He couldn’t see the man’s face, because his whole body was wrapped in flames, and he didn’t hear anything, other than the people who were hollering at the man to drop the baby he was carrying.

Bundt, then 30, tore off his uniform coat and rushed at the blazing man to try to smother the flames. An Army officer joined him. They didn’t have much luck. Bundt recalled that it took the fire department to put him out.

Afterward, Bundt stood by, his hands and neck scorched. A bystander was holding the chubby baby, which was dressed in blue, kerosene-soaked overalls, but uninjured. Firefighters were spraying the incinerated body.

It was Nov. 2, 1965, and Bundt, now 80, had witnessed the self-immolation of Quaker antiwar pacifist Norman R. Morrison, who had just carried out one of the most horrific public protests of the era of the Vietnam War.

A group stands at a three-hour vigil near an entrance to the Pentagon in memory of Norman Morrison. Morrison, 31, a Quaker from Baltimore, set himself ablaze to protest U.S. involvement in the war in Vietnam. (Ellsworth Davis/The Washington Post)

Scarcely remembered now, Morrison’s suicide 50 years ago Monday was front-page news at the time, across a country that was increasingly torn by protests over the war.

Infighting in the ranks of jihadi groups is commonplace in this region of the war-ravaged country. Last week officials reported a mass decapitation of ISIS fighters by their fellow militants.

Attaullah Khogyani, the provincial governor's spokesman, told Reuters that the ISIS executions took place in the Surkh Ab bazaar of Achin district. ISIS made no official statement on kiling its own members, and Afghan authorities provided no additional details. 

The Afghan affiliate of ISIS—itself active predominantly in Syria and Iraq—calls itself  "The Khorasan Province," in reference to an ancient region now by the modern Afghan-Pakistan border. It is one of more than adozen affiliate branches of ISIS around the world.

The U.S. military is currently increasing its presence in the country in line with the new strategy adopted by President Donald Trump. The American troop count in the country stands at around 14,000. The U.S. military is also conducting drone strikes in Afghanistan, but these are mostly targeting the Taliban.