Bin Laden heard on radio in Tora Bora area

Associated Press

WASHINGTON — American forces heard Osama bin Laden giving orders over short-range radio in the Tora Bora area of eastern Afghanistan during all-out assaults this past week on the rugged mountains and caves where he is believed hiding, a U.S. official said today.

Afghan fighters aided by U.S. and British soldiers advanced today against al-Qaida holdouts while U.S. airstrikes supported the ground troops, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said during a visit to several former Soviet republics.

Afghan commanders said they believed their troops had bin Laden trapped in one of the area’s many caves, a claim American officials have not confirmed.

The voice on the radio was identified as bin Laden’s through comparisons with his voice from several videotapes, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Americans have several ways to listen in on such radio transmissions, including gear carried by special operations forces and instruments on aircraft and satellites.

U.S. Marines are building a prisoner of war camp at the airport in the southern city of Kandahar to hold as many as 300 detainees, and there were plans to interrogate about 50 al-Qaida fighters who had been captured but were not yet under U.S. control. It was not immediately known if al-Qaida leaders were among the prisoners.

Evidence found in caves and deserted al-Qaida sites — along with information developed elsewhere in the investigation into the Sept. 11 attacks — has led to several arrests in foreign countries of suspected al-Qaida operatives, Rumsfeld said. Officials offered no details.

American officials say bin Laden could have escaped from the Tora Bora area after making the intercepted radio transmissions, though evading detection would be difficult.

The al-Qaida forces are concentrated in two valleys that cross the border into Pakistan to the south. The Afghan forces are moving in from the north, and Pakistani troops are guarding their border. That puts the al-Qaida between "a hammer and an anvil," as the war’s commander, Army Gen. Tommy Franks, put it.

Escaping would mean traveling through a dense forest and over high mountain ridges, probably either on foot or on a horse or donkey. That would expose bin Laden to U.S. or Pakistani surveillance, which is scrutinizing the area around the clock. The surveillance includes instruments that detect body heat — which is much easier to spot when the ground is cold and snowy.

Bodyguards and aides who might accompany bin Laden would make his party easier to spot. Concealing a vehicle would be even harder, while air travel is hazardous over the mountains.

U.S. officials say there is a chance that tunnels in the Tora Bora area could provide an escape route. U.S. forces do not know how many tunnels there are or where their entrances and exits are, defense officials said.