Night raids in Afghanistan

Gareth Porter on US/NATO night raids in Afghanistan.

Two moves by McChrystal last year reveal his strong commitment to night raids as a tactic. After becoming commander of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and United States forces last May, he approved a more than four-fold increase in those operations, from 20 in May to 90 in November, according to a December 16 report in the Los Angeles Times. One of McChrystal's spokesmen, Tadd Sholtis, acknowledged to IPS that the jump in number of night raids reflected McChrystal's guidance.

As a result of McChrystal's decisions, civilian deaths from night raids have spiked, even as those from air strikes were being reduced. Night raids caused more than half of the nearly 600 civilian deaths attributable to coalition forces in 2009, according to United Nations and Afghan government estimates,.