WASHINGTON (Islamweb & News Agencies) - The United States will soon put more elite troops on the ground in Afghanistan, sharply increasing bomb targeting and other support for anti-Taliban forces, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Thursday. (Read photo caption below) But bad weather and Taliban ground fire had beaten back recent attempts to insert more forces, said Rumsfeld, adding the military would press ahead with the plan.
``We have a number of teams cocked and ready to go,'' he said. They would join fewer than 100 U.S. special forces in northern Afghanistan.
``We are going to be adding people to have a reasonable cluster of American special forces who are able to be in there, serve as liaison, assist with the communication, assist with the targeting,'' Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news briefing.
``I would like to see, as soon as humanly possible, the numbers of teams go up by three or four times.''
Rumsfeld told reporters there had been no U.S. casualties from ground fire against what other U.S. officials told Reuters were attempts to insert troops using helicopters.
``Ground fire was simply too heavy to unload the folks and so they went back and they'll try it again in a different landing area,'' the secretary said. Weather was also a problem.
Rumsfeld and Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, denied press reports that Washington had shifted its strategy of waiting for closer cooperation among anti-Taliban factions and was now openly and strongly supporting the Northern Alliance.
PHOTO CAPTION:
U.S. Marines aboard the assault ship USS Peleliu sailing in the Arabian Sea off Pakistan board a CH-53E Sea Stallion helicopter en route to an undisclosed location November 1, 2001. The United States is planning to put more troops on the ground in Afghanistan to help forces opposing the Taliban and target U.S. air attacks Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon briefing November 1. (Earnie Grafton/Pool via Reuters)