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October
7, 2001
Tariq
Ali
Who Said History
Stopped Being Ironical?
October
6, 2001
Vijay
Prashad
US
War Aims
Kevin
Gray
The
Trap:
Blacks and 9/11
October
5, 2001
Ronnie
Gilbert
Déjà
Vu: The FBI's War
on Civil Liberties
Patrick
Cockburn
Taliban
Cluster Bombs
Dave
Marsh
John
Brown, Woody Guthrie
and the Secret Music of 9/11
Babak
Nahid
A
Suspect's Perspective
October
4, 2001
David
Vest
Send
in the Cons
Robin
Blackburn
Road
to Armageddon
Noam
Chomsky
Chatting
with Chomsky
Tony
Blair
The
Dossier on bin Laden
Norman
Madarasz
Canada
Kow-Tows to US
Lorenzo Ervin
No Palestinian
Ever
Called Me Nigger
October
3, 2001
Peter Bell
Hitchens
and Coulter:
Love at Last?
Patrick
Cockburn
Waiting
Is the Hardest Part
Jeff
Chang
Clear
Channel Fires
Davey D!
John Chuckman
War
on Terror:
Crusade Without a Definition
Mahajan/Jensen
Tough
Talk Won't Solve
Problems of Terrorism
Ariel
Dorfman:
America
the Wounded
Lennie
Brenner
Dr.
Watson in Afghanistan
Steve
Perry:
Ashcroft's
Scare Tactics
October
2, 2001
Patrick
Cockburn:
Inside
an Afghan Hospital
Richard
Manning:
A
Vietnam Vet on Patriotism
St. Clair/Cockburn:
Tarnished
Star,
Tom Ridge in Vietnam
October
1, 2001
Noam
Chomsky:
Memo
to Hitchens
Hizam
Bitar:
Refuting
Michael Kinsley
David Grenier:
The
Good, The Bad,
and the Ugly
Douglas
Valentine:
Homeland
Insecurity
Resources:
100s of Links
About 9/11
CounterPunch:
Complete
Coverage of 9/11 and Its Aftermath
Five
Days That
Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By
Alexander Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
Photos by Allan Sekula
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Published Oct. 3, 2001
8-Page Special
Issue
Aftermath
Diary
Ashcroft's Onslaught
on
Civil Liberties
Ridge Long Groomed
for
Cheney's Job
Those CIA Killing
Bids
Never Stopped
The Not-So-Great
Mayor Giuliani
Crop Duster
Ban
Will Save Lives
Madeleine Albright's
Deadly Legacy
How the Bin
Laden Women
Fled Bel Air
Tom Ridge's
Vietnam
Same as Kerrey's?
A CounterPunch
Journey
to Ramallah
A Word About
God
Nostrodamus
Jam-maker
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CounterPunch
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How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James
Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas
Valentine
Al
Gore:
A User's Manual
by Cockburn
and St. Clair
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New Stories:
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October 7,
2001
Inside
Afghanistan
The Northern Alliance Builds an
Airport
By Patrick Cockburn
in
the Panjshir Valley
The Independent
Deep inside Afghan territory, the anti-Taliban
Northern Alliance is secretly building an airbase at breakneck
speed, which the US-led coalition will then use to funnel massive
amounts of military supplies to the one force that is already
taking the war to Osama bin Laden's protectors.
The new airfield is expected
to transform the military balance between the Taliban and its
last surviving internal military foe, which has been reduced
to holding only 5 per cent of Afghan territory. About 600 workers
and engineers have already levelled the stony ground to build
a runway on the plain below the mountains outside Golbahar, a
small town about 50 miles north of Kabul.
It will allow the 10,000 troops
fighting on the front lines against the Kabul government to receive
military supplies directly from Russia, Iran and the US. The
airport is capable of taking some of the massive air transport
planes such as the Galaxy, C-130 or Tupolevs which can carry
tanks, artillery and tons of guns and munitions.
Western military strategists
hope that once the Northern Alliance has been re-equipped, it
will cut off Taliban troops in the north, acting in concert with
US air strikes launched from the US aircraft carrier the USS
Kitty Hawk in the Indian Ocean.
Moves to bolster the Northern
Alliance dovetail with the US military build-up north of Afghanistan
in Uzbekistan, where the first US-marked aircraft arrived yesterday,
a day after President Islam Karimov granted permission for American
warplanes and troops to use Uzbek air bases for military operations.
The plane was spotted flying overhead near the airbase at Khanabad,
180 miles south-west of the capital, Tashkent.
The Pentagon has not commented
on its troop movements in Central Asia owing to the need to maintain
security against Mr bin Laden's supporters.
The US Army has dispatched
1,000 infantry soldiers skilled at search-and-rescue, humanitarian
missions and helicopter assaults to Uzbekistan. Part of the main
north-south road in Afghanistan is already held by Northern Alliance
troops, which means the Taliban must use poor minor roads to
supply its troops in the north. Until now, anti-Taliban forces
have been forced to rely on elderly Russian helicopters to deliver
arms and ammunition to their men quickly. Heavy equipment is
moved by trucks along some of the worst roads in the world.
The Northern Alliance formerly
held an old Soviet military airport at Bagram, several miles
from Golbahar, but a Taliban offensive has captured the southern
end of the airport. Although the 2.5-mile-long runway is intact,
the airport buildings have been burned.
As soon as the runway at the
airfield at Golbahar is surfaced, the first planes will fly in.
This will be crucial in the next few weeks when the winter snows
close the high passes in the Hindu Kush mountains, making it
impossible to reach the Panjshir valley by road. The valley,
protected by soaring peaks on either side, is the opposition's
military stronghold. But because so much of the Northern Alliance's
territory is mountainous it has few landing places for fixed
wing aircraft.
The Taliban have enjoyed the
strategic advantage of operating over short supply lines. Once
the Golbahar airfield is operating and weapons and ammunition
can be brought rapidly to the Northern Alliance frontline, the
playing field will be more level.
With a support base concentrated
among minority Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara (Shia Muslim) tribes,
the Northern Alliance has a relatively narrow political base,
which appeared to rule it out replacing the Taliban government.
Britain has said it does not
want to see the Northern Alliance take power in Kabul because
it does not command support among the majority Pashtun population.
Instead, Britain and allied western European powers would prefer
the exiled King Zahir to decide the future direction of the country.
To pre-empt this, the Northern
Alliance is planning to convene a 120-member Council in Afghanistan
in the next few weeks to broaden its appeal. Half the members
will be chosen by the Northern Alliance and half by the former
king, who lives in exile in Rome. CP
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