Al-Qaida posted Friday a video showing what it claimed to be an insurgent attack on a military position of U.S. and Afghan forces in southern Afghanistan. The video appears to be an attempt by the terror network to disparage U.S. claims of winning the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan. It argues that the people of Afghanistan support the insurgents and assist their attacks on U.S.-Afghan forces. The tape comes as the United States and Britain deploy more troops to Afghanistan, after the worst year of insurgency-related violence since the Taliban regime was overthrown in 2001. The 24-minute video carries the logo of the al-Qaida media company, as-Sahab, and was posted on an Islamic Web site known for hosting extremist material. It was titled "Holocaust of the Americans in the land of Khorasan, the Islamic emirate: Capture of an American post, Arghandab." Khorasan refers to Afghanistan.
The tape begins with the deputy leader of al-Qaida, Ayman al-Zawahri, ridiculing President Bush's claim to have deprived al-Qaida of a safe haven in Afghanistan as a "barefaced lie." Al-Zawahri, who speaks in Arabic with an English translation in subtitles, seems to be referring to Bush's speech on Jan. 10 when the president said that U.S. forces "took away al-Qaida's safe haven in Afghanistan — and we will not allow them to re-establish it in Iraq."
With a narrator speaking in American-accented English, the tape shows video film of a purported attack on a military position in Arghandab, a district 100 miles northeast of the city of Kandahar. The narrator, who sounds like the American al-Qaida member Adam Gadahn, claims that the position is "liberated" by the insurgents. The film does not show the insurgents capturing the target — a compound of mud-plastered buildings in a valley — during the nighttime battle. It only shows the insurgents walking through the compound in daylight.
| Bari said the NATO and Afghan troops suffered no casualties, but they detained one man after the battle, which ended with the Taliban retreating. |
The video was first obtained by IntelCenter, a U.S. group that tracks extremist messages. IntelCenter said the tape represented a "significant step up" in al-Qaida's video marketing. It was more than twice as long as previous operational videos, and it was distributed in two versions — Arabic with English subtitles and another with an English voiceover. The footage shows what is said to be the mujahedeen reconnoitering the target, then firing. Tracer bullets cross the night sky, fire is returned and there are explosions of what are said to be rocket-propelled grenades. "After a fierce battle, the mujahedeen begin their retreat from the zone of operations," the narrator says in English.
| An empty packet of Lay's potato chips is found. The camera focuses on the name of the Saudi manufacturer, Saudi Snack Food Co. Ltd, as the narrator says: "As is always the case in our tours of liberated bases, we find evidence that the primary financiers of this crusade are the puppet regimes of the Gulf." |
An empty packet of Lay's potato chips is found. The camera focuses on the name of the Saudi manufacturer, Saudi Snack Food Co. Ltd, as the narrator says: "As is always the case in our tours of liberated bases, we find evidence that the primary financiers of this crusade are the puppet regimes of the Gulf."
An Afghan with a white beard and black turban tells the camera that local residents suffered under the foreign "devils."
"No one could leave his house, not even for absolutions [sic] and prayers. We couldn't even light a lamp at night ... The people are very happy about the coming of the Taliban," he says.
The video has an element of theater. It shows a U.S. helicopter flying overhead and a fighter trying to camouflage himself under dried grass. "The reconnaissance operation is not free of danger," the narrator says. But the fighter does not work with any urgency. He talks to the cameraman, who does not take cover himself.
