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Assalamu'alaikum
Day 100: another raid in the bombing war without end
http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,1284,633637,00.html
The Taliban may have vanished but the conflict is far from over for many in Afghanistan
Suzanne Goldenberg in Zhawar
Tuesday January 15, 2002
The Guardian
The rocket screeches low overhead, and the world stands still for a second
before US munitions slam into an Afghan mud hut and the mountains shudder
in a sickening explosion. It is a direct hit on this abandoned training
camp of the Taliban and al-Qaida, a moment of pure terror for the Afghans
of these neighbouring mountain hamlets. In darkness and in light, for 10
long days, US bombers have prowled above the winter clouds, pulverising
the slate and lava rock of Zhawar. The villagers gauge the danger by the
engine noise. When the low whirr rises to a grinding roar, it's time to
take cover.
"All the mountains are shaking," says Khali Gul from Kaskai, a small
hamlet a few hundred metres from the Americans' target. "We are very
afraid of these planes. We just want this to stop."
In the capital, Kabul, delegations come and go. Aid workers draw up charts
for reconstruction; diplomats leave their calling cards with the interim
government. As America's war on terror entered its 100th day yesterday,
the world speculated on its next venue: will it be Somalia or Sudan; Yemen
or Iraq?
Here, in the mountains of Zhawar, there is only war. US warplanes are
destroying, day after day, one of the last redoubts of the Taliban.
Overnight, the bombing was so heavy the windows shook in Khost, a town 22
miles from America's latest theatre of war.
Fifteen people were killed two days ago in Shudiaki village, says Noorz
Ali, rattling down the dried-up river bed in a pick-up truck piled with a
wheelbarrow, a brass basin, and four baby goats - the pitiable sum of his
belongings as he joins the exodus for the safety of the plains.
"The village is completely flattened. My house was destroyed, and my
neighbours were killed," he says. "There were so many bombs I lost count.
The dead remain there in the village. Everybody else has left."
Like all the other villagers, he swears there are no Taliban or al-Qaida
in Zhawar anymore. They bundled into their four-wheel drives and vanished
into the mountains.
It is impossible to verify Mr Ali's story, or other accounts of civilian
casualties as the American bombing of Afghanistan enters its fourth month.
Mr Ali's village lies on a ridge behind the Zhawar camp, and the extensive
network of caves dug into the sides of the gorge below. The bombing is too
intense for any exploration, and the area is too remote, accessible only
by four-wheel drive jolting along through the mountains.
Every vehicle is a target for the American bombers as they hunt down the
stragglers of the Taliban and al-Qaida, and the warplanes begin to circle
over our pick-up truck - the vehicle of choice for Afghanistan's old
rulers. Apart from the growling of the bombers, and the thunder of
rockets, there is silence.
The isolation was crucial to the establishment of the Zhawar caves and
training camps in the early 1980s. Two decades later, it allows the US
bombardment of the base - and the calamity that has befallen the civilian
hamlets clinging to the mountain tops - to go largely unremarked, and
unlamented. For those outside this small corner of the world, the Afghan
war is over.
Afghans say the bombing began 10 days ago when 20 special US forces
descended on the district capital of Khost. They emerge at dusk, night
vision goggles strapped over furled woollen Afghan caps, and assault
rifles smothered in blankets in a vain attempt at disguise to meet the
local tribal chieftain of Khost who is their patron and protector.
By day, they hunker down in a two-storey building the colour of egg yolk.
The locals call it mechanik ; it's the vocational high school. We send up
our business cards. The Americans send down a polite refusal, fat printed
letters written in a careful hand. "Be safe," the note ends.
In the hills around Zhawar, it's a difficult proposition. The men sent
their women and children down to Khost several days ago, but stayed to
guard their herds. At night, they sleep in bunkers above their mud and
chaff houses. By day, they squat beneath the parched acacia trees that
provide what little cover there is on these barren mountains.
"What can we do? Where can we go?" asked Khalil Jan, a shepherd squatting
by the road.
"Everyday, the Americans are dropping bombs. Last night there were six and
this morning there were five. We are very afraid of the bombs, and we are
very angry at the Americans. There is no reason for this. The camps are
empty, but still the Americans are dropping their bombs."
A generation ago the CIA helped anti-Soviet rebels tunnel through the
mountains to create the camp: an impenetrable system of connecting caves
that served as arms depot, training camp, and safe haven.
When that stage of Afghanistan's war ended, Jalaluddin Haqqani, the
powerful local warlord threw his lot in with the Taliban. He has since
vanished but his men may still be in Zhawar deep inside the caves.
There is little left of the camp, and little evidence of the Taliban or
al-Qaida. A machine-gun barrel pokes through the detritus of a destroyed
mud and chaff house in the centre of a drill ground. The ruins of eight
sentry posts dot the surrounding ridge.
The tailfin of an American rocket emerges from the dirt. There are scorch
marks on the dirt track nearby, and there is the lasting rancour of the
Afghan villagers whose war seems never-ending.
"I've been upset and angry for the last 22 years," says Khali Gul. "First
the Russians started bombing. Then came the mojahedin, and now the
Americans. We are a very unlucky people."
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