Afghan relatives carry the coffin of a Afghan National army (ANA) soldier killed in a Taliban attack on an army base in the Dihdadi district of Balkh province on April 22, 2017. "The soldiers were dropping like sparrows hit by a shotgun".
There are now about 8,400 USA troops and another 5,000 North Atlantic Treaty Organisation forces in the country, and Nicholson and other US military officials have said that several thousand more are needed to continue training and supporting Afghan forces. Conversations, however, according to current and former officials, were revolving around 3,000 to 5,000 additional troops.
The incident raised immediate questions over how such a mass killing could occur in a heavily defended headquarters frequented by foreign soldiers.
Insurgents targeted troops leaving Friday prayers at the base's mosque and in a canteen, the army said.
Meanwhile, German news magazine Der Spiegel reported yesterday that thousands of former Taleban fighters may have entered Germany over the past two years among an influx of more than a million migrants and refugees.
A U.S. Navy spokesman tells NPR's Tom Bowman, while there were more than two dozen Coalition forces at the base at the time of the attack, they sheltered in place and there were no Coalition casualties.
The attack lasted for almost six hours, with the insurgents firing guns, throwing grenades and detonating suicide bombs, officials and witnesses said. Taliban officials denied the charge, but photos circulating on social media showed a bullet-riddled pulpit.
"I had just finished my prayers and was outside the mosque when an army pickup sped towards us", said another wounded officer, who asked not to be named as his family had not been notified.
US carrier group heads for Korean waters, China calls for restraint
A Japanese official said the phone call between Trump and Abe was not prompted by any specific change in the situation. Analysts said earlier this month that North Korea's only nuclear site is "primed and ready" for another test.
"They entered the compound using two army trucks with machine guns on top of them".
"The dining room and the mosque are close to each other", said Lt-Col Aram.
McMaster said in a TV interview after returning to Washington that the U.S.in recent years has scaled back its military effort against the Taliban. In a message posted on Twitter, he said the assailants were led by four soldiers, who were Taleban sympathisers, inside the base.
The militants sprayed the base with gunfire before being shot and killed by Afghan commandos.
Afghanistan's defence minister and army chief have quit following the Taliban slaughter which claimed the lives of almost 140 unarmed soldiers and left scores of others injured.
Mattis' visit also comes after the USA dropped a GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast, dubbed the "Mother of All Bombs", on Islamic State hideouts in Achin district in eastern Nangarhar province, killing almost 100 militants, according to unverified figures from Afghan officials.
"Security is so tight that even soldiers without IDs are not allowed to get in", he said.
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