Preventing roadside bombs from killing U.S., NATO, and government troops has been more difficult in Afghanistan than in Iraq because of the undeveloped conditions there, a senior Pentagon official said Monday. Defense Department acquisitions chief Ashton Carter told reporters that “we are just beginning to get set in Afghanistan … in doing everything that we can” because the country is so remote and lacks infrastructure. Carter and Lieutenant General Jay Paxton are leading a new taskforce focused on diffusing so-called improvised explosive devices (IEDs). The Pentagon already has an IED office, though critics say that bureaucratic obstacles have prevented it from being as effective as possible.
