I woke up about 1:30am last night (Australian central time) and listened to the radio for a bit to try and get back to sleep. at about 2:00am (10 hours ago now) there was a news bulletin explaining that air strikes had begun, so I got up and watched TV for half an hour or so. A couple of our stations were showing CNN. President Bush was giving his speech, and then they were showing some very grainy night footage from both Jalalabad and Kabul. couldn't see much except some very light AAA firing, and maybe a fire or two on the horizon. the journalists thought that some airfields and radar stations were targeted. This morning the news showed a Pentagon official (dont know who, but he had lots of decorations and stripes etc on his jacket!) describing how 50 GPS guided tomahawk missiles were launched at targets (in 7 cities inc. Kabul, Jalalabad, Herat, Khandahar, plus other undisclosed locations) (from American ships and also from a British submarine), 15 bombers (supposedly all three types were involved - B1's, B2's and B52's), and 25 British and American strike aircraft also hit targets. I suppose the bombers went after command and control type targets, while the fighters were tasked with SAM suppression, but thats just a guess ... following the air strikes, transport planes apparently went in and air dropped food & first aid supplies across the country.
seems like a fairly small, precise, strike really, esp. compared to the Gulf War's 1st night, (and Kosovo) ... i guess thats due to the fairly different nature of this conflict. Mark. Gautam Mukunda wrote: > > Anyone with good info wanting to discuss it? > > Julia > > Sure, but my info. probably isn't any better than yours. I know a little > bit, but no more than anyone else watching the news. They seem to be doing > very well so far. On a personal note, I'm very proud of myself at the > moment, as I've been telling everyone that it would start with a B-2 strike > launched from Whitman, and that's exactly what happened. Perhaps I have a > future in the Air Force after all... > > Gautam
