The latest UN report on Afghan civilian deaths in the US occupation showed that so far in 2019, US and allied forces have killed more civilians within Afghanistan than the Taliban has. This was fueled by a growing number of US and Afghan airstrikes.



Interestingly, the report showed that the overall civilian casualties fell in the same period, reflecting a massive decrease in the number of suicide attacks across the country.



This reflects a major shift in the war situation in Afghanistan. With the Taliban consistently winning battles over territory on the ground, they’re less and less reliant on suicide attacks, and are just overrunning Afghan forces at will.



At the same time, with the Taliban winning, the US and Afghan forces are increasingly desperate, and with ground operations not working, they are relying increasingly on airstrikes to try to slow their losses, and that’s putting more civilians at risk.





Author: Jason Ditz Jason Ditz is news editor of Antiwar.com. View all posts by Jason Ditz