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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| Al-Qaeda fighters returning to Afghanistan |
| 2005-07-08 |
| Members of Osama bin Ladenâs Al Qaeda network may have returned to Afghanistan en masse to bolster Taliban militants fighting US and Afghan forces in the east and south of the country, officials and analysts say. Although no one has come forward with any hard proof, evidence seems to indicate that hardline Al Qaeda fighters have gone back to the country that was their home base for years until US-led forces toppled the Taliban in late 2001. The governor of the southern Afghan province of Kandahar, Gul Agha Shirzai, said after a deadly suicide attack at a mosque last month that police âfound documents on the (bomberâs) body that showed he was an Arabâ. He told reporters that this proved that âArab Al Qaeda teams had entered Afghanistan and had planned terrorist attacksâ. Afghan Defence Minister Abdur Rahim Wardak on Monday told the New York Times: âThere is a regrouping of Al Qaeda, and it seems they are going to pay more attention to Afghanistan. We are running into foreign fighters here and there.â And Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said on a visit to India this week that the Taliban had become ânumerically strongerâ and that the likely explanation was that they were getting âoutside supportâ. The head of the UN mission in Afghanistan, Franceâs Jean Arnault, warned the UN Security Council in late June that the security situation in the country was worsening. Arnault told the council that the Taliban rebels seem to have âmore funding, more deadly weaponry, more powerful media for propaganda and more aggressive, cruel and indiscriminate tacticsâ. Michael Scheuer, who headed up the CIAâs special âbin Laden unitâ from 1996 to 1999, sees nothing shocking in the recent reports of an increased Al Qaeda presence in Afghanistan. âThe recent attacks fit bin Ladenâs strategic goal of ensuring âthe pious Caliphate will start from Afghanistanâ,â accords to Scheuer. âConsistent with Al Qaedaâs tactical doctrine for aiding Islamist insurgencies, Taliban leaders are taking the lead in discussing and claiming credit for the increased violence. âAl Qaedaâs doctrine is clear: Support the insurgents fully and offer advice, but stay in the background, do not dictate, and allow local leaders to run operations as they see fit,â Scheuer said. In certain remote regions of Afghanistan, US and Afghan forces routinely encounter concentrations of hardened militants, sparking long hours of combat. Increased pressure by Pakistanâs military in the lawless tribal regions along the Afghan border could prompt Al Qaeda militants to travel back and forth across the border to avoid detection, officials said in Islamabad. Pakistan and Afghanistan have recently traded accusations about whose side of the border the militants are on, and who is to blame for failing to find them. Olivier Roy, an analyst at Franceâs National Centre for Scientific Research and one of the worldâs leading specialists on central Asia, warned against drawing quick conclusions about Al Qaeda activity in Afghanistan. âWe still donât have any concrete evidence which proves that there are foreign fighters among the Taliban,â Roy told AFP. âThe Afghan authorities obviously have a vested interest in saying publicly that militants responsible for deadly attacks are foreigners, including Pakistani Taliban.â He concluded: âBut if it were confirmed that there were Arab militants in Afghanistan, that would mark an important turning point.â |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #11 .com - anything that does the trick. If things don't straighten out (in our favor) pretty soon, we're going to have to start playing "cowboys and muslims" - only THIS time, WE use the flaming arrows. And napalm bombs, cluster bombs, ap mines, and anything else that works. If Islam refuses to "live and let live", we'll see their side is the first to stop living. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2005-07-08 20:30 |
| #10 OP - I though you were an FAE man, second only to ArcLight, lol! |
| Posted by: .com 2005-07-08 15:01 |
| #9 I don't think using nukes in the NWFP would do the kind of good you're thinking, remote. Napalm and cluster bombs work better, used in sequence. Napalm to cook all the goats, and cluster bombs to take out the idiots who come to the feast. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2005-07-08 14:52 |
| #8 As noted yesterday - The deadly H5N1 strain of avian flu has been found for the first time in migratory birds. It would be terrible if this showed up in the Pak tribal areas too. |
| Posted by: Chavish Grilet6152 2005-07-08 13:01 |
| #7 Did I say that the tribal areas of Pakistan would be an excellent testing ground to confirm the current operational capability of our nuclear weapons? Hmmmm, I guess I did. |
| Posted by: remoteman 2005-07-08 12:56 |
| #6 Oh, and don't forget the American Taliban doing time rather than hanging from a rope. |
| Posted by: Chavish Grilet6152 2005-07-08 12:27 |
| #5 âWe still donât have any concrete evidence which proves that there are foreign fighters among the Taliban,â Roy told AFP. French guy, right? I wonder if it's the water over there? |
| Posted by: tu3031 2005-07-08 11:58 |
| #4 The Pakistani gov is pushing the remaining 1 million refugees to return (almost 4 million already have). Of those remaining refugees, there is a higher percentage of Taliban symps than the previous returning refugees. Couple that with their madrassa raised, jihad indoctrinated cousins from Pakistan, and you have an opportunity to remove from the gene pool a lot of koran pollution. Any non Arabs/Chechens/Uzbeks pushed out by the Pakistani army are bonus targets. |
| Posted by: ed 2005-07-08 10:19 |
| #3 The US can just as swiftly shift forces into Afghanistan from Iraq or from the deployment cycle. So what's the advantage? Maybe the locals are a lot less receiptive these days in Iraq. Terrorists getting their asses turned over to the local authorities faster than they can move them into country. The trouble is that the population in Afghanistan is smaller and thus less of a mass to hide among. Guess this means USAID has got to fund a lot of cell phone towers and make distribution of free phones. Advantage: Afghan citizens. Further the terrain in Afghanistan compartmentalizes the battlefield more. I don't buy into the myth that somehow a muslim raised in Saudi [from which most of the terrorist seem to come from these days] is any better prepared to operate at 20,000 feet than an American. If they plan to use the Pak's as the new recruits from the NW Territories, that might be different, but simply makes it easier to end the game of sanctuary that they currently enjoy. However, no one said these people were among the best of Mensa. Those harboring these terrorist seem to suffer a lot these days. Guess its the NW Territories turn. Couldn't happen to a nicer group of people. |
| Posted by: Chavish Grilet6152 2005-07-08 09:22 |
| #2 I wonder if this means they are getting hit hard in Iraq. It seems to have slowed down against our boys there, at least newswise. Maybe they are hoping it will be easier going in Afghanistan. |
| Posted by: plainslow 2005-07-08 08:27 |
| #1 "Come into my parlour," said the spider to the fly. After yesterday, the wisdom of letting AQ hard boyz get themselves killed by our professionals is very, very clear. And, like Iraq, this is an important step in the Afghanis seeing themselves as part of a nation, not just of the tribe they were born into. Good hunting, lads! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2005-07-08 06:57 |