Troops prepare for battle near border

WASHINGTON -- The United States is moving parts of more than two battalions of the 101st Airborne Division to the Afghan-Pakistan border, providing the latest and strongest sign that a major battle is brewing in that region, the Washington Post reported Tuesday.

The deployment of what one top officer said ultimately could be more than 1,000 Army infantrymen follows the movement into the area of several hundred British marines who specialize in fighting in cold weather and mountains. The United States also has moved Apache helicopters to a U.S. Special Forces base near the city of Khost, 20 miles from the Pakistan border, in the heart of the turbulent region where U.S. officials believe hundreds of al-Qaida fighters and their Taliban allies are hiding.

U.S. forces and their allies on both sides of the border are acting in part on recent unconfirmed intelligence reports that place Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaida leader, and his top lieutenant in the tribal areas on the Pakistani side of the border not far from Khost. The United States is not certain of the accuracy of the reports that bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri have been seen in the village of Maidan in the Waziristan area of Pakistan, but nonetheless is chasing down the tips, the Post reported, citing a defense official.

Asked about the movement of U.S. forces, Rear Adm. Craig Quigley, a spokesman for the Central Command, disputed the number of troops being deployed -- saying it was fewer than 1,000 -- but declined to discuss specifics.

U.S. military officials Tuesday reported two firefights in the area in which U.S. and Australian special operations troops killed four al-Qaida fighters. Army Maj. Gen. Franklin Hagenbeck, the U.S. ground commander in Afghanistan, said the two fights occurred northeast of Khost, about a mile from the Pakistani border.

In the first incident, Australian forces were attacked on Monday with mortar and rocket-propelled grenades and returned fire, killing two, according to Australian military officials. In the second clash, Hagenbeck said, U.S. and Australian troops ambushed fighters who were moving near Khost before dawn Tuesday, killing another two.

The operation that now appears to be looming promises to be smaller and more diffuse than the offensive against al-Qaida by U.S. and allied forces in the Shah-e-Kot region west of Khost in early March. In that battle, Operation Anaconda, al-Qaida fighters had dug-in positions with some heavy weapons, such as long-range mortars and machine guns configured to shoot down aircraft. Cement had been poured in some areas to provide firing platforms for the mortars. A communications wire ran from an entrenched position atop a 10,000-foot-high ridge to a bunker serving as a command center that was powered by a solar collector with a back-up car battery.

In the border area, by contrast, U.S. intelligence has not detected massed groups of al-Qaida and Taliban members with prepared fighting positions. Instead, they are tracking handfuls of fighters, almost all in groups of 25 or less.

U.S. intelligence analysts think the al-Qaida fighters learned from the Shah-e-Kot offensive that they cannot fight conventional battles against U.S.-led forces. The U.S. military believes that hundreds of al-Qaida fighters died in the Shah-e-Kot battle, mainly from aerial bombardment. Eight U.S. troops were killed.

By contrast, the U.S. plan along the border appears to be to launch a series of fast-moving raids that capitalize on the Army's ability to move troops quickly by air, to fight at night and to call in airstrikes around the clock.

The purpose of the attacks would be to flush al-Qaida fighters from their hiding places in towns, villages and mountain caves. At best, U.S. planners calculate, the raids will force al-Qaida fighters to expose themselves, either by counterattacking or by making them flee. Even if few fighters are caught or killed, military planners say, the continued pressure is aimed at keeping al-Qaida off balance and so impeding its ability to launch new attacks, either in Afghanistan or the United States.

"I think they still do have a command and control structure in place," Hagenbeck said. "All the reports that I get from a variety of intelligence sources tells me that they have the ability to conduct low-level terrorist activities."

To carry out the plan, conventional U.S. forces, such as the 101st Division units, are expected to operate only on the Afghan side of border. They have been given permission to cross into Pakistan if in pursuit of al-Qaida fighters, the Post reported. But that is not expected to be necessary because the United States already has Special Forces troops operating with the Pakistani military in Pakistan.

The political situation in the Khost area is extremely volatile. Over the past week, fighters loyal to local warlord Bacha Khan have engaged in violent battles in Khost and Gardez, just to the west.

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