The largest US-led offensive in Afghanistan since the 2001 charge that unseated the Taliban is now under way, with Marines and Afghan troops attacking the southern Taliban stronghold of Marjah, which they surrounded yesterday. Operation Moshtarak—meaning “together” in the native Dari tongue—could involve as many as 15,000 troops, the BBC reports. Estimates put the number of insurgents in Marjah between 400 and 1,000.
(More Operation Moshtarak stories.)