Afghan Artillery Becoming More Important

U.S. Army photo by SFC Pinnington

With the stepping back of U.S. forces from combat operations in Afghanistan the Afghan security forces are conducting more and more combat operations on its own. U.S. forces used to "partner" with the Afghan National Army (ANA) in the past - conducting joint operations and relying primarily on U.S. UAV, ISR, MEDEVAC, CAS, and fires support. Now that the Afghans are in the lead much of this support is fading away - fast. With the withdrawal of U.S. air assets and artillery units from Afghanistan the ANA will find itself relying more and more on it's own artillery assets - primarily the ANA 122-mm D-30 howitzer found at brigade level in its Combat Support kandak.

There is much concern about the reliance of the ANA on its own artillery units. Many of the ANA brigades still have not been fielded their D-30s (even though we have been building up the ANA since 2002). Those units that do have the D-30s are in the very beginning of their training program and still rely heavily on ISAF advisor assistance for fires deconfliction and targeting processes.

A recent new article on Danger Room of Wired.com by Spencer Ackerman captures the concerns of the newly minted Afghan artillery units in "Coming This Year to Afghanistan: Way More Artillery Strikes", January 23, 2013.