Retreating al-Qaeda under fire

U.S. gunships, bombers assist tribal forces in keeping up pressure

12/18/2001

By GREGG JONES / The Dallas Morning News

TORA BORA, Afghanistan – Tribal troops backed by U.S. bombers and helicopter gunships on Monday fought running battles with fleeing al-Qaeda fighters deep in the rugged White Mountains of eastern Afghanistan.

The whereabouts of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden remained a mystery, a day after tribal forces overran the group's main base and cave complex at Tora Bora.

U.S. bombers roared over the White Mountains throughout Monday, guided to their targets by American commandos traveling with the tribal troops, local Afghan commanders and fighters said. U.S. helicopter gunships joined the hunt, pounding al-Qaeda forces with cannon fire.

"Our mujahedeen [holy warriors] are on top of the mountain," said Cmdr. Nangiali, a tribal military leader, who like many Afghans uses only one name. "They are searching for al-Qaeda fighters and going toward the border with Pakistan."

Two al-Qaeda fighters were killed and five captured in one clash on Monday, said Auzubillah, another local commander.

Tribal commanders are trying to determine the identities of at least 25 al-Qaeda members captured on Sunday, including one who bears a resemblance to top bin Laden lieutenant Ayman al-Zawahiri, Cmdr. Nangiali said.

Dr. al-Zawahiri is a surgeon who also leads Egyptian Islamic Jihad, a terrorist group held responsible for the 1981 assassination of President Anwar Sadat of Egypt.

U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Sunday that one senior al-Qaeda leader reportedly had been captured, but he didn't identify him. In footage taken by Associated Press Television News, tribal fighters said their prisoners included two unnamed senior al-Qaeda commanders.

In other developments Monday:

• In London, Prime Minister Tony Blair told Parliament that Britain is prepared to lead an international peacekeeping force. A number of details remain to be resolved, but among the nations willing to contribute troops were Canada, Australia, Argentina, Jordan, and New Zealand.

• The leader of the interim Afghan administration, Hamid Karzai, arrived in London for talks with the British Foreign Office's senior Afghan experts. He was on his way to Rome to meet with the exiled Afghan king, Mohammad Zahir Shah.

• A Marine who stepped on a land mine at Kandahar's airport was flown to a hospital outside Afghanistan. Marine spokesman Capt. David Romley said Cpl. Chris Chandler lost his foot in the accident.

• David Hicks, a 26-year-old Australian captured while fighting with the Taliban, was handed over to U.S. forces and flown Monday to an American ship in the region, the Australian government said.

Challenging weather

Fresh snowfall overnight made conditions even more difficult in the heavily forested mountains, where as many as several hundred al-Qaeda fighters were believed to be trying to cross the porous border into nearby Pakistan, tribal commanders and fighters said.

Damon Winter / DMN Amanatgul (right) tries to keep warm while manning an Eastern Shura tank position in the mountains of Tora Bora.

In the southern city of Kandahar, where thousands of U.S. Marines have established a base, the governor's intelligence chief said that supreme Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and hundreds of Taliban troops had sought refuge near Baghran, about 100 miles northwest of Kandahar. The United States has put a $25 million bounty on Mr. bin Laden's head and plans to offer a $10 million reward for information leading to the capture of Mullah Omar.

Tora Bora and the White Mountains have been the focus of U.S. efforts to find Mr. bin Laden, described by U.S. officials as the architect of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. President Bush ordered U.S. airstrikes against Afghanistan on Oct. 7 after Mullah Omar's radical Taliban regime refused to surrender Mr. bin Laden.

Following the fall of al-Qaeda's Tora Bora complex on Sunday, U.S. officials conceded that they don't know Mr. bin Laden's precise whereabouts.

Tribal commanders and fighters say they believe the Saudi-born Islamic militant has slipped into neighboring Pakistan along with other senior al-Qaeda leaders. But there is no hard evidence to support that belief, and it's not clear even whether Mr. bin Laden is dead or alive.

U.S. and Afghan officials are hoping that al-Qaeda prisoners captured during the assault on Tora Bora might shed light on the whereabouts of Mr. bin Laden and other senior al-Qaeda leaders.

At al-Qaeda's former Tora Bora stronghold, tribal troops – loosely commanded by the Eastern Shura, a tribal council – were searching the caves and tunnels along with U.S. special forces, the eastern alliance fighters said. Pentagon officials reported sporadic firing from some of the thousands of caves in the Tora Bora area.

One of the larger caves includes a mosque and "very sophisticated rooms," said Zulmai, a member of one of the leading tribal clans involved in the Tora Bora military operations.

Eastern alliance fighters said they captured eight truckloads of ammunition stored in caves at Tora Bora. Some of the al-Qaeda troops had been cut off from the ammunition dumps and were running out of bullets when captured on Sunday, tribal fighters said.

'A lot of dead bodies'

Estimates of the number of al-Qaeda fighters who had taken refuge at the Tora Bora complex ranged between 700 to 1,000, but "a lot were killed by the [American] bombing," said Haji Zahir.

Among the estimated 200 bodies of al-Qaeda dead were women and children, local fighters said.

A few miles north of the Tora Bora battlefield, eastern alliance fighters just back from the front showed off trophies seized during Sunday's victory. Musharraf Shah, 27, said he had taken his new head scarf off the body of a dead Arab fighter the day before.

Ghul Muhammed, 38, had a pair of trophies that he had taken from dead Arabs: a shoulder bag with Arabic words written on the strap, "This belongs to Rahmani," and a black leather shaving kit, both of which he had filled with bullets.

Around midday Monday, Haji Zahir's troops paraded 18 al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners – nine Arabs and nine Afghans – before hundreds of villagers and foreign journalists.

Journalists weren't allowed to question the prisoners.

The foreign prisoners had to be coaxed and cajoled from their mud-walled cells in a compound beside a village mosque. Some of the prisoners were afraid their families would recognize them and discover that they were al-Qaeda members, a guard said.

Finally, at 12:30 p.m., a big, bearded al-Qaeda member wearing camouflage fatigue pants and combat boots was led before the crowd. The man's head was swathed in a gauze bandage, with a large bloody spot on the back of his head.

One by one, the other prisoners were led into view. Most had been wounded. An older prisoner who appeared to be from Pakistan limped into view wearing plastic sandals and a sock cap. A prisoner with curly black hair and wearing camouflage fatigue pants and high-top tennis shoes glowered at the crowd.

After the nine foreign al-Qaeda troops were presented, nine Afghan members of Mr. bin Laden's organization were led into the yard. Their hands had been tied behind their backs with red rope. They looked far less frightened than the foreign prisoners, and one even smiled sheepishly.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.