Posted on 11/19/2003 12:36:15 PM PST by kattracks
RIYADH, Nov 19 (Reuters) - Taking cover behind desert shrubs, Saudi commandos creep up to a house where suspected militants are holed up.With a burst of gunfire and flash bombs, they storm through doors and windows, clamber over walls and race through the rooms to take control of the gunmen's hideout.
Today it's just a training drill.
But men from this unit of Saudi Arabia's Special Security Forces, on the front line of the kingdom's battle with an Islamist insurgency, were in action for real two weeks ago when they raided a house in Riyadh and killed a suspected militant.
On the same day, two other militants died in a clash with security forces in the holy city of Mecca. Barely 48 hours later, suspected suicide bombers killed at least 18 people when they blew up a residential compound in the capital Riyadh.
Saudi authorities, keen to show their determination to stamp out the threat posed by Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network, took Western reporters on Wednesday to an elite special forces training camp.
At the sprawling counter-terrorism school in the desert 15 km (10 miles) north of Riyadh, troops are trained in bomb detection and disposal, urban warfare and hostage rescue.
"There has been huge progress in eliminating the terrorists," said Brigadier-General Nawaf al-Shwayeb, head of training at the special forces base.
As he spoke troops firing live ammunition stormed a two-storey house where an imaginary foe had taken hostages.
Earlier, special forces brought an escaping car to a screeching halt with a "fishtail" manoeuvre, spinning the vehicle round before firing a hail of blank rounds at the driver. They also showed how they would storm a hijacked bus.
PREPARING FOR THE WORST
Commanders say they are learning how to deal with the potential threat of chemical or biological attacks. "We are preparing to face the worst case scenario," Shwayeb said.
Despite the very public display, officers gave few details about their units. One said there were around 13,000 to 14,000 special forces in Saudi Arabia.
He said they were trained by Britain's Special Air Service (SAS) as well as French, German and U.S. units.
After the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, carried out by mainly Saudi hijackers, Saudi Arabia was accused of doing too little to tackle al Qaeda militants.
It has cracked down hard since a triple suicide bombing of residential compounds in Riyadh in May which killed 35 people, including nine Americans. Saudis dubbed the Riyadh attacks their own September 11.
"We are facing groups of terrorists trying to kill innocent people and children," Shwayeb said. "We will stop them".
Major Mehdi al-Amri said as well as the Riyadh operation earlier this month, some men training on Wednesday were involved in October raids on farms in the Islamist heartland of Qassim province north of Riyadh.
Several security forces have been killed in recent clashes, but Shwayeb said he had not lost any men. "Concerning our unit, no one has been killed by terrorists, even when we have conducted operations," he said. ((Editing by Andrew Roche. dom.evans@reuters.com))
That's very funny, especially for Mort.
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