Taliban Troops Prepare For Underground Fight

The Sunday Times (UK) ^

[blam]

Taliban troops prepare for underground fight

AFGHANISTAN'S leading cave-fighting veteran from its 1980s war with the Soviet Union has been appointed head of the Taliban army. The move raises the prospect of British and American soldiers having to fight in the country's labyrinth of tunnels and mountain caverns if they mount an invasion to find Osama Bin Laden.

Jalaluddin Haqani, a former mullah, has been promoted to the post by Mullah Mohammed Omar, the Taliban leader, according to sources in Pakistan. He has established a base close to the Zhawar caves near the Pakistan border, from where his men inflicted some of the greatest losses the Russians suffered during their occupation of the country.

Allied forces, however, are likely to be far better equipped than the Russians were to beat Haqani's veterans.

"Cave-fighting is nasty, vicious, inhuman work," said Michael Clarke, director of the centre for defence studies at King's College, London. "But in the darkness, with their night-vision equipment, our troops would have a key advantage."

Last week American B-2 and B-52 planes began destroying Afghanistan's caves, dropping "bunker-buster" bombs designed to penetrate rock up to 20ft thick before exploding.

Many caverns, though, are likely to survive. The biggest at Zhawar are more than a quarter of a mile long, carved out of sheer mountains. Bin Laden, whose workers helped to dig them, has taken refuge there on several occasions.

The caves were among those attacked by American cruise missiles in 1998. If bombs fail to destroy such a hideout, allied troops would begin an assault by sealing them off from the surrounding area. Infrared sensors and ground-penetrating radar would be used to find where fighters were hiding. Deafening music or propaganda messages could be played over speakers to coax them out. Sending soldiers into the caves would be a last resort.

Charles Heyman, a former army staff planning officer in Germany and editor of Jane's World Armies, said: "The only way to take them is to smoke people out with gas and then blow up the entrances to seal in anyone who was left."

The Zhawar caves cost the lives of hundreds of Russians and their Afghan allies as they tried to capture them in 1985-86. The mujaheddin also shot down 24 helicopters in the battle.

Haqani, who last month called the prospect of war against America "a very good chance for those Afghans who missed the jihad against the Soviets", held out for seven months. He was wounded in the face during a Russian fighter attack and his men abandoned the caves after rumours that he was dead.

An account of the capture of the complex, included in an article about the battle to be published this week in the journal Slavic Military Studies, was written by Viktor Kutsenko, a Russian colonel.

"After a narrow passage of mountain road, it opened up into a wide canyon of 150 metres whose sides stretched upwards for two kilometres," he wrote. "There were 41 caves in all. All had electricity . . . Behind a fence was a mosque with a beautiful brick entrance and a hospital with new medical equipment made in the United States . . . There was a library with English and Farsi books. There was a bakery and, by the entrance, a stack of fresh nan bread."

There was even a hotel. "There was overstuffed furniture inside and the floors were covered with carpets. Many of our aircraft had worked this site over," wrote Kutsenko, "and the hotel and caves were still intact."

In addition to mountain caves, much of lowland Afghanistan is crisscrossed by underground irrigation channels, called karez, at depths of up to 100ft. Mounds of earth show where shafts have been sunk to connect with the tunnels, which have been used by villagers and fighters to hide or move between ambush positions. Extra dangers are posed by cobras and scorpions. The tunnels are typically 3ft wide and must be crawled through.

If the karez are used, the allies are likely to adopt methods similar to those developed by the Russians - such as stereophonic blasting - to avoid the terrifying prospect of pursuing their enemies underground

Another way of eliminating defenders was for a soldier to lower a small rocket launcher into the tunnel opening and fire it with a piece of string tied to the trigger.

The American army's most recent experience of fighting underground was 30 years ago in Vietnam, when specialised "tunnel rat" soldiers crawled inside with pistols to fight hand-to-hand with the Viet Cong.

Connie Steers, 52, a postal worker from Long Island, New York, fought in 1969-70, checking tunnels for enemy fighters. "I just hope the guys now have proper training for it," he said. "We didn't, we just got volunteered. You crawled along with a .45 and a cigarette lighter. Viet Cong could be right in front of you and you wouldn't know."

[P-Marlowe]

I don't believe that anyone would have any problem with underground nuclear testing, do you? We need to test some of our old 50 megaton behemoths. See if they still work.

[FReethesheeples]

Good point.

But the pigs gotta die anyway.,P>Go long pork bellies!

[FReethesheeples]

Exactly.