20-03-2003 20:01									#1
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Didnīt see this covered here, so be it....

From CNN : http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiap...n.us/index.html

quote: 1,000 U.S. troops raid Afghan towns Thursday, March 20, 2003 Posted: 6:45 AM EST (1145 GMT) U.S. troops are trying to flush out al Qaeda and Taliban remnants. KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (CNN) -- About 1,000 U.S. soldiers have launched a full-scale operation in southeast Afghanistan, targeting suspected al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists. As the world watched events unfold in Iraq early Thursday morning, Operation Valiant Strike, begun with an air assault, just east of Kandahar, army officials confirmed on Thursday. Troopers from the 82nd Airborne are handling the two-and-a-half day mission, focusing on three villages along the Pakistani border. The U.S. Department of Defense said soldiers were sent into the area after military intelligence intercepted radio transmissions coming from caves located in the hills surrounding the three border towns. Two teams of soldiers descended on the region within 30 minutes of one another, arriving in Humvees and Apache, Chinook and Blackhawk helicopters. Valiant Strike follows in the wake of the military's last big anti-terror mission in Afghanistan, which was called Operation Anaconda. Anaconda was the largest U.S.-led ground offensive since the 1991 Gulf War, using American and Canadian forces to hunt down terrorists in the Shah-e-kot region in eastern Afghanistan. Hundreds of Taliban and al Qaeda fighters were killed in the three-week offensive. Eleven allied forces, including eight Americans, also died. A U.S. official told CNN that Osama bin Laden was not the target of Valiant Strike but the official said he couldn't comment further.

Interesting timing.

	20-03-2003 20:04									#2
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I don't see any reason why they would have waited for the beginning of the Iraqi war to do this. ANyone has an idea ?

	20-03-2003 20:07									#3
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quote: Originally posted by Spiffor I don't see any reason why they would have waited for the beginning of the Iraqi war to do this. ANyone has an idea ?

The conventional wisdom on US television is that this operation is to disrupt any terrorist reprisals coinciding with the start of the war.

	20-03-2003 20:07									#4
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Iīm not sure. One could think that the US tries to send a political message a la "even if we attack Iraq we donīt forget Afghanistan", but of course it is speculative at this time...

	20-03-2003 20:09									#5
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I think it's just coincidence myself, but one possibility would be to indicate to Al Qaeda that the Iraqi situation will not be a distraction in regard to the anti-terrorist campaign.

	20-03-2003 20:10									#6
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quote: Originally posted by PLATO1003 The conventional wisdom on US television is that this operation is to disrupt any terrorist reprisals coinciding with the start of the war.

I usually view US television with high suspicion, but I think I'll believe it for once. It seems to be a valid reason.

	20-03-2003 20:10									#7
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Operation "Valiant Strike?"

	20-03-2003 20:14									#8
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This war with Iraq begun out of the blue, since they wanted to get Saddam and thought they had a chance. This other operation was probably already in the works before the Iraq strike.

	20-03-2003 20:19									#9
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quote: I don't see any reason why they would have waited for the beginning of the Iraqi war to do this. ANyone has an idea ?

I thought of it more in terms of the Pentagon using the war in Iraq as a distraction to catch them off guard ( No, I don't think that the entire war is a distraction, but in this case they're using it as this, IMO. The war in Iraq is multitasking. )

	20-03-2003 20:23									#10
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quote: Originally posted by GePap This war with Iraq begun out of the blue, since they wanted to get Saddam and thought they had a chance. This other operation was probably already in the works before the Iraq strike.

The operation was probably scheduled to disrupt terrorist operations prior to an attack on Iraq, but it serves the same purpose regardless of timing.

	20-03-2003 20:27									#11
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It also allows the US administration to say they have not forgotten Afghanistan and Al-Q just because the shooting has started in Iraq.

	20-03-2003 21:17									#12
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quote: Originally posted by GePap This war with Iraq begun out of the blue, since they wanted to get Saddam and thought they had a chance. This other operation was probably already in the works before the Iraq strike.

Yes, but they knew when the ultimatum would run out, so it was not totally surprising....

Of course nothing to make a big conspiracy theory about, but still interesting.