U.S. bombing runs increase

BAGRAM, Afghanistan -- U.S. jets dive-bombed Taliban positions on the front line north of the Afghan capital on Thursday, eluding at least one missile and sending thick columns of black smoke climbing into a cloudless sky. Warplanes later pounded Kabul in the strongest attack on the city in days.

The warplanes repeatedly struck targets near Kabul's airport, the center, and to the north and west. The assault lasted past midnight and involved at least 10 waves of warplanes. Gunners for the ruling Taliban responded with heavy salvos of anti-aircraft fire.

Bombing to the north of the capital was for control of the strategic Bagram airport -- held by the opposition northern alliance but of no use because of Taliban fighters in the hills around it.

Driving the Taliban away from positions around the airport would enable the alliance to fly in troops, ammunition and supplies for an attack on Kabul, about 30 miles away.

Opening supply routes

U.S. jets were also in action Thursday in the skies near Taliban-held Mazar-e-Sharif, striking Taliban positions to the south and east of the strategic city, whose capture by the northern alliance would open up crucial supply routes to Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

Opposition officials in Uzbekistan said a Taliban commander, Mullah Yusuf, and 10 other Taliban fighters were killed in the bombing near Mazar-e-Sharif. The opposition also claimed its troops captured the village of Shurchi on the southern outskirts of Mazar-e-Sharif and took 180 Taliban prisoners. The reports could not be independently confirmed.

In other developments:

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said the U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan was hurting the Taliban as well as No. 1 terror suspect Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida terrorist network, but that efforts to get bin Laden himself were proving difficult. "It's like finding a needle in a haystack, Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news conference.

Marine Corps commandant Gen. James Jones said the Marines' top special operations unit is ready to deploy to Afghanistan on six hours' notice. He spoke aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt in the Arabian Sea.

U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft warned suspected terrorists that authorities will use every law and immigration violation to put them behind bars and to intercept their communications, even unopened electronic and voice mail.

The British Broadcasting Corp. said Britain would commit a marine commando group of about 1,000 to be moved to navy aircraft carriers ready to launch assaults on Taliban-held territory. The BBC report, which named no sources, said it understood the troops would be on the ground "for rather longer" than the "very short, in-and-out raids" of the Americans. The government has not yet announced new military commitments. Prime Minister Tony Blair's office said Thursday that an announcement would likely be made in the next few days.

Heaviest bombing yet

Attacks Wednesday and Thursday marked the heaviest U.S. bombing yet in the front line area north of Kabul. Even so, opposition officials urged Washington to step up the strikes.

"If America wants to finish off terrorism and the Taliban in Afghanistan, they must bring in ground troops," said Ezatullah, leader of a small group of opposition fighters north of Kabul. "This should be quick," said Ezatullah, who like many Afghans uses one name.

Elsewhere, the Taliban said a U.S. bomb struck a bus early Thursday in the southern city of Kandahar, killing at least 10 civilians in a fiery explosion. The report also could not be independently confirmed.

Diplomats, regional leaders and Afghans worked Thursday to find a formula for governing this war-ravaged country after the Taliban falls.

Nearly 1,000 Afghans -- many of them from influential southern tribes -- approved a resolution in Peshawar, Pakistan, calling on the country's former king, Mohammad Zaher Shah, to help form a multiethnic government.

They also demanded that "those foreigners who add more to our miseries" leave the country -- a reference to bin Laden and his al-Qaida group.

The attacks Thursday north of Kabul were most intense along the Shomali Plain, where Taliban fighters and northern alliance forces face one another from rooftops barely 50 yards apart.

"I was standing here. I could feel the vibration," said Farid Mohammed, a 20-year-old northern alliance fighter.