OT: Al-Qaa'eda Regrouping

[Kefka]

(ABCNews.com)<br /><br />"But al Qaeda and Taliban fighters hiding in the mountainous terrain around Gardez have been putting up a stiff guerrilla resistance, emerging from ridges overlooking coalition positions with machine guns and wide grins between bombings before sprinting back to their positions when the bombings resume. <br /><br />Capt. Kevin Butler said just before missiles would hit, al Qaeda fighters would duck into caves from their positions launching mortars at his troops below.<br /><br />Once the F-15s left, the enemy fighters would emerge only to throw stones, wave and shout taunts at the Americans in a show of defiance.<br /><br />"I've never been so frustrated and angry," said Butler, 30, from Pattenburg, N.J.<br /><br />U.S. intelligence reports say local al Qaeda and Taliban commanders have called a jihad against the coalition forces and there were reports that fighters across the border from neighboring Pakistan were joining the guerrillas. <br /><br />U.S. intelligence reports have also revealed that al Qaeda followers have been using the Internet to regroup in western Pakistan in difficult-to-patrol terrain close to the Afghan border. "<br /><br />Responding to the reports earlier this week, Rumsfeld said he had seen the reports but he was certain the United States would be able to crack down on al Qaeda's use of the Internet, including its sophisticated use of scrambling and concealing technology.

[Kilmer17]

You must be so proud of your "brothers".<br /><br />I say nuke em all.

[Kefka]

hehe, I see it has been moved. <img border="0" title="" alt="[smile]" src="smile.gif" /> <br /><br />Anyhow. <br /><br />Hi Kilmer17,<br /><br />I see you are back to posting your thoughtful remarks of "nuking 'em all". Well actually the US has been "nuking" them with new types of bombs being use the first time. Some weighing up to 2000lbs. How nice. Sadly... with little effect since they are so well fortified inside the caves and mountains. Though if your talking about using a Nuclear Bomb, much like Hiroshima and Nagasaki, be my guest. I suggest you submit your idea to the Pentagon. heh.

[Kilmer17]

Actually I never left, but that's not the point. Speaking of points, what exactly was yours when you posted this story?<br /><br />And the Nuclear option has been available since the beginning of this crusade. Rumsfeld has stated a couple of times that EVERY option was in play. Wouldnt bother me one bit.

[Zen-like Todd]

Not that I'm going to bother an comment on 99% of the drivel you post, Kefka, but a 2000 pound bomb is pretty standard, as bombs go. What you are referring to is the delayed ignition propellant, hardly constitutes a nuke, and you have literally no idea what "effect" they have had, so you can't actually comment on it. Although lack of facts has never stopped you before.

[Zen-like Todd]

BTW, congratulations on allowing your posts to admit your support of radical terrorists groups and their philosophies.<br /><br />I'm sure you haven't marginalized yourself at all.

[Kefka]

Please<br /><br />All I do is post the facts. The above article is from ABCNews... not my fault I struck a nerve w/ Kilmer17. The truth hurts sometimes.<br /> <br /> <small>[ March 07, 2002, 07:08 PM: Message edited by: Kefka ]</small>

[Henry]

The nerve you have struck, Kefka, is that you seem to be pleased with apparent setbacks to the U.S. and her allies' effort against the terrorists in Afganistan. Noone here thinks we've defeated them yet. Noone here thinks there won't be the occasional setback. It's just disturbing when someone actually thinks that's cool. Shrug.

[Art]

Kefka, you do not post facts.<br /><br />You have posted, before relenting, that Muslims weren't responsible for the WTC attacks. What we know about your terrorist brothers who've regrouped here is that they are all nearly dead. We've lost eight Americans and three Afghan soldiers while slaughtering hundreds of your racist, facist brothers, capturing the high ground of the combat and essentially burying these morons under their mountains.<br /><br />ABC News and other news outlets were talking about Afghanistan in Vietnam terms. A forbidding, unwinnable area of conflict. This was before we took a few days to dispatch the existing government and replace it with a new one. The victory in Afghanistan for the Allied forces is among the most remarkable in warfare if you exclude what Israel has done to your Muslim and Arab brothers in war every time they attack it.<br /><br />There'll be pockets of resistance for some time. You can only pray your boys will be smarter next time than to mass in one place so we can kill them so much more easily.

[Riggo-toni]

Good heavens Kefka,<br />You mean our Jewish controlled Zionist led puppet media actually reported a setback against an Islamic stronghold. Peter Jennings must be worried about possible reprisals from the Mossad if this gets out...<br />By the way, did you know Jennings college sweetheart was (drumroll please...)<br />Palestinian Negotiator Hanan Ashawri (No, I am not making that up!)

[The Grey Wackey]

Taliban had the blues, according to Afgan doctor<br /><br />By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN, Times Staff Writer<br /><br />MAZAR-I-SHARIF, Afghanistan -- They strutted around in black turbans, they drove big pickups, they looked tough. But on the inside, the Taliban were actually a bunch of pretty depressed guys. <br /><br />At least that's what their shrink says. <br /><br />"I remember one Taliban commander telling me he hadn't seen a sunny day his whole life," said Dr. Nader Alemi, director of mental health at Mazar-i-Sharif's General Hospital. <br /><br />Another commander, Alemi recalled, wanted to commit suicide but couldn't because of Islamic strictures. "Every time he went to battle--and this was a big general--he hoped someone would shoot him. <br /><br />"I don't think the Taliban needed more guns," the doctor added with a grin. "But more Prozac." <br /><br />When the hard-line Islamic Taliban invaded this northern Afghan city 3½ years ago, Alemi was stuck in the unenviable position of dispensing mental health care to a group of people who, with their appetite for war and medieval punishments, would seem certifiably insane almost anywhere else. <br /><br />His Taliban patients are gone now. But Alemi, who deposits a soft touch and a gigantic "Ho-bas!" (Good!) on each person he meets, is still very, very busy. Every day, there's a line 50 patients long outside his office: children traumatized by bomb blasts, soldiers who were tortured, schizophrenic shopkeepers, sleepless farmers worried about drought, sleepless girls worried about marriage. <br /><br />Post-Taliban life is a little freer, a little brighter, though still unsettled. Alemi's practice offers a glimpse, however random or rushed, of how Afghan society is adjusting. <br /><br />"Doctor, I can't remember any verses from the Koran, and my mullah says I'm crazy," began Mohammed Tahir, a distressed student, during a recent office visit. <br /><br />"You seem as wise as the prophet," Alemi said, patting the young man on the head. "Don't worry so much. You'll remember everything." <br /><br />Despite Alemi's soothing optimism, mental health care here is in a sorry state. For a population of 25 million, Afghanistan has perhaps two dozen psychiatrists. The only psychiatric hospital is a 50-bed facility in the capital, Kabul, and it is shut down half the time. In Mazar, Alemi works from a corner of the hopelessly crowded General Hospital and in a small private clinic above a vegetable shop. <br /><br />Afghanistan has no practicing psychologists, social workers or counselors, said Dr. Azizullah Baig, one of Alemi's few colleagues. Most aid agencies are still in emergency mode, focusing on first aid, child immunizations and nutrition. <br /><br />Modernity vs. Tradition<br /><br />"We feed people first," said Dr. Abdul Wahid Wahidi, a Mazar-based program officer for the World Health Organization. "Then we worry if they are happy." <br /><br />Extended families and mosques provide some support for the mentally ill. But they can also muddy things up. <br /><br />The other day, Alemi's redcarpeted office, with its bare white walls and empty light sockets, became a boxing ring where modernity and tradition duked it out. <br /><br />In one corner was a desk cluttered with price lists for modern psychotropic medications--Zoloft, Paxil, Lithonate, Prozac--or, more specifically, the Iranian-made generic equivalents available here. <br /><br />In another corner lay a 25-year-old woman convinced that her in-laws had cursed her with a supernatural intruder--a jinni. <br /><br />"All of a sudden, life does not interest me," said the woman, named Feriba. "I don't even wash my husband's clothes anymore." <br /><br />Her mother had already taken her to see a mullah. <br /><br />"Should we sacrifice another goat?" Feriba asked. <br /><br />"Ney. Ney," Alemi said. No. No. "Allah has given these pills great power. It's like swallowing a little piece of god." <br /><br />After she shuffled off, he said, "They usually trust the doctor." <br /><br />A Practical Approach<br /><br />Alemi's work is no Freudian analysis. With five to six patients an hour, many of whom have journeyed for days to see him, there's no time to sit alongside a couch and download an entire life story. <br /><br />Often, he dispenses practical health advice. <br /><br />To a farmer with insomnia and high blood pressure: "Eat less fat and nuts." <br /><br />To a nibbled-fingered woman depressed about miscarriages: "Your baby will come, God willing. But you must rest more." <br /><br />During the Taliban days, Alemi, 46, was careful to refer to many ailments as "nervous problems," not as mental or emotional ones. <br /><br />"These guys were warriors," he said. "They couldn't be marked as mad." <br /><br />Because Alemi grew up in the northeastern city of Jalalabad and is the only psychiatrist in northern Afghanistan to speak Pashto, the language of most Talibs, he became their doctor after they captured Mazar in August 1998. <br /><br />Taliban forces used the city of 200,000 as a base for military operations across the north, and Alemi, an ethnic Tajik, estimates he treated at least 1,000 soldiers and commanders of the regime. <br /><br />"Sometimes when they'd cry, I'd cry, and when they'd feel down, I'd feel down," he remembered. "One soldier once told me: 'This is great. Finally I meet a doctor who suffers from the same thing I do.' " <br /><br />Alemi has a simple diagnosis for the Taliban: They were sick of war. Most wanted to go home and see their families, except a few leaders who really were quite ill. <br /><br />One night, a few weeks before Mazar fell last November, Alemi was whisked from his house to see Aktar Osmani, the most powerful Taliban commander in Mazar and a confidant of Mullah Mohammed Omar, the group's spiritual leader. <br /><br />"The commander was hearing voices," Alemi said. "He was schizo." <br /><br />Alemi scribbled out a prescription for haloperidol, an antipsychotic medication that the man would be able to obtain, and left. <br /><br />"I would treat anybody who was sick," Alemi said. "But I was not neutral. These people caused a lot of pain in our society." <br /><br />Nowadays, there are many jokes about the Taliban, which Alemi encourages. <br /><br />Outside his office, a young man nudged through the crowd, saying, "Excuse me, excuse me, I must see Mullah Omar," which means "go to the bathroom." <br /><br />Things in Afghanistan are easing up, and once again Alemi has time to go cake shopping in his rusty Nissan, grow roses on his front lawn and research the next topic for his weekly 15-minute "Health for All" radio show. <br /><br />He has a great reputation. <br /><br />"There is so much empathy in that man's blood," said Rafat Fugaha, a psychiatrist visiting from Jordan. Alemi got his M.D. from the Kabul Faculty of Medicine, completed a three-month fellowship in Poland and learned English from Mr. Chris, a Peace Corps volunteer. It's come in handy because he keeps his notes of psychiatric sessions in English, which protects patient confidentiality since nobody in his office can decipher them. <br /><br />He and his wife, Perween, illegally ran a girls school during the Taliban era. But the Taliban left him alone, because so many of its members were his patients. <br /><br />He makes $30 a month. Short and thick, he suffers from diabetes. Sometimes all the gunmen on the street frighten him. <br /><br />But at the end of a recent workday, with the last bits of sun glinting off his gold-rimmed glasses, Alemi's cheerfulness hadn't slackened. <br /><br />"I would love to see the world and have many nice things," he said. "But Allah put me here in Afghanistan to work. And I am satisfied." <br /><br />Then he caught himself with a laugh: "Or maybe I'm just--how do you say in your language?--rationalizing." <br /><br />I'm just putting this out there <img border="0" alt="[angel]" title="" src="graemlins/angel.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[big Grin]" src="biggrin.gif" />

[PCS]

Kefka, you seemed to have pasted several reports together, apparently not a suprising thing from you. Here is what you may not have seen or left out.<br /><br />March 6, 2002, 5:02 PM EST<br /><br />SIRKANKEL, Afghanistan -- Capt. Kevin Butler couldn't believe his eyes. <br /><br />Just before the U.S. missiles would hit, al-Qaida fighters would duck into caves from their positions launching mortars at Butler's troops below. <br /><br />When the F-15 Strike Eagles were gone, the enemy fighters would emerge -- only to throw stones, wave and shout taunts at the Americans in a show of defiance. <br /><br />"I've never been so frustrated and angry," said Butler, 30, from Pattenburg, N.J. <br /><br />Frustration was coming easy to the U.S. troops of the 101st Airborne Division. They were facing a well-armed and well-entrenched foe. They'd had little sleep and were shivering in subfreezing temperatures that left many of their uniforms tinged with frost. <br /><br />The Americans were preparing to flush out enemy fighters on ridges overlooking their positions, their piece of action on the second day of the biggest joint offensive yet in the Afghan war. <br /><br />The first sounds of incoming artillery and heavy machine-gun fire cut through the air. The mortar bursts came slowly at first, then intensified as al-Qaida and a few Taliban holdouts zeroed in on some 200 soldiers hidden in a deep stone riverbed that had dried up long ago. <br /><br />The U.S. soldiers called headquarters to request airstrikes on the enemy in the caves. But the fighters were resilient. <br /><br />"We were moving our command post to high ground," said Cpl. Jeremy Gaul, 25, from Marietta, Ohio. "When I looked out on the horizon I saw a flash of light and I saw a projectile coming and fall to the earth. It must have exploded no more than 30 yards away." <br /><br />Butler requested another airstrike, watching through a scope. Again the enemy fighters disappeared into caves dug into the granite, snowcapped mountains at 9,000 feet. When the explosions ended, they emerged with wide grins, flailing their arms over their heads. <br /><br />That's when Butler had enough. He sprinted forward, running uphill on the peak -- a task made more difficult by the thin mountain air -- and exposing himself to hostile fire so he could pinpoint his enemy. <br /><br />Getting a read on their location, he raced 45 yards back to relay the coordinates to his radio man behind him. He needed six trips before he could make sure he'd gotten all the data he needed. <br /><br />Now he was ready to put his own plan into action: His forces would launch 60 mm mortars just as the jets roared toward the caves -- a risky proposition because it placed the planes in danger of being struck by friendly fire. <br /><br />The jets roared ahead, and just like before, the enemy ducked into the caves, emerging for a third time to taunt the Americans. <br /><br />But as they came out, the mortars detonated over their heads, spraying the al-Qaida fighters with shrapnel. Four of them died, said U.S. special operations soldiers who scaled the mountains and counted bodies. <br /><br />"It was like a game of mortar pingpong," Butler said. "They might think twice before they try that move again." <br /><br />The al-Qaida fighters could get a few more chances; the Gardez area offensive is expected to continue for a few more days at least. U.S. forces are pursuing al-Qaida and Taliban forces together with Afghan commanders who have sent in thousands of fresh troops for a final push. <br /><br />With pockets of al-Qaida forces dug in, allied forces are trying to clear several enemy caves honeycombed across the rugged terrain of Paktia province. Hundreds of al-Qaida fighters are believed to be in the area. <br /><br />Butler and soldiers in the Alpha company, 187th Infantry Regiment of the division's 3rd Brigade, were still fighting in the lunar-like Paktia landscape late Wednesday. He doesn't even know he's being recommended for a Bronze Star by his unit commanders. <br /><br />"These guys were trying to be clever," Butler said just after the mortar match. "I guess they don't like it when we hit back." <br /><br />Here are 2 different sites for the above story.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-afghan-taunting-americans0306mar06.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines" target="_blank">http://www.newsday.com</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/comment/story/0,11447,663214,00.html" target="_blank">http://www.guardian.co.uk</a><br /> <br /> <small>[ March 15, 2002, 06:58 PM: Message edited by: Blade ]</small>

[The Grey Wackey]

Excellent post park city. Links are usually best bc we get people like kefka who cut/past an article into something else. That entire tone and contact was completely different in the updated version. <img border="0" alt="[Evil]" title="" src="graemlins/evil.gif" /> <img border="0" alt="[Evil]" title="" src="graemlins/evil.gif" /> kefka must be yawning w/o covering his mouth-(Sahih Muslim 41.7131) <img border="0" alt="[Evil]" title="" src="graemlins/evil.gif" /> <img border="0" alt="[Evil]" title="" src="graemlins/evil.gif" />

[Guest <Kefka>]

Yawning w/out covering my mouth eh? I see you can read.

[Brave]

"with little effect since they are so well fortified inside the caves and mountains." - Kefka<br /><br />It's too bad the civilians in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania on Sept. 11 didn't have such good cover or advance warning.<br /><br />"All I do is post the facts. The above article is from ABCNews ..." - Kefka<br /><br />Why is it when a media source doesn't support your view it must be a case of the media lying? But, lo and behold, when you find a snippet you like you are ready to swear to Allah as to it's accuracy. Can't have both ways, you know?

[PCS]

Here is the ABCnews.com article on the above mentioned engagement. It is somewhat different than what kefka put out originally. Look closer to the bottom for the battles' end. <br /><br /><a href="http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/DailyNews/afghan020307_mortar.html" target="_blank">http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/DailyNews/afghan020307_mortar.html</a><br /><br />I did a rather time consuming search on abcnews,com and this is what I came up with.<br /> <br /> <small>[ March 12, 2002, 11:01 PM: Message edited by: Park City Skins ]</small>

[Guest <Kefka>]

I never claimed the media of outright lying. That'd be too obvious w/ all the different sources of news. I do claim that the media in the US is either hiding the facts or twisting information from its actual truth to show the US as the super heroes and the Muslims as the terrorists.

[PCS]

Interesting to note here is that out of all the articles I have posted here, not one targets Muslims as a whole. These articles have identified groups as Al Qeda and Taliban fighters or governments, but no mention of Muslims as terrorist. By specifying these groups, they are in fact, separating the 2.<br /> <br /> <small>[ March 13, 2002, 12:05 AM: Message edited by: Park City Skins ]</small>

[PCS]

Seems to me, and I'm with Brave on this one, that the very same U.S. media you claim hides the truth and twists information is the very same media you have used to start this thread. I've posted the abcnews.com stories on this incident. Doesn't appear to be the same as the one you posted. <img border="0" alt="[question]" title="" src="graemlins/question.gif" />

[Kefka]

Just a snippet of true information leaking out... what do you expect them to do once other news agencies and organizations start reporting similarly. They have to write something, only afterwards to downplay it.<br /> <br /> <small>[ March 14, 2002, 08:55 PM: Message edited by: Kefka ]</small>

[PCS]

Ah. I see. The information that you posted was what was there before the media had a chance to "gloss" it over. Fortunate that you were online at the time to get it before it was edited. Convenient. <br /><br />The problem kefka is that what you posted was just that. Snippets. Parts. Not a whole story. If true as you posted it,(curious, how do you know what you posted was true), then why not the link?

[Kefka]

Just trying to help the reader, have the post right there, instead of having to open a new window. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

[PCS]

Right. It would appear your assistance was of an editorial nature as well. Wouldn't want to confuse the reader with to much information.

[Kefka]

Sorry didn't "edit" anything... just cut and paste.

[PCS]

"Sorry didn't "edit" anything... just cut and paste. "<br /> <br /><br />And that kefka is that. You defended the post that started this thread,( when it was challenged by others), by saying all you do is post facts. You stated the article was from abcnews. You claimed the American Media was either twisting information and hiding facts.<br /><br />Now you admit to cutting and pasting. <br /><br />What you cut and pasted was from several different stories, and different sources. Not just abcnews as you originally claimed. Apparently you cut and pasted several parts of a story in order to make your own fact. Your own truth. Or at least to mislead some on this board as to what the "true facts" were at the time. <br /><br />This in itself makes you guilty of that which you have criticized the U.S. media for. Interesting and thankyou.