After weeks of promising retribution for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, America hit back yesterday – pounding Afghanistan with bombs and missiles in the first strike of a military operation against Osama bin Laden and his Taliban protectors.
Thunderous explosions rocked as many as 100 key targets – and the night sky crackled with anti-aircraft fire as the United States and Britain launched a land-and-sea assault at 9 p.m. (12:30 p.m. New York time).
“The battle is now joined on many fronts,” President Bush said in a live address to the nation from the White House Treaty Room less than an hour after the first wave.
Bush sought to prepare Americans for a “sustained, comprehensive and relentless” operation against the Taliban militia, which has repeatedly refused to surrender bin Laden.
As the FBI put the nation on its highest level of alert and the State Department issued a warning to Americans abroad, Bush said security precautions are being taken to ward off expected revenge attacks from bin Laden’s al Qaeda network.
Even before bombs fell on airports, command centers and terror training camps in three waves, the Taliban and bin Laden joined the war of words.
Dressed in fatigues and sitting at a cave, the No. 1 suspect in the Sept. 11 attacks branded Americans “sinners” and praised the hijackings that killed thousands at the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
America was “hit by God in one of its softest spots,” bin Laden said in a video shot before the strikes and aired on the Arabic station Al-Jazeera.
“Its greatest buildings were destroyed. Thank God for that.”
Taliban leaders – who called the U.S. onslaught “a terrorist attack” – crowed that bin Laden had not been killed.
But Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the Saudi exile was not a target of yesterday’s action – which was aimed at Taliban military infrastructure.
The only Taliban report of casualties said two died and four were hurt in Kandahar, home to many Taliban leaders.
But an Afghan press agency based in Pakistan said it knew of 20 deaths, adding the toll could rise. It said 10 people were killed near the Kabul airport and another 10 died when a bomb fell near a radio station.
“I was wounded in Karte Nau [east of Kabul],” said a Taliban fighter, who said four of his friends died.
Afghanistan’s ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, said, “Civilians died. It was a very huge attack.”
The strike involved 15 land-based bombers and 25 carrier-based warplanes – including B-1s, B-2 Stealth aircraft, B-52s and Navy F-18 and F-14 fighters.
Dozens of 500-pound gravity bombs were dropped, and ships and submarines launched at least 50 Tomahawk cruise missiles from the Arabian Sea.
Forty countries were indirectly involved in the assault, including Pakistan, which allowed its airspace to be used by the U.S. and British planes.
During the first round of strikes, huge blasts shook the capital of Kabul, Kandahar and the eastern city of Jalalabad, where al Qaeda trains its terror squads.
Early reports of damage included the home of Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar, although the Taliban said he was still alive. Taliban headquarters in Kandahar, the Defense Ministry in Kabul and several airports were also hit.
But claiming the bombs caused insignificant damage, the Taliban insisted it had downed an aircraft in the southern province of Farah. U.S. officials said there was no indication of any American casualties, but it was unclear if a drone aircraft had been lost.
Electricity in Kabul was cut off for two hours, and there was a mass exodus from Kandahar.
“People are trying to run away,” one resident said. “They are very scared.”
Bush said the military strikes would be accompanied by humanitarian aid, and C-17 cargo planes began dropping medical supplies and food, including 37,500 rations, in civilian areas.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair said the military would do “all we humanly can to avoid civilian casualties,” but emphasized that the Taliban had left the United States and its allies no choice but to retaliate.
“It is now almost a month since the atrocity occurred. It is more than two weeks since an ultimatum was delivered to the Taliban to yield up the terrorists or face the consequences,” Blair said.
Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, today urged warlords aligned with the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance not to take advantage of the strikes.
Musharraf said yesterday’s strikes were aimed at “terrorists, terrorism, their sanctuaries and their supporters,” and vowed to suppress anti-U.S. protests in his own country.