, US Army engineers plan to double their workload in Afghanistan in the next year as NATO forces try to convince Afghans that reconstruction projects are improving their lives, a U.S. commander said on Oct. 18.
Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, said his staff in Afghanistan would focus on tasks such as road construction and electricity generation.
NATO officials have said reconstruction must be intensified to win over ordinary people in Afghanistan, which is experiencing its bloodiest year since U.S.-led forces ousted Taliban Islamists in 2001 after the Sept. 11 attacks.
“What I see in this coming year is about a doubling of the workload,” said Strock, referring to the U.S. fiscal year which runs from Oct. 1, 2006, to Sept. 30, 2007.
“The engineer district here has something like about 600 projects, I think, that we
