Free Republic

The Taliban may be prepared to renounce terrorism and sever links with al Qaeda, accept a power sharing role in a new Afghan government and even tolerate American bases in their country, according to a new report. A panel of four experts from the Royal United Services Institute interviewed four senior figures - each one part of the "pragmatic" or "moderate" part of the Islamist movement - at a secret location in the Arabian Gulf. The four figures, among them two former Taliban ministers, a Mujahideen commander and a well-connected negotiator, surprised the experts by insisting that they had no...

GOTTA SEE THIS - War for Enduring Freedom 12/28/07 - Lahore, Rawalpindi, Kabul, Kandahar, Musa Qala, Helmand, Haditha, Ruwaydah, Iraq BREAKING: Kabul- Buzkashi game; European Union and UN thrown out BREAKING: Musa Qala - Taliban terrorists in the southern Helmand routed BREAKING: Rawalpindi, Pakistan, former premier Benazir Bhutto murdered. BREAKING: Rawalpindi, Lahore, burnt vehicles to protest the murder Haditha, Iraq - Heroes on patrol in the waterways of the Haditha Dam Forward Operating Base Ruwaydah, Iraq - USAF Heroes identify ordnance found QFN ==== YE OLDE QUAGMIRE-FREE NEWS Exclusive to FReerepublic PICTURES YOU WILL NOT SEE IN THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA...

Rafiq Maqbool/Associated PressMUSA QALA, Afghanistan — Last week the Taliban controlled this southern town and its dozens of heroin-processing labs. Today, hundreds of Afghan and British troops patrol the streets as engineers build new military outposts, attempting to fortify the town before a possible Taliban counterattack. The town of Musa Qala is situated in the northern section of Helmand province — the world's largest poppy-growing region and scene of the heaviest fighting in Afghanistan this year. Militants overran the town last winter and held it for 10 months, until Afghan, British and American troops retook it last week. As...

As the only journalist to join NATO forces entering the town, I found it a ghost town abandoned by both the Taliban and its residents at the end of an eight-day coalition operation. The offensive was one of NATO's biggest in the country since Operation Anaconda in 2002. Embedded with a team of British troops and a detachment/"A–team" of U.S. special forces, I watched the Taliban being pounded these last few days with overwhelming force -- vapor trails circled in the clear blue sky over the Helmand desert as B1 and B52 bombers backed by A10 tank busters, F16s, Apache...

Kabul (13 December) - The Afghan Ministry of Defence says that hundreds of Taliban soldiers have been killed, wounded or taken prisoner in the fighting in and around the Afghan town of Musa Qala. Musa Qala was the only town in the country to be occupied by the Taliban. It was re-taken by the Afghan military and NATO troops on Tuesday, after several days of heavy fighting. The coalition troops were supported, among others, by Dutch Apache helicopters and F16s. The British newspaper The Times is reporting that the fleeing Taliban have left behind a fortune in opium, worth approximately...

NATO claimed victory Tuesday in the four-day battle for Musa Qala as the Afghanistan flag was raised over what had been the only town held by the Taliban. NATO military leaders promised that the town in Helmand Province will get the decent government and economic development that was not provided before the Taliban moved in months ago, The Times of London reported. "We have a plan ready, and we will want to demonstrate that people will be better off with the Afghan government than they were with the Taliban," said Lt. Col. Richard Easton, a spokesman for the British military....

BBC News, Kabul The Afghan army may struggle to hold on to Musa Qala Holding the town of Musa Qala has taken on symbolic importance for both sides. It is "iconic", in the words of British Defence Secretary Des Browne. Now it has fallen, British troops will keep a small presence there, but the main defence of the town and the surrounding area will be led by the Afghan army. The decision to take the town at this time fits into a wider strategy of trying to restrict Taleban movement during the winter months. No-one expects a pause in...

via translation - Afghanistan: Afghan army entered Musa Qala KABUL - The Afghan army entered Monday in the capital district of Musa Qala, detained for ten months by the Taliban in southern Afghanistan, told AFP a spokesman for NATO. "The Afghan army entered the town of Musa Qala," said AFP Major Charles Anthony, spokesman Forces International Security Assistance (ISAF) by NATO. Asked if she now controlled the entire district, the spokesman replied: "The Afghan army has at least entered the capital." In a statement, the spokesman of the Defense Ministry, General Mohammed Zahir Azimi said that Afghan forces backed by...

The massive Coalition assault on Musa Qala, dubbed Operation Mar Kardad (Snake Pit), scored its first series of casualties against the swarm of Taliban and foreign fighters entrenched in the city center. A targeted air strike killed a local commander known to be involved in arm and drug trafficking along with several of his aids, according to a US military statement. The three pronged assault on the city’s outskirts was launched yesterday with thousands of Afghan army and British troops along with US, Danish and Estonian forces taking part in the operation.Local Taliban commanders have previouslyclaimed having nearly 2,000...

Excerpt - KABUL, Dec 9 (Reuters) - Afghan and NATO-led forces have captured two senior Taliban commanders during their offensive to retake the insurgents' most important stronghold in Afghanistan, the Afghan Defence Ministry said on Sunday. Musa Qala, in the southern province of Helmand, has a symbolic significance for both sides in the conflict in Afghanistan as the only sizeable Afghan town controlled by the Taliban. U.S. and British forces opened the operation on Friday, in the words of a British spokesman "kicking the door in to Musa Qala", to be followed up by an assault by Afghan forces. The...

via translation - The British Minister of Defense in Afghanistan, fighting in Musa Qala KABUL - The British Minister of Defense Des Browne arrived in Afghanistan where he met with his counterpart at the situation in the country, scene of an offensive by NATO and the Afghan army against the Taliban in the south, it was learned Sunday from diplomatic source. Arriving Saturday, he Browne met Sunday with his counterpart Abdul Rahim Wardak before traveling in the city of Herat (west), said the British embassy in Kabul. On the first day of his visit, the minister also met with British...

Excerpt - KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan -- The Afghan National Army, supported by international coalition forces, launched an operation Friday to recapture Musa Qaleh, a Taliban stronghold in southern Afghanistan’s Helmand province. Wing Cmdr. Antony McCord, a NATO spokesperson, said coalition forces, including British, Danish and Estonian troops, were taken by helicopter to the edge of the town. “This operation will continue for the next few days,” he told journalists at Kandahar Airfield. Afghan and NATO troops surrounded the town and launched air strikes to dislodge Taliban rebels who had been in control for 10 months, the Afghan Defence Ministry said....

KABUL, Afghanistan - Days after Taliban fighters overran Musa Qala a U.S. commander pledged that Western troops would take it back. Nine months later, the town is still Taliban territory, a symbol of the West's struggles to control the poppy-growing south. But a string of recent battles around Musa Qala, won overwhelmingly by American Special Forces, signal a renewed U.S. focus on the symbolic Taliban stronghold. An Afghan army commander said Sunday that U.S. and Afghan forces have taken over the area around the town and that Afghan commanders are holding talks with Musa Qala's tribal leaders to persuade them...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- U.S.-led coalition forces killed about 80 Taliban fighters during a six-hour battle outside a Taliban-controlled town in southern Afghanistan Saturday, the latest in a series of increasingly bloody engagements in the region, officials said.

Musa Qala, Helmand, is unusually peaceful. Farmers in this opium-rich region are busy preparing for autumn planting.Nor do residents live in fear that the Taleban are coming – they are already here. Said Mohammad Aref, “They collect food from every house, and drive around in their trucks.The Taleban took over in February after a truce collapsed. "We have no plans to recapture Musa Qala," said Ghulam Mahayuddin Ghuri, commander-in-chief of the Third Corps of the Afghan Army.The Taleban established their own regime, complete with district governor, police chief and Sharia courts.Said a Taleban commander. “Everyone gives zakat [Muslim tithe] to...

For the second time this week, US forces battled an entrenched Taliban unit inside Taliban controlled district of Musa Qala, which is located in the notorious southern province of Helmand. Initial reports suggest nearly 50 Taliban fighters died in the vicious 12 hour battle which began after Taliban soldiers ambushed an ANA patrol consisting of the 1st Brigade, 205th Afghan National Army Corps. The troops came under attack by heavy machine gun fire, small arms and rocket propelled grenades, all of which were fired from 16 different compounds, according to the statement. US soldiers accompanying the ANA unit called...

US forces battled an entrenched Taliban unit in the village of Shaban, located in the heart of Afghanistan’s number one poppy producing state, Helmand province. The clash began on Sunday when a US patrol was attacked by a suicide car bomber and an ensuing ambush by militants who were dug into several mud walled compounds. The patrol initially used small arms fire to repulse the ambush, according to a statement released by US forces. As the firefight quickly escalated, US war planes were called in to bomb the Taliban positions. The mud walled compounds were subsequently blown apart by...

LASHKARGAH, 28 June 2007 (IRIN) - The bodies of four bearded men still hang from two tall poles at a roundabout in Musa Qala District, Helmand Province, in southern Afghanistan. Musa Qala District is controlled by Taliban insurgents. The four were hanged two days ago allegedly for spying for the Americans and the government of President Hamid Karzai. Only a Taliban decree can bring the decomposed bodies down and allow them to be buried according to Islamic rites. In both Islamic and international law governing conflicts, dead bodies, even those of armed enemies, should be protected from disrespect, mutilation...

Musa Qala, “city died” in fear of engagements KANDAHAR (Afghanistan) - the situation was very tightened Monday with Musa Qala whose inhabitants said to fear an operation of NATO and gave a report on dissensions among the talibans who seized Friday this chief town of district of the south of Afghanistan. “The bazaar is closed and the streets are deserted, because people fear that the Afghan NATO and troops launch an operation to take again” the locality, declared in AFP an inhabitant, Hadji Bashir Khan, joined by telephone. Hundreds of families fled this small provincial town of Helmand since...

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - A NATO air strike has killed a Taliban commander behind an insurgent takeover of a small southern Afghanistan town, as a US general took command of the 35,000-strong NATO-led force. A Taliban spokesman said meanwhile the fighters were ready to "hand over" the town of of Musa Qala, which they captured overnight Friday, if the government and foreign forces agreed "they won't bomb again." Mullah Abdul Ghafour and "some of his aides" were killed in the strike near the town in the province of Helmand, the interior ministry said in a statement that described the death...