General says war not at stalemate

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – The commander of the U.S. military campaign against Afghanistan on Tuesday rejected suggestions of a stalemate in operations against the Taliban.

"We are committed to this as long as it takes, and so in my view it is not at all stalemate," said Gen. Tommy Franks, at a news conference in nearby Uzbekistan a day after meeting with senior Pakistani officials.

In Washington, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said a "modest" number of U.S. ground troops were already in northern Afghanistan, providing targeting information for the 24-day-old U.S. bombing campaign. The defense secretary's comments confirmed reports from the opposition Northern Alliance that about 15 to 20 U.S. troops have set up a base at Dara-i-Suf in northern Afghanistan.

The confirmation of a U.S. ground presence in Afghanistan comes amid rising criticism from commentators and military analysts who say the U.S. campaign has gotten off to a sluggish start.

"Both the military and political front seem to be stalemated at the moment," said Talat Masood, a retired Pakistani major general and respected commentator.

The U.S. campaign also has been dogged by accusations from some of high civilian casualties, which have helped increase anti-American passions in the Islamic world.

The Pentagon says the Taliban has grossly exaggerated the number of civilian casualties.

Gen. Franks declined to say whether the United States would heed the warnings of Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and other Islamic leaders and scale back the bombing campaign during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which begins in mid-November.

Pentagon officials and military analysts said the United States must balance any potential harm to the U.S. standing in the Islamic world if the bombing campaign is sustained through Ramadan against the costs of allowing the Taliban a chance to regroup by suspending the campaign.

U.S. aircraft kept pressure on Taliban ground forces Tuesday with dozens of strikes on front-line positions north of the capital of Kabul, the strategic northern city of Mazar-e Sharif, and targets in the Taliban political base of Kandahar.

Large bomb dropped

President Bush ordered the U.S. airstrikes on Afghanistan on Oct. 7, after the Taliban regime repeatedly refused to surrender Osama bin Laden. U.S. officials describe Mr. bin Laden as the prime suspect in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States.

Gen. Franks, commander of the U.S. Central Command, which is coordinating the Afghanistan campaign, insisted Tuesday that operations against the radical Islamic regime were proceeding as planned.

"I can tell you that my boss, the secretary of defense, and the president have not indicated to me any frustration about the pace of this activity," he said. "We will undertake our actions on a timeline that is satisfying to us. We will maintain the initiative."

The U.S. general was speaking in Uzbekistan, which is allowing U.S. forces to use an air base about 90 miles from the border with Afghanistan. The base is being occupied by an estimated 1,000 soldiers of the U.S. Army's 10th Mountain Division.

Gen. Franks said the United States had been in discussions with commanders of the fractious Northern Alliance opposition group, which has been locked in a civil war with the Taliban since the early 1990s. But he sidestepped the question of whether the U.S. campaign would satisfy alliance requests for airstrikes specifically aimed at aiding a ground offensive against Taliban lines.

"We've taken a decision that says we will remain focused on our objectives, and we will retain the initiative rather than providing a specific focus on a specific area," Gen. Franks said.

Northern Alliance commanders are continuing to complain about what they describe as a disjointed American campaign that has failed to break Taliban resistance.

"They are trying to bomb over a wide area, and it just is not effective," said Gen. Mohammed Hassan, a Northern Alliance commander in northeastern Afghanistan, speaking in an interview with the Reuters news agency. "There is no coordination. One day they bomb Mazar-e Sharif, the next day Herat, the next day here. But they don't follow up, so the impact of the attack is lost."

On the political front, U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi expressed pessimism about the prospects for progress in efforts to create an acceptable alternative to the Taliban in Afghanistan.

"One of the key aspects at present is that we don't see a formula emerging yet where those who are holding the gun will stop holding the rest of the country hostage," Mr. Brahimi reportedly said.

Mr. Brahimi's comments came after two days of discussions here with senior Pakistani officials, foreign diplomats, and Afghan opposition leaders on the possibilities for a post-Taliban Afghanistan.

"[Gen. Musharraf] and Mr. Brahimi agreed on the principles that must guide the resolution of the conflict" in Afghanistan, said U.N. spokesman Eric Falt. "This includes the fact that the unity of Afghanistan and its territorial integrity must be preserved."

Pakistan's view

Furthermore, a new government in Afghanistan should "not allow its territory to be used for hostile acts against its neighbor or anybody else," he said.

The composition of any post-Taliban government in Afghanistan is an especially sensitive issue in Pakistan. Because of Pakistan's hostile relations with India, its eastern neighbor, Pakistani officials say, it is imperative to have a friendly government in Afghanistan, on its western border.

Meanwhile, Pakistani police said they detained 12 Islamic militants on Tuesday in connection with the killing of 16 Christians during a Sunday morning worship service in the city of Bahawalpur.

Some church officials and analysts have suggested the attack was an act of revenge by Islamic radicals angered by the U.S. bombing campaign in Afghanistan.