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They
Are the Perfect Soldiers By Ron Martz They are the perfect soldiers. They never sleep, never complain and never leave their posts. They silently wait for years to attack. But those attacks often are indiscriminate, with civilians, especially children, wounded or killed more often than battlefield combatants. These perfect soldiers are anti-personnel land mines, designed to maim rather than kill, manufactured to be virtually undetectable by sensors and priced so they are readily available to even the most ragtag of armies and militias. They have become the scourge of the modern battlefield. In Afghanistan, the mines and unexploded ordnance that are the detritus of more than two decades of warfare constituted a serious risk to the civilian population before the U.S. bombing campaign began Oct. 7. Now, as the United States narrows the focus of its firepower on the Tora Bora mountain lairs of Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida fighters, what had been a bad problem has grown worse. "We haven't taken just a step back; we've taken a quantum leap back. In many areas, we're going to have to start at ground zero," said Bob Macpherson of Atlanta-based CARE. That was evident Friday as U.S. Marines began clearing the airport at Kandahar of mines, booby traps and unexploded ordnance left by Taliban and al-Qaida fighters. Yusuf Pashtun, a spokesman for Kandahar Gov. Gul Agha, said the airport's reopening was delayed because of the number of mines that have been found. "We have lost three men there because of booby traps; there are even mines in the showers," he said. An Afghan assistant for a French television crew was badly injured last week when he stepped on a mine in the Kandahar area. Before Oct. 7, Afghanistan already was one of the most heavily mined countries in the world, say mine experts. Some believe there may be as many as 10 million land mines scattered around a country the size of Texas. Others put the figure at between 5 million and 7 million mines. Most of those mines were placed by the Soviets during their 1979- 89 occupation. Since a serious de-mining effort began in Afghanistan in 1991 under U.N. guidance, at least 50 different types of mines from 19 countries have been found, said Joe Lokey, deputy director of the Mine Action Information Center at James Madison University in Virginia. Many of the mines were manufactured by China, Pakistan or former Soviet-bloc countries. They range from the Chinese Type 72 mine, a small, round fiberglass explosive sometimes called a "toe- popper" because it is designed to blow off a foot, to the Italian Valmara 69, which pops out of the ground and explodes at waist level. The Valmara 69 and mines of its type are sometimes referred to as a "bouncing Betty." But one of the most prevalent mines in Afghanistan is the PFM-1 "butterfly" mine that actually is an airdropped cluster bomblet. Children think they are toys. Shaped like a butterfly, they are relatively flat and easily covered by dust. But they pack enough explosive punch to blow off a foot or a hand when disturbed. "A lot of these mines are made of fiberglass and will last forever," said CARE's Macpherson, a retired Marine and combat veteran of Vietnam. Gina Coplon-Newfield, coordinator of the U.S. Campaign to Ban Land Mines, said an estimated 88 Afghans, most of them civilians, are killed or maimed each month by land mines. Many of them die either where they detonate the mine or on the way to the hospital because of the lack of emergency care. Despite the factional fighting in Afghanistan since the Soviet pullout and the subsequent tyrannical rule of the Taliban, the Mine Action Program for Afghanistan was considered one of the most progressive in the world, say the experts. Nearly 5,000 Afghans worked for eight nongovernmental organizations under auspices of the United Nations to survey mine fields, clear explosives, assist victims and make Afghans aware of the problem. The United States has contributed more than $23 million to the Mine Action Program for Afghanistan since its inception, according to State Department figures. Nearly $154 million has been contributed overall by various countries. The result has been the clearance of about 300 square miles. From 1990 to 2000, nearly 216,000 anti-personnel mines, 10,000 anti-tank mines and 1.3 million bombs, bullets or artillery shells were found and removed, the International Campaign to Ban Land Mines reported. The United Nations estimates it costs about $1,000 to clear a mine that often costs as little as 50 cents to manufacture. The process is labor-intensive, requiring de-miners to crawl slowly, probing the ground inch by inch. In Afghanistan, dogs have been trained to sniff out explosives, and a breeding program for the animals was initiated. "Afghanistan had one of the most sophisticated mine removal programs in the world. But as of Sept. 11, all of the work was completely halted," said Coplon-Newfield. Two days into the U.S. air campaign, four employees of one of the Afghan de-mining organizations were killed and four others wounded by a bomb that hit their office in Kabul. Non-Afghan workers were pulled back to Pakistan. Fighting between Northern Alliance forces and the Taliban escalated in northeastern Afghanistan after the start of the air campaign, eradicating what gains had been made there and producing an untold amount of unexploded ordnance. Whether either side has used land mines is not known. The Mine Action Information Center's Lokey said, "There is no evidence that the Taliban had used land mines. They consider land mines very anti-Islamic and believe they are an abomination in the eyes of Allah because they harm innocents." But CARE's Macpherson said, "There is no doubt in my mind that the Northern Alliance and Taliban have been throwing down mines all over the place. In desperate situations, people will use desperate measures." It also is not known whether the Marines have used land mines as a defensive measure around their desert air base near Kandahar. Lt. Col. Rivers Johnson, a Pentagon spokesman, said he could not comment about that "as a matter of policy for security reasons." The United States has not signed a 1997 treaty calling for an international ban on land mines, and is believed to have about 11 million mines available. Johnson said a commander can request that he be permitted to use land mines, but if they are used, all would self-destruct in 15 days. The only persistent, or "dumb," mines in the U.S. inventory are used along the Korean demilitarized zone, he said. But some of the unexploded ordnance, especially new models of cluster bomblets, could pose a problem for de-miners, experts say. Dan Kelly, manager of the Mine Action Program for Afghanistan, said in October that a large number of new explosive devices are being used in the war. Lokey said the Pentagon has been working with the Mine Action Program for Afghanistan and providing grid coordinates for where certain munitions are being dropped. The Pentagon is "working with them to assist with detonation techniques, but they won't teach them how to disarm them or render them safe," he said. Some mine survey teams have returned to areas where fighting has stopped, said Lokey, but it is too early to tell just how serious the problem is. But Coplon-Newfield said she fears the worst. "It was just devastating before. It's difficult to imagine how it could get worse, but I am afraid it will," she said. |
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