Samizdata

The Daily Telegraph is carrying interesting articles on the expanding role of the SAS in Afghanistan.

ALLIED commanders want the Special Air Service to provide one of the lead assault teams for the attack on Tora Bora, the mountain cave complex where Osama bin Laden is expected to make his final stand. Gen Tommy Franks, the operational commander of US forces involved in the Afghan campaign, made the decision after a series of spectacularly successful operations conducted by British special forces in the past fortnight.

I cannot help wondering if the Brits have not just won the booby prize. Hunting terrorists in a cave complex? That is certainly not my idea of jolly japes.

It is also reported that the Brits will be reinforced by their comrades in the Australian SAS and the New Zealand SAS. Given the somewhat different operational philosophies of the British/Commonwealth SAS and the US SpecOps groups, there is considerable scope for valuable synergies. The sheer range of experience, specialist skills, equipment and capabilities that these groups collectively represent is tremendous. As a result, the range of tactical options available must present Taliban/Al Qaeda with an appalling defensive dilemma on every level.

A lot of utter tosh has been written by the small but loud and malodorous nitwit faction within British BigMedia^(tm) (such as the cretinous Daily Mail), who seem to be suggesting the SAS would win the war single handed. To that end “sources said” the Brits were making sure they did not end up having to work the inept US special forces and thus were operating in completely separate operational areas from the Yanks. Completely ludicrous of course. During the messy prison revolt in Mazar-i-Sharif, who should be filmed operating together, as in literally next to each other, M4 rifles in hand, by the excellent SkyNews team? British SAS and American Delta commandos naturally. And people wonder why I say the Daily Mail is best employed in cat litter trays.

There is also an article about the ‘new’ British L115A .338 calibre sniper rifle being used by the SAS in Afghanistan. They are quite correct that it is a superb weapon: the combination of rugged Arctic optimised construction, outstanding ballistics and sub-MOA accuracy makes it ideal for poaching Al Qaeda members… but with all due respect to the Daily Telegraph, the ‘new’ L115A is just a re-barreled L96A1. It has been on the civilian market in the fearsome .338 Lapua for several years.

It seems that British Special Air Service (SAS) commandos came very close to nailing the biggest hunting trophy in recent history! There is a fascinating article in The Advertiser about how Osama bin Laden came extremely close to getting caught and (probably) killed.

The conflict featured the largest deployment of SAS troops in one battle since the war in Oman in the mid-1970s, the paper said.

“We were within a whisker of getting him. It was a hard battle and will have put the fear of God into his people,” a source close to the regiment was quoted as saying.

“When prisoners were questioned it came out we had just missed him by about two hours,” the source added. Intelligence sources, also contacted by the paper, believed bin Laden fled as the battle began.

“The enemy were facing highly-trained and disciplined troops who, although outnumbered, had the tenacity, professionalism and firepower to terrorise them.

“Bin Laden knows the SAS are not far behind,” one said.

It was during this action that the four British casualties that were recently reported received their injuries. Other accounts have said that the SAS, which usually operates in four man teams, had deployed two entire sabres (the idiosyncratic SAS equivalent of a platoon, or aprox. 60 men per sabre) for the operation.

Let us hope it is only a matter of time before the SAS or their American Delta comrades personally deliver the civilised world’s definitive response for September 11 directly to its author.

Godspeed and good hunting gentlemen.

Instapundit is reporting an interesting Gulf News article about the disillusionment with the fundamentalists in Pakistan

A groundswell of resentment has emerged in Pakistani tribal territories against a fundamentalist leader who took thousands to Afghanistan to fight for the Taliban and left them stranded, residents said yesterday.

Soofi Mohammad, head of Tehrik Nifaz Shariah Mohammadi (TNSM), was arrested and jailed when he returned from Afghanistan after the rout of the Taliban militia, leaving his men behind. Scores of the tribesmen were reportedly killed inside Afghanistan and more than 2,000 were still missing.

Now far be it for me to say ‘I told you so’ but back on November 16th I predicted exactly this coming to pass in the article The depth of the disaster for the Islamists starts to become clear:

So as the Islamic politicians of Pakistan survey how in the matter of eight days the entire situation in Afghanistan has turned upside down, the families and friends of the dead Pakistani boys who listened and then marched to their deaths across the Khyber pass are going to start asking ‘why?’ When people start to figure out the answer, I don’t think the forces of Islamo-fascism are going to like what happens next. It must be slowly dawning on the more secular forces in Pakistan that their Islamist political enemies are starting to look very exposed indeed

This is probably not quite the result Osama had in mind on September 11.

I told you so.