Militants in Afghanistan have suffered massive casualties in the past two weeks while battling against U.S. and Afghan government troops. In some of the bloodiest fighting since the collapse of the Taliban regime in late 2001, U.S.-led coalition forces recently have engaged several large groups of militants who have tried to hold on to strategic ground. U.S. troops have been able to call in air strikes by American and British warplanes against the concentrated Taliban forces with devastating results. Since last week, about 100 suspected Taliban fighters have been killed in battles across southern and eastern Afghanistan that have followed the pattern. Deaths among antiterrorism coalition forces have included nine Afghan government soldiers, two U.S. Marines, and one Afghan police officer.Paul Beaver is a London-based independent defense analyst who thinks the insurgents' new tactics reflect significant changes on the ground this spring. "There's no doubt at all that the militants in Afghanistan -- mainly the Taliban but also, of course, elements of Al-Qaeda -- are now working in a much more organized way. They have had time to form up. They are trying to hold ground. Particularly in the southeast of the country on the borders of Pakistan," Beaver says. Beaver says he thinks the Taliban and Al-Qaeda have been forced to use more conventional military tactics because of a well-tuned U.S. strategy that has been developed against their classic Afghan guerilla-warfare techniques. "I don't think [the Taliban] are desperate. I think that they are actually having to adjust their tactics to the tactics of NATO and the western allies. For the first time in Afghanistan, I do detect that the West is on the front foot. Not only in the north of the country around Mazar-i-Sharif do we see pacification of the countryside. We see very large amounts of support for the Western way of doing things. There is a lot of issues out there still to be resolved. But there is an increase of military activity. And I think the Taliban is really on the back foot -- at the moment," Beaver says.