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CNN Live At Daybreak

Changing Mood of Northern Alliance; In-Depth look at FA-18 Strikes

Aired October 22, 2001 - 07:20   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: And we are now into week three of the war. U.S. warplanes continue to strike Afghanistan.

CNN's Matthew Chance is in the north of the country. He reports on the changing mood of anti-Taliban Northern Alliance forces.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Opposition forces waiting at the front lines north of Kabul. There's been mounting frustration here. U.S. led air strikes have left Taliban positions defending the capital intact. A long expected offensive has been held up, hopes dashed of a quick advance. But the mood and the situation is changing fast.

Pointing at the war planes as they screech overhead, opposition fighters watch an unprecedented assault from the skies. Taliban anti- aircraft gunners open fire as two coalition jets make a total of four passes south of the old Soviet Bagram Air Base, unleashing powerful bombs each time. There have been isolated U.S. attacks on Taliban troops around here in the past. This was a series of pinpoint strikes on their front lines. The opposition ranks were delighted.

"The air strikes are targeting our enemy at last,'' this Mujahadeen (ph) fighter says. "Now, the morale of the Taliban must be low."

From the ruined control tower overlooking the front lines, senior Northern Alliance commanders have gathered in time to watch the strikes. All along, Afghan opposition leaders say they've been coordinating military action with the U.S. More close air support now could degrade Taliban positions enough for the Northern Alliance to advance.

(on camera): Commanders here on the front lines say their forces are at full strength and waiting for the order to push on the capital. Still, there's no sign about when the order will come for them to move on their ultimate military prize.

(voice-over): Still, the prospects for an early advance may now have increased, but much may depend on what U.S.-led military action the coming days will bring.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHANCE: Well, Paula, those U.S.-led strikes continuing overnight, with U.S.-led coalition war planes continuing to strike what Northern Alliance commanders say were front line Taliban positions. Too early to tell yet, though, whether this is a sea change in Washington's strategy in this air campaign or whether it was just an attempt to appease the Northern Alliance forces here.

We're watching the situation, though, very closely -- Paula, back to you.

ZAHN: Matthew, there is much discussion here that part of the reason for the Northern Alliance not advancing to the south, because the United States wants to make sure that there is a group that can assume the power of the Taliban if the Taliban is wiped out. Does the Northern Alliance expect to be a part of that group that might ultimately lead Afghanistan?

CHANCE: Well, yes, certainly that's a big consideration of the international community, to make sure that post-Taliban there is some kind of ethnically broad-based government that can be put in place to stop this country slipping back into the kind of ethnic infighting that has really ravaged the country since the end of the Soviet invasion in 19 -- occupation in 1989.

Now, one of the initiatives on the table is, of course, to bring back the deposed but aging king, Zahir Shah, from exile in Rome to head some kind of interim administration ahead of elections. There have been a flurry of diplomatic meetings in Rome between him and, for instance, Javier Solana, the foreign policy chief of the European Union, as well as representatives of the State Department.

He's also scheduled to meet the U.N.'s special envoy to Afghanistan later on today, Lakhdar Brahimi. But there's no clear agreement that's been put on the table as yet that is acceptable to all the diverse ethnic groups and political parties here in Afghanistan. It's still the one, though, that everybody's pinning their hopes on -- Paula.

ZAHN: Matthew Chance, thanks so much for that report.

As you might remember, we learned late last week that U.S. special operations forces were conducting missions in Afghanistan.

Let's get more on the capabilities of these units from Miles O'Brien, who stands by at the CNN Center in Atlanta -- good morning, Miles.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula.

Let's talk about special operations and also, before we get too far down that road, let's also talk about those strikes that Matthew Chance was just talking about.

Joining me to help us understand a little bit more about the significance of those FA-18 strikes, broad daylight strikes very near the front lines is Major General Don Sheppard, Retire, U.S. Air Force. Good to have you with us, as always, General Sheppard.

MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPARD (RET.), U.S. AIR FORCE, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Good morning, Miles.

O'BRIEN: First of all, let's roll the video of those strikes one more time. There's some things that are worth pointing out here.

First of all, broad daylight, what does that tell you?

SHEPPARD: Broad daylight tells me that they're not worried about the radar-guided SAMs. They can stay at high altitude out of the AAA and the shoulder fired SAMs and make multiple passes.

O'BRIEN: All right. Will air strikes alone, though, be enough in this case? You've got some other issues here. There's a heavily fortified front line here that will probably require some other type of action in order for the Northern Alliance to seize Kabul.

SHEPPARD: Right, here's the things to think about. We're hitting the front line troops of the Taliban now, which encourages the Northern Alliance and other opposition groups. The problem is when you take territory, you stretch out your own supply lines. You have to defend that territory. And also this territory north of Kabul is one of the most heavily fortified. You've got tunnels. You've got mine fields. You've got trenches. It's almost like WWI what they have to go across.

O'BRIEN: All right, let's take a look at the capabilities of the aircraft that were involved in this. The FA-18 Hornet, it's a carrier based aircraft. This is one of those aircraft that can do both. It's a fighter and an attack aircraft, right?

SHEPPARD: Indeed, it is. It can do air to air and also air to ground, which we just saw, and basically it can drop a whole series of weapons all the way from the laser guided to the satellite guided weapons and others, as well. A very versatile and good airplane.

O'BRIEN: Like the after burners when you're going about 1,100 miles an hour. That is not bad at all.

Now, let's take a look at some animation we put together. We should give you the caveat, we don't know that this is anything that occurred in these latest attacks, but this is a sense of how you might use people on the ground, forces on the ground surreptitiously getting information, intelligence, to call in an air strike.

SHEPPARD: Right.

O'BRIEN: Walk us through this.

SHEPPARD: This is the concept of close air support that goes way, way back to WWII, even before that, actually. Basically, you can put people on the ground. They can site moving targets, emerging targets. They can pass the coordinates. They can designate targets from the ground. You don't have to do this from the ground. You've also got other assets, airborne, that can do this. But the whole idea is to get the eyes of the attacking aircraft and the ordinance at cursor over the target that you are after and basically that's what these folks do.

O'BRIEN: All right, what we're trying to depict here is a radio signal to somebody and then perhaps a laser designation which would lead to perhaps a strike by, in this case, an FA-18. That laser beam illuminating the target, allowing the precision guided weapon to go in on target. We don't know that that's what happened in this case.

SHEPPARD: No.

O'BRIEN: But nevertheless, this is going to be the type of things you will see as these precision guided weapons are used.

SHEPPARD: Yes, the key to all of this is, it doesn't matter whether it was a person on the ground or not, all the way from outer space to undersea, we've got the capability in any kind of weather, day and night, to hit targets that emerge or fixed targets. No matter who you are or where you are, if you move, if you spend money, if you talk, you can be found. There's no sanctuary anymore, Miles.

O'BRIEN: Bottom line, it seems like over this weekend we saw some significant shifts in the strategy and the way the tactics are being employed.

SHEPPARD: Yes, it appears we're hitting the front line troops, which encourages the Northern Alliance and other opposition groups. It also appears that we are moving toward a political solution in Kabul, a political solution made up of the various ethnic groups there that will take over the country as opposed to having the Taliban rule the country. That's what we've moving toward, Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right, and we want to talk a little bit about the timetable, but we're going to do that in our next segment. So we'll see you at the next hour. We'll take a walk on the map room and talk about why things may have some deadlines. For example, there might be some weather considerations. Also, the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and how that might impact on the strategy -- we'll send it back to Paula in New York.

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