A Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, stood by the militia's numbers in a telephone interview Monday, saying that its fighters film every operation and verify the tolls.
"The numbers I have given to you, that is counted one by one," he said. "When we say there are 2,818 vehicles destroyed, that is a correct number. Why aren't we saying 2,820? Because we have reports of 2,818."
Mojdeh said that some of the exaggerations likely come from false assumptions. For instance, he said, if a roadside bomb hits a U.S. Humvee, then the Taliban probably report four U.S. deaths, even if everyone inside the armored vehicle survives.
(This version CORRECTS Corrects spelling of Marriott in graf 5.)
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