MiamiHerald

Pakistanis pour in to aid Taliban

Posted: 11:55 p.m. EST Wednesday, Oct. 31

By ANDREW MAYKUTH Knight Ridder Newspapers

NOWABAD, Afghanistan — Fresh Taliban recruits from Pakistan are pouring into Afghanistan to shore up the front lines against a potential attack of opposition forces, refugees who were fleeing Kabul said Wednesday.

Residents who were leaving the bomb-shattered capital for opposition territory said the new Taliban troops began appearing in Kabul last week, wearing new uniforms, armed with AK-47 assault rifles and speaking Pakistani dialects.

Khairullah, a white-bearded trader who traveled to Pakistan five days ago through an illegal border crossing in tribal areas, said "there were many trucks full of Taliban" crossing the frontier.

"If the United States really wants to destroy the Taliban, they should bomb the Pakistan border," said Khairullah, who like many Afghans uses only one name. He was wedged into the back of a jeep that was traveling from front-line positions to Golbahar, a trading center behind the lines of the opposition United Front.

The refugees, thousands of whom have crossed by foot in recent weeks through a mountain gap skirting the front line, also said that mounting civilian casualties in Kabul threaten to anger potential supporters of the U.S. bombing campaign.

"Most of the bombs are hitting civilians," said Khudadada, a fruit and vegetable vendor whose statement prompted nods of agreement and a few angry outbursts from the companions in his vehicle. "The people are getting angry at the United States for dropping the bombs."

Refugees' accounts that Muslim extremists are arriving in Afghanistan in great numbers confirm reports that thousands of students from Pakistani religious schools were flocking to Afghanistan to engage in jihad — holy war — against the United States.

Pakistan, the chief patron of the Taliban and the only nation in the world that recognizes it as the legitimate Afghan government, has promised the United States that it would close its long border with Afghanistan and discourage the Islamic students from joining the war.

But the border, which follows a harsh frontier through tribal areas, is not entirely under the control of Pakistan's government and is easy to penetrate.

"There were no questions asked at the border," Khairullah said.

Supporters of the United Front, which also is known as the Northern Alliance, think that significant numbers of Taliban troops could not be crossing into Afghanistan without the knowledge of Pakistani intelligence agents, many of whom sympathize with the Taliban's puritanical version of Islam.

"We hear on the radio that thousands of people from Pakistan are coming to help the Taliban," said Gulagha, 26. "Why doesn't the United States bomb Pakistan instead of Afghanistan?"

The refugee Kabul residents, who were interviewed along a dusty dirt road, said the population of the capital has been slowly depleted in recent weeks as hope disappeared that the bombing campaign would be brief. Most said they were aware that the United States was targeting military installations, but they were concerned because stray bombs were hitting civilian targets and the Taliban had devised ways to avoid the brunt of the bombings by hiding in residential areas.

Some said the Taliban appeared to be gaining confidence.

"A lot of the Taliban sent their families out of Kabul before the bombing, but now they're bringing them back," said Ato Mohammed, 35, who had been unable to return to his home territory in the ethnic Tajik stronghold of the Panjshir Valley because he could not spare the $40 that was required to pay various taxis to cross the front lines.

Most said the Taliban were losing some authority and respect with the public, though confidence in their imminent downfall was not strong enough that Kabul residents were prepared to rise up against them.

"People aren't that scared of the Taliban anymore," said Gulagha. He said Kabul residents had organized nightly neighborhood watches to prevent Taliban troops from invading and looting houses where the residents had left the city. The patrols don't directly confront the Taliban, he said, but they make enough noise that the Taliban know they are being watched.

"The Taliban is like a watermelon that has softened with time," he said.

Most of the fleeing residents said the bombing in Kabul had failed to accomplish much.

"If the bombs hit places that benefit people, it wouldn't be so bad," said Sultan Mohammed, 43, a former military officer who retired to become a street vendor after the Taliban captured Kabul in 1996. "People are getting angry because the Taliban are getting away and civilians are dying."

Mohammed, who said all the glass in his house was shattered by the bombing campaign, also said he had seen new recruits from Pakistani religious schools.

He said he had read some of the leaflets dropped from American planes that indicated the United States was fighting terrorism, not Islam.

"If the ground troops come, we can tell them where the Taliban are hidden," said Mohammed. "But how can we communicate that information to those airplanes in the sky?"

-- Anonymous, November 01, 2001

Answers

Just dig out your old Viet Nam history books. This is the same story with just minor variations in color and detail. In the end we got kicked out of Viet Nam and in the end we will get kicked out of Afghanistan, same as the Brits and the Russians did. Unless, unless, we decide to use the nuclear option. If we do that we may win, or we may lose even worse, but we will certainly start a new chapter in the history books. What I think many people are ignoring is that even if we start to "crush" the Taliban it will only serve to enrage the militant Muslims all over the Middle East and trigger chaos and revolutions, some of which will surely spill over to us here at home.

-- Anonymous, November 01, 2001

When the US declared war on terrorists, it became the world police.

If the US leaves Afghanistan before achieving the objectives set, it will lose face in front of the world.

Yes, I agree that as we continue with the attacks, we will enrage more moronic idiots with weapons, some of mass destruction. But, the US and its citizenry should have realized that. Anyone who didn't wasn't paying attention.

Remember, after we finish Afghanistan, we will go to the next one on the list. But which one is that? Iraq?

We have the rest of Bush's presidency to fight this war, and if he is not re-elected, the next president may decide to cut our losses and end it. The US voters are a fickle lot, and by the time we are ready for the next election, some may be tired of the war and in essence vote to end it by electing some idiot like Gore. I doubt that Gore will continue the fight but I could be wrong. It has happened before, I think.

-- Anonymous, November 01, 2001

"We have the rest of Bush's presidency to fight this war" Which would be how long? (Still waiting to see if the Tecumseh curse holds...)

At one point I thought the reason Pakistan was appearing to be so cooperative was that we had indicated a willingness to relieve $37 billion in debt, and I believe the sanctions were also lifted. Apparently Pakistan can't see any downside here, if it is arming the Taliban anyway.

-- Anonymous, November 01, 2001

Brooks, there are two Pakistans, at least. One Pakistan is the Muslim version, which supports the Taliban for their tough religious stance. *That* Pakistan has aligned itself with the Taliban side and will continue to do so with ever increasing fervor, in my opinion. The other Pakistan is the one being headed up by General what's-his-name, the guy who is siding with the US right now, letting us use bases there, etc. In this regard it's very much like the Shah of Iran situation we had.

The Shah was our buddy, we supported him, helped keep him in power. But when the chips were down the Muslim clerics threw him out, took over, took us hostage, you remember the story. We are playing with fire in Pakistan, same as we did in Iran. The Muslim fundamentalists will go where the clerics point them, and that means against us. Some people seem to think that we can "put down" a billion Muslims. No way. It has never happened and will never happen. What will likely happen is that our own war of terror will escalate right here at home. As the weeks and months go by now just watch. The "alerts" will keep being broadcast to us and targets will continue to be hit, and hit, and hit.

The *only* way we will ever get out of this and return to some sort of peace and security is if we make some important agreements with the Muslims. And those agreements will require that we leave them alone, and probably that we stop supporting Israel. Will we do that? I seriously doubt it. So we better just get used to a continuous path of upset, waiting for the next attack against us. It is vitally important for us to understand exactly what drives the Muslim behavior, but we don't seem to be doing that. We seem only to keep focused on more and more confrontation, bombing, and chaos.

-- Anonymous, November 02, 2001