The oft-fought over Helmand province produces about 80% of the world's (yes, world's!) opium despite having a population of only 1,000,000 or so, whom are mostly Taliban-friendly Pashtuns. It's about the size of West Virginia.
They don't want any government, whether it be US-backed, Russian-backed or whatever. They regard Kabul with same suspicion they regard Moscow or Washington. There are few roads, few schools, little electricity, etc. Illiteracy is the rule, not the exception. It borders the sparsely-populated Balochistan province of Pakistan, where that country has been trying to suppress a similar insurgency for about 50 years with a lot more troops, weapons, resources and local knowledge that the US-NATO command will ever have in Helmand. With little success, I might add.
For 15 years US and NATO troops have tried their best to drag this rural backwater into the 16th century, with very little to show for it. The Kabul regime has made little effort to bring Helmand under their control, so the US-NATO forces have tried to form local alliances with tribes, whom are loyal as hell until the next Taliban force arrives.
After a decade and a half of war in Afghanistan, the American people are war-weary and any news about that country doesn't draw the attention it would have in, say, 2002. Add that US news agencies seldom send reporters and camera crews anywhere overseas anymore (too expensive), particularly in the hostile Moslem world and even more particularly in hard-to-reach Helmand province of Afghanistan, and it's really no surprise that there little coverage and little interest in this skirmish.
As for the Fox News story, it breaks to a rehash of a Pentagon news release, some stock "File" footage (nothing pertaining to the action in question) and typical Obama-hatred nonsense. Even Fox News doesn't really care about US troops in Afghanistan, unless they can use a casualty as a reason for convenient anti-administration agit-prop.
Two things I don't doubt, though. One, no amount of US military effort or billions of dollars is ever going to stop Afghan farmers from growing heroin to be eagerly consumed by customers globally. Two, none of those Helmand province farmers are turn up as suicide bombers in New York or LA or Paris.
