Local leaders say Kandahar airport falls to opposition

Reuters ^ | Nov. 13

[codeword]

QUETTA, Pakistan (Reuters) - The strategic airport outside the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, powerbase of the fundamentalist Taliban, fell to opposition forces on Tuesday, tribal leaders said.

"It's confirmed from tribal leaders," Mohammad Yusaf Pashtun, spokesman for former mujahideen governor of Kandahar, Gul Agha, told Reuters in this southwestern Pakistani city just across the border from Afghanistan.

"They don't know who took it," he said.

"Kandahar airport has fallen in the hands of the Northern Alliance," Qatar's al-Jazeera television said in an unsourced report and without further details.

The report came moments after the satellite television station's correspondent in Kandahar, Youssef al-Shouli, said in a live interview that he could hear small arms fire close to the city.

[patriciaruth]

"They don't know who took it," he said.

I wonder if our Special Forces will be known in the future as "The Frito Banditos."

[quimby]

"Kandahar airport has fallen in the hands of the Northern Alliance," Qatar's al-Jazeera television said in an unsourced report and without further details.

Good to know reuters sources.

[Clinton's a rapist]

O Great Taliban warriors, [ waving arms about like a spastic and snarling like a rabid dog ] you are completely f***ed.

[Keith]

I think that earlier move by our US SF was to set this up at the right time. I also note that the NA are now moving on Jalalabad...I see that as the Taliban's Berchtesgaden.

[patriciaruth]

Fascinating historical reading here today and tonight.

[Straight Vermonter]

I don't think that the NA has the ability to move that far that fast. It has to be locals attacking the airport, maybe with US support.

[Cold Heat]

Could be the Southern tribes have finally got their act together. They have been trying to combine forces for a couple of weeks.

[monocle]

All Afghans respect force and victories and the recent successes of the Northern Alliance has convinced those in the south where their future is assured.

[Illbay]

former mujahideen governor of Kandahar, Gul Agha...

I didn't realize there were Cardassians living among the Afghans.

GUL AGHA

[Cold Heat]

Makes sense to go with a winner!

[aristeides]

This may mean the Taliban no longer control any airfields. If that's so, bin Laden and his lieutenants may have a harder job fleeing the scene.

[Cold Heat]

You must be a DS-9 fan! Great show...wish they would have kept it going for a few more years.

[Trueblackman]

Maybe The Taliban will head for the badlands or maybe the wormhole! LOL Your post was too funny I had to stop laugh after a GOOD FULL MINUTE

[Illbay]

Strangely enough, I never really got into DS-9. But one of the cable networks had a week-long, nonstop ST:TNG marathon about a month ago, and I got absolutely NO work done that week.