AIR DROPS - May use military backup

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Saturday October 6 1:45 AM ET

Air Drops May Use Military Backup

By JOHN J. LUMPKIN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - Air drops of food to hungry Afghans, beginning as early as this weekend, could require major military protection and even lead to the first known shots being fired at U.S. forces in the campaign against terrorism.

The flights could also serve a secondary, intelligence-gathering purpose, picking up tips on Osama bin Laden's whereabouts.

Air Force C-130 Hercules cargo planes would be the best bet to drop in supplies of food, said John Pike, a military specialist with GlobalSecurity.org, an Alexandria, Va., think tank.

These rugged, if slow, propeller-driven planes can be expertly piloted through Afghanistan's mountains regions, flying low enough to drop supplies - but also low enough to expose them to anti-aircraft fire.

While the Taliban regime is not believed to have an especially capable air defense system - certainly nothing like those American forces withstood in Yugoslavia or Iraq - the ruling militia does have anti-aircraft guns and probably some U.S.-supplied Stinger surface-to-air missiles that can hit low-flying aircraft.

The Taliban's air force consists of about 15 old Soviet-era jet fighters that have seen action exclusively in a bombing role in recent years, so it's unclear if they are capable of attacking other aircraft.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said this week that any food supply drops would be done only with the assurance that the Taliban's air defenses would not pose a threat to U.S. aircraft.

Because of the threat, the food drops are expected to be supported by a full package of military aircraft for protection.

A Pentagon spokesman, Rear Adm. Craig Quigley, said the food planes would likely have fighter escorts. They could bomb any anti-aircraft sites that attack the relief flights.

About 30,000 American troops are in the Persian Gulf region, with some 350 planes and two aircraft carrier battle groups and two more carriers on the way.

AWACS radar planes would likely be used to direct the air traffic over Afghanistan, and move fighters quickly to any targets.

Search-and-rescue teams also would stand by, flying by helicopter into a crash site should a U.S. plane go down - and to fight off any adversaries trying to capture or kill the aircrew.

Partly for that purpose, the Army dispatched 1,000 infantry soldiers skilled at search-and-rescue, humanitarian missions and helicopter assaults into Uzbekistan, which borders Afghanistan.

The Army's 10th Mountain Division, based at Fort Drum, N.Y., has experience in Kosovo, Somalia and Haiti.

To get the lay of the land from above, surveillance aircraft like the RC-135 Rivet Joint could tap communications, listening for movement of Taliban forces, or - if lucky - bin Laden and his supporters.

While it would be up to U.S. intelligence to locate good places to drop food, the flights would also provide a chance for firsthand observation of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan, Pike said.

The food would come in the form of ``humanitarian daily rations,'' plastic pouches of food with added vitamins and minerals to invigorate refugees weakened by hunger and travel. The air drops will be focused on areas inside Afghanistan, not refugee camps in Pakistan and other bordering countries, Quigley said.

The food, wrapped so that one packet has enough for one person for one day, is rice-based and does not contain any animal products to avoid violating any religious or cultural practices, such as those of Muslims, who do not eat pork.

The yellow plastic packets have a picture of a smiling person eating from a pouch, a stencil of an American flag and the greeting in English, ``This food is a gift from the United States of America.'' The United States has a stockpile of about 2 million of the pouches, Quigley said.

The United States would try to prevent the Taliban from taking the food supplies, he said. The regime is sheltering bin Laden, the Saudi exile whose al-Qaida terror network is accused of carrying out the Sept. 11 attacks at the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon.

-- Anonymous, October 06, 2001

Answers

Sounds good. Why not a greeting in Farsi, tho.

-- Anonymous, October 06, 2001

I thought Farsi was the Iranian language. They speak it in Afghanistan too?

-- Anonymous, October 06, 2001

OG, the answer is yes. I was in Afghanistan in 1973, for A.I.D.,and the computer project I was working on had to among other things print out fertilizer receipts in Farsi. (Needless to say, I had nothing to do with that part of the project).

-- Anonymous, October 06, 2001

Hmm, I didn't realize there was that much of a connection. Interesting.

-- Anonymous, October 06, 2001

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