Afghanistan

Reflecting a quickening tempo of combat in Afghanistan as a U.S. troop buildup gets under way, six Western troops died Monday in or following clashes in the south and east. At least three of the dead were Americans. It was the worst daily toll in months for the Western coalition, which will increase this year by 30,000 American troops and an additional 7,000 from allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Four of the deaths came in separate incidents in Afghanistan's restive south, where most of the newly arriving troops are expected to be deployed.

With the American combat involvement in Iraq finally winding down, even as it continues to surge in Afghanistan, President Barack Obama is engaged in a political juggling act on which the fate of his presidency might eventually hinge. In his speech to a Disabled American Veterans convention Monday, Mr. Obama strove to convince the country he is living up to his 2008 campaign pledge to end the American combat role in the two Middle East wars — in Iraq by the end of this month and in Afghanistan by about a year from now. By Aug. 31, he said, the 141,000 U.S. forces in Iraq when he took office will have been reduced to 50,000, all of them limited to training Iraqi security forces and protecting American military trainers, contractors and facilities left behind.

For all practical purposes, the communist regime that ruled Afghanistan for 14 years no longer exists. What kind of government will replace it is an explosive issue, one that could trigger a second civil war even bloodier than the first.At this writing, rival rebel forces are poised north and south of Kabul, the defenseless capital, alternately talking reconciliation and war. It is an ominous situation, one that the United Nations with support from Moscow and Washington is frantically trying to defuse.

The man so big in stature and so brutal in technique that he was nicknamed "The Ox" was clearly in a good mood that day, beaming broadly as he predicted confidently that history would remember him as the savior of his nation.Seated at the big wooden conference table in an office ringed by security men, President Najibullah banged the table time and again to make his point. He belly-laughed, told stories of swimming against virtual tidal waves in the Caspian Sea and finally lowered his voice, narrowed his eyes and jabbed the air with a beefy finger as he summed up his five years at the helm of a nation at war with itself.

A Marine from Edgewater has died in Afghanistan, defense officials said Wednesday. Sgt. Julian C. Chase, 22, died Monday while conducting combat operations in Helmand province, Afghanistan, the Pentagon said. Chase was assigned to the 5 t h Air Naval Gunfire Liaison Company of the 3 r d Marine Expeditionary Force in Okinawa, Japan. Chase joined the Marines after graduating in 2008 from Woodrow Wilson High School in Washington. He told The Washington Times in 2009 that he "wanted to serve.

The nine o'clock news on the radio included a 15-second report that three American servicemen had been killed in Afghanistan. That was it. There wasn't time to mention that these three dead soldiers had mothers and fathers who will grieve for them the rest of their lives. It also left out whether these young men had brothers, sisters, wives or girlfriends — and maybe children, too. And it failed to ask why we were even in Afghanistan in the first place. Edward J. Gutman, Baltimore

In his address from Kabul, President Barack Obama said that the war that began in Afghanistan will end there because it is necessary to "finish the job" even though many Americans are tired of war. To my mind, the president's trip was a selfish political ploy. The U.S. has no choice but to fight when our enemies include groups likeal-Qaidaand the Taliban, whose aim in life is to annihilate every freedom-loving individual from the face of the earth. Quinton D. Thompson, Towson

Maj. Robert Marchanti of the Maryland Army National Guard was killed Friday night in Afghanistan, his family said Sunday. Marchanti, 48, a Baltimore County teacher, was on his first one-year tour in Afghanistan and was scheduled to return in September, said his sister-in-law Trish Sauter, who was reached at Marchanti's home in Baltimore. "He will be missed very much," said Sauter as she held back tears. The family, which was informed of Marchanti's death on Saturday, declined to reveal the circumstances of his death.

Sens. Benjamin L. Cardin and Barbara A. Mikulski urged President Barack Obama on Wednesday to speed the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Afghanistan. The Maryland Democrats joined a group of 24 senators in declaring the mission in Afghanistan largely accomplished. “It is time to bring our troops home from Afghanistan,” the group, which included 21 Democrats, two Republicans and an independent, wrote in a letter to Obama. “The United States intervened in Afghanistan to destroy al Qaeda's safe haven, remove the Taliban government that sheltered al Qaeda, and pursue those who planned the September 11th attacks on the United States.

A Maryland soldier is in Army custody and classified as a deserter - unfairly, relatives say - after he extended a two-week mid-tour leave to take care of his sick wife and their new baby. Republican Rep. Roscoe Bartlett of Frederick has asked the Secretary of the Army to investigate whether the Army mistreated Pfc. Christopher Pfeiffer, 20, of Westminster. Army officials would not comment on whether he faces charges or has received nonjudicial punishment. Lisa Wright, a spokeswoman for Bartlett, said Pfeiffer's case has been brought to the Army secretary's attention, the highest level for such appeals.