GlobalSecurity.org In the News

Afghanistan Spring Brings New Challenges to US, Allies

WASHINGTON - American and allied military forces are entering a more uncertain period of the war in Afghanistan as spring weather arrives with the prospect of hunting down thousands of remaining Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters who could resort to guerrilla tactics, US officials and military analysts said.

As the US-led Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan hits the six-month mark this weekend, military commanders are preoccupied with keeping their battlefield momentum and preventing a counteroffensive by militant supporters of the ousted regime or the terrorist network. At the same time, they are starting the difficult task of training and equipping a new Afghan army and helping prepare for a group of tribal elders to choose a new government in June, a key turning point in the post-Taliban Afghanistan.

Military officers and private analysts predicted that the next few months will determine whether Afghanistan will remain the US success story it has been called. US and coalition forces must now destroy the remaining Taliban and Al Qaeda operating in the country. Those elements pose a threat not only to coalition forces but to the new Afghan government, whose level of support among its ethnically divided residents will determine whether the country breaks with its bloody past or slides back into civil war.

"The fear is that this thing will come unraveled with a higher level of guerrilla warfare that requires a larger American force to become engaged," said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, based in Alexandria, Va. "I would say that between hard-core Taliban and residual Al Qaeda there have got to be several thousand guys with guns that would kill Americans if they had the chance."

This week, coalition forces on patrol in the Shah-e-Kot Valley in eastern Afghanistan - scene of last month's Operation Anaconda against hundreds of enemy fighters - escaped harm in several rocket attacks, according to US military officials. However, the attacks signalled that enemy fighters are still active in the mountain region.

Some hostile forces, meanwhile, are taking aim at the interim government of Hamid Karzai. On Wednesday, Afghan government forces, with the assistance of the United States, arrested hundreds of people in Kabul, many of them ethnic Pashtuns, who were suspected of planning a series of bomb attacks in the capital to unseat the Karzai government.

"A lot depends on how hard-core the resistance is and how Karzai and others are perceived," said a retired Army general, Wesley Clark, who commanded NATO operations during the Kosovo conflict in 1999. "The arena is ripe for conflict."

He predicted that the war could move to the cities, where suicide bombings would be effective.

The estimated 7,500 US, British, and Canadian combat troops that will be in the country by mid-April will be keeping a low profile, using a few small, forward bases and relying on helicopters for transport.

Analysts said the best way to prevent a guerrilla campaign from spreading is for US-led military forces to continue pursuing Taliban and Al Qaeda militants. The first of 1,700 British combat troops arrived in Afghanistan this week to take part in mop-up operations.

"We continue intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance over a majority of the country," Air Force Brigadier General John W. Rosa, deputy director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said yesterday. With a combination of spy planes and teams of special forces and conventional ground units, US commanders are scouring areas of the country where holdout fighters are suspected to be regrouping, particularly in the east near the border with Pakistan, officials said.

Finding the enemy is getting harder. Enemy fighters are no longer massing in large numbers, making a more difficult target than in Operation Anaconda. During that operation, which began last month, hundreds of Al Quaeda and Taliban fighters took refuge in cave complexes in eastern Afghanistan.

"You're a lot more vulnerable that way," said Rosa. "So the fact that they're staying, from what we see, in small pockets, doesn't surprise us."

Rosa said that the United States lacks the information to proceed against these pockets.

"We are pacing when we attack and how we attack on our terms," he said. "All those signs have not come together yet."

Afghanistan's political stability will be critical in future military operations, analysts said. In June, a council of tribal elders, or Loya Jirga, is to choose a new transitional government to succeed Karzai.

"The biggest unknown determinant is what happens with the Loya Jirga that takes charge for the next 18 months," said Julie Sirrs, former Afghanistan specialist at the Defense Intelligence Agency. "A lot of elements are not included in the current government and it will be a challenge to include them in order to stabilize the country. Tribal Pashtuns haven't been included. The next government will need to include more of them" to avert civil war.

The United States has taken pains to stay out of the tribal and ethnic conflicts that still beset the country, but ultimately may have little choice.

"There is always the risk of mission creep," said Pike, "by getting embroiled with local warlords. The pessimistic view is the country returns to business as usual, with the local commanders going after each other, in which case the United States would face an entirely new war. Disarming local commanders is not going to happen."

Pike also noted that with both Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar still on the run, there is a danger of future attacks.

"If they are going to have a new safe haven of sorts, that could be a big problem," said Sirrs. "They might use the coming year to regroup or focus on terrorist operations elsewhere."

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