Afghanistan News
2002

U.S. soldier wounded in exchange of fire  12/31/02 IHT: "He was the second American soldier evacuated to Germany with head wounds in two days. A soldier shot in circumstances that did not involve hostile fire was evacuated Saturday. The incident is under investigation, the Bagram press center reported." The pace of this will continue to increase, as the Afghan War follows the pattern laid down under the Soviet occupation.

U.S. Says Pakistani Guard Shot Soldier in Afghanistan  12/31/02 NYT: "Pakistan has deployed its own forces to try to stem infiltration of armed groups either way, but they are not seen as particularly effective because of the strong anti-American and pro-Taliban feeling of the local population, which allows the armed groups free movement. Several dozen low-level members of Al Qaeda are believed to be in South Waziristan, in Pakistan's tribal territories, near where the border clashes have occurred, according to Pakistani officials. But efforts to arrest them have been thwarted as local people have tipped them off before government forces move in, they said."

U.S. Bombs Hit Pakistan Town After Border Clash  12/31/02 Reuters: "The wounded American was part of a unit conducting a mission with Pakistani forces along the Afghan border when a disagreement appeared to break out, according to a statement released by the U.S. military at their Afghan headquarters at Bagram air base. "A Pakistani border scout opened fire with a G3 rifle after the U.S. patrol asked him to return to the Pakistan side of the border," the statement said. "That individual and several others retreated to a nearby structure," it added. "Close air support was requested and one 500-lb bomb was dropped on the target area."

Warlord says he has joined al-Qaeda to expel foreign soldiers  12/27/02 Sydney Morning Herald: "Hekmatyar was a key guerilla commander during the 1980s Soviet war in Afghanistan. In the civil war that paved the way for the Taliban to take power, his men pounded Kabul with daily rocket barrages. He lived in exile in Iran during the five years of the Taliban rule, and returned after US-led forces ousted the hardline militia. Western intelligence agencies say they suspect he is receiving money from Iran." Hekmatyar was #1 CIA asset in his day, and was also the #1 narcotrafficker in a replay of so many other Company scenarios.

Four Coalition Soldiers Killed, Mujahideen Possibly Martyred In Another Afghan Battle  12/23/02 Jihad Unspun: "Daily Ausaf has received two reports regarding these attacks. One of their sources reported sixteen coalition troops killed while two Mujahideen martyred and one source confirmed upt o thirty coalition troops killed and two Mujahideen martyred. Whichever of the above three casualty figures is correct, the fact of the matter is that another ambush took place and once again no international media tried to cover the truth."

Update Of Afghan Attacks, Death Toll Rises  12/23/02 Jihad Unspun: "Two days ago a US military jeep was attacked in Kabul. Two soldiers and their translator/interpreter were killed in the attack. There are 8,000 American soldiers active in Afghanistan. The commander of US forces in Afghanistan, Lieutenant-General Dan McNeil, said serving in Afghanistan was not a job without danger and that recent attacks do not imply that the situation of peace and harmony is disturbed in the country! US soldiers were also attacked with hand grenades in Orgon city in the province of Paktika. Three commandos in the pick up died while the 4th one was injured. According to the recent news obtained from across the border some unknown assailants threw bombs on the pick up of the US patrol unit that killed 3 soldiers on the site and injured the 4th one. The injured commando was captured by the Mujahideen. The American Airforce was informed about the event and the American airplane started patrolling the area and the air was filled instantly filled with terror. The sources have informed that the Mujahideen have killed the soldier they had kidnapped and had thrown the body in a remote area. Later on some unknown people injured 3 US patrol unit soldiers, when they attacked them with grenades. The sources said that the injured soldiers were given first aid but one of them could not endure the injury and died. According to the news received from the province of Konar , a US soldier was seriously injured during an attack on the US soldiers on Friday. According to the news an unknown assailant fired a rocket on the US training camp on Kandahar’s Spin Boldik, which severely injured a foreigner."

Afghanistan: Rogues on the loose  12/23/02 Working for Change: "For the most part, response to his work was positive, especially overseas. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Dr. Herold's work had "received extensive coverage in the European media but almost no mention in the American press." There were a few critics, but no organized campaign was waged to discredit his numbers. The Pentagon, as is their wont, didn't bother to try and discredit Herold's work; they simply paid the entire issue no mind. Pentagon officials claimed not to be keeping statistics on dead or injured Afghan civilians. Now, a year after publishing his first Afghan Dossier, I caught up with Prof. Herold and asked him where he thought things currently stood in Afghanistan."

US pilots in friendly fire were on drugs, says lawyer  12/22/02 Scotsman, UK: "TWO US fighter pilots charged with accidentally killing four Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan had been given amphetamines to keep them awake, their lawyer claimed. Charles Gittens is representing the pilots, who face prison for 64 years if found guilty in a court martial next month. In an interview with a US television station yesterday Mr Gittens claimed Major Bill Umbach and Major Harry Schmidt were ordered to take six amphetamines each to ward off fatigue during their mission." High as a kite.

Details of U.S. victory are a little premature  12/22/02 Toronto Sun: "In fact, America's Afghan adventure has gotten off to as poor a start as that of the Soviet Union. The U.S.-installed ruler of Kabul, veteran CIA asset Hamid Karzai, must be protected from his own people by up to 200 U.S. bodyguards. Much of Afghanistan is in chaos, fought over by feuding warlords and drug barons. There are almost daily attacks on U.S. occupation forces. My old mujahedin sources say U.S. casualties and equipment losses in Afghanistan are far higher than Washington is reporting - and are rising. American troops are operating from the old Soviet bases at Bagram and Shindand, retaliating, like the Soviets, against mujahedin attacks on U.S. forces by heavily bombing nearby villages. The CIA is trying to assassinate Afghan nationalist leaders opposed to the Karzai regime in Kabul, in particular my old acquaintance Gulbadin Hekmatyar… Since the U.S. overthrew the Taliban, opium cultivation has soared from 185 tons a year to 2,700. The Northern Alliance, which dominates the Kabul regime, finances its arms-buying and field operations with drug money. President George Bush's war on drugs collided with his war on terrorism - and lost. The U.S. is now, in effect, colluding in the heroin trade." Repeating the pattern established in Laos, Viet Nam, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Colombia, Lebanon, and many other places.

U.S. Casualties Since Oct. 2001  12/21/02 AP: there are those who say the list is far longer and that some of these accidents were hostile fire.

U.S. Commander: Afghan Attacks May Rise  12/21/02 AP: "Attacks on U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan are likely to increase if there is war in Iraq, a top commander in the war on terror said hours before the military announced the death Saturday of an American soldier in combat."

Attacker killed in Kabul blast, 867 US troops killed in Afghanistan  12/19/02 Ummah News

With runners and whispers, al-Qa'ida outfoxes US forces  12/6/02 Independent, UK: "According to the same officer, American security agents in Karachi were looking for the murderers of US journalist Daniel Pearl but there, as in many other cases, they would find their arrest "targets" had fled because of secret support within middle ranks of the Pakistani army. "We would go with the Pakistanis to a location but there would be no one there because once the middle level of the Pakistani military knew of our plans, they would leak the information. In the North-West Frontier province, the frontier corps is a second-rate army – they are a lot more anti-Western in sentiment than the main Pakistani army. In the end we had to co-ordinate everything through Islamabad."

Attacks against US-led coalition forces intensify in Afghanistan  11/30/02 AFP: "Saturday's attack brings the number of missiles targeting coalition bases in November to 57, markedly higher than previous months. Few missiles have hit their target. A US military spokesman offered no explanation for the increase in attacks blamed on al-Qaeda and Taliban forces, possibly allied to former Afghan prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who are believed to be operating in the border region." This follows the pattern of the previous Afghan - Soviet conflict, where it took the Afghans a year to get into the full swing of a guerrilla war.

Afghanistan: Rocket attack destroys US armoured vehicle  11/28/02 Ummah News: "In the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, anti-US mujahideen have knocked out an American armoured vehicle on patrol in the area. The attack was launched from a nearby farm by remote control. It is believed that there were six Americans in the vehicle that was completely destroyed in the attack. The attackers managed to flee the area."

Two US bases in Afghanistan hit by rockets  11/26/02 Sydney Morning Herald: "Unknown gunmen fired nearly a dozen rockets at two US military bases in central and eastern Afghanistan, damaging two trucks but causing no casualties, the US military said today. Assailants fired nine white phosphorus rockets at a base near Lwara, 178 km southwest of Kabul, at about 10:30 pm on Saturday night, said Colonel Roger King, a spokesman at the US military headquarters at Bagram Air Base. The rockets - which, instead of exploding, spread an intense, burning chemical heat - sparked several fires in the Lwara base, which King said were extinguished within minutes… US bases in Afghanistan are attacked several times a week, usually with crude rockets set off by remote control or timers. They rarely hit their targets and damage is minimal because the rockets are hard to aim."

Twelve killed in attack on US chopper  11/19/02 Ummah News: "Unknown assailants have downed a US military helicopter near mountains in Shahi Kot, eastern Afghanistan. All the twelve aboard are said to have been burnt to death. Five coalition troops were killed and several injured when a bomb exploded at the new airport at Bagh Sira in the Afghan province of Khost. According to undisclosed sources here, the authorities have banned the entry of civilians into the airport area in order to keep the losses secret. Meanwhile, the first successful attack by Northern Alliance forces on an American military patrol in Koh Sani near Bagram Airbase resulted in two American deaths and four severely injured. The American soldiers were travelling in a group of four vehicles and were on a mission to capture and destroy heavy ammunition from the former commander Maulan Zabeeh Ullah Shaheed."

Fresh attacks on US military in southeastern Afghanistan  11/18/02 Ummah News: "However, the Balochistan Post reported that five allied forces troops were killed and several others injured in the attack caused by a bomb planted under cover of construction work at the airbase."

Losing Control? The U.S. concedes it has lost momentum in Afghanistan, while its enemies grow bolder  11/11/02 Time Magazine: "The bad guys are still out there, undetectable in the rocky, umber hills of eastern Afghanistan — until they strike, which they do with growing frequency, accuracy and brazenness. These days American forward bases are coming under rocket or mortar fire three times a week on average. Apache pilots sometimes see angry red arcing lines of tracer bullets rising toward their choppers from unseen gunners hidden in Afghanistan's saw-blade ridges. Roads frequented by special forces are often mined with remote-controlled explosives, a new tactic al-Qaeda fighters picked up from their Chechen comrades fighting the Russians. With phantom enemy fighters stepping up attacks and U.S. forces making little headway against them, General Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, felt compelled to acknowledge last week, "We've lost a little momentum there, to be frank."

4 U.S.-Afghan Bases Come Under Fire  11/4/02 AP: "On Saturday night, two rockets exploded near a U.S. base at Orgun, about 110 miles south of Kabul, the statement said. One of the rockets landed about 500 yards from the base. At dawn Sunday, three rocket-propelled grenade rounds were fired at a U.S. fire-base in the southeastern town of Shkin in Paktika province, about 150 miles south of Kabul."

Taliban gone, opium returns  10/27/02 Sydney Morning Herald: "An attempt to curb heroin production in Afghanistan has been overwhelmed by the country's largest-ever opium poppy harvest, according to a UN crop survey published yesterday. It said 3,400 metric tonnes of opium would be produced in Afghanistan this year - higher than the 2,700 tonnes estimated earlier this year, and considerably higher than the 2,000-tonne harvest before the Taliban banned production. The survey shows Afghanistan is set to resume its place as the source of 75per cent of the world's heroin. Opium production under the Taliban fell to only 185 tonnes during 2001. In January the interim Afghan Government announced a ban on opium poppy cultivation, trafficking and abuse." Making the world safe for heroin.

Dawn raids stoke fires of resentment  10/8/02 Guardian, UK: "When America began Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan a year ago it was largely welcomed. At last the west was promising to bring peace and reconstruction to a country run by warlords and ravaged by drought and 20 years of conflict. But slowly Afghans have grown resentful of the thousands of US troops. The bitterness is especially deep in the southern Pashtun tribal lands, where the Stars and Stripes flies above isolated and heavily fortified bases in areas that were once the Taliban's heartland. Many Afghans, including powerful commanders, want them out."

US soldier wounded in Afghan helicopter fight  10/5/02 Independent, South Africa

‘I Yelled at Them to Stop’  9/30/02 Newsweek: "U.S. Special Forces are frustrated. Kicking down doors and frisking women, they say, is no way to win hearts and minds in Afghanistan. A report from the front"

Afghan opium production soaring again  9/27/02 AFP: "DrugScope says poppy cultivation, banned by the ousted government, has leapt from about 185 tonnes a year to up to 2,700 tonnes, and is approaching pre-Taleban levels of over 4,000 tonnes." Now we know why the US got rid of the Taliban!

Massive post-war rise in production of Afghan opium  9/26/02 Independent, UK: "Britain is expected to be hit by a flood of heroin after a gigantic increase in the production of opium in Afghanistan, the United Nations will warn today. A UN survey estimates the farmers will grow 2,700 tons of opium this year compared with 185 tons in 2001, a 1,400 per cent jump."

U.S. Soldier Wounded in Afghan Blast  9/24/02 ABC News: "A U.S. soldier received shrapnel wounds in what appeared to be an accidental bomb blast near an American base in eastern Afghanistan today, a military spokesman said." It's always accidental…

According To Plan -- But Whose Plan ?  9/24/02 Intervention Magazine: by Stephen Morgan, author of The Mind of a Terrorist Fundamentalist, is a former executive member of the British Labour Party National Executive Committee and today is a political and management consultant based in Brussels, Belgium. - "In other words, events today are going roughly as al Qaeda and the Taliban planned. They decided to accept and incur inevitable and calculated "battle losses" and retreat in order to protect their international terrorist structure and operative capacity rather than lose cadres to bombing and worthless combat. Al Qaeda and the Taliban are experts of guerrilla and terrorist activities, they will not waste their efforts on engaging forces in conventional warfare. Bin Laden was smart enough to know that his camps and base in Afghanistan could never be a permanent stronghold. The camps were there purely to serve the purpose of creating and training an international terror network and nothing else. Sooner or later, he knew that once he put his plans into action, U.S. retaliation would be devastating."

Pentagon Tells Troops in Afghanistan: Shape Up and Dress Right  9/11/02 NYT: "On Monday," said a Special Operations Forces officer, leaning against the mud wall of a local bazaar, "we got the word: some general in Washington ordered no more beards." Asking that his name not be used, the freshly shaved officer continued, "The guys are really burning on this" and nodded to his squad, men who all looked as if they had just emerged from a sheep-shearing shed… Instead of knots of bearded men with a few touches of local garb and concealed weapons strolling through this city with a studied casualness, a Special Forces squad looks like what it is: foreign soldiers patrolling in Afghanistan." And Osama thanks those kind American generals who have learned nothing from their many colonial wars.

US forces launch strike in Afghanistan  9/10/02 Scotsman, UK: "AMERICAN forces have launched a large-scale operation in south-eastern Afghanistan, aimed at Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network, the US army said last night. Details of Operation Champion Strike were released as the Arab satellite channel al-Jazeera aired excerpts from a videotape in which bin Laden praises the 19 hijackers involved in the 11 September terror attacks. Champion Strike began a few days ago and is centred in the Bermel valley near the town of Shkin, about 150 miles south of Kabul, close to the border with Pakistan, Major Richard T Patterson said. Major Patterson would not say when Champion Strike was launched or when it would end. He said there had been one firefight involving US soldiers, but there were no US casualties nor deaths among the enemy. However, soldiers taking part in the operation had detained a number of people, and seized weapons caches, including land mines and rockets."

US forces disgruntle civilians in remote province  9/9/02 AP: "However, for the people of this remote, mountainous province along the Pakistani border, the war is ever present in the rumble of distant explosions and the faint roar of B-52 bombers passing overhead. And the US operation is fueling hostility against the Americans, even among officials loyal to President Hamid Karzai, who admit they asked the US military to come here because of threats from Taliban fighters hiding in the mountains. The Afghans complain that the Americans have relied on faulty information that has caused injury and death to civilians trying to live without getting mixed up in the conflict. That in turn is increasing support for militant organizations, including the Hezb-i-Islami movement of Hekmatyar, who has called for jihad, or holy war, against the Americans and who is suspected of involvement in last week's car bombing that killed 30 people in Kabul."

U.S. Investigation Clears Wedding Party Bombing  9/8/02 LA Times: this event was a turning point in Afghanistan, where it angered many and contributed to a mobilization of anti-US sentiment a year after the US invasion, much as anti-Soviet sentiment took a year to coalesce after Moscow took Kabul.

Revealed: The Taliban minister, the US envoy and the warning of September 11 that was ignored  9/7/02 Independent, UK: "Mr Muttawakil's aide, who has stayed on in Kabul and who has to remain anonymous for his security, described in detail to The Independent how he alerted first the Americans and then the United Nations of the coming calamity of 11 September."

Three killed in Karzai shooting incident; 30 killed in Kabul car blast  9/5/02 AFP

Unos 30 muertos al estallar dos coches bomba en el centro de Kabul  9/5/02 Prensa Latina

Newsweek exposé of war crimes in Afghanistan whitewashes US role  9/4/02 World Socialist: "The Newsweek article provides a fairly detailed account of these atrocities, but does so from a very definite political standpoint—to lay the blame for evident war crimes entirely on the shoulders of the Northern Alliance, while exonerating the United States."

Commanders Want Elite Units Freed From Qaeda Hunt  9/2/02 NYT: "Commanders in the American military's most elite Special Operations unit are contending that their troops should be freed from the fruitless hunt in Afghanistan for Osama bin Laden, military and intelligence officials say."

Grupo desconocido asume decenas de ataques contra tropas de EE.UU.  9/1/02 Granma: "Los diarios egipcios Asharq Al Awsat y Al Hayat publican un comunicado del Ejército Secreto de los Combatientes Musulmanes, el cual asegura que ha matado a 59 soldados estadounidenses, tres canadienses y 15 "agentes afganos", y que seguirán su campaña para "vengar a la gente inocente asesinada por los canallescos ataques estadounidenses en Afganistán". El escrito ofrece detalles de una treintena de operaciones llevadas a cabo por los miembros del grupo contra tropas estadounidenses en seis provincias del Sur y el Este de Afganistán, incluida la capital, Kabul, y la cercana base aérea de Bagram." None of this in the US media.

Bin Laden Reportedly Back at Helm of al Qaeda  8/27/02 Reuters: Osama bin Laden ( news - web sites) is firmly back in command of al Qaeda and the group is digging in for guerrilla attacks on U.S. troops in Afghanistan, an Arab journalist with close ties to the militant's associates said on Tuesday." And Al Qaeda is keeping up with a steady pace of attacks on the Afghan government and US troops, some of which are going unreported in the US press, as is the custom.

20 troops from US-Afghan troops killed in Afghanistan rocket attack  8/27/02 Ummah News: is there light at the end of this tunnel? - "Two US helicopters were destroyed in the South of Kabul due to which eight US and twelve local Afghan troops were killed on Monday. The helicopters were flying over the Loogar district of Muhammad Agha when unknown assailants shot down these helicopters by rocket fire. The debris of these helicopters was seen lying every where in the region and all the troops were dead. According to eyewitnesses local villagers immediately ran to collect the parts of the destroyed helicopters. 45 minutes after this operation almost more than a dozen US helicopters appeared over the region. When no weapons nor attackers were found they took away the dead bodies of their troops. Another report came from Loogar that on August 20 at around midnight in Dasht Qila (fort) Dolat an intensive attack was made on the US base due to which at least four troops were reportedly killed. One attacker who was arrested was severely wounded, but died later from his wounds."

Taliban melt away before army sweep  8/26/02 Guardian, UK: "The commander of the biggest US search for Taliban and al-Qaida fugitives in Afghanistan for five months said last night that the quarry appeared to have been tipped off that the troops were coming. When Operation Mountain Sweep in the south-east ended it had nine prisoners and a tonne of weapons and ammunition, but it had failed to engage any sizeable units in combat. "It was clear to me there was advance warning at each site we went to," Colonel James Huggins, commanding officer of the 3rd Brigade taskforce of the 82nd Airborne division, said."

U.S. soldiers exchange fire with allied Afghan troops  8/23/02 AP

Poppy Paradox - U.S. War in Afghanistan Boosts Terror Funds  8/21/02 Pacific News: by Peter Dale Scott, from 8/1 - "Sources in Washington have suggested that behind the Bush decision to tolerate the return of the Afghan drug traffic was the fear that eliminating it might destabilize the Musharraf government and further encourage ISI-linked extremists to overthrow him. A simpler explanation is U.S. reluctance to take on further responsibility for restoring the Afghan economy, and instead let drugs do the job. A still more cynical possibility is that the Bush administration wants in the short run to limit the embarrassing stories of chaos and rebellion in Afghanistan, which could hurt the Republicans in the November elections."

The Death Convoy of Afghanistan  8/19/02 Newsweek: it took months for this story to hit the US media and possibly only now is it being discussed since everyone else in the world knows about it and knows the US involvment, which is much greater than what is depicted here.

Afghan opium crop back to record levels  8/19/02 Scotsman, UK: "THE new Afghan government has "largely failed" in its effort to eradicate the opium poppy crop in Afghanistan, which in recent years became the world’s biggest producer of the raw material for heroin, United Nations crop experts reported yesterday. The 2002 crop was close to the record levels of the late 1990s and could be worth more than $1 billion (£650 million) at the farm level in Afghanistan. The nation’s GDP for 1999 was put at $21 billion"

US commandos reported kidnapped in Afghanistan  8/19/02 Ummah News: "Fourteen US commandos have been kidnapped in eastern Afghanistan according to the pro-Taliban news agency Azaam. . The agency said the abductions occurred when an unknown group of men, who were most likely anti-US Mujahideen, lured the commandos into a trap by claiming to know the whereabouts of Al-Qaidah and Taliban soldiers."

Newsweek Cover Special Report: 'The War Crimes of Afghanistan' America's Afghan Allies Asphyxiated Hundreds of Surrendering Taliban Prisoners En Route to Jail, Transporting Them in Sealed Cargo Containers; Bodies Buried in Mass Grave  8/18/02 PR Newswire: "Newsweek's extensive inquiries of prisoners, truckdrivers, Afghan militiamen and local villagers, including interviews with survivors who licked and chewed each other's skin to stay alive, suggest also that many hundreds of people died. And while nothing that Newsweek learned suggests that American forces had advance knowledge of the killings, witnessed the prisoners being stuffed into the unventilated trucks, or were in a position to prevent that, they were in the area of the prison at the time the containers were delivered, although probably not when they were opened, report National Security Correspondent John Barry, Special Correspondent Babak Dehghanpisheh, and Diplomatic Correspondent Roy Gutman in the Aug. 26 issue." Other witnesses say US troops were there when they were opened and aided in the coverup, helping Aghan Allies to avoid satellite detection.

Return to Afghanistan: Americans begin to suffer grim and bloody backlash  8/17/02 Independent, UK: "The Americans are being attacked almost every night. There have been three shootings in Kandahar, with an American officer wounded in the neck near the airport two weeks ago. American troops can no longer dine out in Kandahar's cafés. Today, US forces are under attack in Khost province. Two Afghan auxiliaries were killed and five American soldiers wounded near the Pakistan border at the end of July."

Robert Fisk: Afghanistan is on the brink of another disaster The Americans now leave the beatings to Afghan allies, but the CIA are there during the beatings  8/14/02 Independent, UK: "This is just how the Americans began in Vietnam. They went in squeaky clean with advisers, there were some incidents of "termination with extreme prejudice", after which it was the Vietnamese intelligence boys who did the torture."

Anti-US mujahideen inflict more casualties in Gardez  8/14/02 Ummah News: "A missile attack was launched on Sunday night by the Mujahideen at the residential complex of US commandos in Gardez, capital city of the Afghan province of Paktia. In the attack, the Mujahideen fired 10 remote controlled missiles at the Coalition Forces, killing 11 soldiers (including US commandos) and seriously injuring 18 others."

5 die in grenade attack in Afghanistan  8/13/02 AFP: "Unidentified attackers killed five people including four children in a grenade attack on a house near the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad, the Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) reported on Tuesday."

By Wading Deeper Into Afghanistan, the U.S. Could Step Into a Big Hole  8/13/02 LA Times

Counting the dead  8/8/02 Guardian: "For political reasons, it has been necessary to hide the human carnage on Afghan soil as much as possible from the western public. Given that many of the bombing attacks - such as those on civilian infrastructure (cars, clinics, radio stations, bridges) and those during November and December on anything rolling on the roads of southern Afghanistan - violated the rules of war, there are war crimes that need to be investigated. An inadequate count will make it impossible for the families of those wrongfully killed to get the compensation to which they are entitled. It will also impede international justice."

Fierce firefight erupts near Kabul  8/8/02 MSNBC: "Unidentified attackers struck an Afghan army base south of Kabul early Wednesday, and an ensuing firefight killed 16 people, local officials said. The hour-long clash was the most serious battle near the Afghan capital in months. In separate developments, a U.S. spokesman said American soldiers patrolling in eastern Afghanistan killed four men who opened fire on them in the second attack in the region in two days, and a U.S. soldier was shot and wounded in the chest by a sniper in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, U.S. military officials said."

Daily Casualty Count of Afghan Civilians Killed in U.S - Bombing and Special Forces Attacks, October 7 until present day  8/8/02 University of New Hampshire: from 3,111 to 3,582 dead since 9-11, more than perished on 9-11 and counting. This is an xcel spreadsheet, you may need the plug in, though IE should be OK.

The return to Afghanistan: Collateral damage  8/6/02 Independent, UK: "The first anniversary is approaching of the attacks of 11 September and the subsequent 'war on terror'. To mark the date, The Independent today launches a major new series of special reports by our Middle East correspondent Robert Fisk. In his first dispatch from Afghanistan, he relates the untold story of Hajibirgit, a tiny village in the south-west of the country, where a raid by US Special Forces left a tribal elder and a three-year-old girl dead . . ."

Afghan protestors make new demands  8/2/02 BBC: "Hundreds of protestors have staged a fourth day of demonstrations in one of the most restive regions of Afghanistan - the Khost area of neighbouring Paktia and Nangarhar provinces near the border with Pakistan."

4 US troops feared dead in Gardez attack  7/24/02 Frontier Post, Pakistan

Why Afghanistan's Leader Wants American Bodyguards  7/23/02 Time Magazine: the puppet regime.

Bomb errors may have cost 800 civilian lives  7/22/02 Scotsman, UK: "The US aid and advocacy group Global Exchange, based in San Francisco, claims survey teams sent into Afghan villages have compiled a list of 812 Afghan civilians killed in air strikes. But more damaging for the public image of the Pentagon may be yesterday’s report in the New York Times. The newspaper said its survey of 11 locations put the death toll at up to 400 civilians." Both these numbers are on the low side.

Flaws in U.S. Air War Left Hundreds of Civilians Dead  7/21/02 NYT: significant article for its appearance in the New York Times, employs the "limited hangout" technique of admitting to a portion of the problems, as the number of civilian deaths is certainly far larger than the "hundreds" claimed.

US Special Forces Come Under Grenade Attack In Uruzgan  7/14/02 Azzam: "Unknown gunmen launched an attack on an American Special Forces checkpoint on Friday. Grenades and other light weapons were used in the attack, which was launched near the same village that was victim to the barbaric US bombing that claimed 250 innocent lives and injured more than 400."

U.S. Forces Compound Attacked  7/12/02 ABC News: "A U.S. special forces compound came under grenade and small arms fire near the village where an American airstrike killed civilians at a wedding celebration, U.S. officials said Friday. There were no casualties in the attack, which occurred late Thursday near Tarin Kot, capital of Uruzgan province, U.S. military spokesman Col. Roger King said. Afghan soldiers working alongside special forces returned fire after the brief attack, King added. Hostility toward U.S. military operations has increased in southern and central Afghanistan since the July 1 airstrike, in which an AC-130 gunship raked a compound where members of an extended family were celebrating an upcoming wedding." And on it goes to the next wedding rubout.

Slow Death on the Jail Convoys of Misery  7/11/02 Antiwar: "The second soldier testifies that many US soldiers were present at Shibarghan when they arrived and it was a US officer who gave the order for the dumping of the bodies. "All the containers were full of holes which were visible," he states. "In each container about 150 to 160 had been killed. The Americans told the Scheberghan people to get them outside the city to avoid them being filmed from a satellite." (5) Interviewed separately, the two drivers say that dead, wounded and unconscious prisoners were left on the trucks for the ride to the desert site. As the trucks were unloaded there, the prisoners who were still alive were summarily executed by NA soldiers. One of the drivers maintains that on at least one occasion, dozens of US soldiers were present during the executions… When Doran got word that Dotsum's troops were tampering with the grave site, he showed a short version of his film to the German and European parliaments, in the hope that the publicity would lead to the protecting of the site and an investigation leading to war crimes trials. 5000 of the 8000 Kunduz prisoners are unaccounted for and may be buried in the desert, he fears. Physicians for Human Rights also has called for the site's protection and a full investigation. Its personnel have performed autopsies on three of the bodies and found suffocation to be the probable cause of deaths."

Two French Troops Critically Injured in Explosion at Bagram Airbase  7/9/02 Azzam: "A massive explosion took place on Saturday during land mine removal at Bagram Airbase near the Afghan capital of Kabul. Two French soldiers were critically injured due to this explosion and were later shifted to France. The international 'peace keeping' troops' spokesman, Turkish Colonel Seamet Ooz said that in this incident, both soldiers sustained injuries on their head and arms. Since 'peace-keeping' troops took control of Bagram Airbase in April, almost 800 land mines have been removed but millinos remain over the rest of Afghanistan."

Murder of minister plunges Afghanistan into fresh crisis  7/8/02 Independent, UK: "The daylight murder in Kabul yesterday of Abdul Qadir, one of Afghanistan's three vice-presidents, plunged the country into its worst political crisis since the West intervened to throw out the Taliban regime. President Hamid Karzai called his Cabinet into emergency session and declared Tuesday a day of national mourning for Mr Qadir, his most senior Pashtun ally in the government. But in Mr Qadir's home city of Jalalabad, where he will be buried today, it was suggested that the list of potential suspects in his killing was almost limitless."

Anti-American Rage Spread In Afghanistan  7/8/02 Kavkaz: «Had people been allowed to take these injured to the hospital more and more lives would have been saved», he said as he received bereaved villagers in the local mosque. «Many of the injured with broken arms and broken legs died due to loss of blood. «Until seven or eight o'clock in the morning the Americans did not allow anyone to help the injured and to cover the bodies. Most of their clothes had been burnt off (in the attack). «They kept filming and photographing the naked women». Casus belli.

Five US soldiers killed  7/8/02 Kavkaz: "Later the US troops planted explosives at his home and blasted the building. US troops have been facing tough resistance in Khost but they could not find any traces of Mullah Jalaluddin Haqqani or the bases of his supporters in the area. In retaliation to this move, the anti-US fighters attacked the Khost airport where a large number of US troops are based. The attackers used rockets and missiles in the attack and damaged the barracks and equipment of the US troops. However, the details about the casualties could not be ascertained." Sounds like Israel!

Afghan wedding victims get $18,500 in compensation  7/8/02 Times of India: winning the hearts and minds - "District commissioner Abdur Rahim said he paid out to relatives eight million Afghanis ($200) on behalf of each individual killed and three million afghanis ($75 dollars) for each wounded person. "I paid the relief money in Afghan currency," Rahim told AFP in the district capital of Dehrawad where the village of Kakrakai was hit in last week's US bombing raids. The total compensation paid out by the Afghan government amounted to just under $18,500. He said the few tents and blankets US forces had provided for the victims had just added insult to injury. "If they think a few tents and a blankets can heal the injuries of the victims, OK." Rahim said. "We will kill two or three Americans and then give them some tents and blankets. Would it be adequate compensation?"

2 Afghan Clerics Taken to Guantanamo  7/7/02 AP

Rockets fired at coalition base in Afghanistan  7/7/02 Times of India: "US special forces in the troubled eastern Afghan province of Khost came under a rocket attack, but no casualties have been reported, the Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) said on Sunday. Unidentified attackers fired at least four rockets on Saturday night at Khost airport where US forces are said to have established their base, the Pakistan-based private Afghan news agency reported."

'Cruel' Americans stormed homes, filmed naked women: villagers  7/7/02 Yahoo: "First they bombed the womenfolk, killing them like animals. Then they stormed into the houses and tied the hands of men and women," Mohammad Anwar told AFP at Kakrakai village in central Uruzgan province's Dehrawad district."

Ambush Near Meerwais Hospital, 3 US Soldiers Killed 2 Injured  7/5/02 Azzam: "The ambush was aimed at a group of US soldiers near Meerwais hospital in Kandahar last Tuesday. Three soldiers were killed on the spot while two others sustained serious injuries. The assailants succeeded in escaping after the attack. The international media has portrayed the US damage as being light saying there was only one soldier injured during the ambush. The sources who contributed to this current report were actual eyewitnesses of the ambush. Local officials also confirmed the death of three American soldiers. The group that was ambushed had come to gather details of those injured due to the US bombing of a village in the Uruzgan province."

Anti-US protest in Kabul  7/4/02 BBC: "Up to 200 Afghans have demonstrated in Kabul against a US bombing raid that is believed to have killed more than 40 civilians on Monday. It is the first time people in Afghanistan have protested against the Americans since the fall of the Taleban last year."

Al Qaeda courting warlord, officials say - Afghan said to have money, following  7/4/02 Boston Globe: Hekmatyar was the top CIA connected narcotrafficker in the 80's and passed his network along to Bin Laden, according to Le Monde.

Stop killing our civilians, Afghan govt tells US  7/3/02 Arab News, Saudi Arabia: "The Afghan government yesterday demanded that America review its operations to hunt down Al-Qaeda fighters after US forces killed and injured scores of wedding guests in the most deadly “friendly fire” incident since the “war against terror” was launched last October. President Hamid Karzai called US commanders to his office and “strongly advised them of the grave concern and sorrow over the incident”. In a statement he called on coalition forces to “take all necessary measures to ensure that military activities to capture terrorist groups do not harm innocent Afghan civilians”. The unprecedented language came after scores of Afghan civilians were killed during an assault by US forces involving a B-52 bomber and an AC-130 gunship. Some reports say up to 120 people were killed, though most estimates put the death toll at around 40."

No US apology over wedding bombing  7/3/02 Guardian, UK: "Last night a US soldier was shot in the foot as an American military convoy returning from the hospital in Kandahar where wedding party victims were being treated came under fire. Col King said the wounded soldier was taken to the US base at Kandahar airport. Afghans travelling with the convoy returned fire but it was not known if they hit any targets."

'US gunship opened fire on Afghan wedding'  7/3/02 Times, UK: Other news reports say Karzai knew some of those killed, yet US defense spokespersons are saying these people fired on US planes.

US Blames Gunfire in Afghan Deaths  7/2/02 AP

Six US Soldiers Killed in Uruzgan Province Ambush  7/1/02 Azzam: "Six American soldiers were killed and several others injured during an ambush in the Uruzgan Province of Afghanistan, North of Kandahar Province. According to reliable sources, in the Uruzgan provincial district of Jarawat, American troops were attempting to launch an offensive operation near the Darawat Pass when the famous Taliban commander Mulla Baradar's men ambushed them. They were surrounded and ambushed from all sides and those still alive fled from the area in chaos. After this successful Mujahideen operation, US warplanes targetted various portions of the village due to their embarassment. All of this bombing was in vain and the Mujahideen left the region safely."

OTRO NUEVO ATAQUE CONTRA AEROPUERTO USADO POR EE.UU. EN AFGANISTÁN  7/1/02 Radio Havana: "Dos granadas cohete fueron lanzadas contra un campo aéreo en el sur de Afganistán que es empleado por las fuerzas especiales de Estados Unidos, dijo un vocero militar este lunes. Se carece de información sobre posibles lesionados. El coronel Roger King dijo que se desconoce quien lanzó las granadas el domingo en la noche. Los proyectiles explotaron dentro de los terrenos del campo aéreo, cercano a la ciudad sureña de Kandahar."

Missile Destroys Munitions Depot in Spin Boldak - Explosion Destroys U.S. Military Vehicle in Kandahar; Killing all Occupants  6/30/02 Azzam: not to be found in any US media - "In a separate incident, according to reliable information received from Kandahar city, an Afghan civilian reportedly stabbed a patrolling U.S. soldier with a knife and killed him instantly. This incident took place at around 1300 Local Time near the Currency Market in Charsu shopping center in central Kandahar on Thursday. Eye witness accounts report that the U.S. soldier was left to bleed to death, whilst the attacker escaped unharmed."

Al-Qaeda rocket attack kills 19 in east Afghanistan  6/29/02 Times, UK: "A ROCKET attack that killed 19 people in eastern Afghanistan yesterday marks the latest step in a concerted al-Qaeda campaign to destabilise the fledgeling Kabul regime. The missile hit an ammunition dump, sparking a chain of massive explosions lasting several hours as other rockets and munitions rained down on the former Taleban redoubt of Spin Boldak. Those killed included seven soldiers and 12 civilians, among them four women and three children."

Blast hits Afghan arms depot  6/28/02 BBC: "Afghan officials in Pakistan say the explosion appears to have been an accident, but some local residents believe it was started deliberately and have blamed fugitive al-Qaeda fighters."

US commander: 'This is still a war, any way you cut it'  6/27/02 Christian Science Monitor: someone finally notices that the US has not won the war, just as the Soviets didn't before them - "US troops won't be leaving the scarred battlegrounds of Afghanistan any time soon. Far from crumbling after the destruction of the Taliban's national government, Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters have proved to be tenacious guerrilla warriors, lying low, launching hit-and run-attacks – and fighting back when confronted."

Why is the US media blacking out documentary on war crimes in Afghanistan?  6/21/02 World Socialist: "This major story, however, has received virtually no coverage in US newspapers or on network or cable television. Aside from stories on some alternative Internet publications, and a June 16 article on Salon.com, the story has been essentially blacked out in the US. A search for news about the documentary in the major dailies—including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe and the Miami Herald —turned up empty. Web sites for ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News and CNN have likewise carried nothing on the film… The media’s silence makes it complicit in what are horrific war crimes. It also provides an even more sinister service to the Bush administration. Filmmaker Jamie Doran decided to release a rough cut of his documentary before final editing because he feared Afghan forces were preparing to destroy evidence of the mass killings, scattering the remains of the victims. Self-censorship by the US media only facilitates such a grisly cover-up."

U.S. Afghan role not nearly over  6/19/02 IHT: there is light at the end of the tunnel - "The situation is quite like Vietnam," said Andrew Krepinevich, executive director of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a military research group in Washington. "As long as the regime in Kabul is perceived as weak, the Taliban and other groups aligned with radical Islam will see the war as winnable, and will continue to soldier on."

Australians say Afghan attack was botched  6/18/02 Times, UK: "Speaking after returning to their headquarters in Perth, Western Australia, two officers whose names cannot be revealed, claimed that the masterminds of the military offensive had failed to learn the lessons of the Russian experience in Afghanistan." Indeed.

Documentary of US war crimes in Afghanistan shocks German parliament  6/17/02 Ummah News: "American soldiers have been involved in the torture and murder of captured Taliban prisoners, and may have aided in the "disappearance" of up to 3,000 men in the region of Mazar-i-Sharif, according to Jamie Doran, an Irish documentary film-maker. Doran's latest film, Massacre At Mazar, was shown last week in the Reichstag, the German parliament building in Berlin, and there were immediate calls for an international commission to be set up to investigate charges made in the documentary."

Pentagon denies Afghan torture claims  6/13/02 Washington Times: "The claims come in an explosive documentary by award-winning British filmmaker Jamie Doran -- screened Wednesday for members of the European Parliament at their headquarters in Strasbourg, France. The film documents events following the Nov. 21 fall of Konduz, the Taliban's last stronghold in northern Afghanistan… In the film a witness charged that American interrogators tortured suspected al Qaida members there. The witness tells the interviewer: "I was a witness when an American soldier broke one prisoner's neck and poured acid on others."

Murder, Incorporated  6/11/02 Counterpunch: "We were told there were no friendly forces," Guckenheimer said. "If there was anybody there, they were the enemy. We were told specifically that if there were women and children to kill them."

One Thousand Coalition Troops Deployed Near Pak-Afghan Border  6/6/02 Azzam: "Consequently, it is believed that a 16- year-old youth was arrested by U.S. troops on Tuesday, apparently due to intelligence received by their 'reliable' drug addict source. This has resulted in increased anger amongst local tribal leaders and it is unclear as to their expected reaction in what seems to be a new phase of operations in the region."

Web Site Aids Afghan War Efforts  5/30/02 AP: "A drab tent under the Afghan sun hides a high-tech war room that soon will become the nerve center of the campaign: Inside, tables are lined with soldiers bent over laptops. They look up at computer maps of Afghanistan projected on large screens illuminating the dim interior. All are logged onto the Tactical Web Page, a secret, secure website being used in combat for the first time, through which American commanders at Bagram air base and in the United States can direct the fight in Afghanistan."

The US Army's men in black ... Turbans  5/30/02 CSM

Fresh memories of war  5/25/02 Ithica Journal: "We were told there were no friendly forces," said Guckenheimer, an assistant gunner with the 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum. "If there was anybody there, they were the enemy. We were told specifically that if there were women and children to kill them." And then Americans don't understand why they are targets around the world.

Al qaeda 'low-tech' approach deceptively successful  5/25/02 Washington Times: The major blunder occurred when multimillion-dollar satellites failed to detect the heavy fortification at the top of Takur Ghar. "What we were seeing was 3 feet of snow on top of well-hidden bunker positions," the military official said. "They were well-fortified and they were under the foliage of the tree, hidden from anything that we would have to discern that ahead of time Our high-tech systems don't always defeat low-tech means."

Memories of Chechnya  5/24/02 Al Ahram: "With nearly 40 US casualties in Afghanistan and Taliban leader Mullah Mohamed Omar and Osama Bin Laden making defiant remarks in the media, the war against terror is far from over, reports Anayat Durrani from Washington "

US operations in Paktia to find 20 missing troops  5/23/02 Pak News: "Diplomatic and intelligence sources believe that the joint US-British search operations in eastern Afghanistan are basically aimed at finding clue to the whereabouts of the missing personnel of the American special forces rather than capturing al-Qaeda or Taliban fighters."

US Marines in swipe at British forces  5/21/02 Scotsman

War and peace is clash of cultures  5/21/02 Times, UK: "However, amid the backbiting, there still remains one martial element that is convinced of its superiority over US forces: the British soldier. “Here’s something for you Brits,” an American trooper had scrawled on the wall of the joint US-UK lavatories at Bagram airbase. “No Brits here — we’re all out fighting while you guard the toilets,” a British soldier had responded beside it, “something you’ll get more medals for anyway.”

US soldier killed in Afghanistan  5/19/02 BBC: and just what did this man die for? The Americans have already killed more Afghan civilian than they lost on 9-11. But according to colonial rules of warfare, they have to exact a 10-1 kill ration at least. This could prove expensive…

Marines' chief under fire for Afghan 'farce'  5/19/02 Telegraph, UK: did the Russian commanders experience similar problems in the 80's?

Really Bad Bird in Afghanistan  5/18/02 Cryptome: artwork to decorate a genocide

Alarm as Afghan bug spreads to more servicemen  5/18/02 Independent, UK: disease was one of the factors that led to the Russian defeat in Afghanistan.

U.S. Tells of Covert Afghan Plans Before 9/11  5/18/02 LA Times: this lends credence to early post 9-11 reports that Bush was threatening the Taliban with a buy 'em or kill 'em strategy around a US bombing campaign and the lucrative Unocal pipeline.

Mullah Omar warns US of war  5/17/02 Arab News: “As for Afghanistan, I can say that the war has just started, its fires have been kindled. That fire will reach the White House because it is the seat of all injustice and oppression and where they launched a war against Islam and Muslims without any legitimate reason....When the killing of the oppressed people increased in number we decided to withdraw from the land and start the phase of guerrilla war in the mountains so that the lives of people and the poor Mujahedeen may be spared,” he said. Omar said those who carried out the attacks in the United States had a clear objective. “What is important for the US now is to find out why they did that. America should remove the cause that made them do it.”

SHAM IN BAGRAM - Officers blast politicians as mountain mission ends in fiasco  5/16/02 Mirror, UK: "Privately British officers are furious with politicians for sending troops at America's request without, they believe, asking enough questions. They feel the marines - seen as the best mountain troops in the world - have been humiliated. One middle-ranking officer said: "If we can't do what we do best, fighting wars, then we shouldn't be here. "And if we start taking casualties without any obvious results on the ground, the politicians who are keeping us here are going to have a hell of a lot of explaining to do."

Afghan Gas Pipeline Planned, Will Depend on US Commitment to Afghan Security  5/16/02 Peter Dale Scott

Pipeline dream - The emerging connection between oil plans and the 9-11 attacks  5/16/02 Working for Change: "In light of Brisard and Dasique's allegations, the last several days have offered a number of corroborating news stories. A twelve year veteran agent with the FBI named Robert G. Wright, Jr. has filed suit in Washington D.C.'s District Court alleging that the agency willfully ignored terrorist threats from Hamas. According to Wright, the FBI intentionally thwarted his efforts to curtail Hamas activities in America that threatened American citizens. Wright's lawsuit came one day after Congress chastised the FBI for failing to look into warnings from Arizona agents about suspicious Arab men seeking flight training at American aviation schools."

Afghans shot in raid may not be Taliban  5/15/02 Herald, UK: errors upon errors

Facing attack, a rogue ally hands US an ultimatum  5/14/02 Boston Globe: "''Karzai will lose here if he sends troops, and I will never support the Americans again in this region,'' said Khan, 57, sitting cross-legged on a cushion and wearing a sash of bullets across his chest and a pistol on his left hip. This is far more than the run-of-the-mill, post-Taliban warlord feud. The dispute directly threatens the continuation of Operation Mountain Lion, a US-led search for Al Qaeda soldiers in the border region that has so far yet to turn up a single member of Osama bin Laden's group. If civil war breaks out between Karzai's forces and Khan, the US could lose the services of Khan's 600 to 800 soldiers in the manhunt, suddenly face chaos on the ground, and would almost certainly consider ending the operation."

Thousands who backed wrong side held in Afghan 'Auschwitz'  5/14/02 Sydney Morning Herald: "The European Union's special envoy to Afghanistan has called for urgent action by Afghan authorities to end the plight of more than 2000 starving Taliban supporters being held prisoner in conditions he compared to the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz."

Arms blown up by Marines were mine, says Afghan ally  5/14/02 Telegraph, UK: Sounds more and more like Nam, just like the fake body counts we now have fake arms counts: "THIRTY lorry-loads of supposed terrorist arms destroyed in Afghanistan by the Royal Marines probably belonged to a coalition ally, it emerged yesterday. Ibrahim Omari, a former commander in the anti-Soviet resistance, said the four caves detonated amid much fanfare over the weekend at Gerdaserai in south-eastern Paktia province contained weapons and ammunition he had stored there 15 years ago."

Troops: Too Many Caves to Search  5/12/02 AP

U.S. hit squads signal new twist to Afghan war  5/12/02 Toronto Sun

INVISIBLE ENEMY LURED US INTO TRAP  5/10/02 Mirror, UK: "We are now in an impossible position. We will have to start reducing British troops. It is costing us around £70,000 a year per soldier. With the cost mounting up, Gordon Brown will be biting his finger nails and they will be even more chewed when the Defence Secretary knocks at his door asking for more, when he wants to spend his cash on the NHS. It is a nasty situation. We have said all these things about how we are going to destroy al-Qaeda and the Taliban and get bin Laden and as long as we can't do that, their street cred goes higher and higher. Lots of people in the Arab world are laughing at us."

CIA Missile Misses Ex-Afghan Warlord  5/9/02 AP: Hekmatyar joins a long line of other CIA agents whose agency turned on them: he was once the CIA's top man in Afghanistan, and held the largest drug networks which he passed on to bin Laden.

New Afghan war grave revealed  5/3/02 BBC: "The US based human rights group says its teams have discovered a new grave in northern Afghanistan which may contain the remains of Taleban fighters who surrendered to Northern Alliance forces in November and December last year."

Preliminary Assessment of Alleged Mass Gravesites in the Area of Mazar-I-Sharif, Afghanistan: January 16-21 and February 7-14  5/3/02 Physicians for Human Rights: satisfying American blood lust, creating new terrorists: the forever war

Al-Qaeda fighters give crack US troops the slip  5/1/02 Scotsman, UK: Vietnam & Cambodia all over again!

Tribal clash hints at Bin Laden hideout  4/28/02 Sunday Times: "The incident illustrates both the ease with which large groups of Al-Qaeda fighters can escape American clutches and the difficulties of establishing who may be hiding in the anarchic Pakistani tribelands of northern Waziristan. Yet many local leaders seem convinced that Bin Laden is hiding in the area. “Everybody believes he is already here,” said Mohammad Ashraf, a tribal leader in the Kurram area. “He may be confined to a house in the Tirah valley or north Waziristan. Where, we don’t know, but he is somewhere near us.”

US base in Afghanistan under rocket attack  4/26/02 Times of India

The real war on terrorism  4/23/02 Salon: great interview with Robert Young Pelton

British troops in secret hunt for Taliban  4/23/02 Telegraph, UK: "So far, apart from the seizure of weapons, the operation has had limited success. Only two suspected Talibs have been captured and taken to Bagram for interrogation."

Taliban human bomber kills 14 Americans  4/19/02 Ummah News

Four US Troops Killed  4/15/02 Sky

Costly weekend for US forces in Afghanistan  4/15/02 Ummah News: "US central command in Florida said the deaths were an accident, but the information could not be verified." So many accidents…

US soldier killed in Afghan attack  4/9/02 BBC: ongoing pattern of casualties.

Rocket fired at Kabul peacekeepers  4/7/02 BBC

Russian Generals Question Pentagon Victories In Afghanistan  4/6/02 Counterpunch: What many US officers are also saying in private: "However, the US and European press carried enough facts that prompt conclusions about the inadequate preparation of US special troops for hostilities in the mountains."

Mountain Division: Why the U.S. can't match the British at high altitudes.  4/5/02 American Prospect: relevant for some time to come, published 3/21/02

Captured by the One-Eyed Cyclops (I): Vest Report  4/5/02 Defense and the National Interest: A professional soldier's view (3/22/02) of the battles in Afghanistan and the wishful thinking about these on the US side: "Other officers I interviewed found it interesting that the person arguably best suited to help the public understand what was going on in Shah-i-Kot had been muzzled, and were not charitable in speculating as to what that meant. One officer who follows Grau's work did, however, draw my attention that day to a recent article co-authored by Grau for the Military Review Bulletin, published by the Army Command and General Staff College. Entitled "Ground Combat at High Altitude," the article flies in the face of early official optimistic pronouncements about Anaconda, essentially stating that the US Army's knowledge about high-mountain combat – defined as 10,000 feet and higher – is disturbingly deficient. (Anaconda ranged over turf from 8500 to 13,000 feet). "The US Army has no experience fighting in truly high mountains and its mountain warfare manuals deal primarily with low and medium mountains," the piece begins, adding that the Army "needs to know how to conduct high-altitude mountain warfare, develop the tactics, techniques and procedures to do so, and share the experience of other armies to understand and prepare for possible high-altitude conflicts."

Coalition forces under attack in Anaconda battle zone  4/4/02 Yahoo: the forever war

U.S. Fears Afghan Farmers Can't End Cash Crop: Opium  4/1/02 NYT

Three US Soldiers Beaten to Death in Kabul for Chasing Afghan Women  3/28/02 Azzam

U.S. troops faced own captured weapons  3/28/02 Washington Times: shades of Viet Nam

18 U.S. Soldiers Killed in Ambush at Khost Airport  3/26/02 Azzam

Britain accused on terror lab claim  3/24/02 Guardian, UK

Al-Qa'ida biological weapons laboratory is 'found in Afghanistan cave'  3/23/02 Independent, UK

If he is white then he is a Chechen  3/23/02 Kavkaz

The strange battle of Shah-i-Kot by Brendan O'Neill  3/22/02 Spiked Online

General warns of unwinnable guerrilla war  3/22/02 Telegraph, UK

British forces caught in attack by Taliban  3/21/02 Independent, UK

Marines to face guerrilla war as Taleban fighters change tactics  3/21/02 Times, UK: "US troops at Khost airfield were attacked early yesterday by al-Qaeda and Taleban fighters armed with rocketpropelled grenades, mortars and machineguns. The airfield is only 45 miles east of the Shah-i Kot valley in Paktia province, where a US-led force has just completed Operation Anaconda after 17 days of fighting. An American soldier was wounded in the arm and three Afghans were said to have been killed."

No quick pullout from Afghanistan  3/21/02 UPI

Taliban sympathisers warn of revenge on US television  3/20/02 Ananova

US puzzled as battle zone yields few bodies  3/18/02 Sydney Morning Herald

US, Taliban hold secret talks on POWs  3/17/02 Frontier Post, Pakistan: "ISLAMABAD (SANA): Taliban have announced their willingness to release 18 US troops in exchange for all prisoners detained at Guantanamo island."

US forces braced for long guerrilla fight in mountains  3/17/02 Scotsman, UK: say 10 years, like the Soviet Union? - "Some American officials had spoken of heavy casualties - up to 800 dead - inflicted on al-Qaeda fighters and remnants of the ultra-fundamentalist Islamic Taliban government which crumbled at the end of last year. On Wednesday American and Afghan troops finally entered the village of Shah-e-Kot, at the centre of the battle area. But among the shattered houses and terraced fields gouged by scores of bombs there were only three dead enemy fighters and another two who were injured. The rest had seemingly melted away."

Over 100 US servicemen killed so far in Afghanistan says Russian agency  3/16/02 Ummah News: "The armed forces of the United States have lost 102 men killed and 124 wounded during the "anti-terrorist" operation which began in Afghanistan in October 2001. The figure was furnished to Itar-Tass by military sources in the Afghan capital. They noted that the indicated number of killed and wounded American officers and men included only the "combat losses" sustained by U.S. troops during the operations against Taliban and Al-Qaeda fighters."

With no medicine and little food, detainees are slowly dying  3/15/02 IHT

Afghan Airstrike Killed Women, Kids  3/13/02 ABC News

Qaeda's solar-powered, carpeted caves  3/11/02 IHT

Mujahideen may demand freedom of Camp X-Ray inmates in prisoner exchange  3/11/02 Ummah News: "The US has now offered to negotiate with opposition Afghan Mujahideen to secure the exchange of 18 of its captured soldiers, two of whom are thought to be senior US military officials. The sources disclosed that as soon as news of the arrest of the soldiers reached the Commander in charge of operation Anaconda, Gardez, Major General Franks, he immediately gave the order to halt the operation and ground US warplanes. He then sent a delegation of two senior military officials to meet the Governor of Paktika Wardaag to relay the offer to the Mujahideen commander, Mulla Saif ur Rehman Mansoor."

U.S. Pulls Troops From Battle; Afghan Force Divided  3/10/02 Reuters

Afghan Alliance Rift Looms as US Seeks Back-up  3/10/02 Times, UK

Wounded Soldiers Recall Tenacious Enemy Attack  3/9/02 NYT

Canadian soldiers escape injury in Kandahar explosion  3/8/02 CBC: "It was no accident. An explosion and fire at an ammunition dump near an airbase for Canadians and Americans near Kandahar was set off by a booby trap, according to the Canadian commander." Would the US Commander be allowed to admit to that?

Slow Progress in Afghanistan May Delay US Iraq Offensive  3/8/02 Debka, Israel: From the Israeli psyops site: "Tommy Franks, the US Central Command chief, transferred to the Gardez battlefield US forces standing by on Oman’s Masirah Island base for the US offensive against Iraq. Several thousand more may have to follow, if fighting flares up in additional Taliban-al Qaeda pockets around Afghanistan. US forces in Gardez commanded by major general Frank Hagenbeck faced a hard fact this week: the joint US-Afghan force was unable to stem the influx of Taliban and al-Qaeda reinforcements from Pakistan, only several dozen kilometers away, and from among additional enemy concentrations in Afghanistan – particularly since Thursday, when the mountain region was struck with blinding snow storms. DEBKAfile’s military sources say that, while the Americans were pouring additional soldiers, 17 assault helicopters and tank-busting A-10 aircraft into the area, the other side was moving in reinforcements too, equipped with large quantities of anti-tank missiles and various shoulder-held surface-to-air missiles, including US-made Stingers. US spy satellites and drones spotted groups of Taliban and al-Qaeda converging on the battle zone from as far away as the Hindu Kush mountains, north of the city of Jalalabad, and the Zabul province south of Gardez."

US faces guerrilla warfare  3/8/02 Guardian, UK

Four More U.S. Helicopters Destroyed: More American Casualties in Gardez  3/8/02 Kavkaz: "Huge numbers of crying American soldiers, wounded in combat, are being ferried to and from medical centres in Khost and the U.S. Base in the vicinity."

Operation Anaconda: Questionable Outcomes for United States  3/8/02 Stratfor: "Operation Anaconda signals the beginning of a new phase of the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan. In this phase insurgency and counterinsurgency operations will become the main feature. Militarily, Operation Anaconda shows the United States has yet to find an effective response on the ground to guerrilla warfare. Dominant air power will remain the only sufficient means to win battles, but it might not be enough to win the war in Afghanistan."

Fierce fight rages in Arma hideout, US forces struggling to capture ground  3/7/02 Ummah News: "But opposition sources claim that about 70 US servicemen have also been killed and some 50 wounded in intense fighting in the Arma mountains of Paktia province, in eastern Afghanistan."

Heavy US casualties as al-Qaeda hits back  3/5/02 Times, UK: the quagmire…

Gardez mujahideen continue to inflict heavy losses on US-led forces  3/5/02 Ummah News: In Grenada, Panama, and other US interventions, body bags came back without any press coverage…

US helicopters downed in assault against Mujahideen positions  3/4/02 Ummah News: Are the Americans reporting all their casualties? "Two American CH-47 'Chinook' helicopters each carrying 20 special forces troops have been shot down by Mujahideen during fierce fighting in Gardez."

US losses mount throughout Afghanistan  3/4/02 Ummah News

New US-Afghan Offensive is an Eye Opener  3/3/02 Debka: from the Israeli psyops site: "US Air Force B-52 and B-1 bombers, F-15E fighters and AC-130 gunships blasted the caves around Gardez with laser- and satellite-guided bombs, as well as 2,000-pound suffocating “thermobaric” bombs. The Russian Army used this type of bomb against Chechen insurgents in the nineties, to little effect. Moscow’s failure to put down the rebellion in seven years of fighting is partly responsible for the arrival of US Special Forces in neighboring Georgia in the last two weeks...The current offensive, which needs another week at least, has already been an eye-opener. The American-Afghan setback on Saturday demonstrated that the Taliban and its al Qaeda partners had studied the five-month battlefront – especially the Tora Bora campaign of mid-December – and drawn some lessons. They are in far better shape now than in the days of the Mazar- e-Sharif, Konduz and Tora Bora battles. The Tora Bora engagement was for the Taliban and al Qaeda no more than a delaying maneuver to cover a rapid tactical withdrawal in the face of superior strength. Today, their objectives and style of combat are quite different. They have replaced their small, undisciplined bands and free-ranging chiefs with an organized central command at the head of a hierarchy, arming the revamped units with communications equipment and decent clothes. Their arsenal is substantial, containing such heavy weaponry as missiles, mortars and heavy machine guns, which they have learned to use economically. Seen against Afghan battlefield traditions, their food and ammunition supply systems are much enhanced, as are their facilities for caring for the wounded, including evacuation to hospital. There are signs that they have developed a competent, real-time field intelligence capability; their units are also far more mobile and flexible, they time counter-attacks for the hours of dark, have learned to evade US bombing strikes by day and fortify their positions. The Taliban also command a reserve force – not large but adequate - part of which is standing by across the border in West Pakistan. Faced with enhanced and expanded Taliban-al Qaeda combat capabilities, US strategists will need to retool their assault plans accordingly. It must be scheduled for no later than March 15-20, before the receding winter snows open up the mountain passes to Taliban movement."

U.S. Bombs Eastern Afghan Mountains  3/2/02 AP: "U.S. warplanes and helicopters opened a new offensive Saturday against Taliban and al-Qaida believed regrouping in Afghanistan (news - web sites)'s eastern mountains in an air assault backed by Afghan forces on the ground, Afghan leaders said."

Afghan caves hit with pressure bombs  3/2/02 BBC

Anti-US mujahideen step up guerrilla strikes in Afghanistan  3/1/02 Ummah News: 'Nam all over again!

Oil And Military Power In The Middle East And The Caspian Sea Region - Part I  2/28/02 Black World Today

Rockets Fired at U.S. Airbase in Afghanistan  2/24/02 Reuters

Afghans flee hunger and strife  2/22/02 Guardian, UK

MI5 fears flood of Afghan heroin  2/21/02 Guardian, UK

Shh, It's an Open Secret: Warlords and Pedophilia  2/21/02 NYT: warlords and catholic priests…

US says troops to stay in Afghanistan till Taliban, al-Qaeda go  2/21/02 Yahoo: we are not in a quagmire therefore we are not in a quagmire.

Afghanistan war 'just beginning'  2/20/02 Telegraph, UK

Europe Upset by US Inaction Over Resumed Afghan Opium Production  2/19/02 Peter Dale Scott: by the respected co-author of Cocaine Politics.

Civilian toll in US raids put at 1,000  2/17/02 Boston Globe: a gross undercount, as usual in the US media. Plus bizarre, maudlin antics of US soldiers: "''The Americans said they were very sorry about the bombing,'' Pashtoon said. Then, he said, the soldiers took out a small piece from the World Trade Center and buried it in the village's graveyard. ''They also took a small part of a building in the town, and they said they would bury it in New York,'' Pashtoon said."

Atacan a soldados británicos en Afganistán  2/16/02 Radio Sancti Spíritus: British troops attacked in Afghanistan

U.S. attack killed children, Afghan survivors say  2/15/02 Nando Times: just like Viet Nam.

Afghan minister killed in Kabul: Al-Jazeera  2/15/02 Times of India

Attackers Fire at Afghan U.S. Base  2/14/02 AP

Huge Fire at U.S. Base in Kandahar  2/14/02 Reuters: just like Viet Nam.

US planes rain dollars on Afghanistan  2/14/02 Reuters: "US aircraft over southern Afghanistan have scattered $100 bills tucked into envelopes bearing a picture of President George W. Bush, witnesses said on Thursday.Read this story in... Hindi " - buying another US election? Wrong country, W!

Les paysans afghans reçoivent des semences génétiquement modifiées au titre de l'aide américaine  2/12/02 Centre de recherche sur la mondialisation, Montreal: US donates genetically modified seed stock to Afghans, to complete the destruction.

Afghans are still dying as air strikes go on. But no one is counting  2/12/02 Guardian, UK: "There are no official US figures, and nor have the dozens of non-governmental charities now operating in the country done any independent research. "Undoubtedly there have been civilian casualties," says a well-informed Afghan professional working for an NGO mainly funded by the US government. "No one is doing a real assessment of that. It gets very political. Please don't ask me about that." - the wonders of USAID money...

Storm over Afghan civilian victims  2/12/02 Guardian, UK: "US military officials, who had routinely rejected earlier accounts of civilian casualties as enemy propaganda, were forced back on the defensive at a Pentagon press conference yesterday at which every question focused on targeting errors and the treatment of captives." - got that, Rummy?

Missile from drone kills nomads  2/10/02 Telegraph, UK: another great kill for US technology: they thought they got bin Laden or at least "senior" al Qaeda, but it was just folks collecting scrap metal that they wiped out.

Villagers Released by American Troops Say They Were Beaten, Kept in 'Cage'  2/10/02 Washington Post: The Empire strikes back…

US Commandos Kill Innocents, CIA Pays Off Kin--A Model Program?  2/7/02 The Nation: Sergio Leone: Buy 'em or kill 'em.

Did Israel's lost tribes end up in Afghanistan?  2/3/02 Times of India: "The Pashtun tribes that produced the Taliban, one of the most zealous sects the Muslim world has ever seen, have traditionally traced their roots to the Jews who disappeared after the Babylonian Captivity in the sixth century B.C. The legend, which seems bizarre in light of Jewish-Muslim tensions since the creation of Israel in 1947, is the cornerstone of the complex genealogies delineating the proud Pashtun tribes of Islamic Afghanistan and Pakistan."

Commanders say 30,000 troops needed to secure Afghanistan  2/3/02 Yahoo: sounds like 'Nam…

U.S. Says Innocents Died in Raid  2/2/02 AP: "Two senior officials said Friday it appears likely that a mix of Taliban and anti-Taliban fighters were present at the site of the nighttime raid by U.S. special forces soldiers. U.S. intelligence officers had believed it was an al-Qaida terrorist hide-out." Hey Rummy, did you let this one slip out?

Villagers Add to Reports of Raids Gone Astray  2/2/02 NYT

The Others  1/31/02 The Nation: by Howard Zinn - "Then it occurred to me: What if all those Americans who declare their support for Bush's "war on terrorism" could see, instead of those elusive symbols--Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda--the real human beings who have died under our bombs? I do believe they would have second thoughts."

Afghans Protest U.S. Capture Of Officials  1/30/02 Ummah News

US Helicopter Downed in Khost: 25 Killed.  1/30/02 Ummah News: more hidden casualties, a practice not unknown in previous US engagements…

Four US commandos die  1/29/02 Frontierpost, Pakistan

US accused of killing anti-Taliban leaders  1/28/02 Guardian, UK

Main drug control agency in Kabul is evicted  1/25/02 Independent, UK: remind you of the Cocaine Coup in Bolivia, right after Reagan came to power?

Taleban army rises again to face US  1/25/02 Times, UK: "A renegade army of 5,000 Taleban soldiers with 450 tanks, armoured carriers and pick-up trucks is locked in a tense stand-off with American special forces in Afghanistan."

Alliance nearly opened fire on UK troops  1/23/02 Independent, UK: "Paul Bergne told MPs that Northern Alliance commanders "came within an ace" of ordering their soldiers to open fire on the 100-strong contingent of Special Boat Service marines. His graphic description of the near-disaster on 15 November prompted immediate demands for a Ministry of Defence statement on the incident."

THE GETAWAY  1/23/02 New Yorker

Pashtun ire toward US grows  1/22/02 Boston Globe: "Villagers and commanders in the area said in interviews that the attacks killed more civilians than Taliban and Al Qaeda members. Pashtun leaders said the base itself had been abandoned and contended that the US military ignored their intelligence in carrying out the attacks, which ended last week."

Bomb goes off at American embassy  1/21/02 Guardian, UK: The naïve and gullible Americans thought they had won the war so easily: "A bomb exploded outside the newly reopened US embassy in Kabul in the first reported attack on the growing international presence in the city, sources told the Guardian last night. United Nations personnel, diplomats, and aid workers have been warned that there could be an attack on a major installation in the Afghan capital in the days ahead, and a contingency plan has just been drawn up for the emergency evacuation of all UN staff from Afghanistan."

Unexploded US bomblets mine villages  1/20/02 Boston Globe: "Despite the official declaration of peace, thousands of Afghans who fled during the war cannot go home because their houses, fields, and villages are littered with unexploded remnants of US cluster bombs - far more than the United States had predicted." Not to mention the tons of depleted uranium, to be revealed later: at 60% of the radioactivity of uranium, it could make cancer rates shoot up 1000%, as it did in Iraq.

Afghan tribes balk at aiding search for Taliban: report  1/18/02 The News, Pakistan: more American defeats.

SMITH REPS NORTHERN ALLIANCE  1/17/02 O'Dwyer's PR Daily: Dostum is a ruthless hoodlum and he hires a Republican PR firm to clean up his image…

Villagers cower as US bombs fall, 24 hours a day  1/16/02 Sydney Morning Herald: "Fifteen people were killed two days ago in Shudiaki village, says Noorz Ali, driving a pick-up truck piled with a wheelbarrow, a brass basin, and four baby goats - the pitiable sum of his belongings as he joins the exodus for the safety of the plains."

American civilian held hostage by tribal chiefs  1/16/02 Times, UK: "Clark Bowers, a political consultant from Alabama, apparently was trying to deliver medical supplies when he rang his wife to report his plight...Mr Bowers is a long-time friend of Dana Rohrabacher, a Californian congressman, who put out a statement yesterday saying that he had tried to dissuade Mr Bowers from travelling. One of Mr Rohrabacher’s aides described Mr Bowers as a “thrill-seeker in a war zone”. Mr Bowers told his wife Amanda in a brief, sketchy phone call that he had been robbed of all his belongings and was being held by captors demanding a ransom. The State Department was treating the reports “very seriously”. " Some friend!

American forces 'may be breaking PoW convention'  1/14/02 Independent, UK: "may be"? "The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said yesterday that those being held by American forces must be counted as prisoners of war under the Geneva Convention, and were, therefore, entitled to the full protection offered by it… Some of the terms used by America to describe the prisoners, such as "battlefield detainees", have no legal meaning, the ICRC says." Hard to see how "battlefield detainee" is not equal to POW. If an American were captured, would not the US be calling him a POW?

Kandahar comes out of the closet  1/12/02 Times, UK: "Kandahar’s Pashtuns have been notorious for their homosexuality for centuries, particularly their fondness for naive young boys. Before the Taleban arrived in 1994, the streets were filled with teenagers and their sugar daddies, flaunting their relationship."

Al-Qaida helped to flee, US says  1/11/02 Gurardian, UK: "Al-Qaida fighters are escaping from Afghanistan in large numbers, eastwards through Pakistan and westwards through Iran, with the help of hardline anti-American elements in the security services of both countries, US intelligence sources said yesterday."

Taleban back in black to plot return  1/11/02 Times, UK: The gullible Americans don't yet quite understand that the Russians took Kabul in 2 days then had hell to pay for 10 years.

US base in Kandahar comes under fire: military spokesman  1/11/02 Yahoo

US Military Plane Shot Down in Afghanistan  1/10/02 Ummah News: "Mujahideen fighters in Afghanistan claim to have shot down a C-130 Hercules transport plane late Wednesday afternoon, on its way from the Bagram Airbase North of Kabul, towards Islamabad in Pakistan."

Bad Intelligence Causing Pentagon-CIA Rift  1/9/02 Stratfor: "On the other side of the payoff are cagey and ruthless Afghan clan leaders or warlords, who trade purported knowledge of the whereabouts of Omar or bin Laden for cash, weapons or food. They know how to exploit the inability of many field agents to distinguish between credible and obviously false reports. If he is particularly skillful, a good tribal leader can also convince an operative that a local rival is actually harboring Omar and should be bombed."

WIDESPREAD HUNGER, STARVATION REPORTED IN AFGHANISTAN'S REMOTE MOUNTAINS  1/8/02 Radio Havana

1,300 enemy men killed by handful of Green Berets  1/8/02 Telegraph, UK

Bloody evidence of US blunder  1/7/02 Guardian, UK: "Some of the things his follow-on reporters missed: bloodied children's shoes and skirts, bloodied school books, the scalp of a woman with braided grey hair, butter toffees in red wrappers, wedding decorations. The charred meat sticking to rubble in black lumps could have been Osama bin Laden's henchmen but survivors said it was the remains of farmers, their wives and children, and wedding guests."

Afghan Jail Described as Having 50 to a Cell - Conditions Are Deadly, Aid Groups Say  1/7/02 IHT

Report: Afghanistan Faces Serious Environmental Crisis  1/6/02 Islam Online

U.S. helicopters gunned down fleeing Afghan women and children  1/6/02 Yellow Times

Taleban envoy detained by US  1/5/02 BBC: why should criminal American diplomats, frequently CIA agents, be accorded any different treatment, why should they then not be detained and punished according to a secret military tribunal? The Americans have no answer to this question, for none is possible other than reasons of imperium.

A Body and Spirit Broken by the Taliban  1/5/02 Washington Post: not mentioned when Unocal was dealing with the Taliban…

MP seeks air strike inquiry  1/4/02 Guardian: more evidence of war crimes - "… the UN said it had unconfirmed but reliable reports that 52 civilians were killed in the incident. It said there was no evidence that Taliban or al-Qaida fighters were in the village when it was hit."

Warlords Steal Food Shipments, Hampering Efforts to Relieve Famine  1/4/02 NYT: more good behavior from US narcoterrorist allies

UN CONFIRMS SUNDAY'S CIVILIAN CASUALTIES IN AFGHANISTAN; MORE INNOCENT DEATHS REPORTED  1/4/02 Radio Havana: "As new reports of civilian casualties in Afghanistan surface, the United Nations has joined voices with those condemning last Sunday's bombardment of a civilian village. While residents near the village in eastern Afghanistan assert that more than 100 innocent people were killed, the UN said the air strikes killed more than 50, half of them children."

US raid killed 25 children, says UN  1/4/02 Times, UK: from conservative press magnate Murdoch's flagship paper in London, the venerable Times - more genocide, sounds like 'Nam - "UNARMED women and children were chased and killed by American helicopters during an attack on an Afghan village that left 52 dead, the United Nations suggested yesterday, citing an unconfirmed report. Some of the victims, who included ten women and 25 children, were said to have been killed by the initial airstrike on Niazi Qala village in Paktia Province, others as they fled to shelter and a third group as they tried to rescue survivors, Stephanie Bunker, a UN spokeswoman in Kabul, said." War crimes are punishable, there is no statute of limitation, and perpetrators can be arrested in many countries, as the Israelis and others are beginning to discover.

Trolling the Web for Afghan Dead  1/4/02 Wired: true pathology on display - ""We did not start this war," Rumsfeld said. "So understand, responsibility for every single casualty in this war, whether they're innocent Afhgans or innocent Americans, rests at the feet of al-Qaeda and the Taliban."

Oil company adviser named US representative to Afghanistan  1/3/02 World Socialist: not available in the mainstream media - "President Bush has appointed a former aide to the American oil company Unocal, Afghan-born Zalmay Khalilzad, as special envoy to Afghanistan. The nomination was announced December 31, nine days after the US-backed interim government of Hamid Karzai took office in Kabul. The nomination underscores the real economic and financial interests at stake in the US military intervention in Central Asia. Khalilzad is intimately involved in the long-running US efforts to obtain direct access to the oil and gas resources of the region, largely unexploited but believed to be the second largest in the world after the Persian Gulf. As an adviser for Unocal, Khalilzad drew up a risk analysis of a proposed gas pipeline from the former Soviet republic of Turkmenistan across Afghanistan and Pakistan to the Indian Ocean. He participated in talks between the oil company and Taliban officials in 1997, which were aimed at implementing a 1995 agreement to build the pipeline across western Afghanistan."

Pentagon: al Qaeda regrouping in Afghanistan  1/2/02 CNN

Ignorance is Not Bliss  1/2/02 San Francisco Chronicle: "While American viewers remain oblivious, Europeans, Asians and others have access to information about the catastrophic effects of U.S. bombing. They have seen images of dead and wounded civilians and the many widows, widowers and orphans created by Operation Enduring Freedom."

Secret calls tell parents al Qaeda sons died Confusion in Arab world over fighters' fates  1/2/02 San Francisco Chronicle

US accused of killing over 100 villagers in air strike  1/1/02 Guardian, UK: "A Qalaye Niazi villager, Janat Gul, told Reuters he was the sole person from his 24-member family to survive Sunday's pre-dawn attack by helicopters and jets. "There are no al-Qaida or Taliban people here," he insisted. Haji Saifullah, head of the tribal council, invited US forces to inspect the village, claiming 107 civilians died, including women and children." - that pathological liar Rumsfeld at work again.

US troops sent to find Mullah Omar  1/1/02 Independent, UK: "American commanders in Afghanistan were believed to have rushed scores of marines into the mountains near Baghran, about 100 miles north-west of Kandahar, in a fresh attempt to capture or kill the defeated Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar

Afghanistan News
2002

Contacting AfroCubaWeb

Copyright © 1997 AfroCubaWeb, S.A.

Afghanistan News 2002

Contacting AfroCubaWeb

Copyright © 1997 AfroCubaWeb, S.A.

Afghanistan News
2002