Still on Red Alert Over Green-on-Blue Attacks HONG KONG - The new agreement that gives Afghan forces more control over controversial night raids against suspected insurgents could also serve to reduce the stress levels between Afghan and American troops. But the "strategic corporal" in the field is ever more vigilant and wary. Tensions among troops have escalated markedly since the burning of some Korans by U.S. soldiers and the killing of 17 Afghan civilians a month ago, allegedly by an American staff sergeant. Meanwhile, of course, American and NATO troops continue to work alongside their Afghan counterparts every day - and every night. They are manning remote combat outposts, conducting patrols, gathering intelligence, reaching out to local villagers. It is not always a good fit, to say the least, and the Koran burnings and the civilian massacre have made an uneasy relationship all the more difficult. There have been at least 10 attacks this year by Afghan soldiers or police officers on their American or NATO counterparts - what the military calls green-on-blue attacks. Gen. John R. Allen, the top commander in Afghanistan, has also called it the "insider threat." "It is a characteristic of this kind of warfare," General Allen said. A brief video of his remarks is here. He said Afghan military leaders were checking new recruits more fully while using informants inside existing units to catch out infiltrators. "Every single incident has an out-of-proportion effect on morale, and that goes for coalition forces as it goes for Afghan national security forces," said Brig. Gen. Carsten Jacobson, the NATO spokesman. In his military blog for Foreign Policy magazine, Thomas Ricks cites a letter from a friend in Kabul, asking about Taliban infiltrators in Afghan units: People should take a close look at what a young Private or Sergeant or Lieutenant say about this. This is the strategic corporal and is the real indicator. The "strategic corporal" has become a much-discussed concept in the military, the idea that younger, greener or lower-ranking soldiers are necessarily making more strategic decisions in the field while assuming more complex levels of leadership. To get a sense of what the strategic corporals are thinking about the current green-on-blue tensions, Rendezvous reached out to Heath Druzin, a correspondent in Afghanistan for the military newspaper Stars and Stripes. In the wake of the civilian massacre, Heath wrote in an e-mail, "The troops for the most part were angry because they knew it was going to make their jobs more difficult and probably get quite a few soldiers killed." "It also puts a big dent in the SOF village-stability ops," he said, referring to Special Operations Forces. As for the green on blue, that's definitely put everyone on heightened alert. I went to one base where the U.S. airmen all wear body armor just bumping around the Afghan side. After the civilian massacre in Panjwai, Heath went to an army outpost across the river, a place called Pashmul, where, he said, "the grape rows and poppy fields are rich with booby traps, and the mud-hut ruins that dot the area often conceal insurgents." "It's obviously going to have a negative effect, and it's frustrating," said the company commander, Capt. Nate Smith, adding that the killer's "actions have the potential to be catastrophic for all of us." Heath's colleague at Stripes, Martin Kuz, spoke to a number of soldiers at Combat Outpost Nerkh, southwest of Kabul in Wardak Province. Specialist Lance Hagan, 22, of Gillespie, Illinois: "All you can do is worry about what's in front of you. People can speculate, but our job is still the same. At Camp Salerno in Khost Province, Martin described the mood as tense. He quoted Pfc. Jessica Young, 23: "It's basically like we're waiting on them to do something now to retaliate." Specialist Keith Gipulan, 21, Los Angeles: "It does scare me a little. We go out on patrols with (Afghan soldiers) and we have to trust them with our life. You're always keeping your eyes open. At C.O.P. Nerkh, Martin also interviewed Pfc. Erik Koenig, 20, of Merced, California, who said U.S. troops were being extra-vigilant now. He has lately begun carrying a knife with an 8-inch blade strapped to the front of his armored vest. "Nobody can miss it," he said, tapping the knife's black handle, visible above the sheath. It sends a message.