US Air Force drone crashes in S. Afghanistan

Afghan army to fly first unmanned aircraft in March

KABUL, Feb 21, (Agencies): An unmanned American aircraft crashed at an airfield in southern Afghanistan less than three months after an identical drone went down in November, a US Air Force spokesman said on Sunday.

After ending its combat mission in 2014, the US military still uses air strikes by drones and other aircraft in Afghanistan to target suspected members of al-Qaeda and Islamic State and back up Afghan forces battling a Taleban insurgency.

There were no injuries or civilian damage in the crash of the state-of-the-art $14-million MQ-9 Reaper late on Saturday night, Captain Bryan Bouchard of the 455th Air Expeditionary Wing said in a statement.

“The crash was contained on Kandahar airfield,” he added. “US Air Force authorities will investigate the cause of the crash but hostile fire was not a factor.”

Usually guided remotely by pilots outside Afghanistan, unmanned aircraft have played a major, and sometimes controversial, role in the American war, acting as spy planes and launching missiles at suspected militants.

In November, another Reaper operating out of Kandahar and armed with missiles was totally destroyed when it went down more than 483 km (300 miles) to the northeast of the base in a mountainous area.

The cause of that crash was not made public but the military also ruled out ground fire as a suspected factor.

Reapers were the US Air Force’s first specifically designed “hunter-killer” unmanned aircraft, and are larger and more powerful than the older MQ-1 Predator drones.

Meanwhile, the Afghan military is expected to field its first specialized surveillance drones as soon as March, a US commander in Kabul said on Thursday, as the Asian nation slowly expands its own air force.

The boost in military hardware comes as Afghan security forces, fighting largely alone since the withdrawal of most international forces in 2014, have struggled for months to hold back a Taleban insurgency.

The NATO-led military alliance will provide the remotely piloted ScanEagle aircraft, and will train Afghan soldiers to operate the system, said Major General Gordon Davis, commander of the unit that procures new equipment for the Afghans.

“We are just getting the first drones that will be deployed by the corps,” Davis told Reuters in an interview. “We’ve been preparing sites. The pieces and parts are coming in now.”

The first drones to be operated by the Afghan National Army will be rolled out in the country’s north and south, which have seen some of the heaviest fighting in recent months, Davis said.

Afghan officials have asked the alliance for additional resources in air support and reconnaissance, both areas that remain heavily reliant on its aid.

An Afghan defence ministry spokesman confirmed the unmanned aircraft were on their way, with crews preparing for their deployment.

“Afghan army officers are currently being trained on drones in the United States,” said Dawlat Waziri. “As soon as their training is complete, they will be able to fly them here.”

He declined to comment on the numbers being trained, or when training will be completed.

Afghan crews will train at a base in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, with equipment and parts being positioned ahead of the expected deployment late in March, Davis added.

International contractors will operate the initial aircraft alongside Afghan army mission commanders as well as help in the training for at least three years, the alliance says.

The army will receive eight “systems,” each including six aircraft, that are planned to be eventually used in all of the most contested areas in the country.

Taleban operations in the northern provinces of Jowzjan, Kunduz and Baghlan, besides fighting in southern Helmand, have severely stretched government forces and caused heavy casualties in recent days.