[iwar] [fc:It.may.seem.a.phoney.war,.but.that.cannot.last]

From: Fred Cohen (fc@all.net)
Date: 2001-10-15 21:41:03
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From: Fred Cohen <fc@all.net>
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Date: Mon, 15 Oct 2001 21:41:03 -0700 (PDT)
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Subject: [iwar] [fc:It.may.seem.a.phoney.war,.but.that.cannot.last]
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It may seem a phoney war, but that cannot last

By Patrick Cockburn in Panjshir valley, Afghanistan
Independent, 15 October 2001

American warplanes pounded Kabul, the Afghan capita, and a military base
in the eastern city of Jalalabad yesterday as the air war against the
Taliban and Osama bin Laden entered its second week. 

But the soldiers who mill about in the villages behind the opposition
front line north of Kabul have the air of men who are expecting great
events and are a little bemused by the fact that so little is happening
in their sector. 

The sense that it is a phoney war is almost palpable.  The first aid
stations, hastily cleared of non-urgent cases two weeks ago to make way
for the casualties of war, are empty aside from a few farmers who were
injured by mines while they worked in their fields. 

It cannot last.  The Northern Alliance promised it would launch a
military offensive against the Taliban a few days after the American
bombing started.  Its commanders say they are waiting for the United
States to hit frontline Taliban positions. 

This is easier said than done.  The Shomali plain, which has been
divided between the Northern Alliance and the Taliban for five years, is
heavily populated.  American bombing would kill many of the civilians
who are still living in their half-ruined villages. 

But the nature of the front in northern Afghan militates against the
effective use of air power.  The very words "front line" evoke images of
the Western Front in the First World War, with opposing armies crouched
in well-defended trenches protected by machine- guns and barbed wire. 

Afghanistan is not like that.  Armies are small.  The Taliban has 60,000
men and the Northern Alliance has 15,000, though both can increase their
numbers using local militias.  Front lines are usually a tripwire, held
by few men, with forces for counter-attacks held further to the rear. 
"Fighting here is partly like regular warfare using fixed positions and
partly like guerrilla war," said General Babajan, who commands the
Northern Alliance's forces at Bagram airport. 

War in northern Afghanistan has other peculiarities.  There are few
roads and where they do exist they are atrocious.  Most of the big
bridges were blown up in the past 10 years.  Both sides have tanks, but,
as the countless wrecks beside the roads testify, these are easy to
ambush and destroy. 

The Northern Alliance has a number of options.  It could launch a sort
of cavalry charge from Jabal Saraj, its forward headquarters, and try to
reach Kabul, which is only 50 miles away.  American bombers have heavily
attacked Taliban positions at Kohi-i-Safi, 10 miles behind their front. 

But there is only limited evidence, in the shape of a few deserters,
that the Taliban is demoralised.  In a drive south across the Shomali
plain the Northern Alliance forces could suffer heavy casualties.  Their
supply lines are very long here, stretching all the way from Tajikistan
three or four days drive away, and the Taliban's supply lines are short. 

An attack on Kabul would also be a political mistake.  It would anger
Pakistan and irritate America.  The Northern Alliance forces are
ethnically Tajik on this front and their capture of the Afghan capital,
repeating their success in 1992, might frighten the Pashtun, 38 per cent
of Afghanistan's population.  Dr Abdullah Abdullah, the Northern
Alliance foreign minister, said at the weekend that his army might not
send their main forces beyond the outskirts of the city. 

But all this is very much dividing the Taliban tiger's skin not only
before it is dead, but before it is even seriously wounded.  So far the
biggest blow to the Taliban has been the loss of its control of the air. 
This was important to them because it allowed them to move their troops
to and from cities such as Mazar-i-Sharif and Kunduz in the far north. 
These forces are now isolated, apart from a single road.  The Taliban
has no way across the Hindu Kush mountains which divides Afghanistan. 

The obvious strategy for the Northern Alliance is to try to take all of
Afghanistan north of the Hindu Kush.  This is a land of minorities all
of whom have suffered at the Taliban's hands.  To the north-east are the
Tajiks in the great mountain fortress of the Panjshir valley.  In
central Afghanistan are the Hazara, reputedly descended from Genghis
Khan's Mongols, who, as Shiah Muslims, have been persecuted, starved and
massacred by the Taliban.  Further north are the Uzbeks, who were badly
defeated in the civil wars of the 1990s. 

Big advances in the war in Afghanistan have in the past usually been the
result of sudden defections by key leaders and warlords - usually in
return for a substantial bribe.  This enabled the Taliban to take
Jalalabad in 1996, which in turn opened the doors of Kabul.  The
following year they took Mazar-i-Sharif after it was betrayed by a
senior commander only to lose it in a general uprising against their
rule. 

Could the Taliban find themselves betrayed in turn? Afghan warlords do
not like to bet on a loser.  Money will presumably be available.  But
the Taliban will be on their guard against betrayal.  In the past they
have been notorious for not allowing commanders who have defected to
them to have substantial influence. 

How the Taliban can survive the cumulative military pressures on them is
difficult to see.  They no longer have the support of Pakistan and Saudi
Arabia, which was so critical to their rise.  Their many enemies at home
scent blood.  They alone, sustained by their fundamentalist beliefs, may
not believe in the inevitability of their own defeat. 


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Next message: Mohammad Ozair Rasheed: "RE: [iwar] Clash of interests"
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