Pakistan Ground Forces Move In For Offensive
ISLAMABAD — Pakistani ground troops moved into Taliban-controlled areas Friday and engaged in the first gunbattle of a new offensive in the volatile northwest, as an aerial and artillery bombardment pounded other targets.
Officials said Friday's action did not represent the start of a full-scale operation in the tribal belt along the border with Afghanistan, but that most troops were now in place for when the orders came.
The coming operation in South Waziristan, along with one winding down in the Swat Valley further north, could be a turning point in Pakistan's yearslong and sometimes halfhearted fight against militancy.
It could also help the war effort in Afghanistan, because the tribal belt is believed to house key bases of al-Qaida and Taliban militants accused of launching attacks on Western and government forces in Afghanistan.
Washington strongly supports the operations, which are seen as a test of nuclear-armed Pakistan's resolve against an insurgency that has expanded in the past two years.
The Swat offensive has been generally welcomed in Pakistan, but public opinion could quickly turn if the government fails to effectively help more than 2 million people displaced from their homes by the fighting, or if civilian casualties mount.
South Waziristan government official Nematullah Khan said Friday ground troops had started taking up positions around strongholds of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, who is blamed for a series of suicide attacks in Pakistan that have killed more than 100 people since late May.
"Troops have entered Mehsud's areas" for the first time, Khan told The Associated Press.
Nearby, fighter bombers and artillery pounded suspected militant targets, flattening at least three suspected training facilities and killing or wounding several insurgents, two senior intelligence officials said.
The Taliban opened fire on troops elsewhere in the mountainous area, starting a gunbattle that lasted hours, said one of the intelligence officials, without giving any further details. It was the first ground fighting since the military announced this week that the operation was on, but in its early stages.
The troop deployment in many areas of South Waziristan has been completed, and soldiers were moving toward strategic areas where large numbers of Taliban fighters were believed to be entrenched, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to give information to the media.
One of the officials said the military was blocking all roads that the militants could use to flee.
Khan said a full-scale operation was still not under way.
"These are sort of advance" attacks, he said. "These are attempts to soften targets before hitting them hard. But you can say something has begun."
The timing and strategy of the offensive are not clear. Senior commanders have indicated they want to avoid adding to the refugee crisis by launching a fight that could send more people fleeing.
Mahmood Shah, a retired brigadier and former chief of security of the tribal regions, said one army division of up to 20,000 troops was based in South Waziristan and that many more were needed before the operation could be launched. He declined to comment on how many, saying that was up to the army.
The current action "appears to me to be attempts to confuse Baitullah, to disturb him psychologically," Shah said.
Mehsud is believed to have some 5,000 or more fighters who are entrenched in steep mountainous terrain fortified with bunkers and tunnel networks. Thousands more could be expected to join the fight if tribal elders think the military offensive might also challenge their power in the semiautonomous zone, Shah said.
Ikram Sehgal, a defense analyst, said the bombing and shelling currently under way is a common strategy to prepare for a ground offensive, and warned "there will be close-quarter battles in the days to come."
Meanwhile, Defense Minister Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar was cited by Dawn newspaper on Friday as saying refugees could start returning to the Swat Valley on Saturday.
But the military did not announce the lifting of any curfews imposed to keep people away from the fighting, and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani contradicted Mukhtar by saying the government wants people to be able to go home as soon as possible but that "no deadline can be given."
The military says the Swat operation is winding down, and refugees have been returning in dribs and drabs to some southern towns even as sporadic fighting continues further north.
Elsewhere in the northwest, militants ambushed an army patrol in the Bajur agency near the Afghan border, killing an army officer and a soldier and wounding three other troops, said local government official Jamil Khan. The military retaliated with artillery fire at militant hide-outs, killing 11 insurgents, he said.
Khan said militants were suspected in the bombing Friday of three schools in Bajur, where the military declared victory over the extremists in February. No casualties were reported.
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Associated Press writers Munir Ahmad in Islamabad and Habib Khan in Khar contributed to this report.
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ROHAN SULLIVAN and ASIF SHAHZAD | June 19, 2009 01:36 PM EST |
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