TORA BORA (wnbc) – Anti-Taliban forces launched a major offensive on Monday aimed at forcing al-Qaida fighters from their heavily fortified mountain lair in the Tora Bora region of Afghanistan. Meanwhile, U.S. military officials said they had used the biggest bomb in their conventional arsenal on Sunday in an attempt to kill al-Qaida leaders — possibly including Osama bin Laden himself — believed to be holed up in a cave at Tora Bora.
U.S. warplanes dropped at least three heavy bombs and rocketed al-Qaida positions as the anti-Taliban forces began the long-awaited offensive against the vast network of caverns and tunnels in eastern Afghanistan’s White Mountains.
Commanders of the approximately 2,500 anti-Taliban forces said they had seized a key ridge near the cave complex and were inching their way up a second amid fierce fighting with bin Laden’s warriors. The al-Qaida forces, believed to number at least 1,000, were responding with heavy machine-gun fire and 120 mm mortars — larger weapons than they had used in skirmishes with the anti-Taliban troops.
The anti-Taliban force is made up of three tribal militias and each was moving toward the Tora Bora valley from a different direction, said Hafta Gul, a senior officer in what is known here as the eastern alliance. He said U.S. warplanes had halted their bombing to avoid hitting allied fighters moving into the area.
By nightfall, the eastern alliance forces said they had captured one ridge of the Milawa valley, overlooking the adjacent Tora Bora valley, and made significant gains up a second, Gul said.
A Northern Alliance intelligence official in Kabul claimed even more spectacular success in what has been expected to be a long, difficult fight to oust the al-Qaida forces.
