No US airstrikes while Taliban seized Kabul

NOT USED IN THE IMES : The Pentagon decided against bombing the Taliban as they took the first steps towards overrunning Kabul, even though they arrived in the capital in American armoured Humvees captured on the battlefield. In recent US strikes much of the targeting was against Taliban-seized American military equipment. Officials from the White House and the Pentagon had indicated in June that the imminent fall of Kabul to the insurgents would likely be the trigger for US intervention. The Pentagon began drawing up plans for bombing operations to prevent the Taliban seizing control of the capital. However, the speed of the Taliban advance and the growing sense in the Pentagon that Kabul could not be saved appear to have been the primary factors behind the absence of US firepower over Kabul in the days before the insurgents took control. “No strikes have been conducted in the last 24 hours,” Major-General Hank Taylor, the Pentagon’s director of current operations on the joint staff, said. Yet US Central Command had launched airstrikes, using B-52s, AC-130 Spectre gunships and Reaper armed drones, to attack the Taliban and destroy captured Humvees and artillery at other cities including Herat, Kandahar and Lashkar Gah. The lack of any American bombing presence to save Kabul is proof that the Pentagon was forced to accept that last-minute targeting of the Taliban was not going to make any difference and might lead to civilian deaths. General Taylor insisted that the US commander on the ground in Afghanistan – now Rear Admiral Peter Vasely – continued to maintain the airstrike capability “if required to do so”. However, the new reality in Afghanistan means that any form of US bombing intervention from now on will be strictly limited to targeting al-Qaeda or other terrorist groups posing a potential threat to the US. One consequence of that new reality is that the Taliban will be able to keep the mass of American equipment they seized over the years or more recently had been handed over to them by surrendering Afghan army units. As for the future and potential airstrikes against any sign of a resurgent al-Qaeda presence in Afghanistan, the Pentagon says the US military has “robust” over-the-horizon capabilities in the Gulf – principally in Qatar and United Arab Emirates – and carrier-borne strike assets. “There is not a scrap of the earth we can’t hit, “ John Kirby, Pentagon press secretary, said. However, he admitted: “Is it more difficult to do counter-terrorism strikes over the horizon? You bet.”