美国有线新闻 CNN 2013-12-23

 I'm Anderson Cooper. Welcome to Podcast. The chopper goes down in Afghanistan. Doctor Sanjay Gupta answers vital questions about multivitamins. so whether you should take them and ridiculous. Let’s get started. 

 

We begin with the breaking news. The deadliest single incident for Americans in Afghanistan since the summer of last year, a Black Hawk¹ helicopter down, six US members, the NATO-led International security assistance force are dead. It happened today in southern Afghanistan. Even though we don’t yet have a full picture of what happened exactly, it's beginning to come to focus. Barbara Starr is working her sources at the Pentagon and joins us now. What are you learning, Barbara?  

 

Good evening, Anderson. At this hour, military investigators² are urgently trying to figure out exactly what did happen here. The reports are that the helicopter, the Black Hawk, went down due to the mechanical failure, but once it hit the ground, were any of those six military members still alive? They are looking at the report that the helicopter once crashed came under mortar³ fire from Taliban forces in the immediate⁴ vicinity. So what they need to determine now, did the six members die in the crash or is it possible , possible that they were alive when they hit ground and that there wasn’t mortar attack and they perished in that. Investigators are talking to members of another helicopter that was flying in the immediate vicinity. They are trying to see what they can learn. We are told from one, the one survivor⁵ of the crash for U,, 6 U.S military families, terrible news on this holiday season. But this has been a big issue up and down the Pentagon hallways all day, Anderson, constant meetings about what did happen. And we know the Defense⁶ Secretary Chuck Hagel is also looking for some answers.

 

And the Taliban is claiming responsibility for the attack? 

They have claimed, interestingly enough, that they shot down a US aircraft today. These are the kind of claims they often make, most of the time, obviously not true, propaganda. But this is also raising the question clearly. Was this claim that they shot it down related to the report that it came under a mortar attack. 

 

And this comes, I mean, at a backdrop of the Afghan President Hamid Karzai refusing to sign an agreement with the White House over long-term troops in Afghanistan.

 

That's right. There are now 42,000 US troops in Afghanistan. They want to get this agreement for a number of troops probably about 10,000 to remain after the end of 2014. The job of the US troops will be to help train and assist the Afghan forces and do the very dangerous work of continuing to go after terrorist targets in Afghanistan.  He hasn’t signed the agreement and US is getting increasingly frustrated⁷ with him, given especially the price the US troops are paying. 

 

Yeah, all right. Barbara, appreciate the update. Thank you.

1 hawk   

n.鹰，骗子；鹰派成员

参考例句：

• The hawk swooped down on the rabbit and killed it.鹰猛地朝兔子扑下来,并把它杀死。
• The hawk snatched the chicken and flew away.老鹰叼了小鸡就飞走了。

2 investigators   

n.调查者，审查者( investigator的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This memo could be the smoking gun that investigators have been looking for. 这份备忘录可能是调查人员一直在寻找的证据。
• The team consisted of six investigators and two secretaries. 这个团队由六个调查人员和两个秘书组成。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 mortar   

n.灰浆，灰泥；迫击炮；v.把…用灰浆涂接合

参考例句：

• The mason flushed the joint with mortar.泥工用灰浆把接缝处嵌平。
• The sound of mortar fire seemed to be closing in.迫击炮的吼声似乎正在逼近。

4 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

5 survivor   

n.生存者，残存者，幸存者

参考例句：

• The sole survivor of the crash was an infant.这次撞车的惟一幸存者是一个婴儿。
• There was only one survivor of the plane crash.这次飞机失事中只有一名幸存者。

6 defense   

n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩

参考例句：

• The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
• The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。

7 frustrated   

adj.挫败的，失意的，泄气的v.使不成功( frustrate的过去式和过去分词 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧

参考例句：

• It's very easy to get frustrated in this job. 这个工作很容易令人懊恼。
• The bad weather frustrated all our hopes of going out. 恶劣的天气破坏了我们出行的愿望。 来自《简明英汉词典》