Posted on 11/28/2001 6:02:43 PM PST by blam
THURSDAY NOVEMBER 29 2001
US targets bin Laden's fortress
BY ROLAND WATSON IN WASHINGTON AND MICHAEL EVANS, DEFENCE EDITOR
OSAMA BIN LADEN and the Taleban leadership have lost control of their troops, the Pentagon said last night as American forces concentrated on a deep mountain bunker in which they believe the al-Qaeda leader is hiding. The extensive cave complex near the village of Tora Bora, south of Jalalabad, has become the focus of US bombing after the latest American and British intelligence pinpointed it as bin Laden’s hiding place.
As opposition forces massed in Jalalabad ready to advance on Tora Bora, the Pentagon said that bin Laden and Mullah Muhammad Omar, the Taleban spiritual leader, could no longer communicate freely with their forces.
Rear-Admiral John Stufflebeem, the Pentagon’s war spokesman, said: “We know that there are elements of the leadership that are trying to reach their seniors for guidance. We know that there’s still guidance coming down from senior leaders. But to say that they are still calling the shots, or are still formally in control, is an overstatement.”
A defiant radio message to Taleban troops quoted Mullah Omar as ordering them to stand and fight. “Don’t vacate any areas,” the statement said.
Defence sources are increasingly sure that bin Laden is in the Tora Bora complex. “We’re now convinced this is where he is and where the 1,000 or so al-Qaeda fighters with him will make their last stand,” said one. The whereabouts of Mullah Omar is less certain, amid reports that he is moving every six hours to evade capture.
The Pentagon said that it did not yet know if any Taleban or al-Qaeda leaders had died in Tuesday night’s strike on a leadership compound southeast of Kandahar.
Concerns that the endgame in Afghanistan would develop into a brutal, uncontrollable bloodbath were heightened yesterday following a report that more than 150 captured Taleban fighters were killed by machinegun fire as American forces looked on.
The Pentagon said that US Central Command was investigating the account of an unnamed Pashtun commander who was reported by Reuters as saying that the dead were dumped in shallow graves after protests from the American military personnel failed to halt the massacre.
The opposition forces had tried to persuade the Taleban to surrender at Takteh Pol, the commander said. “But they replied with abuse, so we had no choice,” he said.
The account followed the bloody prison riot in Mazar-i Sharif. Washington confirmed that a CIA officer, Johnny “Mike” Spann, from Winfield, Alabama, had been killed there. The CIA said that his body had been recovered. He is the first American known to have been killed in combat since the start of the bombing campaign on October 7.
Defence officials said that two dozen US soldiers from the 10th Mountain Division had been posted outside Mazar-i Sharif to serve as a rapid reaction force in case of further Taleban resistance. About 1,000 soldiers from the division have been providing security at an airbase in southern Uzbekistan. More might be sent to Mazar-i Sharif, the officials said.
Although American and British intelligence analysts realise that bin Laden may have devised a deception plan, there is now so much material, covertly and overtly acquired, pointing to Tora Bora as his hideout that military planners are likely to be focusing much of their effort on drawing up a plan to attack the mountain stronghold.
Defence sources said that bin Laden no longer had the ability to switch from one part of Afghanistan to another because of the Northern Alliance advances and the increasing presence of US Marines in the south, and that Tora Bora provided him with a seemingly impenetrable fortress.
The conviction that bin Laden is at Tora Bora, a complex of deep caves carved more than 1,000ft into the 13,000ft mountain, has come after analysis of all the accumulated intelligence, human as well as technical.
The intensive intelligence-gathering operation has involved American and British special forces, the CIA, MI6 and “technical means” — airborne electronic eavesdropping systems, including RAF Nimrod R1 reconnaissance aircraft and US signals intelligence satellites.
Soldiers will have to hunt bin Laden
BY MICHAEL EVANS, DEFENCE EDITOR
THE Tora Bora fortress where Osama bin Laden is believed to be hiding is a self-contained complex with its own electrical heating system, huge stocks of ammunition and accommodation for more than 1,000.
During its occupation of Afghanistan, the Soviet Army had a base at Jalalabad but never succeeded in flushing out the Mujahidin from Tora Bora. In recent days American bombers have been targeting the area around the White Mountains region and dropping leaflets with bin Laden’s picture, appealing for assistance in tracking him down.
One American defence source said that there were no weapons in the US arsenal that could guarantee to flush out bin Laden from Tora Bora. “It will come down to soldiers having to enter the tunnels, which is why (Donald) Rumsfeld (the US Defence Secretary) and President Bush have been warning of future casualties among American troops,” the source said. Attacking Tora Bora from the air with fuel-air bombs or the 15,000lb “daisy cutter” would have no impact, the source said. A significant amount of the intelligence on bin Laden’s suspected whereabouts has been provided by Britain’s SAS and MI6, according to the defence sources.
One of the missions of the British and American special forces in Afghanistan at present is to check out the exit routes from the Tora Bora complex. There are believed to more than 100 routes into Pakistan, and the United States is relying on the Pakistani Government to seal all the frontier crossings.
Bin Laden also needs a constant supply of food for such a large number of fighters and there are local reports of supplies being ferried regularly to the bunker.
The yellow bird with the yellow bill
Flew upon my window sill
Lured him in with crumbs of bread
Then I crushed his F***** head
I mean, if I understand the complex's construction, 1000 foot tunnel and associated air shafts (coupled with howling winter winds) create one H*LL of a wind whipped "chimney fire".
I mean, they used the Jet fuel and no one called it Napalm. Just think of the 1004 crispy critters (1000 "fighters" and OBL+wife and two kids)??
Is that what Dubya means by Smoking 'em out??
Kinda helps the burning mixture kling to things.
Find 500 Marines who smoke cigarettes and station them around the hideout --- Kill Osama with second hand cigarette smoke (the most dangerous product America produces).
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