farmgirl
03-25-2004, 03:18 PM
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040325/ap_on_re_as/afghan_us_military_1
By STEPHEN GRAHAM, Associated Press Writer
CHAPMAN FIREBASE, Afghanistan - The U.S. military inaugurated a project on Thursday that is supposed to speed reconstruction and win over skeptical Afghans in a former al-Qaida stronghold that is still on the front line of America's war on terrorism.
Military and Afghan officials cut a ribbon across the entrance to the office of the Khost provincial reconstruction team, the 12th of its kind and a symbol of America's changing strategy in the face of a stubborn Taliban-led insurgency.
"Combat has been necessary in the past to defeat the terrorist threat, which is our common enemy," Maj. Gen. Lloyd Austin, the U.S. second-in-command in Afghanistan (news - web sites), told dozens of Afghan elders and officials at the ceremony.
"But our concern now is the future. Our emphasis must remain on setting the conditions for reconstruction and development," Austin said.
Commanders claim that Taliban and al-Qaida holdouts are now so weakened that they can be finished off by bringing long-delayed relief and reconstruction aid to their former strongholds in the south and east.
Yet attacks on aid workers and military targets continue, and the number of mainly U.S. soldiers here has risen some 2,000 — to 13,500 in all — in recent months as the military seeks to capture al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden (news - web sites) and Taliban leader Mullah Omar.
The reconstruction team in Khost, and others like it, is key to victory, commanders said.
A squat concrete building, its walls still wet and its windows yet to be glazed, will house a small group of American soldiers with orders to catalyze reconstruction and aid work.
Austin said the team would build schools, wells and clinics to bolster local services. Streets in Khost city are also to be repaved. All the projects are intended to pour money into the local economy.
Top U.S. commanders at Wednesday's ceremony were not available to speak to reporters covering the event, embellished with national anthems and flags and a bout of traditional Afghan music and dance.
Instead, it was left to a reservist physician at a small clinic in the barren, rock-strewn base to defend the reconstruction effort in what is still a combat zone.
"There is a 'hearts-and-minds' aspect and you can't overestimate that," said Capt. Steve Travis, a native of Guthrie, Okla.
"But we're really making a difference," Travis said, pointing to more than 9,000 mostly female patients treated since November. "It's not eyewash."
The team is based inside Chapman Firebase, the home of an undisclosed number of American special forces and their Afghan helpers, just off a packed dirt runway littered with the wrecks of old military planes.
Bearded American soldiers in civilian clothes moved in and out of the heavily guarded base in dust-caked Humvees and pickup trucks, betraying how the war continues.
At the ceremony, Khost Gov. Hakim Taniwal pleaded for international aid groups and the United Nations (news - web sites) to return to his province.
But officials acknowledge that aid workers spooked by the deadly shootings of mine clearers and well-diggers still don't believe the border areas are safe.
Khost juts into Pakistan, from where weapons and guns flowed in over the mountains during the war against the Soviet Union in the 1980s — and where U.S. and Afghan officials say insurgents continue to find safe havens.
The town of Khost is only 80 miles from Wana, the Pakistani town at the center of a fierce battle between thousands of Pakistani troops and hundreds of suspected al-Qaida militants and their tribal supporters.
Khial Baz, the Afghan military commander of the province, told reporters that his men had killed Chechen, Arab and Pakistani fighters creeping over the mountainous frontier as recently as January.
He said his men, who work closely with American troops in the province, were keeping a tight cordon — but acknowledged that his foes were at best dormant.
"There are some people trying to work against us," Baz said. "But they're lying low at the moment."
By STEPHEN GRAHAM, Associated Press Writer
CHAPMAN FIREBASE, Afghanistan - The U.S. military inaugurated a project on Thursday that is supposed to speed reconstruction and win over skeptical Afghans in a former al-Qaida stronghold that is still on the front line of America's war on terrorism.
Military and Afghan officials cut a ribbon across the entrance to the office of the Khost provincial reconstruction team, the 12th of its kind and a symbol of America's changing strategy in the face of a stubborn Taliban-led insurgency.
"Combat has been necessary in the past to defeat the terrorist threat, which is our common enemy," Maj. Gen. Lloyd Austin, the U.S. second-in-command in Afghanistan (news - web sites), told dozens of Afghan elders and officials at the ceremony.
"But our concern now is the future. Our emphasis must remain on setting the conditions for reconstruction and development," Austin said.
Commanders claim that Taliban and al-Qaida holdouts are now so weakened that they can be finished off by bringing long-delayed relief and reconstruction aid to their former strongholds in the south and east.
Yet attacks on aid workers and military targets continue, and the number of mainly U.S. soldiers here has risen some 2,000 — to 13,500 in all — in recent months as the military seeks to capture al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden (news - web sites) and Taliban leader Mullah Omar.
The reconstruction team in Khost, and others like it, is key to victory, commanders said.
A squat concrete building, its walls still wet and its windows yet to be glazed, will house a small group of American soldiers with orders to catalyze reconstruction and aid work.
Austin said the team would build schools, wells and clinics to bolster local services. Streets in Khost city are also to be repaved. All the projects are intended to pour money into the local economy.
Top U.S. commanders at Wednesday's ceremony were not available to speak to reporters covering the event, embellished with national anthems and flags and a bout of traditional Afghan music and dance.
Instead, it was left to a reservist physician at a small clinic in the barren, rock-strewn base to defend the reconstruction effort in what is still a combat zone.
"There is a 'hearts-and-minds' aspect and you can't overestimate that," said Capt. Steve Travis, a native of Guthrie, Okla.
"But we're really making a difference," Travis said, pointing to more than 9,000 mostly female patients treated since November. "It's not eyewash."
The team is based inside Chapman Firebase, the home of an undisclosed number of American special forces and their Afghan helpers, just off a packed dirt runway littered with the wrecks of old military planes.
Bearded American soldiers in civilian clothes moved in and out of the heavily guarded base in dust-caked Humvees and pickup trucks, betraying how the war continues.
At the ceremony, Khost Gov. Hakim Taniwal pleaded for international aid groups and the United Nations (news - web sites) to return to his province.
But officials acknowledge that aid workers spooked by the deadly shootings of mine clearers and well-diggers still don't believe the border areas are safe.
Khost juts into Pakistan, from where weapons and guns flowed in over the mountains during the war against the Soviet Union in the 1980s — and where U.S. and Afghan officials say insurgents continue to find safe havens.
The town of Khost is only 80 miles from Wana, the Pakistani town at the center of a fierce battle between thousands of Pakistani troops and hundreds of suspected al-Qaida militants and their tribal supporters.
Khial Baz, the Afghan military commander of the province, told reporters that his men had killed Chechen, Arab and Pakistani fighters creeping over the mountainous frontier as recently as January.
He said his men, who work closely with American troops in the province, were keeping a tight cordon — but acknowledged that his foes were at best dormant.
"There are some people trying to work against us," Baz said. "But they're lying low at the moment."