NEAR MARJAH, Afghanistan – U.S. Marines fired smoke rounds Wednesday and armored vehicles maneuvered close to Taliban positions to test insurgent defenses ahead of an anticipated attack on the biggest militant-controlled town in southern Afghanistan.
A NATO spokesman in Brussels called on Taliban militants holding Marjah to surrender. But a Taliban spokesman boasted that the militants were prepared to "sacrifice their lives" to defend the town against the biggest NATO-Afghan offensive of the eight-year war.
The date for the main attack by thousands of Marines and Afghan soldiers has not been announced for security reasons. However preparations have accelerated in recent days, and it appeared the assault would come soon.
I am not a military genius, don't plan big assaults nor do I plan to, but I have serious doubt about this strategy. So now we are giving warning to the enemy that we are going to attack them in the near future. We probe them and then release statements to the news media that we were just testing there defenses for an up coming attack. What happened to the surprise attack, I am having a hard time with this. We are already in an area that we are not familiar with, the locals aren't real keen on us being there and now a third strike against us, we let them know we are planning an attack. Whats the big deal right? We have the most advanced military in the world, what are we worried about. These people are not the usual enemies, like the Taliban spokesman said, they are ready to sacrifice their lives, lets not give them time to prepare their IED's and ambushes of our armoured convoys by announcing we are coming. I will be praying for our soilders in the weeks to come, I fear this will turn out........not as good as we would hope. God be with those troops.