Coalition drops 2,000 bomb on Taliban insurgents

[maddezmom]

KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Coalition forces launched a precision airstrike on Taliban fighters cornered in a cave in central Afghanistan Tuesday, a coalition military statement said.

According to the statement, Afghan National Army and coalition forces engaged Taliban insurgents in western Uruzgan province, while clearing roadside bombs.

During the fighting, Taliban fighters retreated into a cave.

"Coalition forces dropped one 2,000 pound bomb on the cave, sealing it off," the coalition said.

"Due to the precision of the airstrike, there were no damages or injuries to civilians during the operation. Additionally, there were no reported Afghan or Coalition casualties during the engagement."

more:http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/02/19/monday/index.html

[Zynx]

1. 2,000 lb bombs are hardly news.

[NJCher]

2. coalition?

Cher

[maddezmom]

4. exactly

All the airstrikes are done by the US Military. The coalition on the ground in this area may be from the Netherlands, but they aren't dropping the bombs.

[rodeodance]

18. what a farse!

[Parche]

19. DA BOMB

In Iran its "What a Farsi"!!!

[hack89]

33. 36 countries presently fighting in Afghanistan

including nearly all of NATO


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Security_Assistance_Force

[maddezmom]

36. how many are involved in active fighting vs humanitarian missions?

Coalition is still misleading either way, the US and the UK have been begging for months for more people and more equipment.

[hack89]

37. It's a little more complex than that

It is true that the US, England, Canada and the Dutch are doing most of the conventional fighting in the east and south while other NATO nations have restrictions on what combat their soldiers can face. On the other hand, Afghanistan is referred to as the "Special Force Olympics" due to the prominent role of special forces. All the NATO countries in addition to France, Australia and New Zealand have their special ops guys fighting with no restrictions. The French and Germans have just rotated out while the Australian SAS and Polish GROM are rotating in. This is acceptable to the European governments for several reasons - one is that the operations are usually secret and out of sight of the press. Additionally, the public accepts the deaths of volunteer spec ops troops better than then they do conscript troops.

[ama]

3. Nasty

Bury the alive, let them die of thirst, how humane:sarcasm:

[Nihil]

6. Yep

It also avoids any of that first aid, medical assistance stuff mentioned
in the Geneva convention and saves on the cost of feeding/guarding the
POWs pending trial.

[cigsandcoffee]

7. Um... it also prevents them from killing any more soldiers.

I don't think that fighting the Taliban is like arresting a street thug. Good luck showing them your badge and expecting them to come peacefully.

[Robbien]

8. Dropping bombs

based on suspect data just makes more enemies. I wouldn't bet on the odds this bomb actually killed anyone it was suppose to kill.

Using bombs in that area just makes the bomb manufacturers richer and makes more recruits to the Taliban.

[cigsandcoffee]

10. Fair enough, but that's a different argument.

Assuming it was a pack of armed Taliban fighters holed up in a cave, who would you volunteer to walk in there with a badge and handcuffs?

[Robbien]

12. No one

If the fight is now so widespread that in order to get a win one has to go into caves, it is time to reconsider what the heck anyone is doing out there. Just send the troops back to the towns and provide pockets of security there until BushCo finally gives the order to leave.

[cigsandcoffee]

13. So you'd leave them be, then?

Letting forces of the Taliban attack and then retreat in to caves unharmed seems a fishy and inefficient way to win a war against them.

[Robbien]

14. Yes

There are not enough feet on the ground to win anything. The time to win was back in 2003. Back then a win was possible.

But we withdrew and started a new front in Iraq. Withdrawal then was the official start of the loss to the Taliban. Everything in Afghanistan/Pakistan since then is just political cover.

[cigsandcoffee]

15. Well, we're looking at it from different angles, then.

If you're coming from the angle of "we've lost already," then you're going to be down and negative on pretty much any action coalition soldiers take in Afghanistan that prolongs the war (including bombing caved-up Taliban).

[CJCRANE]

25. Agreed.

Apparently the Taliban is now gaining ground as a nationalist resistance movement.

[Nihil]

9. So does drawing a knife across the throat of a prisoner ...

... but it doesn't make it right.

Just saying that I hope people remember this next time there is an
unpleasant incident involving US troops or civilians ... it's nothing
personal, just business ...

:shrug:

[cigsandcoffee]

11. You hope people remember that we bombed some enemy soldiers in a cave?

Sorry, but of all the outrages against humanity on all sides of this war, bombing some entrenched soldiers seems way down the list, and pretty much in line with "normal" warfare.

[0rganism]

35. assuming there is no egress from the cave other than the one blocked by the bomb

if the mujaheddin are dumb enough to hole themselves up in a dead-end tunnel, then they've done half the prevention themselves.

Do you think this is likely?

[Marrah_G]

22. The same medical care denied to women by them

Rather make that ANY medical care unless your father or husband was a doctor.

Please fucking spare me, these are assholes who murdered thousands of women, forced pre-teen girls into marriage and took away any rights they had. They cannot have medicaltreatment of any kind. They can't leave thier home without a close male escort and if there are no male relatives alive or available then they can just sit in their homes and die. Work? don't even think about it. Education? Not unless you want to die. To the Taliban women are worth less then a donkey.

[MGD]

16. I've never heard of a war that was humane, have you?

:nopity:

[Marrah_G]

20. The Taliban are all about Humane you know

Ask any Afgani woman. Oh wait... you can't ask her or the Taliban will kill her!

Anyone who wants to feel sorry for these guys needs to do some research on the hell they put Afganistan through, especially the women, and want to put them through all over again.

They are NOT the good guys.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

24. And how about the Northern Alliance?

[Eagle_Eye]

5. 2000 pound bombs are typical Air Force bomb load out

<>

http://www.af.mil/news/airman/0104/bombs.html

[gratuitous]

17. "No damages or injuries to civilians"

Uh huh. Color me skeptical of that claim.

And of course, from 30,000 feet in the air, our faultless, freckle-faced, star-spangled all-American, er, all-coalition troops unerringly identify "Taliban fighters" and not, say, luckless shepherds on whom to drop their 2,000 pound bombs.

Although I am confident that no Afghan or coalition casualties were sustained by the brave men who kill so efficiently by remote control.

[hack89]

32. I sounds like it was directed by troops on the ground

the story does say that the Taliban attack coalition troops and retreated to the cave. And why do you assume it was a US pilot? The Brits, Dutch and Norwegians all have fighter bombers in Afghanistan.

[gratuitous]

34. I corrected myself

And said "all-coalition." I'm just skeptical, and I believe with very good reason, about the initial reports pertaining to anything that goes on in Afghanistan or Iraq out of our military. The examples of Pat Tillman's death, the bombing at Kama Aido, the snafu at Tora Bora, the discrepancies in the reporting of possible war crimes in the imprisonment and transport of detainees in Afghanistan and so forth have all more than earned the distrust of any discerning observer of our military's operations.

[daleo]

21. How do they even know if they got any Taleban?

Do they come back later and dig the bodies out, or just say "we must have got them"?

[Bragi]

27. It's definitional...

If someone is killed by US bombs, then they are by definition a Taliban.

- B

[rcdean]

23. This is good. We should be applauding it.

These people were and are our enemy. They are the core of radical islam in Afghanistan. They are hand and glove with Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda is our sworn enemy and has attacked our nation. Our legitimate mission should be and is to wipe them out.

These Taliban forces attacked coalition forces (yes there is a true coalition there; even France has troops on the ground in Afghanistan) and were observed retreating into a cave.

If you study the geography of Afhanistan you'll see the claim that there were no civilian casualties is no doubt legitimate. The terrain is unbelievably mountainous and remote and--at this time of the year--frigid.

Furthermore, it is reported that it was observed that the mouth of the cave was closed. That means the strike was right on target.

This was a 2,000 pound bunker buster, evidently equipped as a smart bomb. The accuracy is phenomenal.

We must keep in mind that this is Afghanistan--home of Al Qaeda training camps and the ruthless, fanatical Taliban (remember the dismemberments in the soccer stadiums in Kandahar a few years ago). This is not Iraq.

I say all this because it's easy to become jaundiced about all war news coming out of the area. But we liberals must keep our thinking caps on and remember that the Afghan theater is a legitimate effort, one that the Bushies have badly bungled and given the short end of the stick. This is the war we should be fighting.

[Bragi]

26. rcdean wrote...

... we liberals must keep our thinking caps on and remember that the Afghan theater is a legitimate effort, one that the Bushies have badly bungled and given the short end of the stick. This is the war we should be fighting.

It was probably worth fighting in 2001 when Osama and al Qaeda were there in force, but he's no longer there, and nor is al Qaeda there in any significant numbers, since they've moved on to Iraq and other hotspots like Palestine and Lebanon, where the action is.

The remaining Taliban are just your average band of awful, idiotic, tribal religious extremists (like the Saudis, for example) who have been fighting on and off for power there for the last 20 years.

They eventually outlasted and defeated the Soviets, and will do the same with the US and its coalition.

All in all, there is little for the west to gain in this war, nor is there any grave danger associated with exiting from it at this point.

- B

[ama]

28. the bush administration refuse bin laden surrender feb 2001

http://youtube.com/watch?v=HDvVZ2Gn-9g

[rcdean]

31. The war in Afghanistan is strongly supported by nearly all Democrats

We can not and must not pretend that there aren't militant, fundamentalist Islamic groups out there who are out to do damage to the US and much of the rest of the western world.

You don't have to support the ridiculous farce in Iraq or even buy into the "War of Civilizations" right wing garbage to see clearly that we do indeed have to guard against Muslim extremist terrorism.

If we don't pay attention to this threat and do everything we can to destroy it, the voters will make us pay for it.

As to Afghanistan and the Taliban being harmless, that just isn't so.

This area borders seamlessly on the Paki "Tribal Region," the main Al Qaeda refuge. It's the site of the infamous Tora Bora, where Bush admin incompetence allowed a couple thousand Al Qaeda--including Binladen himself--to escape over the Pakistan border because we didn't order our troops to surround their obvious escape route.

The whole point of the coalition effort in Afghanistan is to build a stable government; one which will police its borders and prohibit Al Qaeda enclaves.

It was supposed to involve the investment of billions to build roads, subsidize farmers to replace poppy production, and build other infrastructure projects, but the US has only partially followed through.

Bush and the neocons have so mucked up the Afghan rebuilding and war front--and so heavily diverted resources from it--that the Taliban's rebound is now making headlines. We can't afford to let them regain their strength.

[Bragi]

38. Seriously...

If that pile of White House half-inspired half-truths is your best shot at "putting on our thinking caps" then we are all in serious trouble.

You write:

We can not and must not pretend that there aren't militant, fundamentalist Islamic groups out there who are out to do damage to the US and much of the rest of the western world.

You don't have to support the ridiculous farce in Iraq or even buy into the "War of Civilizations" right wing garbage to see clearly that we do indeed have to guard against Muslim extremist terrorism.

If we don't pay attention to this threat and do everything we can to destroy it, the voters will make us pay for it.

As to Afghanistan and the Taliban being harmless, that just isn't so.

Islamicism which targets the west is a real threat and needs to be countered. However, at no point when in power, or since, has the Afghanistan Taliban had any plan to attack the west. They were and are quite content to create a dreadful Islamic regime within their own borders.

As for whether they will succeed, it isn't up to us to decide this, nor could we decide it if wanted to. All we can do is to put the population into a forced lock-down. The US, like the Soviets before them, even like Alexander the Great, will eventually leave without winning anything in Afghanistan.

You then wrote:

This area borders seamlessly on the Paki "Tribal Region," the main Al Qaeda refuge. It's the site of the infamous Tora Bora, where Bush admin incompetence allowed a couple thousand Al Qaeda--including Binladen himself--to escape over the Pakistan border because we didn't order our troops to surround their obvious escape route.

So what. The porous borders in the wild west of Pakistan were there before the US invaded. Nothing has changed on this. Nothing will change on this. The porous border is just another reason why the west can't win in Afghanistan. There are some quarter of million Afghanis livbing in refugee camps in neighbouring Pakistan. No-one can prevent their movement across the mountain passes and remote terrain in that area. Such is reality.

The whole point of the coalition effort in Afghanistan is to build a stable government; one which will police its borders and prohibit Al Qaeda enclaves.

There hasn't been a stable government in Afghanistan is decades, mostly because of tribal and religious strife, and foreign interference. The current government in Kabul rules nothing beyond the walls of that city. Using our notion of central national governance, the place is ungovernable.

And Al Qaeda doesn't need "enclaves" in Afghanistan or anywhere else. Local cells are propagating just fine in Iraq, throughout the Middle East, in SE Asia, even in Europe. Afghanistan is still something of a cause celebre for young militants because of the US presence there, of course, but the jihidists don't need this particular war to grow. All they need to thrive and to gain public support is a continuation of the militaristic foreign policy of the US -- such as the war in Afghanistan.

It was supposed to involve the investment of billions to build roads, subsidize farmers to replace poppy production, and build other infrastructure projects, but the US has only partially followed through.

Sorry, but this a pathetic utterance. What the US wants is a tranquil and pacified Afghanistan, with an oil pipeline through it, and a large permanent US military presence to protect it. And let's not forget the US ambition to once again prosecute Americ's bizarre and infamous "war on drugs" by destroying the crops of the civilian population, which is a proven way to win hearts and minds.

Bush and the neocons have so mucked up the Afghan rebuilding and war front--and so heavily diverted resources from it--that the Taliban's rebound is now making headlines. We can't afford to let them regain their strength.

Man, you really should read up on this stuff. A good place to start would be picking up a copy of Eric Margolis' "War at the Top of the World". He is one of the few western journalists who actually knows what he's talking about on this subject.

- B

[TheWatcher]

29. Wow. Just Wow.

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

You should run for political office. You're perfect.

[Karenina]

30. Karma is a bitch.

Have YOU enlisted?