 and 1,500. The majority of those in Nangarhar are former members of a Pakistan Taliban group known as TTP, he said, adding that they were largely forced out of Pakistan by a government offensive and joined the Islamic State earlier this year.
Despite shrinking numbers and a loss of territory, the Islamic State carried out a suicide bombing in Kabul over the weekend that killed more than 80.
The joint U.S.-Afghan offensive operations against the Islamic State are just one part of a broader 2016 battle plan in Afghanistan, Nicholson said, one that involves widespread offensive operations against the Taliban, the Islamic State and other terrorist groups in the country.
Because of the uptick in operations, Afghan casualties are trending 20 percent higher than they were in 2015, Nicholson said. Additionally, U.S. forces have taken advantage of new authorities granted by President Barack Obama that allow for more leeway when it comes to advising and clearing airstrikes to better assist Afghan forces on the offensive. Nicholson said that since Obama approved the new authorities in June, the U.S. coalition in Afghanistan has conducted 40 airstrikes in support of their Afghan allies.
Information for this article was contributed by Thomas Gibbons-Neff of The Washington Post.
A Section on 07/29/2016