December 6, 2001
Bin Laden Hunted in Caves; Errant U.S. Bomb Kills 3 G.I.'s
By JAMES DAO and ERIC SCHMITT
ASHINGTON, Dec. 5 — Opposition forces closed in on the last Taliban and Al Qaeda stronghold in the eastern mountains of Afghanistan today, while intensified combat in the south led to the deaths of three American soldiers in an accidental bombing.
The bombing, which also killed five Afghan soldiers and injured 18 Afghan fighters and 20 Americans, occurred when American Special Operations forces in the area called for an airstrike against Taliban units about five miles north of Kandahar, Pentagon officials said.
The Americans were advising troops led by Hamid Karzai, who has been appointed to lead Afghanistan's new interim government. Mr. Karzai was slightly hurt in the explosion of the single 2,000-pound bomb that hit their position after being released from a high-altitude B-52 bomber.
The cause of the errant bombing remained under investigation tonight. Military officials said it was possible that the spotters on the ground provided the wrong coordinates for the intended target, that the bombardier aboard the B-52 erred in aiming the weapon, or that there was a malfunction in the bomb's guidance system or other equipment.
Speaking after a meeting with Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik of Norway, President Bush said: "I want the families to know that they died for a noble and just cause; that the fight against terror is noble and it's just; and they defend freedom. And for that, we're grateful."
The military identified the dead soldiers as Master Sgt. Jefferson Donald Davis, 39, of Tennessee; Sgt. First Class Daniel Henry Petithory, 32, of Massachusetts; Staff Sgt. Brian Cody Prosser, 28, of California. The soldiers' hometowns were not disclosed; all three served in the Third Battalion, Fifth Special Forces Group, Fort Campbell, Ky.
American warplanes continued to attack concentrations of Taliban forces near Kandahar and the cave- pocked mountains along the Pakistan border south and west of Jalalabad, including a heavily fortified encampment known as Tora Bora. Anti-Taliban leaders say Osama bin Laden was spotted at Tora Bora last week.
Senior Pentagon officials said that they had seen intelligence reports showing that senior Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders had been wounded or killed in recent American airstrikes against those caves and tunnels. But the officials said they could not confirm reports from anti-Taliban commanders that the casualties included Ayman al-Zawahiri, one of Mr. bin Laden's top lieutenants.
"I've seen reports, single source reports, about Al Qaeda who may have killed," Rear Adm. John D. Stufflebeem, the deputy director for planning and operations for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon today. "We have not been able to confirm any of that."
The casualties were the first three American military deaths during combat in the eight-week-old war in Afghanistan. Late last month, a Central Intelligence Agency operative died during a prison uprising near Mazar-i-Sharif. In addition, four Americans have died in truck, ship or helicopter accidents, while a soldier from the 10th Mountain Division died from a noncombat-related gunshot wound in Uzbekistan, possibly a suicide.
This was the second so-called "friendly fire" incident involving American bombs. Last week, five Special Forces soldiers were injured when a bomb dropped by a Marine Corps F/A-18 landed too close to their position during the prison uprising in Mazar-i-Sharif. None of the injuries were life threatening.
Admiral Stufflebeem said that the rebel forces who were familiar with the rugged terrain had begun searching cave and tunnel complexes near Tora Bora in the east. A small number of American commandos, possibly fewer than two dozen, are advising those opposition groups, but have not participated in cave-to-cave hunts, Pentagon officials said.
As fighting in the eastern mountains intensified, anti-Taliban forces closed in on Kandahar, the Taliban's last major military bastion. From their base about 80 miles southwest of the city, heavily armed marines continued to fan out around the outskirts of the city in helicopters and armored vehicles, setting up roadblocks to stop Taliban forces from escaping or receiving supplies.
Maj. James R. Parrington, the executive officer of the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit's battalion landing team, said today that the marines had not yet encountered any Taliban forces. Although he emphasized that the American forces were playing a supporting role in the push on Kandahar, he said the marines were still closely coordinating their operations with rebel groups.
"The opposition groups are closing in on Kandahar," he said. "We're working in support of those groups."
The dead and wounded from today's accidental bombing were evacuated from the battlefield by military search-and-rescue helicopters to the base where 1,400 marines and other American military forces are now stationed. Mr. Karzai was not seriously enough hurt to need evacuation, a Pentagon official said.
According to the United States Central Command, the injured Afghans were flown to two Navy ships, the Bataan and the Peleliu, in the North Arabian Sea. Seventeen injured Americans were flown to a hospital in Oman to see specialists . Their injuries included lost hearing, shrapnel wounds, eye and head cuts, and burns.
The other three soldiers were treated for minor injuries at the marine base and were expected to return to duty soon. The bodies of the dead soldiers were being prepared for their return to the United States at the marine base.
The accident took place while two Special Operations teams were meeting with Mr. Karzai, Pentagon officials said. They were standing about 100 yards from where the bomb exploded. The accident occurred when the ground spotters called for what is known as close-air support, which in the past has involved low-flying attack planes bombing targets near their own forces.
But since the Kosovo campaign in 1999, the Pentagon has modified high-altitude bombers, including B- 52's, to perform this same mission with much less risk to the pilots.
The weapon dropped today was a GBU-31 Joint Direct Attack Munition, better known as J.D.A.M. The 2,000-pound conventional bomb is transformed into a precision weapon by attaching a guidance system to its tail. A constellation of orbiting satellites steer the bomb to its target.
More than 4,000 J.D.A.M.'s have been dropped from Air Force and Navy warplanes during the war, and only a handful have missed their mark, mainly because of human error, military officials said.
Admiral Stufflebeem, a former Navy fighter pilot, said there was no reason to doubt the effectiveness of the precision-guided weapon, but added, "these are human-made, human-designed systems, and therefore, they're going to have flaws that are going to either be built in or that are going to occur."