2RHPZ
05-27-2004, 01:48 PM
Old-fashioned raids pave way for new kind of fighting
Why the hit-and-run attacks are not the signal for a major land offensive
Paul Beaver, Peter ******** and Paul Harris
Sunday October 21, 2001
The Observer
One thing is now clear. The daring raid on Kandahar early yesterday by elite Ranger
soldiers will not be the last. Many more attacks are set to come. The war in
Afghanistan has moved into a dangerous and bloody new phase. It is not the kind of
war fought solely from the safety of a US carrier's cruise missile tubes, or from the
cockpit of a high-flying B-52. For all the high-tech trappings of the US Rangers - with
their night-goggles and specially equipped helicopters - this is old-fashioned warfare.
This is war fought by men against enemies visible as other men in close combat. And
inevitably this new phase in the 'war on terrorism' will lead to American fatalities on
the ground.
The Kandahar raid had several purposes in paving the way for this next cycle of the
war.
Firstly it was a 'dry run', attacking a largely abandoned site in a quick in-and-out
operation that would serve as a learning exercise for bigger raids to come. The raid
showed that such attacks could be carried out.
Secondly, it is a massive psychological blow to the Taliban. American military might
has reached out from the aircraft carriers in the Gulf and attacked the heart of Taliban
spiritual and political power. '[The Taliban] said, "Come on in with 100,000 troops and
face us on the ground". Well, we're going in with 100 or 200 Rangers, and they
should be sufficient to do the job,' said former US Army colonel Mitch Mitchell.
Thirdly, the raid had a message to send out to America's domestic and international
critics. It showed that the US is willing and able to put its own flesh and blood in the
line of fire, accepting the risk of casualties and loss of American lives. The raid was
the exact opposite of the sanitised image of a safe war conducted by cruise missiles,
bombs and minimal risk to American life.
Fourthly, and finally, the raid will have gathered vital intelligence. The targeting of an
airfield in such a key area will have put troops on the ground to see with their own
eyes whether the facilities could one day be captured permanently and used as a
future base. One man looking on the ground is often worth a hundred photos from a
spy plane.
It is raids like this, from bases inside or close to Afghanistan, that mark out the next
phase of the war - the need to capture or kill Osama bin Laden. Pentagon officials
know the 'pyrotechnics' of their air war so far have little chance of fulfilling that aim.
Only men on the ground, able to launch swift raids as soon as a target is identified,
will be able to bring Bin Laden to justice.
This wider ground war plan is now emerging into fact. News of the first ground
incursions by US troops came after US defence officials had confirmed that a small
number of elite Special Operations forces were already in Afghanistan and said to be
working with tribal factions in the south who oppose the Taliban leadership as part of
a CIA-controlled political thrust.
On Friday, a commander with Northern Alliance forces opposed to the Taliban also
confirmed that eight US personnel had earlier arrived in northern Afghanistan and
been moving with warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum. They are Green Berets,
trained in liaison with friendly forces. They will help guide and support alliance
movements.
Another crucial development is the granting to America and Britain of access to
Pakistan's Dalbandin air base, situated in the desert just outside Quetta. The base is
a vital staging post to Kandahar, which is just 125 miles away. The military,
diplomatic and political frontline is closing in on the Taliban heartland.
But another key element of the Rangers raid will have been noticed by worried
Pentagon officials: it cost American lives. They may not have died in combat but the
two US servicemen who perished when their helicopter crashed were acting in
support of the mission. As the war expands, and more and more raids are carried
out, the casualty total will mount. Losses in this kind of warfare are inevitable.
The quick move to the ground phase of the war in Afghanistan has taken many
observers by surprise. But the speed partly reflects the lack of useful targets left in
the country after two weeks of air war.
'We started the campaign with 40 targets on a sheet of A4, compared to the 47
pages of targets over Yugoslavia,' said a senior Ministry of Defence source. 'Last
week, it went up to 67 and now it's about 120, but we really are scraping the barrel.'
A speedy move is also necessary for diplomatic reasons. Continuing with the
relentless bombing as a sole way of waging war would also have increased the risk
of civilian casualties, and with it the risk of dissent within America's fragile coalition.
British officials in particular were worried that the coalition is showing signs of stress.
This is especially true of Pakistan and Arab Gulf nations that will be vital as hosts for
the re-supply of forces on the ground in Afghanistan.
It is expensive, too. Already around 100 Tomahawk land attack missiles - known to
the military by their acronym, TLAM - have been launched. So many, in fact, that the
US Navy has begun a re-supply operation and Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon
announced last week that a further 48 missiles costing about L60 million, would be
ordered from Boeing.
'Too many people - especially US politicians - believe that all modern weapons of war
are precision attack. They are better than in Kosovo with new satellite guidance, but
even that can go wrong,' said the MoD source. 'They watch too much Hollywood and
believe their own propaganda.'
But the raid is not about to signal the beginning of a large-scale ground offensive
which military planners know would be costly, high in casualties and cumbersome.
The ground war now embarked upon will involve 'search and destroy' missions,
discrete airborne raids against selected targets where the watch words are: 'Get in,
get out - and quickly'. These raids will be designed to capture a base or create a
desert airfield, fly in special forces and secure the perimeter. They are essentially
heavily armed police raids, using the special forces to capture or kill al-Qaida
members, destroy bases and take prisoners. The US and British special forces are
trained for so-called 'flexible' warfare - light, mobile and able to respond quickly to
changing situations on the ground.
That is the theory. Critically, it is a kind of fighting heavily dependent on good on-the-
ground intelligence. And it is here that the special forces troops on the ground come
in. For while the US Rangers can come in and raid and leave, they need to know
what they are about to hit, how many enemy troops are there, and who they are after.
It is a skill honed by the SAS in Northern Ireland and, later, in Bosnia. It is the dirtiest,
most uncomfortable and dangerous kind of soldiering - working undercover in the
open, moving at night and spending long days observing hostile forces at close
quarters. Typically working in the smallest of formations of a handful of men, these
forces are required to live off the rations they can carry, or off the land, on missions
up to two weeks at a time - sometimes longer.
And they are not only responsible for gathering intelligence on the ground. In the
moments before a raid, inserted special forces might be required to act as forward air
controllers, helping to co-ordinate targeted weapons-fire from helicopters
or ground support aircraft on to specific targets, direct sniper fire on identified key
leaders or place themselves to snatch key targets.
While Britain's contribution may look small on paper, there is no doubt that politically
and militarily the Americans are glad to have them along. The diplomatic and political
muscle is important especially in places such as Pakistan, where former Chief of
Defence Staff, General Lord Guthrie, has been acting as the Prime Minister's
personal envoy.
Britain has also contributed just about the best reconnaissance aircraft available in
the shape of the Royal Air Force Canberra PR9. Tanker aircraft, too, are playing a
crucial role, flying nightly from the Gulf to refuel thirsty US Navy Tomcats and
Hornets on their way home from Afghanistan.
In warfare nothing is certain. One thing, however, seems likely. A new kind of war
has come to Afghanistan. And we are in it for the long haul.
Elite US Rangers storm mullah's mountain fort
The stronghold of Baba Sahib was never conquered by Russian forces. It was a
byword for invincibility to Afghans - but it
fell in a single attack
Paul Harris and Jason Burke, Peshawar
Sunday October 21, 2001
The Observer
The first sign that something had changed came on Friday. Unlike the previous week,
there was no pause in the American bombing for the Muslim day of prayer. US attack
aircraft prowled the skies above Kandahar, given the green light to go after random
targets and troop formations. But among the bombs came leaflets, fluttering down to
the battered and terrified people of the Taliban stronghold. They warned them to
avoid potential military targets and stay in their homes. Then came four slow-moving
EC-130CE planes, sweeping high over the city and broadcasting radio messages in
Pashtu.
The tone was mocking and brutal as the signals cut into local frequencies with
jamming equipment. The words were aimed at the Taliban fighters below, huddled
over radio sets. 'You are condemned. Did you know that? The instant the terrorists
you support took over our planes, you sentenced yourself to death,' they said. The
war, barely two weeks old, was entering a bloody and dangerous new phase.
The attack came just after midnight yesterday: enough time for the day of prayer to
have ended, but giving enough hours of darkness for the assault to be carried out
during night-time. This time the aircraft would not be dropping bombs. They would be
dropping highly trained, heavily armed men.
They had taken off a few hours earlier - reportedly from the aircraft carrier USS Kitty
Hawk - heading north over the Indian Ocean and through Pakistani airspace. Joining
them was an escort of AC-130s, the feared gunships which had been laying waste to
Taliban positions around Kandahar since the start of the week. Helicopters, based at
the newly opened Pakistani airstrip of Dalbandin, 125 miles from Kandahar, also flew
in to join the mission.
As the planes and choppers flew in low over hills and mountains surrounding the city,
at least 100 elite US Rangers slipped out and parachuted down out of the night sky.
They descended silently, each man wearing night-vision goggles that would reveal
the landscape below bathed in an eerie green light. His enemies - perhaps still not
knowing what was happening - would have scanned the darkness in vain, looking for
an attacker they could not see.
The target was Baba Sahib, a village of mud huts on a low hilltop about five miles
from the city centre. It is the base of a small Taliban garrison set up to guard a home
owned by the Taliban's spiritual leader, Mullah Omar. The houses have mud walls
and straw roofs. The roads are potholed and difficult to pass. The only solid building
of brick and concrete is Omar's house. But the village holds a special place in the
psyche of the Afghans. It and the surrounding mountains were a stronghold of the
anti-Russian forces during the Eighties.
First reports seem to indicate the attack was a surprise. For the Rangers, it was time
to put years of dedicated practice into action. This was the moment they had been
trained for.
If, as analysts believe, the raid was a 'dry-run' for future operations, this would have
been vital to demonstrate that US forces can take and secure territory inside
Afghanistan. As the Rangers landed they split up into their individual weapons teams
and moved quickly to secure the area.
A typical company of Rangers is equipped with two 60mm mortars and three-man
teams deploying an 84mm Carl Gustav anti-armour weapon. Each company is also
complemented by a weapons platoon that includes a sniper section, consisting of
two-man teams. A third team section employs a .50 calibre Barrett rifle capable of
penetrating light armour.
If Taliban forces had any doubts as to what was happening, they would have been
dispelled by the support fire of the AC-130s, backed up by the Nightstalker attack
helicopters that accompany Rangers on all their missions. When the guns from the
air opened up, they would have known a battle was on its way.
The AC-130s circled low overhead, always flying anti-clockwise so as to bring the full
brunt of their weaponry down upon Taliban forces below. The gunships can put a
round in every metre of an area the size of eight football pitches in a single pass.
Their psychological effect is almost as crippling as their firepower.
But for the Rangers on the ground the AC-130s meant security. Reports from
Kandahar spoke of huge amounts of gunfire and explosions from the region of the
village. Flashes and bangs lit up the night sky and some residents reported seeing
American ground troops taking up positions. Reports were still sketchy last night, but
direct man-to-man fighting had broken out for the first time between the Taliban and
US troops.
The Taliban yesterday said they had repulsed the attack and suffered no losses. But
unofficial sources in Pakistan said the Taliban 'took a mauling', leaving more than 20
fighters dead.
The Rangers stayed on the ground for two to three hours. Then, with dawn still
several hours away, the withdrawal began. Under the covering fire of the gunships,
troop-carrying helicopters raced into the airstrip. The Rangers ran to the rescue
craft before getting the all-clear to depart. Then - the mission complete - the
helicopters lifted off, turning for the Pakistani border and safety.
As the smoke from the raid drifted away, the Rangers left behind them more fresh
bullet-holes and shell craters around Kandahar, adding to the rubble already
accumulated over two decades of war. It is unlikely it will be the last time the
Rangers will be seen there.
Though each helicopter that flew to Afghanistan returned unharmed, there were
American casualties - the first in the war, but probably not the last. Two US
servicemen died when their helicopter crashed while on standby for any rescue
operation. After being told about their deaths in a video link from the Pentagon to
Shanghai, President George Bush hailed the dead men as heroes.
As word of the raid spread through Kandahar it became clear there was to be no
respite for the tattered city. US aircraft returned to the city yesterday and the bombing
resumed once again.
US special forces kill 20 in fierce Afghan firefight
Jason Burke, Peshawar, Ed Vulliamy, New York and Kamal Ahmed, London
Sunday October 21, 2001
The Observer
American special forces were yesterday involved in pitched battles inside
Afghanistan after being parachuted into an area where Osama bin Laden, the prime
suspect in the 11 September terrorist attacks, has been a frequent visitor. More than
100 US commandos and light infantry Rangers fought with Taliban forces near the
regime's spiritual stronghold of Kandahar, the Taliban's spiritual centre - where bin
Laden has been a frequent visitor - and a military airport 60 miles to the southeast.
Some 20 Taliban soldiers were reportedly killed. US helicopters were seen over
Kandahar again last night, apparently confirming reports of further attacks.
The forces siezed intelligence from a complex which serves as one of the Taliban
command and control compounds which they hope will reveal clues to the
whereabouts of the Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and bin Laden. After a
savage 30-minute firefight, US troops also cleared the airstrip building by building.
'We have accomplished our objective at the airfield,' said General Richard Myers,
chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, last night. 'We did not expect to find significant
Taliban leadership at these locations,' he said. 'We, of course, were hoping
we would, but we did not expect it, and we did not find senior Taliban of Al-Qaeda
leadership.'
Other operations involving ground troops were imminent, he added. 'We are going to
have ongoing operations around the world.
The general revealed that the US commandos came across stores of rocket
propelled grenades, machine guns and ammunition and destroyed them.
In Britain, Ministry of Defence sources said detachments of British Royal Marines
could shortly be sent to the region. In the event of a long ground war, Gurkha
regiments could also be called upon because of their experience of mountain terrain.
It is understood that at least one SAS unit is already operating inside Afghanistan,
but with orders to unite the rebel troops and attempt to encourage Taliban defections,
rather than take part in direct action.
And in the clearest signal yet that a ground offensive was imminent, Geoff Hoon, the
Defence Secretary, said: 'we have looked at a number of different options. Some of
those certainly involve putting boots on the ground in Afghanistan in a
number of different ways to achieve our ultimate objective of bringing Osama bin
Laden to justice and his associates to account.'
In an unprecedented wartime public relations act, the Pentagon released grainy film
taken by its own camera operators, including dramatic clips of night parachute drops
showing troops jumping on to the airfield from an MC 130E Combat Talon and
destroying equipment.
The special forces were taken out by helicoptor at dawn after hours inside Taliban
territory. The battle against Taliban militia in Kandahar began after troops boarded
aircraft at the remote Pakistani airstrip of Dalbandin, 37 miles from the Afghan
frontier.
US troops began arriving at the base, the third now being used in Pakistan by the
Americans, on Thursday, military sources said. They are believed to have acted with
special forces troops aboard the USS Kitty Hawk positioned in the Arabian Gulf.
Locals reported that helicopters began taking off from Dalbandin at 10.30pm on
Friday and air activity continued until 6am yesterday.
Army Rangers parachuted on to the airport were loaded armed transport planes in
nearby Oman.
Two American military personnel were killed and five others were injured when a
Black Hawk helicopter involved in support operations in Pakistan crashed at an
airbase. Taliban claims that they had hit it were dismissed by the US. Two Rangers
were hurt parachuting onto the airfield.
'These soldiers will not have died in vain,' President George W. Bush said last night.
'This is a just cause. The American people now fully understand that we are in an
important struggle, a struggle that will take time, and that there will be
moments of sacrifice.'
The American raids appear to have been a double-headed attack aimed at killing or
capturing both Mullah Omar, the reclusive cleric who leads the Taliban, and bin
Laden.
Sources said five helicopters landed at the small village of Baba Sahib, in Arghandab
district five miles north-west of Kandahar, the city which is the spiritual home of the
Taliban.
Omar has recently built a house in the village, which has already been the target of
sustained air attacks. Afghan military sources said that he was not in the area at the
time of the attack. Myers said the Taliban leader had lived in the command and
control building the commandos raided.
The raids signalled a new phase of the US-led coalition's war on terrorism, after 13
days of strikes from the air alone. Military sources in America and Britain said the
lightning 'hit and run' raids would be the first of many and that British troops were now
on standby to support further incursions.
The Pentagon said American troops had been in the country for a few hours and had
all returned to bases in Pakistan.
The escalation has provoked a renewed exodus of refugees and sparked a new
offensive by the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, which launched an attack on
positions north of Karbul.
The attacks also increased tension in the whole region, with Pakistan struggling to
contain protests. Yesterday afternoon a bomb was discovered in the departure
lounge of Islamabad airport. It was detonated in a controlled explosion. There were
no injuries. There were also reports of a new anthrax outbreak at the House of
Representatives in Washington.
Bombing raids by American planes continued throughout the day yesterday with
planes hitting Kabul, Kandahar and Herat. More than 30 aircraft were launched from
the carrier USS Carl Vinson.
In the streets of Karbul, tanks and troops were seen moving and sporadic bursts of
gunfire were heard as troops apparently fired with small arms on planes flying low
overhead.
Witnesses reported that resistance was almost non-existent, with little anti-aircraft
fire. The Islamic militia said that 900 civilians have been killed in the strikes so far,
though there is no confirmation of the figure.
The Taliban remained defiant last night, saying that they had successfully repulsed
the US raid and that they might as well give up their Muslim faith as give up the
world's most wanted man.
Why the hit-and-run attacks are not the signal for a major land offensive
Paul Beaver, Peter ******** and Paul Harris
Sunday October 21, 2001
The Observer
One thing is now clear. The daring raid on Kandahar early yesterday by elite Ranger
soldiers will not be the last. Many more attacks are set to come. The war in
Afghanistan has moved into a dangerous and bloody new phase. It is not the kind of
war fought solely from the safety of a US carrier's cruise missile tubes, or from the
cockpit of a high-flying B-52. For all the high-tech trappings of the US Rangers - with
their night-goggles and specially equipped helicopters - this is old-fashioned warfare.
This is war fought by men against enemies visible as other men in close combat. And
inevitably this new phase in the 'war on terrorism' will lead to American fatalities on
the ground.
The Kandahar raid had several purposes in paving the way for this next cycle of the
war.
Firstly it was a 'dry run', attacking a largely abandoned site in a quick in-and-out
operation that would serve as a learning exercise for bigger raids to come. The raid
showed that such attacks could be carried out.
Secondly, it is a massive psychological blow to the Taliban. American military might
has reached out from the aircraft carriers in the Gulf and attacked the heart of Taliban
spiritual and political power. '[The Taliban] said, "Come on in with 100,000 troops and
face us on the ground". Well, we're going in with 100 or 200 Rangers, and they
should be sufficient to do the job,' said former US Army colonel Mitch Mitchell.
Thirdly, the raid had a message to send out to America's domestic and international
critics. It showed that the US is willing and able to put its own flesh and blood in the
line of fire, accepting the risk of casualties and loss of American lives. The raid was
the exact opposite of the sanitised image of a safe war conducted by cruise missiles,
bombs and minimal risk to American life.
Fourthly, and finally, the raid will have gathered vital intelligence. The targeting of an
airfield in such a key area will have put troops on the ground to see with their own
eyes whether the facilities could one day be captured permanently and used as a
future base. One man looking on the ground is often worth a hundred photos from a
spy plane.
It is raids like this, from bases inside or close to Afghanistan, that mark out the next
phase of the war - the need to capture or kill Osama bin Laden. Pentagon officials
know the 'pyrotechnics' of their air war so far have little chance of fulfilling that aim.
Only men on the ground, able to launch swift raids as soon as a target is identified,
will be able to bring Bin Laden to justice.
This wider ground war plan is now emerging into fact. News of the first ground
incursions by US troops came after US defence officials had confirmed that a small
number of elite Special Operations forces were already in Afghanistan and said to be
working with tribal factions in the south who oppose the Taliban leadership as part of
a CIA-controlled political thrust.
On Friday, a commander with Northern Alliance forces opposed to the Taliban also
confirmed that eight US personnel had earlier arrived in northern Afghanistan and
been moving with warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum. They are Green Berets,
trained in liaison with friendly forces. They will help guide and support alliance
movements.
Another crucial development is the granting to America and Britain of access to
Pakistan's Dalbandin air base, situated in the desert just outside Quetta. The base is
a vital staging post to Kandahar, which is just 125 miles away. The military,
diplomatic and political frontline is closing in on the Taliban heartland.
But another key element of the Rangers raid will have been noticed by worried
Pentagon officials: it cost American lives. They may not have died in combat but the
two US servicemen who perished when their helicopter crashed were acting in
support of the mission. As the war expands, and more and more raids are carried
out, the casualty total will mount. Losses in this kind of warfare are inevitable.
The quick move to the ground phase of the war in Afghanistan has taken many
observers by surprise. But the speed partly reflects the lack of useful targets left in
the country after two weeks of air war.
'We started the campaign with 40 targets on a sheet of A4, compared to the 47
pages of targets over Yugoslavia,' said a senior Ministry of Defence source. 'Last
week, it went up to 67 and now it's about 120, but we really are scraping the barrel.'
A speedy move is also necessary for diplomatic reasons. Continuing with the
relentless bombing as a sole way of waging war would also have increased the risk
of civilian casualties, and with it the risk of dissent within America's fragile coalition.
British officials in particular were worried that the coalition is showing signs of stress.
This is especially true of Pakistan and Arab Gulf nations that will be vital as hosts for
the re-supply of forces on the ground in Afghanistan.
It is expensive, too. Already around 100 Tomahawk land attack missiles - known to
the military by their acronym, TLAM - have been launched. So many, in fact, that the
US Navy has begun a re-supply operation and Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon
announced last week that a further 48 missiles costing about L60 million, would be
ordered from Boeing.
'Too many people - especially US politicians - believe that all modern weapons of war
are precision attack. They are better than in Kosovo with new satellite guidance, but
even that can go wrong,' said the MoD source. 'They watch too much Hollywood and
believe their own propaganda.'
But the raid is not about to signal the beginning of a large-scale ground offensive
which military planners know would be costly, high in casualties and cumbersome.
The ground war now embarked upon will involve 'search and destroy' missions,
discrete airborne raids against selected targets where the watch words are: 'Get in,
get out - and quickly'. These raids will be designed to capture a base or create a
desert airfield, fly in special forces and secure the perimeter. They are essentially
heavily armed police raids, using the special forces to capture or kill al-Qaida
members, destroy bases and take prisoners. The US and British special forces are
trained for so-called 'flexible' warfare - light, mobile and able to respond quickly to
changing situations on the ground.
That is the theory. Critically, it is a kind of fighting heavily dependent on good on-the-
ground intelligence. And it is here that the special forces troops on the ground come
in. For while the US Rangers can come in and raid and leave, they need to know
what they are about to hit, how many enemy troops are there, and who they are after.
It is a skill honed by the SAS in Northern Ireland and, later, in Bosnia. It is the dirtiest,
most uncomfortable and dangerous kind of soldiering - working undercover in the
open, moving at night and spending long days observing hostile forces at close
quarters. Typically working in the smallest of formations of a handful of men, these
forces are required to live off the rations they can carry, or off the land, on missions
up to two weeks at a time - sometimes longer.
And they are not only responsible for gathering intelligence on the ground. In the
moments before a raid, inserted special forces might be required to act as forward air
controllers, helping to co-ordinate targeted weapons-fire from helicopters
or ground support aircraft on to specific targets, direct sniper fire on identified key
leaders or place themselves to snatch key targets.
While Britain's contribution may look small on paper, there is no doubt that politically
and militarily the Americans are glad to have them along. The diplomatic and political
muscle is important especially in places such as Pakistan, where former Chief of
Defence Staff, General Lord Guthrie, has been acting as the Prime Minister's
personal envoy.
Britain has also contributed just about the best reconnaissance aircraft available in
the shape of the Royal Air Force Canberra PR9. Tanker aircraft, too, are playing a
crucial role, flying nightly from the Gulf to refuel thirsty US Navy Tomcats and
Hornets on their way home from Afghanistan.
In warfare nothing is certain. One thing, however, seems likely. A new kind of war
has come to Afghanistan. And we are in it for the long haul.
Elite US Rangers storm mullah's mountain fort
The stronghold of Baba Sahib was never conquered by Russian forces. It was a
byword for invincibility to Afghans - but it
fell in a single attack
Paul Harris and Jason Burke, Peshawar
Sunday October 21, 2001
The Observer
The first sign that something had changed came on Friday. Unlike the previous week,
there was no pause in the American bombing for the Muslim day of prayer. US attack
aircraft prowled the skies above Kandahar, given the green light to go after random
targets and troop formations. But among the bombs came leaflets, fluttering down to
the battered and terrified people of the Taliban stronghold. They warned them to
avoid potential military targets and stay in their homes. Then came four slow-moving
EC-130CE planes, sweeping high over the city and broadcasting radio messages in
Pashtu.
The tone was mocking and brutal as the signals cut into local frequencies with
jamming equipment. The words were aimed at the Taliban fighters below, huddled
over radio sets. 'You are condemned. Did you know that? The instant the terrorists
you support took over our planes, you sentenced yourself to death,' they said. The
war, barely two weeks old, was entering a bloody and dangerous new phase.
The attack came just after midnight yesterday: enough time for the day of prayer to
have ended, but giving enough hours of darkness for the assault to be carried out
during night-time. This time the aircraft would not be dropping bombs. They would be
dropping highly trained, heavily armed men.
They had taken off a few hours earlier - reportedly from the aircraft carrier USS Kitty
Hawk - heading north over the Indian Ocean and through Pakistani airspace. Joining
them was an escort of AC-130s, the feared gunships which had been laying waste to
Taliban positions around Kandahar since the start of the week. Helicopters, based at
the newly opened Pakistani airstrip of Dalbandin, 125 miles from Kandahar, also flew
in to join the mission.
As the planes and choppers flew in low over hills and mountains surrounding the city,
at least 100 elite US Rangers slipped out and parachuted down out of the night sky.
They descended silently, each man wearing night-vision goggles that would reveal
the landscape below bathed in an eerie green light. His enemies - perhaps still not
knowing what was happening - would have scanned the darkness in vain, looking for
an attacker they could not see.
The target was Baba Sahib, a village of mud huts on a low hilltop about five miles
from the city centre. It is the base of a small Taliban garrison set up to guard a home
owned by the Taliban's spiritual leader, Mullah Omar. The houses have mud walls
and straw roofs. The roads are potholed and difficult to pass. The only solid building
of brick and concrete is Omar's house. But the village holds a special place in the
psyche of the Afghans. It and the surrounding mountains were a stronghold of the
anti-Russian forces during the Eighties.
First reports seem to indicate the attack was a surprise. For the Rangers, it was time
to put years of dedicated practice into action. This was the moment they had been
trained for.
If, as analysts believe, the raid was a 'dry-run' for future operations, this would have
been vital to demonstrate that US forces can take and secure territory inside
Afghanistan. As the Rangers landed they split up into their individual weapons teams
and moved quickly to secure the area.
A typical company of Rangers is equipped with two 60mm mortars and three-man
teams deploying an 84mm Carl Gustav anti-armour weapon. Each company is also
complemented by a weapons platoon that includes a sniper section, consisting of
two-man teams. A third team section employs a .50 calibre Barrett rifle capable of
penetrating light armour.
If Taliban forces had any doubts as to what was happening, they would have been
dispelled by the support fire of the AC-130s, backed up by the Nightstalker attack
helicopters that accompany Rangers on all their missions. When the guns from the
air opened up, they would have known a battle was on its way.
The AC-130s circled low overhead, always flying anti-clockwise so as to bring the full
brunt of their weaponry down upon Taliban forces below. The gunships can put a
round in every metre of an area the size of eight football pitches in a single pass.
Their psychological effect is almost as crippling as their firepower.
But for the Rangers on the ground the AC-130s meant security. Reports from
Kandahar spoke of huge amounts of gunfire and explosions from the region of the
village. Flashes and bangs lit up the night sky and some residents reported seeing
American ground troops taking up positions. Reports were still sketchy last night, but
direct man-to-man fighting had broken out for the first time between the Taliban and
US troops.
The Taliban yesterday said they had repulsed the attack and suffered no losses. But
unofficial sources in Pakistan said the Taliban 'took a mauling', leaving more than 20
fighters dead.
The Rangers stayed on the ground for two to three hours. Then, with dawn still
several hours away, the withdrawal began. Under the covering fire of the gunships,
troop-carrying helicopters raced into the airstrip. The Rangers ran to the rescue
craft before getting the all-clear to depart. Then - the mission complete - the
helicopters lifted off, turning for the Pakistani border and safety.
As the smoke from the raid drifted away, the Rangers left behind them more fresh
bullet-holes and shell craters around Kandahar, adding to the rubble already
accumulated over two decades of war. It is unlikely it will be the last time the
Rangers will be seen there.
Though each helicopter that flew to Afghanistan returned unharmed, there were
American casualties - the first in the war, but probably not the last. Two US
servicemen died when their helicopter crashed while on standby for any rescue
operation. After being told about their deaths in a video link from the Pentagon to
Shanghai, President George Bush hailed the dead men as heroes.
As word of the raid spread through Kandahar it became clear there was to be no
respite for the tattered city. US aircraft returned to the city yesterday and the bombing
resumed once again.
US special forces kill 20 in fierce Afghan firefight
Jason Burke, Peshawar, Ed Vulliamy, New York and Kamal Ahmed, London
Sunday October 21, 2001
The Observer
American special forces were yesterday involved in pitched battles inside
Afghanistan after being parachuted into an area where Osama bin Laden, the prime
suspect in the 11 September terrorist attacks, has been a frequent visitor. More than
100 US commandos and light infantry Rangers fought with Taliban forces near the
regime's spiritual stronghold of Kandahar, the Taliban's spiritual centre - where bin
Laden has been a frequent visitor - and a military airport 60 miles to the southeast.
Some 20 Taliban soldiers were reportedly killed. US helicopters were seen over
Kandahar again last night, apparently confirming reports of further attacks.
The forces siezed intelligence from a complex which serves as one of the Taliban
command and control compounds which they hope will reveal clues to the
whereabouts of the Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and bin Laden. After a
savage 30-minute firefight, US troops also cleared the airstrip building by building.
'We have accomplished our objective at the airfield,' said General Richard Myers,
chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, last night. 'We did not expect to find significant
Taliban leadership at these locations,' he said. 'We, of course, were hoping
we would, but we did not expect it, and we did not find senior Taliban of Al-Qaeda
leadership.'
Other operations involving ground troops were imminent, he added. 'We are going to
have ongoing operations around the world.
The general revealed that the US commandos came across stores of rocket
propelled grenades, machine guns and ammunition and destroyed them.
In Britain, Ministry of Defence sources said detachments of British Royal Marines
could shortly be sent to the region. In the event of a long ground war, Gurkha
regiments could also be called upon because of their experience of mountain terrain.
It is understood that at least one SAS unit is already operating inside Afghanistan,
but with orders to unite the rebel troops and attempt to encourage Taliban defections,
rather than take part in direct action.
And in the clearest signal yet that a ground offensive was imminent, Geoff Hoon, the
Defence Secretary, said: 'we have looked at a number of different options. Some of
those certainly involve putting boots on the ground in Afghanistan in a
number of different ways to achieve our ultimate objective of bringing Osama bin
Laden to justice and his associates to account.'
In an unprecedented wartime public relations act, the Pentagon released grainy film
taken by its own camera operators, including dramatic clips of night parachute drops
showing troops jumping on to the airfield from an MC 130E Combat Talon and
destroying equipment.
The special forces were taken out by helicoptor at dawn after hours inside Taliban
territory. The battle against Taliban militia in Kandahar began after troops boarded
aircraft at the remote Pakistani airstrip of Dalbandin, 37 miles from the Afghan
frontier.
US troops began arriving at the base, the third now being used in Pakistan by the
Americans, on Thursday, military sources said. They are believed to have acted with
special forces troops aboard the USS Kitty Hawk positioned in the Arabian Gulf.
Locals reported that helicopters began taking off from Dalbandin at 10.30pm on
Friday and air activity continued until 6am yesterday.
Army Rangers parachuted on to the airport were loaded armed transport planes in
nearby Oman.
Two American military personnel were killed and five others were injured when a
Black Hawk helicopter involved in support operations in Pakistan crashed at an
airbase. Taliban claims that they had hit it were dismissed by the US. Two Rangers
were hurt parachuting onto the airfield.
'These soldiers will not have died in vain,' President George W. Bush said last night.
'This is a just cause. The American people now fully understand that we are in an
important struggle, a struggle that will take time, and that there will be
moments of sacrifice.'
The American raids appear to have been a double-headed attack aimed at killing or
capturing both Mullah Omar, the reclusive cleric who leads the Taliban, and bin
Laden.
Sources said five helicopters landed at the small village of Baba Sahib, in Arghandab
district five miles north-west of Kandahar, the city which is the spiritual home of the
Taliban.
Omar has recently built a house in the village, which has already been the target of
sustained air attacks. Afghan military sources said that he was not in the area at the
time of the attack. Myers said the Taliban leader had lived in the command and
control building the commandos raided.
The raids signalled a new phase of the US-led coalition's war on terrorism, after 13
days of strikes from the air alone. Military sources in America and Britain said the
lightning 'hit and run' raids would be the first of many and that British troops were now
on standby to support further incursions.
The Pentagon said American troops had been in the country for a few hours and had
all returned to bases in Pakistan.
The escalation has provoked a renewed exodus of refugees and sparked a new
offensive by the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, which launched an attack on
positions north of Karbul.
The attacks also increased tension in the whole region, with Pakistan struggling to
contain protests. Yesterday afternoon a bomb was discovered in the departure
lounge of Islamabad airport. It was detonated in a controlled explosion. There were
no injuries. There were also reports of a new anthrax outbreak at the House of
Representatives in Washington.
Bombing raids by American planes continued throughout the day yesterday with
planes hitting Kabul, Kandahar and Herat. More than 30 aircraft were launched from
the carrier USS Carl Vinson.
In the streets of Karbul, tanks and troops were seen moving and sporadic bursts of
gunfire were heard as troops apparently fired with small arms on planes flying low
overhead.
Witnesses reported that resistance was almost non-existent, with little anti-aircraft
fire. The Islamic militia said that 900 civilians have been killed in the strikes so far,
though there is no confirmation of the figure.
The Taliban remained defiant last night, saying that they had successfully repulsed
the US raid and that they might as well give up their Muslim faith as give up the
world's most wanted man.