"The Taliban insurgents who attacked a remote American-run outpost near the Pakistan border on Sunday numbered nearly 200 fighters, almost three times the size of the allied force, and some breached the NATO compound in a coordinated assault that took the defenders by surprise, Western officials said Monday.
The attackers were driven back in a pitched four-hour battle, and appeared to suffer scores of dead and wounded of their own, but the toll they inflicted was sobering. The base and a nearby observation post were manned by just 45 American troops and 25 Afghan soldiers, two senior allied officials said, asking for anonymity while an investigation is under way."
"American and Afghan forces started building the makeshift base just last week and its defenses were not fully in place, said one senior allied official. In some places, troops were using their vehicles as barriers against insurgents.
The militants apparently detected the vulnerability and moved quickly to exploit it in a pre-dawn assault in which they attacked from two directions, American officials said."
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