Strikes punish Taliban lines as bad weather forces 2 aircraft down

11/04/2001

By LEE HANCOCK / The Dallas Morning News

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — U.S. airstrikes blasted two embattled fronts for the 13th day Saturday, as opposition commanders claimed the capture of new ground near a key northern crossroads city.

For the first time, U.S. Marines joined the air raids over Afghanistan on Saturday, using Harrier jets to drop 500-pound bombs on Taliban targets.

Despite intensifying bombardments, including carpet-bombing raids last week by B-52s, leaders of the opposition Northern Alliance repeated Saturday what has become a daily talking point: At least several more days of air attacks would be needed before Taliban forces would be softened enough to challenge with a long-promised offensive.

Meanwhile, U.S. efforts to support alliance forces met with setbacks apparently related to deteriorating weather in the northern region. Pentagon officials said that one helicopter sent to rescue a sick American soldier was downed by bad weather Friday, but its crewmen were rescued. An unmanned U.S. spy plane also crashed in similar conditions.

The soldier, suffering from an undisclosed illness, was picked up by a second helicopter sent out for the rescue mission early Saturday in Afghanistan, a senior Defense Department official told The Associated Press.

War of words

In what has become a second fiercely contested front in a daily war of words, the Taliban leadership dismissed the opposition's claim Saturday that their forces had captured a district about 30 miles outside the Taliban-controlled city of Mazar-e-sharif. Neither side's reports could be independently verified.

The city, which the alliance lost to the Taliban in 1998, is one of the major daily targets of recent American air raids. Its recapture would allow opposition forces to reopen crucial supply routes from Uzbekistan and cut Taliban supply routes to western Afghanistan.

It has been a month since U.S. forces began the air war, and a month since Northern Alliance commanders began parading troops and equipment for reporters and talking about imminent offensives.

Some military analysts in neighboring Pakistan say the alliance's bold talk of impending ground action may be nothing more than that. They note that the alliance forces are an ill-equipped, undisciplined band riven with divisions and softened by years of hunkering down behind defensive lines.

"They don't really have a talent for an offensive action," said retired Pakistani Lt. Gen. Talat Massood, a respected military commentator. "They're ideologically not motivated, they're not disciplined enough, and I think they've stayed in the defensive position for so long that they have acquired a defensive mentality.

"This situation will continue for quite some time. The Americans realize the limitations of these people, but they're caught in a dilemma because the Americans don't want to commit their own troops."

"The Americans' only option is to continue bombing," he said.

Escalating U.S. air support for the alliance, coupled with increased supplies of ammunition and other materiel, has raised fears in some quarters.

Some Afghan exiles have said that alliance commanders were responsible for the country's descent into bloody chaos when they lost power to the Taliban in the mid-1990s. And Pakistan's government has warned that the alliance's dominant Uzbek and Tajik minority leadership cannot attract broad support from the dominant Pashtuns or Afghanistan's other ethnic factions.

On Saturday, an Afghan women's resistance group warned that the United States was inviting chaos by throwing its weight behind the alliance.

"For us and for our people, there is no difference between the Northern Alliance and the Taliban," spokeswoman Sahar Saba said at an Islamabad news conference. "This would be the same mistake that Western countries committed 20 years back by bringing these criminals on the political scene."

The Pentagon confirmed last week that U.S. special forces were on the ground with alliance forces, helping direct bombing raids on Taliban lines and coordinating with opposition fighting. Officials have refused to detail how many troops are in Afghanistan, but estimates range from 100 to 200.

Military officials also acknowledged that deteriorating, wintry weather and other problems had slowed efforts to move more U.S. troops into Afghanistan. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has said he hoped the number of advisers could be increased three- or fourfold "as soon as humanly possible."

Special forces units from other members of the U.S.-led coalition also are being sent into Afghanistan to assist the alliance.

Turkey's assistance

"It will create a lot more problems than they will solve, unless there is some sort of understanding among the Muslim countries. ... It must have their blessing," Gen. Massood said. "If the Turkish troops come on the behest of the Americans, it will give a twist as though they are using Muslims to fight and kill other Muslims."

On Saturday, Osama bin Laden issued a videotaped message apparently aimed at widening that fault line between Muslims and the West. In his message, aired Saturday on the Qatar-based Arab satellite television network Al-Jazeera, Mr. bin Laden declared that the Afghan conflict was "primarily a religious war" between Christianity and Islam.

Calling the month-old air war a "crusade," he said: "Whoever stands behind Bush has committed an act that stands as annulment of their Islam."

President Bush launched the bombing campaign on Oct. 7 after Taliban officials rebuffed U.S. demands to surrender Mr. bin Laden. American officials consider him the chief suspect in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

Mr. bin Laden' latest videotaped statement also condemned the United Nations, declaring that any Arab leader who cooperated with the world body was an infidel. He noted that the United Nations in 1947 had approved the partition of Palestine that led to the formation of Israel, adding, "have our tragedies not resulted from the United Nations?"

"The United Nations is a crime tool," he said. "We are being slaughtered every day, and it does not move."

"The people of Afghanistan have nothing to do with this matter," Mr. bin Laden said. "But the campaign continues annihilating villagers, women and children."

Last week, U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi rebuffed requests to meet with the Taliban's ambassador to Pakistan during several days of meetings with Afghan groups and Pakistani officials in Islamabad.

Mr. Brahimi was in Tehran, Iran, on Saturday for more discussions with Afghan representatives and Iranian officials about possible political solutions to the Afghan crisis.

Video condemnation

On Thursday, the network aired a handwritten letter reportedly sent by Mr. bin Laden in which he condemned the Pakistani government for its support of the U.S. effort and called on Pakistani Muslims to defend their faith.

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has been under fire from his country's Islamic militants for his decision to support the American effort. U.S. officials have offered repeated public signals of support for the Pakistani government, easing trade restrictions, proposing new aid packages, and sending high-level delegations for consultations with Gen. Musharraf.

Mr. Rumsfeld's visit comes after Saturday stops in Uzbekistan and in Tajikistan, where he said Saturday that American military teams are in route to explore using three Tajik air bases to house troops and launch raids into Afghanistan.

The defense secretary said that the United States would gain a base for special forces and infantry and in return would guarantee "tens of millions of dollars" in aid to the impoverished former Soviet republic that borders Afghanistan.