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Special Forces Deployed, U.S. War Enters New Phase
WASHINGTON, Oct 19 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - U.S. Army special forces are already inside Afghanistan, adding a new component to the campaign against those blamed for last month's deadly terror attacks on the United States, a newspaper reported Friday.
The Washington Post, quoting defense officials, reported that U.S. troops are operating in small numbers in southern Afghanistan in support of the Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) efforts in the heartland of the ruling Taliban government, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
The report, which could not be independently confirmed, came a day after senior defense officials announced the United States would provide air support and ammunition to help opposition forces in Afghanistan move against the Taliban, and strongly hinted ground forces would soon join the 12-day aerial bombing campaign.
However, U.S. President George W. Bush Friday refused to confirm media reports that U.S. Special Forces were operating in Afghanistan as part of the campaign to punish the perpetrators of the September 11th terror strikes.
"I will not comment upon military operations," he told reporters here during a joint press conference with Chinese President Jiang Zemin after their first ever face-to-face meeting.
"I have made it very clear from the outset of this campaign that I will not respond to rumors and information that seeps into the public consciousness for fear of disrupting operations that are taking place," Bush added.
But another official told the newspaper that additional troops are likely to be deployed soon, and could take on other missions such as reconnaissance, target designation for aircraft and, on rare occasions, direct attacks on Taliban or U.S. deemed terrorist leaders.
Meanwhile, Thursday, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld made the most explicit promise yet of direct assistance to the opposition Northern Alliance, saying Washington would provide air support and ammunition to help opposition forces in Afghanistan move on Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif.
"What's different today is that they [the opposition] are going to have some help. They're going to have some help in food, they're going to have some help in ammunition, they are going to have some help in air support and assistance," Rumsfeld said.
Air Force General Richard Myers, chairperson of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, strongly hinted that special forces might soon be deployed, emphasizing U.S. preparedness to use the "full spectrum of our military capabilities."
BBC's online news service quoted a Pentagon official saying that the use of special forces would be the first phase of a larger U.S. troop presence in the country.
In a previously published report, BBC explained the functions of U.S. special forces.
"Special forces are trained to move at short notice. If the United States thinks the best way to hit those responsible for recent attacks on America is to hit Osama bin Laden personally, then special operations forces are likely to be used to do it," it said.
Navy Seals and Army Rangers may be the best known U.S. special forces units, but special operations command includes a number of other units as well.
Three branches of the U.S. military provide troops to special operations command: the Army, Navy and Air Force.
The different services have had special operations troops for as long as the United States has been fighting wars.
But it was not until 1987 that they were brought together under one joint command by an act of Congress.
The command, in brief, seeks "to maintain specialized forces capable of performing extremely difficult, complex, and politically sensitive missions on short notice, in peace and in war, anywhere in the world."
As the U.S. Department of Defense puts it, special operations troops "can conduct stand-alone operations in situations where a small, discrete force provides the nation's leaders with options that fall somewhere between diplomatic efforts and the use of high-profile conventional forces."
Those options might include "insurgency, counter terrorism, counter drug activities, surgical counter proliferation and counter-insurgency."
Units such as the Army's Rangers were deployed successfully in the Gulf War, Grenada and Panama.
Special forces also made headlines after a spectacular battle in the streets of Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1993, reported the BBC.
The Rangers were also deployed to assist United Nations efforts to bring peace to the country, and their mission included the capture of Mohammad Aidid, a Somali clan leader.
They seized a number of his lieutenants, but on October 3rd Aidid's forces succeeded in shooting down two Black Hawk helicopters and killing a number of U.S. troops.
Bodies of dead soldiers were dragged through the streets of Mogadishu. When footage of those scenes was broadcast on U.S. television, the Clinton Administration's will to keep troops in east Africa broke.
Special operations also include the training of local forces and moving non-combatant populations out of harm's way.
In addition to combat units, psychological operations and civil operation teams fall under special operations command.
Those units' operatives might be trained in languages, negotiation tactics and cross-cultural communication.
For their part, the Taliban's military power is negligible in contrast with that of the United States.
"Drawing up a military balance between the United States, with its colossal firepower and Afghanistan's Taliban, with their increasingly aging stock-pile of weaponry, is almost meaningless. Numbers alone tell only part of the story," said the BBC, but added that the Afghan's resolute struggle against occupying Soviet forces during the Cold War is well known.
The Soviet Army suffered a terrible defeat - its bases and supply columns were attacked and ambushed and its helicopter gun ships were often knocked from the sky with shoulder-fired missiles.
"All sorts of lessons could be learn[ed] from the Russians' experience; chief among them being that it is a very bad idea to invade Afghanistan and seek to establish a new regime there by force," the BBC commented.
This would be playing to the Taliban's strengths; its tough fighters, with supreme local knowledge of the difficult terrain, are quite capable of playing a game of hit-and-run with even a sophisticated Western army.
And Afghanistan hardly has a developed infrastructure - either civilian or military - that can be struck.
"It is no Iraq. There is no integrated air defense system to speak of. There are some military bases. The Taliban have a sizeable quantity of Soviet-era tanks and artillery, but much of this arsenal, if serviceable, will probably have been dispersed," said the BBC.
Meanwhile, a senior Taliban spokesman, Abdul Hai Mutmaen, said on Thursday that between 600 and 900 people had been killed or were missing as a result of 12 days of U.S.-led strikes on Afghanistan.
The U.S. admits some bombs have "gone astray" but claims the Taliban's figure is far too high.
The Pentagon admitted last week that one of its precision guided missiles landed in a village, killing Afghan civilians.
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