KABUL – Following seven Coalition deaths at the hands of Afghan police trainees in August alone, instructors here are struggling with how to keep their own students from ruthlessly gunning them down in so-called “green-on-blue” attacks.

“Part of the blame has to be laid on us,” said NATO Commander John Allen. “But we’ve got a dynamite new system in place now. For instance, we now ask all potential recruits: are you, or have you ever been, a jihadist hell-bent on expelling foreign devils from your ancestral homeland? If they answer yes, it’s a pretty good indication they aren’t well-suited for the Afghan police force. So we refer them to the local fire department instead.”

“We tried to make it a little more fun too,” said Allen. “A lot of the time, we think these trainees are just zoning out when we get to that boring stuff about how not to shoot your U.S. Army instructor. So now we play more games like ‘Should you shoot that guy?’ and a version of Jeopardy! where all the questions are about Coalition uniforms.”

In particular, the police instructors have been told to stop using Qurans for target practice, which Allen said “wasn’t really doing anyone any good anyhow.”
“Everyone is talking about this problem, what with the Afghan police killing Americans every other day now,” sighed Allen as he tore off another day from his wall calendar counting down to the withdrawal. “If I didn’t know any better, I would say that they don’t even want us here anymore.”

Originally published: September 2012