Summary: Continuing a surge in CIA-run, drone-fired attacks, the U.S. conducted two missile strikes in the northwestern Pakistan tribal region along the Afghan border today, killing nine suspected militants. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on October 8, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that there were indications Afghanistan could become the theater for a proxy war between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan.

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Summary: Analysis on the 9th anniversary of the beginning of the U.S. war in Afghanistan on October 7, 2001. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on October 7, 2009, Aubrey Immelman provided news and analysis on the 9th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan to topple the Taliban, destroy al-Qaida, and kill or capture Osama bin Laden and other leaders of the terrorist organization.

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Summary: Weekly report of U.S. military deaths in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, compiled from U.S. Department of Defense news releases. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on October 6, 2009, Aubrey Immelman provided his weekly report of U.S. military deaths in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan).

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Update: Jacob Wetterling’s remains have been found after Danny Heinrich led investigators to a site in Central Minnesota. … Previous: Stearns County Sheriff John Sanner announced that nothing of consequence was found in the July 2010 search of the Rassier farmstead in the Jacob Wetterling kidnapping investigation; however, he added that technology could eventually improve to the extent that it would allow for future testing of the items seized.

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Summary: Pakistan’s shutting of a key supply line for coalition troops in Afghanistan and the apparent ease with which militants are attacking the stranded convoys are shaking an already uncomfortable relationship between Washington and Islamabad. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on October 4, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that hundreds of insurgents armed with automatic rifles and rocket-propelled grenades nearly overran a U.S. outpost near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, killing eight U.S. soldiers and capturing more than 20 Afghan security forces in the deadliest assault against U.S. troops in more than a year.

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Summary: Militants attacked and set fire to at least 20 tankers carrying oil for NATO and U.S. troops in Afghanistan, the third such strike inside Pakistan in as many days. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on October 3, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that President Barack Obama had met with Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, U.S. military commander in Afghanistan, as he pondered whether the U.S. should send tens of thousands more troops to crush the Taliban in a broad counterinsurgency strategy, or shift to a narrower antiterrorism focus on al-Qaida in neighboring Pakistan.

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Summary: Responding to credible al-Qaida threats, the U.S. State Department is issuing a travel alert urging American citizens to be vigilant if they travel in Europe. Officials have not identified specific targets, but it’s likely terrorists might be considering Mumbai-style “swarm attacks.” … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on October 2, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, U.S. Fearmonger-in-Chief — as though vying for the title of “World’s Greatest Exaggerator” — made the histrionic claim that by fall 2010 “someone’s 13-year-old daughter could walk into a sex clinic, have a pregnancy test done, be taken away to the local Planned Parenthood abortion clinic, have their abortion, be back, and go home on the school bus that night … [with] Mom and Dad … never the wiser.”

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Summary: Muqtada al-Sadr, the radical, anti-American Muslim cleric whose Mahdi Army militia once fought U.S. occupation forces in Iraq positioned himself as a big winner in Iraq’s months-long political deadlock when his Sadrist party threw its support behind beleaguered Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on October 1, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported on the inauguration of Fr. Robert J. Koopmann, OSB, as the 12th president of St. John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota.

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Summary: Pakistan has blocked a vital supply route for U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan in apparent retaliation for an alleged cross-border helicopter strike by the coalition that killed three Pakistani frontier troops. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on September 30, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that the Princeton, Minn., police and fire departments and bomb squads from Minneapolis and Crow Wing County were responding to reports of suspicious packages at the Princeton post office, high school, and public utilities building. It was later established that the packages contained “inert powders” and no hazardous materials — an apparent hoax. Police ultimately took two local teenagers into custody a couple of days after the incident.

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Summary: The heavily fortified Green Zone in Iraq’s capital has in recent weeks come under an intensifying barrage of rocket attacks, and a senior American military commander is suggesting that Iranian-backed militias are behind the attacks in an effort to influence the formation of a new Iraqi government. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on September 29, 2009, Aubrey Immelman provided his weekly report of U.S. military deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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