American Jets Bomb Taliban Caves

KABUL, Tuesday - The United States followed up air strikes on caves and tunnels used by Taliban leaders with a new raid Tuesday on Kabul amid mounting signs the US is moving towards the deployment of ground troops in Afghanistan. US warplanes dropped at least one bomb on the outskirts of the capital just after midnight, residents said. Taliban anti-aircraft guns made no attempt to intervene. There were also reports of further bombing of Kandahar. The attack was the first on Kabul in over 24 hours. Intense raids on the capital at the weekend left at least 10 civilians dead, fuelling concern over the impact of the bombing and a Taliban accusation that the US was carrying out “genocide” on the Afghan people. The charge was brushed aside by US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who accused the Taliban of using Afghan civilians as human shields and blamed the US foes for “every single casualty” of the war in Afghanistan. The US-led alliance began an air assault on the Taliban on October 7 because of the regime’s refusal to hand over accused terrorist Osama bin Laden. On Monday, the bombing raids concentrated on caves and tunnels in southeastern Afghanistan aimed at destroying Taliban and bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network command centers. “The objective for today includes continuing to focus on emerging targets, the al-Qaeda and Taliban command and control, including caves and tunnels,” US Defence Department spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said in Washington on Monday. A huge network of caves and tunnels in the Afghan mountains provide a primitive but effective shelter for command centers, forces and munitions against US bombs. Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon news conference that three weeks of bombings had cleared the way for what he called “phase two.” Ends