How much longer does the 'thing' at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. sit by and let this occur? This is only a portion of the story - full text of 8 pages can be found at AP....
AP IMPACT: An insider attack: Trust cost 2 lives
By ROBERT BURNS AP National Security Writer The Associated Press
Tuesday, December 4, 2012 2:39 AM EST
Email Print Share FILE - This Oct. 10, 2011 file photo shows transfer cases containing the remains of... (AP Photo/Steve Ruark, File)
(AP) — It was a sneak attack, but not by the enemy they feared.
U.S. Army Capts. Joshua Lawrence and Drew Russell were inside a small command post on an Afghan army base, wrapping up a long day of coordinating the safe arrival of nearly 100 Afghan religious and tribal leaders for a peace conference at a nearby palace.
Darkness had fallen.
Some of their fellow soldiers had retired for the evening. Two stood guard.
All seemed well.
But as several soldiers sprawled on nearby cots, playing cards, the calm collapsed catastrophically at 9:27 p.m.
An exploding grenade shattered the stillness, followed in seconds by bursts of gunfire. Before any of the Americans could raise a hand to defend themselves, Lawrence was dead from a bullet to the head, and Russell was dying, shot three times in the back.
They were not killed by the Taliban, as the U.S.-led military coalition indicated the day after the Oct. 8, 2011, assault. Lawrence, 29, of Nashville, Tenn., and Russell, 25, of Scotts, Mich., were killed in what U.S. investigators later called a "calculated and coordinated" attack by Afghan soldiers entrusted to work alongside their U.S. partners.
