NATO goes on offensive against Haqqani network

KABUL, Afghanistan – Explosions and gunfire erupted in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan Tuesday as U.S.-led international forces and Afghan soldiers began what seemed likely to become a new, coordinated offensive against insurgents whom American officials blame for a series of recent major terrorist attacks in Kabul.

The joint operation against the Haqqani network follows months of escalating tension between the United States and Pakistan over an increasingly fearsome insurgent group that NATO says has caused the deaths of more than 1,000 Afghan civilians and coalition troops – and whose leadership reportedly enjoys safe haven over the border in Pakistan’s tribal areas.

It was unclear whether any offensive involving NATO troops and hundreds of Afghan army soldiers could seriously weaken the Haqqani group, whose fighters roam a rugged, porous border region where foreign forces have struggled to make gains. But an offensive would send a message that the U.S.-led coalition is prepared to act if Pakistan doesn’t crack down on the network, which NATO accuses of nearly a dozen high-profile attacks in Kabul this year – including the daylong assault on the American Embassy last month.

U.S. officials allege that Pakistan’s powerful army-run spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate, backs the Haqqanis – a charge Pakistan has fiercely denied.

There were no signs of troop movement on the Pakistani side, locals and officials said, suggesting no plans for a complementary offensive in the neighboring North Waziristan region. Pakistan has long resisted U.S. pressure to launch an operation against extremists that use North Waziristan as a safe haven.

A senior Pakistani military official said that Pakistanis hadn’t been briefed in advance about what the U.S.-led forces were up to but were “informed upon inquiring.”

Although few clear details emerged of what the U.S. and its allies were planning, rumor of the gathering forces spread a mixture of panic and bravado in Pakistan. Many North Waziristan residents believed that a surgical U.S. airstrike was imminent, while some said they were prepared to fight U.S. troops if they crossed over.

A senior NATO official dismissed the Pakistani fears, saying that the alliance wasn’t authorized to operate outside Afghanistan and wasn’t trying to threaten Pakistan.

“No, we’re not massing on the border,” said the official.

The pace of military activity in the region has been quickening for the past four days, centered around Musa Khail, a rugged district northwest of the provincial capital of Khost, near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, said Gen. Zahir Azimi, an Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman. He described it as “part of our routine military operations in the area … to pave the way for development and extension of central government rule.”

A resident of Musa Khail, Gulab Khan, who spoke by telephone, said that fighting continued after nightfall Tuesday and that NATO forces had arrested an unknown number of armed men whom he described as civilians. Many Afghan civilians own weapons, and there was no word on whether coalition forces had captured or killed any senior Haqqani figures.