B.K.Bangash/AP
Pakistani villagers collect oil leaking from torched NATO trucks near Peshawar, Pakistan on Thursday, Oct. 7. Gunmen in northwest Pakistan torched a dozen tankers carrying fuel to NATO troops, the latest strike against supply convoys heading for Afghanistan since Pakistan shut a key border crossing last week.
Mohammad Sajjad/AP
Pakistani villagers collect oil leaked from NATO tankers on Thursday. The trucks were waiting for the reopening of the Torkham border crossing, which was closed a week ago after NATO helicopters attacked a Pakistani post along the Afghan frontier.
Arshad Arbab/EPA
A boy collects fuel from a shouldering oil tanker carrying fuel for NATO forces in Afghanistan on Thursday. Firefighters in northwestern Pakistan were trying to extinguish fires engulfing at least 50 trucks carrying supplies for NATO troops in Afghanistan after the latest suspected militant attack on supply convoys.
Adrees Latif/Reuters
Residents on horse-led carts hurry past burning fuel tankers along a road near Nowshera, located in Pakistan's Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province on Thursday.
Today's destruction of dozens of fuel tankers presented a remarkably audacious scene. Kids and adults alike turned out with any container they had to collect spilling fuel from the smoldering and burning trucks.
NBC News reports that NATO tankers have been attacked seven times since the border was closed. Meanwhile, hundreds of tankers, essentially sitting ducks, remain stranded without security.
Fore more photos and information, visit yesterday's post on the same topic.
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They should air strike and blow up the stranded tankers.
A few hellfire missiles should do the trick and put out the fires as well. And we need to send Pakistan a clear message by stopping all aid to the country until they get total control of the Taliban and Al-Quaida. Pakistan is NOT acting like a NATO ally in my opinion.
I agree with stopping all monetary aid to Pakistan, and that they are not acting like allies. Keeping the supply route closed sets our supplies up for the terrorists to act. Screw the Pakistani government and the anti-American sentiment permeating the country. We really need to get out of that part of the world and stop any immigation from those countries into ours. It makes no sense to import terrorism.
I wonder how much of this "fuel" is going to be used against coalition forces after it is neatly bundled up and placed on a vehicle with a timer. Maybe the corrupt Pakistan government and military officials will make sure they have "protection" during their operations.
Where is this Administration, and especially the Secretary of the State, and the U.N. on this issue ???
Oh, forget about the U.N., they are more interested in criticizing Arizona on their expansion of the United States Immigration laws. The U.N. needs to be abloshed NOW !!!
TimesofPakistan.com
57 NATO tankers set ablaze in fresh assaults
* 22 tankers torched in Quetta, one killed
* 35 tankers burnt in Nowshera attack
* Balochistan IGP says police can’t provide security to supplies with limited means
QUETTA/LAHORE: Twenty two oil tankers carrying fuel supplies for ISAF in Afghanistan were attacked and destroyed in a daring raid in the early hours of Wednesday on the outskirts of Quetta. Meanwhile, unidentified assailants attacked a convoy of NATO oil tankers on the GT Road near Nowshera, setting 35 of the tankers ablaze, a private TV channel reported,
The incident in Quetta – the sixth of such on convoys taking supplies to Afghanistan since Pakistan closed a key border crossing almost a week ago – took place at Akhtarabad on the outskirts of the city. The driver of one of the trucks was killed in indiscriminate shooting by the assailants, while firefighters took over six hours to put out the fire as they faced “shortage of chemicals” in doing so.
Witnesses confirmed that armed men in two vehicles and motorbikes attacked the roadside terminal at dawn and opened indiscriminate fire to scare away people. They also fired two rockets on an oil tanker parked inside. Consequently, eight tankers caught fire, which later engulfed, and significantly damaged, at least 22 oil tankers, while 12 were destroyed completely.
Hello World!
NATO and USA must treat Pakistan as a never trusted nation! This nation is a big chaos! from all aspects! al-Qaedas and Talibans are inside this government for decades! and no one can recognize a innocent Pakistu and a killer at all! Due to they all look the same and they can be very deadly if you trusted them! never approach these risky folks! Period! Anyone who might disrespect this said principle then he or she will have greatest chance to pay for his/her own life! Period! If a Pakistanu bought a house next to mine! then I will sell my house for half-price and move away from the troubles next to my house! Period! Thanks to all! ~~~~~(BellaVista)~~~~~~~
Oh God rofl. I think I lost a few IQ points just reading the ignorance all over this post like moss on the north side of a tree. Are you telling me that you would seriously sell your house at half price if someone who claims to be a "Pakistanu" decided to move into the house next door to you? I have an idea, let's criticize the masses based on the actions of the few.
Seriously. Before you make an asinine assumption like you have, please educate yourself on the topic at hand. Might I even suggest stepping outside your house to observe the general population of the area. I'm sure that you will find that a lot of people share a lot of the same ideas and beliefs, but even more don't. Do you believe all Mexicans should be sent back to mexico because a small minority of them are here illegally? Probably not. Do you think that all Muslims are terrorists because of what al-Qaida has done? I honeslty wouldn't put that past you.
Please please please, get yourself educated on humanity and on international conflict before you make comments that make you out to be a psycho.
Ugh....is anyone at the Military reading these articles or even aware of the attacks on the supply convoys?
I know i'm going out on a limb here, but maybe someone should think about incorporating some security measures into the supply chain instead of providing the insurgents/militants with a free shooting gallery every day.
Or even better, threaten the government of Pakistan with whatever is necessary to open the primary supply route back up. This is getting to be regoddamndiculous and our government looks like it has absolutely no idea what its doing right now.
Yes, my immediate thought was "Where was the SECURITY ???" And how do these drivers get out alive ??
The sad part is that they basically just send these convoys out of Pakistan with, at best, some light police protection and those guys aren't going to stick around in a gun fight using their pistols/rifles against heavy machine gun fire, rpgs and automatics being used adversaries who have a huge tactical advantage.
The drivers who are lucky enough to not be the initial targets have to get out of the trucks ASAP and run away on foot...that's really the only way they survive these attacks b/c the vehicles aren't armored or armed in any way aside from whatever side arms the drivers might be carrying. There's no driving them away either since the trucks are all incredibly old and probably in a state that would be considered 'barely functioning'.
Aside from water and ammunition, there's really NOTHING more important than gas for some of the most important aspects of fighting and operating functioning bases out in Afghanistan and THIS is how our government has decided to handle the transport of such an important cargo....it really speaks volumes about the people who are in charge over there.
They should blow up Pakistan
Pakistan is a big mess or chaos and it also is a prehistoric society and culture! where the prehistoric folks are crawling to collect spilled oil and fuel to make living as seeing! Maybe they wanted to see more burned fuel-trucks in their land to get free fuel for winter and cooking around! This is a "Horrible Society" indeed!
Pakistan is the one country that makes me lose sleep at night.
No sympathy anymore.
First they try to blow the trucks up then they steal the fuel. In that part of the world they cut hands off of thieves
It looks that this war will last for long time so it would be good idea to build the tunnel between Alaska and Russia under Bering Strait. It could make good supply road.
For what purpose? To expose our convoys to another of our "Allies" - Russia? You have got to be kidding. (I hope you are!)
Air strike while they collect the fuel, then let's get the hell out of the Middle East. We can't win anything there; we haven't, aren't, and never will do any good in any of the countries in that part of the world. Our last victory in a war was 1945. Will we never learn?
You're advocating airstrikes on civilians (including children) because they're collecting leaking gasoline?
BINGO! ! "Man Mad As Hell" hit the nail on the head (minus the stupid air strike idea). The reality is you can not force people to change without creating resentment and resistance. The trick is to have them want to change for themselves.
What Pakistan needs is Drones, Drones and more Drones!
Politics and BIG government contracts! Our forces aren't allowed to provide security for those vehicles. It would have to be a private security company hired to escort them through Pakistan. And, I bet Pakistan has a law or a policy preventing that as well. If these were military vehicles, then the stakes would be different as they would have secured areas to stop and wait in.
Of course our president wont do anything about it except write a strongly worded letter to Pakistan and may even blame our guys that are killing the militants with the over the border air attacks.
Question - let's say that Canada was tired of the violence in Mexico, and wanted to use our border as the front lines for the battle...and we think "well this saves us a ton of money, sure have it at canada!"
so they set up shop, for a while everything is going really well, until out of nowhere canadian drones light up a texas ranch because they "heard through the grapevine" that a few americans were harborning drug cartel thugs there.
Does anyone think that texans wouldnt respond? Or that their response wouldnt be valid? Im struggling to believe that we'd sit back and say "oh but ya know mistakes happen, have at it canada, we know you didnt mean it"
Or lets just pretend that canada has been our sort-of friend, sometimes they've done things for us to question that, but mostly they've just been annoying to us...are we going to assume they didnt do it intentionally? Even though they SWORE to us they would not drop any missiles from drones on our side of the border?
maybe if we stopped playing "war of the worlds" we could actually focus our efforts on our own failing nation.
So, stop fighting the malignant cancer that these terrorist guys are and focus on soley trying to improve our nations health with legislation that funds everything else except the economy? Emphasis on the malignant cancer part because these guys will spread and multiply if left unchecked.
Now, I agree that this war is costly and extremely complex because the roaches have fled back into Pakistan (where we aren't allowed to go) and are waiting for us to leave. And, Pakistan doesn't have to ability to enforce its own laws over its whole landmass.
It's a perpetual dilemma, stay a long time and hope to secure Afghanistan well enough that it can fend for itself (another 10 years, MAYBE) or just leave now so we can focus (in theory) on ourselves and watch all of our hard earned efforts and money spent go to absolute waste as the Afghanistan army and government falls in a matter of about a year. Then in less than a decade after, there'll be another 9/11 type attack on us.
We're damned if we do, damned if we don't. I prefer the part where we stay and see this through to a better end than if we leave right now. For anyone who wants to challenge my perceived wardrums manner, I am subject to deployment for OEF, just so that you know where I'm coming from.
Do these people have a "spray for pay fee". Who forgot to pay the bill? Another slip on the downslope to the Abyss and Conserative America seems to want to take the lead in getting there. This s not conservatism...it is out and out greed and selfishness. The way we are doing this, we should just burn the fuel in place and forgo trying to move it. This makes no sense to me.
Didn't O'Bama run on an election promise to go after the taliban and al-Qaeda in Pakistan, persuing them if necessary even if the pakistan governement objected? OK so they send in a chopper, and it gets fired upon by pakistani troops and the chopper returns fire killing the troops. Then we get this border being closed in retaliation by teh Pakistan government. Are they an ally or not? if they want to behave this way, then let us stop giving them money. They seem to be doing nothing to help us. They won't even allow us to go in after these people, and Obama has not got the balls to follow up on his election pledges. OK so Pakistan send troops into Swat valley and other taliban strongholds, but all they do is negotiate a settlement with local tribal leaders. Just shoot them and be done with it.
FYI, the US created the Taliban back in 1984. Also, the Taliban are very very different from Al-Qaida.
The best thing we can do is leave and allow the Taliban to take control of Afghan government. They will secure the country from Pakistan and India, and although Al-Qaida will be able to operate there, at least we'll know where they are. We've gone in taken control of a bunch of mountains and where is al-qaida now? Probably right under our nose. Cut our losses and get out before we cause more issues and lose more troops. A mojority of the Afghans don't even want us there anymore. Where's the individual security when innocent people are still getting blown up by our drones?
See them riding in those carts with horses? That's the way America would look with Sharia law!!! They would tear the Country down!! God bless America!!!!
pakistan was once our greatest ally in the region,/ but now the drones have destroyed that too.
The ppl taking the oil, I'm sure, were not the same ones who fired on the NATO tankers. SMDH at all the IGNORANT comments that ppl make. If I didn't have the money for fuel and someone else blew up a tanker, YTF should I NOT go get some free fuel? I am so tired of ppl saying such horrible things about Paki, Iraqi, Indian, etc. WE ARE ALL HUMAN BEINGS with bad and good and extremists in every "race". Until YOU yourself stop the racism and the fear, it will not end. Not ever.
I agree 100 percent. So many americans seem to think we can just violate any countries rights yet if it happened to us we would be yelling and attacking the other country. How many times must they tell us to stay out of their country and airspace? This isnt even a first time. Look at Korea, Vietnam we been doing this forever. Why dont we give others some respect and maybe we will recieve some in return. I also have to wonder how many americans out there think it was ok to spend millions of dollars and kill thousands of innocent people to try and get our hands on one terrorist? If we are so powerfull and so smart couldnt we have done this with just a little more smarts?
What a scummy, dirty part of the world.
I guess since they can't guard the fuel trucks, we will have to not send that 2 billion in aid.
it seems to me that the U.S. military should just re-open the border crossing. Let the Pakistanis try and stop it. My guess is they aren'[t willing to give up the billions in foreign aid they now receive.
we should have never gone into any of those middle eastern countries in the first place, not all wide open like we did. We should have been hush hush about it and let black ops do their jobs. well hind sight is 20/20 and it's to late to turn back now. We have to see this thing through no matter what, if we allow these terrorists a whole nation by leaving they will come back and the next time it will be allot worse than 9/11. We definately should tell Pakistan "screw it we're coming in like it or not" they aren't going to fight us if we do so long as we don't just rampage the country. If they did figth we have the ability to take them down and put our own in place even with the struggling economy. We are still one of the richest most powerful nations in the world and we have the most military strength and the most advanced equipment. If only there was no organized religion trying to define God this wouldn't be happening.
Looks like we are getting closer and closer to "Mad Max" becoming reality. Dress these Pakistani's in leather and spikes instead of their traditional long dresses, and these pictures look like a scene from "Mad Max".