The Battle of Panjwai

May 27 - I am impressed: this item, Canadian troops capture militants, which was written by Bob Weber and appeared in the Toronto Sun, has some solid reporting and indicates some understanding of the military and how they fight. I'm going to quote more than usual due to the uncertain lifespan of the link:

For nearly two weeks, hundreds of Canadians have been fighting in the mud-walled villages of the Panjwai district west of Kandahar, facing large concentrations of Taliban militants who - unusually - have chosen to fight rather than fade away.

The battle, a hide-seek affair of house-to-house searches and sudden, ferocious ambushes, has cost lives both Afghan and Canadian. Forty Taliban fighters were reported killed and 40 others captured in Panjwai last week in a battle that also took the life of Capt. Nichola Goddard, whose funeral was held in Calgary on Friday.

And still the fighting continues.

"We're not 100 per cent sure why (the Taliban) are fighting so hard for this area," said Capt. Dave Johnston of Second Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry.

"But this is definitely the main event now."

I suspect the Taliban are not fighting so hard for the area so much as fighting Canadians and hoping their ferocity will compell the withdrawal of Canadian troops from the region. They probably rely on the Star for their intel and have misunderestimated the character of Canada outside of Toronto.

On Wednesday and Thursday, the big action came to Banzya ...

A long convoy of light armoured vehicles - or LAV IIIs - and G-Wagon patrol vehicles had pulled into an adjacent field the previous night, its soldiers bedding down on the flat plain of dust and goat droppings.

By 8 a.m., about a dozen soldiers had filed through Banzya's main gate to begin the operation.

The Canadians set up a blocking cordon along one side of the town. Then, working with the Afghan police and army, they formed a line at right angles to the cordon. They started from one end of the cordon, searching homes, poking down alleyways and questioning villagers, moving along methodically like a squeegee cleaning a window.

The Afghans took the lead. They understood the tribal differences that allowed them to recognize someone out of place. They could spot the signs that suggest a man habitually carries an AK-47.

"We've got a lot of technology that they don't," said Johnston. "We've got more firepower, we can see better and we can call in artillery."

"But they've got a spidey sense."

The anti-war folk (and much of the MSM) are generally dismissive of the growing involvement of Afghan (and Iraqi) army units in operations because it defies their multi-cult worldview which respects the inherent dignity of people from places like Afghanistan and Iraq. No, wait, that's a contradiction. Let's try again: the anti-war folk (and much of the MSM) are generally dismissive of the growing involvement of Afghan (and Iraqi) army units in operations because it undercuts their premise that the Afghans and Iraqis liked living under the monstrous Taliban and Saddam regime.

For hours, the work went smoothly. Mid-afternoon, the Canadians and the Afghans broke from the mid-40s C heat under a shady tree. After days of fighting in the area, the place seemed deserted.

But about 3:20, as the Canadians were working through a narrow choke point of road near the vineyards, the Taliban sprung an ambush.

"There was a lot of rounds, a lot of (rocket-propelled grenades)," said Pte. Paul Carey - at least 15 of them. Carey watched one of the rockets bounce across a road like a stone over a pond, hopping over a soldier who had dived into a ditch.

The Canadians returned fire with rifles and their own grenade launchers.

Usually, such attacks last for 15 minutes or so then fade before the Canadians can call in air or artillery support. But this time, using the vineyard as a network of trenches and a nearby building for cover, the Taliban kept up fire for an hour.

One Taliban round rammed through a mud wall and the armour of a G-Wagon, setting its interior alight and badly wounding the platoon's interpreter.

The Canadians often escape an ambush by going around it. Suspecting that's what the Taliban anticipated, they changed tactics.

I'm just pausing here because it's hard to write with a big grin on one's face.

"We decided to power through the attack," said Master Cpl. Chris Alden.

Under cover of the big Canadian howitzers, landing punches from kilometres away as the soldiers cheered, the platoon gradually worked out of the trap the Taliban had tried to close on them.

But as they edged forward, they discovered their enemy had one more surprise in store. The road out was now blocked by an IED - or improvised explosive device, the sort of roadside bomb the Taliban regularly use on Canadian convoys.

"They had stuff set up for us," said Alden.

This time, the soldiers zigged, blowing a hole through a wall to open an egress.

Ka-boom! I love this stuff. It's almost Patton-esque. And, not to dwell, it's a testimony to the Canadian soldier that, despite years of neglect, they can still kick ass -- not because of what they carry in arms or equipment but because of what's inside them: guts and determination.

Meanwhile, air support arrived. A U.S. B1 bomber unloaded a 900-kilogram bomb, flattening a Taliban position with a concussion that could be felt inside LAVs two kilometres away. A U.S. air strike earlier this week in fighting elsewhere, in Azizi, killed at least 16 civilians along with dozens of Taliban fighters. Canadians were not involved in that battle.

Let it go. There are political reasons why Canadian non-involvement in that action needs to be emphasized. But, and this is directed to the American MSM, there seem to also be political reasons why the Geneva Convention is often mentioned when they report on the controversy over the Guantanamo holding facility but they don't condemn the Taliban for using human shields -- a definite violation of that same convention.

The platoon finally arrived back inside the defensive perimeter late that night, their interpreter the only casualty. During the skirmish, they had fired at least 7,000 rounds.

The work resumed the next morning at first light, with another platoon of soldiers filing into Banzya. A smattering of gunfire shortly after 10 a.m. was answered almost immediately with about 20 artillery rounds.

As I prefaced, one rarely read this kind of field reporting up here and I look forward to reading more by Mr. Weber.

One more nod to the Afghan soldiers:

Banzya is only one of a dozen tiny communities in Panjwai and operations in the area are ongoing. Each one will be different, and each will be the same.

"With the Afghan National Army taking the lead," said [Capt. Dave] Johnston [of Second Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry], "Canadians are going into compounds and making sure there are no bad guys around."

I ran a google on Bob Weber; a photo is credited to him in a Washington Post story about the battle last week in Musa Qala, a canada.com report about the death of Capt. Nicola Goddard, and there's an item by him cited in The Agonist about the Nov. 2004 Alberta elections. It seems he's a photojournalist who works for CP and AP.

I don't often note by-lines, but I'm going to be looking for his.

The season finale of Battlestar Galactica is about to begin (we're only concluding Season 2 up here) and I am so hyped. And the view on my monitor still looks brilliant.

May 28 20:35 - I wonder if information gathered from those detained is in any way connected to the successful U.S. air attack on an insurgent training facility near the Pakistan-Afghan border.

Posted by: Debbye at 07:55 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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