Rumsfeld: U.S. Special Forces were in Kabul when anti-Taliban troops took over
By Lisa Burgess,
Washington bureau
ARLINGTON, Va. — U.S. Special Forces were in Kabul on Tuesday,
observing the apparent rout of Taliban forces after a series of advances over the weekend
that left the opposition in control of half of Afghanistan, said Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld.
Speaking to Pentagon reporters, Rumsfeld and Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard Myers, confirmed for the first time that anti-Taliban forces
advanced from Mazar-e Sharif in the north on Friday to the capital city of Kabul on
Tuesday morning.
Advances by the Northern Alliance and other anti-Taliban forces
“have clearly altered the situation,” Myers said. “Last Friday, [those
forces occupied] 15 percent of Afghanistan; today, half the country” is under their
control.
Now the United States will focus on creating a logistical base inside
Afghanistan, Rumsfeld said.
“In the short term, we will be focusing … on opening a land
bridge to Uzbekistan and repairing some airfields [near Mazar-e Sharif] to bring in
humanitarian supplies,” Rumsfeld said.
The task will require troops to repair the shattered airfield near
the city and soldiers to protect those workers, Rumsfeld said, but he declined to say
whether those troops would be drawn from U.S. forces.
About 1,000 soldiers from the 10th Mountain Division are currently
stationed in Uzbekistan near the city of Termez.
Meanwhile, Gen. Tommy Franks, head of U.S. Central Command and
principal architect of the campaign in Afghanistan, is currently mulling over offers from
allies such as Italy and Germany to provide troops to the U.S.-led coalition against the
Taliban and terrorist network al-Qaida, Rumsfeld said.
Over the weekend, Pentagon officials were noticeably reluctant to
admit that Afghan opposition forces had won any territory. But on Tuesday, Myers not only
said that Mazar-e Sharif had fallen, but also Kabul itself.
“The Taliban appears to have abandoned Kabul,” Myers said.
As Northern Alliance soldiers entered Kabul, they brought with them
“a very small number of U.S. Special Forces,” Rumsfeld said. “Not
sufficient to monitor or police” the city, but enough U.S. troops to advise alliance
commanders and to report back to the Pentagon on ground actions.
The speed at which the anti-Taliban forces moved, beginning with
Mazar-e Sharif on Friday, spreading southward to Taloqan and westward to Herat and into
Kabul early Tuesday, came as a surprise to many Washington observers, many of whom spent
the previous week complaining of little visible progress in the campaign.
Rumsfeld declined to say whether he, too, was surprised by the
Northern Alliance’s prowess or to speculate why the Taliban so easily abandoned
positions it has held on to for two or more years.
“I’m not a psychiatrist,” Rumsfeld said.
“There’s no way I can climb into [the Taliban’s] heads.”
Myers said he thought the Taliban’s apparent retreat toward its
southern stronghold in Kandahar “was a combination of things — defection,
withdrawal, trying to blend into the landscape … it appears to be less than organized
…. I think [the Taliban are] frustrated” by the U.S. destruction of many of its
command-and-control and logistical assets.
U.S. bombers are in hot pursuit of retreating Taliban and al-Qaida
forces, a target Rumsfeld called “perfectly legitimate and attractive.”
But many of those troops have stolen vehicles owned by
nongovernmental organizations and are fleeing with civilian refugees, making it difficult
for pilots to differentiate between friend and foe on the ground, Myers said — and
therefore pilots are holding fire.
As the Taliban retreated from Kabul, it took along a group of eight
Western aid workers, including two U.S. citizens, who were detained before the air
campaign. The Taliban has accused the charity workers of trying to convert Afghans to
Christianity that is punishable by death under the Taliban’s version of sharia
— or Muslim law.
Rumsfeld said he is concerned about the aid workers, but he declined
to say what, if anything, the United States plans to do to help them.
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