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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| British to assault Taliban stronghold |
| 2005-05-29 |
| Hundreds of British soldiers are to be sent to fight the Taliban in their heartland of southern Afghanistan under plans drawn up by military chiefs to bolster the authority of President Hamid Karzai's fledgling government. At least 1,000 soldiers will be deployed to help restore order across five of Afghanistan's most lawless provinces as part of an expansion of Nato operations. The provinces include Uruzgan, home of Taliban leader Mullah Omar, and Kandahar, the former Taliban stronghold. The area is where resistance to the West and the government in Kabul remains a threat and where only last weekend a US soldier was killed and three injured in a Taliban attack. The deployment, which will take place next spring, will mark a significant extension of Britain's role in Afghanistan and prompt concerns over the level of UK military commitments overseas, especially while the conflict in Iraq continues. So far British troops have been deployed principally in the capital, Kabul, and in the largely peaceful northern cities of Mazar-e-Sharif and Meymaneh. The south, by contrast, has remained largely beyond the control of Karzai's government and has been patrolled only sporadically by US troops seeking Taliban and al-Qaeda remnants. There have been a number of clashes, leading to American fatalities, as well as attacks on aid workers, who now regard much of the region as a 'no-go' area. Although an official announcement of the plan to send British troops to the south has yet to be made, Colonel James Denny, commander of British forces in Afghanistan, told The Observer that a decision would be announced next month. He said the move would require British troops to engage in 'peace-enforcing rather than peace-keeping'. 'We are looking at a series of options,' Denny said at the British headquarters in Kabul. 'We are looking at moving into the southern region - Nimruz, Helmand, Kandahar and Zabul provinces. The threat from the Taliban and al-Qaeda is higher there than in the north, so we may have to change our rules of engagement - to move to a more aggressive posture.' Denny said the provinces posed numerous challenges. There is only one metalled road, communications were difficult and the heat in the summer was more intense than in the north. The area is populated largely by Pashtun tribes - the Taliban's principal supporters - whose beliefs, codes of honour and general way of life differ significantly from those of the population in the areas where British troops operate now. 'It's going to be challenging and an interesting environment, but it is certainly possible to achieve success,' he added. 'We've achieved success in the north and there's no reason why we shouldn't be successful in the south.' Denny also warned that there was no swift exit for Britain from Afghanistan, despite last year's election of Karzai and the growing capabilities of the Afghan forces. 'Afghanistan has a history as being difficult to govern. There has always been a degree of lawlessness, not just for the past 30 years but for 300 or 400 years. What we have to do is to build the capability of the Afghan forces to deal with that and allow Nato and coalition forces to withdraw. It could be a generation,' he said. Colonel Huw Lawford, a British officer working for Nato, said the coming mission would be vital: 'You will not be going out in Land Rovers, you will be going out in armed Warrior vehicles, and you will not be walking around in a beret, you will be going out in a tin hat, with a rifle and body armour.' |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #3 >British to assault Taliban stronghold< 9 paragraphs: Each one full of negative gloom and doom. /[Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005] *yawn* |
| Posted by: AI™®© 2005-05-29 03:14 |
| #2 I've got to stop jumping to conclusions based on these headlines. I thought this one was about a police operation in Luton. |
| Posted by: Classical_Liberal 2005-05-29 01:10 |
| #1 Very sporting, the Brits. Nine months notice, plus- nobody could complain about that. "How about Nimruz in March for you chaps? Shall we say March-for-April? Lovely. See you then." |
| Posted by: Grunter 2005-05-29 00:40 |