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U.S. Hits Frontlines for First Time as Aid Groups Demand Pause
KABUL, Oct 17 (News Agencies) - U.S.-led forces pounded Taliban frontline positions for the first time Wednesday in apparent preparation for ground attacks, as the bombing campaign came under critical spotlight and aid agencies called for a pause.
The Afghan capital, and the main cities of Jalalabad and Kandahar were all subjected to sustained day and night raids.
In Kandahar, where the onslaught was described as particularly ferocious, Taliban officials claimed 20 civilians had been killed, including an entire family who were wiped out as they tried to flee the southern city in a truck.
The Taliban also claimed two clinics in the city, the militia's main base, had been hit, a day after the United States admitted mistakenly bombing a Red Cross warehouse in Kabul.
A U.N. spokesman in Islamabad said a U.S. bomb scored a "direct hit" on a boys' school in Kabul on Wednesday, but failed to explode.
A group of six international aid agencies called for a pause in air strikes to allow food supplies to be delivered before the severe Afghan winter begins.
"It is evident now that we cannot, in reasonable safety, get food to hungry people," Oxfam director Barbara Stocking said.
The United Nations estimates 50,000 tons of food must get into Afghanistan in the next month to stop tens of thousands of people starving this winter. Only 10,000 tons have made it in the last month.
The reported deaths in Kandahar bring to more than 50 the number of civilians the Taliban says have been killed since powerfully-armed low-flying AC-130 ground attack aircraft were deployed for the first time on Monday.
Residents of Kabul reported Wednesday that an AC-130 had been involved in attacks on the capital for the first time.
Helicopters and special forces troops were aboard the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk, awaiting possible action in Afghanistan, a U.S. defense official said.
As if to prove he was still alive, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, a resident of Kandahar, issued his first public statement since Saturday and predicted U.S. forces would be defeated.
"Everyone has to die one day. We are not afraid of dying and we should die as Muslims," Omar said in a message over the Taliban's internal wireless network, according to the Afghan Islamic Press.
"We have fought against the Russians, and this is another jihad
[struggle] against [non-believers]. It is a test. People are in pain, but God will grant them success."
Bombs throughout the day and night rocked Kabul as wave after wave of U.S. planes flew over the shell-shocked capital. Huge clouds of dust were seen to the southeast after a historic walled fort used as a military base by the Taliban was attacked.
To the north, massive plumes of smoke could be seen as fuel depots burned out of control after raids on the 16th Taliban army division.
Two bases south of Jalalabad in the east were also bombarded, but the Taliban claimed they had been empty and there were no casualties.
The Afghan opposition, reported the U.S., also mounted first attacks on two Taliban frontline positions north of Kabul, including close to the Bagram airbase 50 kilometers (30 miles) from here, but voiced disappointment at what they termed purely symbolic attacks.
The frontlines north of Kabul have been in stalemate for years.
In the far north, senior opposition spokesman Mohammad Habeel said the Taliban had launched a major offensive east from the strategic city of Mazar-i-Sharif, where the heavily bombed airport had become a no-man's land in recent days.
"They are backed by 70 vehicles including tanks and pickups. Severe fighting is going on," he said via satellite phone.
The opposition Northern Alliance has promised to cooperate with the U.S.-led military action to end the Taliban's support for alleged terrorist Osama bin Laden, blamed for the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington.
But it has complained that it cannot do anything on the ground until the Taliban's frontline positions are softened.
"The bombs hit a Taliban base, and a convoy of at least three cars were also completely destroyed," the opposition's General Baba Jan told reporters at the frontlines.
"But do you think three bombs will make much of a difference?"
The Taliban's claims of fresh casualties on Wednesday bring to nearly 400 the number of civilians it says have died since October 7th.
Washington has dismissed the figures as ridiculous and insisted that, while some accidents are inevitable, scrupulous care is taken to avoid civilians being killed.
Reports of civilian deaths have triggered protests across the Muslim world, but key allies such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have reaffirmed their commitment to the anti-terror coalition.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said he saw a role for U.N. peacekeepers in post-Taliban Afghanistan as part of international efforts to restore a "broad-based" regime in Kabul.
"I think there probably will be a role for peacekeepers of some kind and that is part of our discussion," Powell told reporters en route for an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Shanghai.
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