Posted on 11/16/2001 10:28:22 PM PST by codeword
BRITAIN is planning to deploy up to 6,000 troops in Afghanistan, far more than originally envisaged, defence sources said yesterday.
Two British brigades are now likely to be sent in to try to prevent a recurrence of the bloody internecine warfare that followed the fall of the city to the Northern Alliance in 1992.
Although officials continued to say publicly yesterday that no decision on whether to deploy troops had been taken, privately the sources said that it was inevitable that a large British force would be sent into Afghanistan.
Geoff Hoon, Defence Secretary, said: "It does depend on what is a very fast-moving situation there. Clearly we are committed to the very long-term reconstruction of Afghanistan."
There remain grave concerns over the difficulties the force might face. The alliance continues to insist that it no longer needs the allies' military assistance.
The troops will also present an obvious target for the hard core of the Taliban and the al-Qa'eda network, some of whom are determined to fight a guerrilla campaign for control of the country, the sources said.
Two battalion-sized units of around 600 men each, 2 Bn, the Parachute Regiment and 45 Commando, Royal Marine, are expected to be ready to fly into Bagram early next week. They may also be joined by 42 Commando, Royal Marine.
The lead element is expected to be the Pathfinder Platoon, which is the main reconnaissance unit of 16 Air Assault Bde, a company of paratroopers from 2 Para, and half a dozen officers from the brigade headquarters.
A squadron of commandos from the Special Boat Service which flew into Bagram on Thursday was carrying out reconnaissance yesterday to determine how usable the airfield is and what problems the British troops might face.
If British troops expected to be greeted as saviours, coming to help humanitarian aid reach a country racked by drought and war, they were mistaken.
It was hard to find anyone in Kabul who knew of the existence of the advance guard of SBS men at Bagram air base.
"We are not asking for any foreign help. We don't need it. We can find the terrorists ourselves," said Alou Zehi, an alliance artillery commander who took part in the march on Kabul.
Another officer, Lieutenant Mohammed Akbar, said: "It's all over now. Why are they here? We don't need them." The alliance has made stunning gains on the battlefield over the past week, moving from controlling barely 20 per cent of the country to more than two-thirds.
But its lack of desire to share power with other factions has dampened the euphoria of liberation among residents of Kabul, who had hoped for an end to 20 years of war.
But people in the capital were far more open to the presence of foreign troops, seeing them as a brake on the ambitions of the alliance.
"As for me, foreign troops are a good idea, and if it was a United Nations force, even better," said Moharram Ali, a shopkeeper from the Hazara ethnic group, whose long history of persecution reached its zenith under the Taliban.
"The Northern Alliance came here with foreign support, so why should there not be foreign troops on our soil?"
Something is going on , that is for sure!
This makes me rather nervous, looks like trouble!
Meanwhile, there are possibly 40,000 Taliban vs 15,000-20,000 NA, so it is doubtful we are about to attach NA.
The NA are very PR aware, and nowhere more so than Kabul.
Maybe CNN is just trying to stir up a bit of trouble!
The Brits have been our best ally thru all this, or didn't you notice?
Eh, that will bring the TOTAL to 6,000 troops — they're not adding 6,000 MORE (as the headline for this post falsely implies). There's already quite a few Brits there...
I might mention that Canada is also committing 3,000 troops to Afghanistan.
We are very lucky here in Socal. I get ITN news at 5pm (Kcet Ch 28), BBC at 6pm (Koce Ch 50), and BBC at 7:30pm (Klcs Ch 58) all on broadcast channels!
They are not talking about keeping Bin Laden if they capture him.
They stop being our allies when they keep Bin Laden from American justice whatever that entails.
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