The Taliban targeted General Mattis last night at the Kabul airport, however Mattis was already long gone when the attack occurred. Five locals were hurt in the attack:
Taliban claims Kabul rocket attack targeted Defense Secretary Mattis but "he was long gone" says @barbarastarrcnn https://t.co/0Pe6ib81d1
— CNN Newsroom (@CNNnewsroom) September 27, 2017
Here’s more:
NY POST – US Defense Secretary James Mattis was targeted in a rocket attack that left at least five civilians wounded at an Afghan airport Wednesday hours after he arrived to pledge support for the government.
The rockets landed in an open area after being fired at Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport, Interior Ministry spokesman Najib Danish told CNN.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, which was meant to target Mattis’ plane, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid tweeted.
But Mattis and NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg had already left the airport at the time of the incident, Danish said.
One rocket struck a home near the airport, wounding the five victims, one of whom was a woman who was “not in a good health condition,” Danish added.
Up to 40 rounds of munitions were fired — 29 of which were rocket-propelled grenades — toward a guard tower and hit the south side of the airport, a US military official told CNN.
Tumor Shah Hamedi, director of Kabul airport, said all flights were halted as result of the attack.
At a press conference with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and Stoltenberg, Mattis said, “an attack on an airport anywhere in the world is a criminal act by a terrorist.”
Ghani said at the presidential palace that special forces troops brought the attack under control.
The Taliban wouldn’t have known Mattis was coming to Afghanistan because they keep all of that a secret. So my guess is that once the Taliban heard Mattis had landed, they just began firing at the airport in an effort to harm him and his plane.