10 - 16 January 2002
Issue No.568
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 10 - 16 January 2002 Issue No.568 |
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Bombs, missiles and mines
As the manhunt for Al-Qa'eda and Taliban forces continues, the US-led campaign is still leaving a trail of destruction in embattled Afghanistan, writes Anayat Durrani from Washington
Four months on from 11 September, US-led forces are still carrying out some of their most intense bombing in weeks in eastern Afghanistan. War planes have been pounding the area in a bid to both prevent Taliban and Al-Qa'eda fighters from regrouping and to destroy weaponry hidden in tunnel complexes.
"They [Al-Qa'eda] are obviously widely dispersed," said Rear Admiral John D. Stufflebeem at a Pentagon press briefing on Monday. "They are attempting to regroup," he added. "They're just trying to find each other and then, obviously, to continue their war."
Those Al-Qa'eda fighters who escaped US air strikes on the Tora Bora cave complex in December are believed to have regrouped in the Khost region, where the Al-Qa'eda network once operated a training and supply camp. Khost is in Paktia province, in the east of Afghanistan and near the Pakistan border. Stufflebeem has branded the region as "a hotbed of support" for Al-Qa'eda and the Taliban.
US jets bombed the Zhawar Kili training camp and the Spin Ghar mountain range in eastern Afghanistan. Additional strikes on Zhawar Kili were carried out on Monday, after US forces searched Al-Qa'eda cave complexes and discovered tanks and other weaponry, according to Stufflebeem. US forces have been flying a little more than 100 sorties a day, using land-based B-1s and B-52s and US and coalition carrier-based aircraft.
"This is what you would call a relatively active area," Stufflebeem commented. "There are obviously still Al-Qa'eda and pro-Taliban forces on the loose there, and we're continuing to find them, and we're continuing to strike their equipment as we find it."
It has been three months since the first US bombs were dropped on Taliban and Al- Qa'eda targets in Afghanistan. US officials are saying that "significant progress" has been made since their military operation began.
"I think it's pretty safe to say that we've made significant progress toward accomplishing [our military] objectives," said Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke on Monday. "The Taliban no longer run the country. An interim government is in place to begin the restructuring of Afghanistan. We have debilitated Al-Qa'eda forces to a certain degree. We have killed or captured some of the leaders from both the Taliban and Al- Qa'eda. And we have assisted in delivering record amounts of humanitarian supplies to the people of Afghanistan."
Much remains to be done in the war in Afghanistan, however. "Our focus continues to be on locating Al-Qa'eda, the Taliban and their leadership; on interviewing detainees in Afghanistan for intelligence, preparing for their transfer to, and detention at, the Guantanamo Base facility; and on supporting international humanitarian relief operations in Afghanistan," said Stufflebeem.
US military officials said on Monday that they would be devoting less time to speculation about the whereabouts of Osama Bin Laden and Mullah Mohamed Omar. US forces in Afghanistan have instead concentrated their efforts on rounding up remaining members of the Taliban and Al-Qa'eda at large. "We're going to stop chasing the shadows of where we thought he [Bin Laden] was and focus more on the entire picture of the country," Stufflebeem said.
Stufflebeem added that the mission in Afghanistan is far from over. US officials say they are casting a "worldwide net" to capture Taliban and Al-Qa'eda leaders. Operations are currently under way in other spots around the world where possible Al Qa'eda cells may be present. "The campaign is currently focused in Afghanistan, but there are also operations occurring around the rest of the world, not all of which are visible to us."
US officials have said in the past that over 60 countries are believed to have Al-Qa'eda cells. Countries often mentioned include Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, the Philippines and most recently Indonesia. A Los Angeles Times report claimed that "between 800 and 1,000 terrorism suspects have been arrested or detained in more than 50 countries, not including the more than 640 being held in the United States, according to US officials. Many of the foreign arrests have not been made public. More than 140 countries have also frozen funds in 270 accounts with total assets of $65 million. Most of the arrests and frozen assets are linked to Al- Qa'eda, but other extremist groups have also been affected."
The number of Al-Qa'eda and Taliban detainees in the custody of US forces in Afghanistan continues to rise. Of the 346 detainees, 300 are in Kandahar, 21 at Bagram, 16 in Mazar-i Sharif, and nine, including American convert to Islam John Walker Lindh, are being held on the USS Bataan in the Arabian Sea, according to Stufflebeem. On Sunday, more than 1,000 US troops were deployed to Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba to begin construction of a maximum-security holding facility. The Guantanamo Bay facility will be equipped to hold about 100 Taliban and Al Qa'eda prisoners for now, and eventually up to 2,000 will be held at the base, according to the US Central Command. Several detainees may soon be arriving at the detention facility, according to reports.
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