Afghan politicians and coalition forces reported fresh assaults Wednesday from presumed Taliban and al Qaeda fighters in the lawless eastern border area with Pakistan, giving credence to fears of a looming offensive by holdouts loyal to Osama bin Laden.
Afghan and U.S. sources also confirmed new outbreaks of fighting among factions in the North and East, suggesting a steady unraveling of the unified support that ethnic rivals had pledged to the interim government of Prime Minister Hamid Karzai.
\Perhaps the enemies of peace will make the most efforts to disrupt the situation in these last weeks before the 'loya jirga,'"" Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah said of the clashes. The loya jirga, a convention of tribal elders expected to select the next government, begins its deliberations in Kabul on June 10.
""Taliban and al Qaeda are present in Pakistan, there is no doubt,"" he told reporters after meeting with his visiting Japanese counterpart, Yoriko Kawaguchi. But he insisted that authorities in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, are aligned with those in Kabul, the Afghan capital, and the U.S.-led coalition in their determination to thwart destabilization of this country ravaged by a quarter-century of occupation and civil war.
Plans for a U.S.-led offensive along the Afghan-Pakistani border call for the Pakistani military and U.S. Special Forces to sweep through villages and mountain passes in Western Pakistan, flushing out fugitive al Qaeda and Taliban fighters and driving them toward U.S. and allied forces waiting across the border, a senior Pentagon official said Wednesday.
The official said the operation, which was developed jointly by U.S. and Pakistani military planners, is still in its early stages. ""The Pakistanis are preparing to move,' he said.
U.S. and Afghan officials have acknowledged this week that a major military operation was being set in motion against Taliban and al Qaeda fighters believed to be hiding in western Pakistan. Driven from Afghanistan late last year by U.S. and allied forces, large contingents of the two radical Islamic groups are said to have taken refuge in Pakistan's remote tribal areas, though some of their forces remain in Afghanistan as well.
""There really are pockets on both sides of the border that have to be dealt with,"" the official said.
The U.S. Army already has flown Apache attack helicopters to a forward operating base near the eastern Afghan town of Khost and has begun ferrying infantry troops from the 101st Airborne Division into the area to support the British Marines and U.S. Special Forces troops already positioned there. Defense officials said as many as 1,000 U.S. troops ultimately could be involved in the fight.
The concept of the cross-border operation reflects lessons U.S. military strategists believe they learned at two earlier battles in eastern Afghanistan, at Tora Bora in December and at Shahikot in March. The new plan relies little on Afghan militias, whose faltering performance disappointed their U.S. allies in both engagements.
