KABUL--The suicide bomber who killed eight Americans, including seven CIA officers, this week might have been able to get through multiple layers of security at the U.S. compound aided by an Afghan informant with the agency, a Western official said Friday.
If this is true, it suggests insurgents had turned the tables on the CIA and been able to place their own agents close to the facility the CIA used to cultivate informants.
On Wednesday, CIA officials had invited the attacker onto the base with the hopes of recruiting him as an informant. They used an Afghan intermediary to arrange the meeting. The attacker arrived, wearing an Afghan army uniform, officials said.
The assault shows a strategy the insurgency has increasingly employed here in recent months: using the uniforms and vehicles of the Afghan army and police to carry out attacks.
At times, militants strike with the help of sympathizers in the Afghan forces. In November, an Afghan police officer opened fire on Western forces, killing five British soldiers, and a similar incident happened in early December. Insurgent sympathizers in the police force helped plan both attacks, Afghan officials said.
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My heart goes out to the families of the victims and coworkers and also those wounded. I hold you in my prayers. Many thanks for your often thankless labors and the risks you take on behalf of us Americans.
