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Wed. Jan 02, 2002

The Last Mile

The Last Mile – I’m sure you’ve heard the Marines recently went on a field trip to see how the other half lives (in this case, Mullah Omar). ”Maj. Chris Hughes of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit said the compound ’had been occupied and deserted and reoccupied during the past several weeks.’ Helicopter gunships and Harrier fighter jets accompanied the 20-vehicle Marine column on the two-day operation, which moved only under cover of darkness from the expanding U.S. base at the Kandahar airport. ’We went with the forces necessary in case this place was inhabited and the inhabitants were fully armed,’ Hughes said. The site turned out to be deserted and the local villagers friendly.”

This recent flurry of deliberate military moves based on info about Omar’s whereabouts has brought Tora Bora back to my mind. Granted, we do not know everything about what went on in that battle, nor what exactly they’ve found since. The only thing of which we can be certain is that the media was not allowed access to tell ”The Whole Story” (even Geraldo), and that our government will tell us only what they think we need to know. I’m fine with all that, but I’m left with lingering questions.

The biggest one? When early reports of this new Mullah Sighting came in, the Pentagon made it clear they would send in a thousand Marines to block Omar’s escape from Helmand province, if that’s what they needed to do. The recent Marine mission was supposedly for recon, but it demonstrates that willingness to utilize a largish force to quickly follow up on intelligence. So, when we supposedly had similar intelligence about bin Laden, down to alleged radio transmissions, where was this blocking force in Tora Bora? While we pounded them from the air, and Special Forces worked with the Eastern Alliance to drive south into the crags and valleys, where was the blocking force behind them? Yes, we surely had surveillance on much of the border with Pakistan, certainly airborne and possibly small units on foot. And we relied on the Pakistani army inside their border. We should have known that would not be enough.

As I understand it, there are about a thousand troops from the 10th Mountain Division cooling their heels in Uzbekistan, and since they are trained in high altititude cold weather fighting, it would seem they would have been perfectly suited to being dropped just inside the Afghanistan/Pakistan border as that blocking force. Everybody involved now admits hundreds of Al Qaeda fighters made it across that porous border, and it seems clear the supposed negotiations for surrender were merely to buy time for the rear guard action we saw as the main fight. Yes, those that remained fought to the death, likely so that others could escape. We’ll never know how many, or exactly who, but this in some ways reminds me of the Persian Gulf War, in which we went all the way around the world to fight, but didn’t go the last mile to finish the job completely. That Last Mile nags at us a decade later.

I’m also concerned by our apparent lackadaisical approach to collecting evidence and intelligence from both the cities and the caves. In both cases, journalists are getting caches of information they’ve bought from various ”vendors,” who’ve managed to buy loot from someone who’s been in the caves. The Wall Street Journal bought two Al Qaeda computers in a Kabul street market. Much of this stuff seems to be going to the highest bidder, and U.S. intelligence isn’t even at the auction. Meanwhile, after the initial dithering over sending some Marines into Tora Bora to aid in the spelunking, the Pentagon now gives the impression the task is being undertaken with all the urgency of a latrine inspection.

I just don’t get it. And finally, remember all those elaborate graphics the media spent countless hours on, illustrating the depth and complexity of these electricity-fed ventilated caves? So what happened with those? Did we find any? Did we give them the Bunker Buster Everlasting Seal of Approval? Are there some still intact, with Al Qaeda members settling in behind the alleged steel doors for a long winter of Scrabble and Monopoly? Or did they not exist at all in the first place? All we’ve seen appear to be the cave equivalent of the ghettos of Bedrock. Fred and Wilma Flintstone wouldn’t even drive by one of those barren slum caves, nevermind live in one [Update: ”Caves searched in the Tora Bora area in recent days by other special forces teams haven’t been elaborate, the U.S. commanders said. Americans saw nothing of the elaborate cave network bin Laden was reputed to have there, or of any tunnels created to connect caves, Mulholland said. Often, he added, caves had been looted by the time the U.S. teams went inside.”]

I know, Tora Bora has been a black hole of information from Day One, and remains a subject with vast unknowns. But c’mon, Rummy, throw us a bone, man. Without further contrary evidence, the conclusions don’t look very pretty.