Taliban using guerrilla tactics against US, UK

NEW YORK - US troops may face a tough time wresting Afghan provinces from Taliban control as many villagers have accepted groups rules, The New York Times reported from Lashkar Gah in Afghanistan on Friday.
The mood of the Afghan people has tipped into a popular revolt in some parts of southern Afghanistan, presenting incoming American forces with an even harder job than expected in reversing military losses to the Taliban and winning over the population, The Times correspondent Carlotta Gall wrote.
Villagers in some districts have taken up arms against foreign troops to protect their homes or in anger after losing relatives in airstrikes, the newspaper said, citing several community representatives. Others have been moved to join the insurgents out of poverty or simply because the Talibans influence is so pervasive here.
On Thursday, 4,000 US Marines began a major offensive to try to take back several southern provinces from the Taliban. However, the Taliban is so pervasive in Kandahar and Helmand provinces that gaining control in some districts may heighten tension, local leaders told the newspaper.
We Muslims dont like them (US-led Nato forces) - they are the source of danger, Haji Taj Muhammad, a local villager, told the Times.
He said his house in Marja, a town west of Lashkar Gah that has been an opium trading post and Taliban base, was bombed two months ago.
Now there are more people siding with the Taliban than with the government, said Abdul Qadir Noorzai, director of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission in southern Afghanistan.
Also, community leaders said villagers havent experienced the presence of the Afghan government or foreign troops except through violence, and the Taliban are a known entity.
People are hostages of the Taliban, but they look at the coalition also as the enemy, because they have not seen anything good from them in seven or eight years, said Haji Abdul Ahad Helmandwal, a district council leader in Helmand Province.
AFP adds: Taliban said it had not started directly fighting against Britain and US troops but was using guerrilla tactics in new operation.
The new assault in Helmand is called Khanjar, which means dagger in Dari and Pashtu but is translated by the Marines as Strike of the Sword.
The Taliban had planted mines in various roads to meet the troops and that some vehicles had been blown up, causing several casualties, Taliban spokesman Yosuf Ahmadi said.
So far we did not start any fight with them face to face but we are conducting our own guerrilla clashes, especially in Nawa and Garmsir, he said, adding the operations would fail like the ones they had before.
An official claimed that Taliban shot and damaged two unarmed marked medical helicopters charged with evacuating US Marines from the battlefield in Afghanistan.
The choppers, marked with a red cross, were deployed Thursday to fetch US soldiers suffering from heat stroke in the southern province of Helmand and came under Taliban gunfire as they approached, Col Mike Killion said.
Two red cross-marked medivac helicopters yesterday (Thursday) afternoon flew from Camp Dwyer to pick up heat victims. Both helicopters were shot at as they came in to land, the Marine officer said.
One chopper was hit in the tail and the other was forced into a bad landing and sustained damage as it hit an embankment, he said.