U.S. troops join Afghan forces in battle to retake captured provincial capital from Taliban

Early Wednesday, U.S. and allied coalition troops battled Taliban insurgents outside the Afghan provincial capital of Kunduz, two days after the Taliban captured the country's sixth-largest city in a lightning strike. "Coalition special forces advisers, while advising and assisting elements of the Afghan Security Forces, encountered an insurgent threat in the vicinity of the Kunduz airport at approximately 1 a.m.," said Col. Brian Tribus, a spokesman for the coalition. Also on Wednesday, he added, the U.S. conducted its third airstrike near the Kunduz airport, an important staging ground for Afghan forces. This report from Reuters shows some video of the Afghan forces' attempt to retake Kunduz:

This is the first time since 2001 that the Taliban has captured a major Afghan city, and if they hold it, it would provide them a new base of operations as well as an economic hub. The attack comes just a year after the formal end of the NATO combat mission in Afghanistan.

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