Wed, Oct 17, 2001 page5

• US special forces swing into action

  ESCALATION After pounding Taliban positions for over a week, the US brought out a AC-130 gunship, a slow attack aircraft usually used to support ground forces

  • AP
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  A US special forces gunship swung into action yesterday, raking a Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan with heavy machine gun and cannon fire. Fierce daylight bombing at Kabul set International Red Cross warehouses afire.

  Massive explosions from the battle over Kabul's skies could be heard along the front lines between Taliban and Afghan opposition forces 50km to the north. Black smoke billowed on the capital's northern edge.

  The second straight day of punishing daylight raids and the first use of the low-flying, lumbering AC-130 marked a dramatic intensification of the air campaign against Taliban military sites and leaders.

  The attacks also signaled US confidence that more than a week of strikes by ship-launched cruise missiles and high-flying jets had removed much of the threat from Taliban air defense.

  Secretary of State Colin Powell, in neighboring Pakistan to shore up support for the US-led campaign, called Afghanistan's Islamic regime ``under enormous pressure'' but refused to say whether he thought it near collapse.

  Yesterday's fresh waves of air strikes targeted the Taliban on multiple fronts -- military bases and airports outside the capital of Kabul, Taliban leaders' southern base city of Kandahar and the key northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif -- a former opposition stronghold.

  Salvos of bombs struck in the north of Kabul throughout the day, blasting at a cluster of Taliban military bases and transport and fuel depots.

  One bomb crashed into a Red Cross compound at Khair Khana, injuring a guard and setting two warehouses afire. Afghan workers braved the smoke to recover some of the blankets, tents and medicine from one building. The other contained wheat, ICRC staffers at the scene said.

  In Islamabad, Pakistan, ICRC spokesman Mario Musa said the warehouse roofs had been marked with a Red Cross insignia.

  Outside Kabul, an Associated Press reporter with opposition forces on the Shomali plain well to the north of the capital could hear huge explosions from the bombardment and the roar of heavy guns.

  Taliban fuel supplies and vehicles were believed to have been removed from some of yesterday's targeted installations in the Khair Khana area. Residents say Taliban forces avoid spending the night at the Khair Khana military bases, taking refuge in local mosques instead.

  Locals say yesterday's bombing injured three farmers out working in their fields when the US jets roared overhead.

  In Washington, a defense official confirmed the overnight attack was led by an AC-130, marking the first acknowledged use of special-forces aircraft in the offensive, which began on Oct. 7. The official spoke on condition of anonymity.

  Previous raids had targeted anti-aircraft artillery sites and other military installations with the aim of making the skies safe for aircraft like the AC-130. The Taliban are believed to still hold an unknown number of shoulder-fired Stinger missiles capable of bringing down aircraft, however.

  High-firepower AC-130s typically are used to support ground forces trained for small-unit operations. There was no word whether the gunship's deployment meant special forces had entered the battle on the ground.

  Aiming to make the skies safe, US forces have made particular targets out of airports in Taliban territory throughout the campaign. Attacks put the Jalalabad airport in eastern Afghanistan out of commission almost from the start.

  Other strikes have pounded Taliban jets at Kabul and the sprawling airport complex at Kandahar, which holds at least 300 housing units of Osama bin Laden's followers.

  The only other major airfields in Taliban territory, at Shindand in southwestern Afghanistan and in Herat, have also taken repeated strikes.

  Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, speaking at the Pentagon, suggested Monday that US airstrikes could next start targeting Taliban front-line positions facing Afghan opposition fighters in the northeast.

  Taking advantage of the massive assaults, opposition forces on the ground claimed Monday to have advanced within miles of Mazar-e-Sharif.

  Taking the city would enable the opposition to consolidate its grip on the small area it controls in the north, since the town controls routes running east to west and linking pockets of the northern alliance's strength.
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