Cheney takes refuge in bomb shelter after Afghan blast
Pastor Dale Morgan
Cheney takes refuge in bomb shelter after Afghan blast*
By Caren Bohan
Reuters
Tuesday, February 27, 2007; 3:06 PM
MUSCAT (Reuters) - Vice President Dick Cheney was whisked into a bomb
shelter immediately after a Taliban suicide bomber struck the main
American military base he was visiting in Afghanistan on Tuesday.
Up to 14 people were killed, including one U.S. and one South Korean
soldier, in the Bagram air base attack which rebels said was aimed at
Cheney.
He had been in his room at the base where he had unexpectedly had to
stay the night after bad weather forced postponement of his trip to the
capital, Kabul, about 60 km (40 miles) away.
"At 10 a.m. I heard a loud boom," Cheney said.
Base authorities sounded a red alert and secret service officials told
Cheney there had been a suspected suicide attack.
"They moved me for a relatively brief period of time to one of the bomb
shelters nearby," he said. "As the situation settled down and they got a
better sense in terms of what was going on, then I went back to my room
until it was time to leave."
NATO's death toll in the attack was four, officials said. A Reuters
photographer at the scene saw an additional 10 bodies, putting the total
at 14.
A U.S. government contractor, whose nationality was unknown, was among
those killed and 27 people were wounded, NATO said.
"We wanted to target ... Cheney," Taliban spokesman Mullah Hayat Khan
told Reuters by phone from an undisclosed location.
In Washington, the White House said it was unclear how the suicide
bomber had been able to get close to the base.
"At this point, people are still investigating what happened, so we
don't have a firm answer for you," White House spokesman Tony Snow told
reporters.
Snow called it an "isolated attack" and declined to say whether it was a
sign of Taliban strength.
"We've often said about acts of terror: An individual who wants to
commit an act of violence or kill him or herself -- very difficult to
stop," Snow said.
U.S. President George W. Bush's initial reaction to the attack was
concern about whether Cheney was all right, he said.
Soon after the blast, Cheney -- who officials say was never in danger
from the blast at the sprawling base -- went ahead with talks with
Afghan President Hamid Karzai in the capital.
Asked if he had ever considered changing his plans to go to Kabul,
Cheney said that was "never an option."
SNOWED IN
The meeting had been scheduled for Monday, but was delayed when Cheney
was snowed in at Bagram soon after arriving from Islamabad on a visit
shrouded in secrecy because of security.
"They clearly try to find ways to question the authority of the central
government," Cheney told reporters traveling with him out of Afghanistan
on a military plane to Oman.
"Striking at Bagram with a suicide bomber I suppose is one way to do that."
Cheney left Muscat later on Tuesday for Washington.
A senior administration official briefing journalists during the flight
from Afghanistan said the purpose of Cheney's visit had been to voice
concerns about the threat from al Qaeda and its Taliban allies on the
Afghan and Pakistani borders.
"We have all got an interest obviously in trying to address" those
issues, the official said.
Washington has said al Qaeda and the Taliban were regrouping on Pakistan
and Afghan soil.
The United States has 27,000 soldiers in Afghanistan, where it says
defeating the Taliban is vital for its own security.
Last year was the bloodiest since the U.S.-led forces ousted the
Taliban's Islamist government in 2001 for refusing to surrender Osama
bin Laden in the wake of September 11.
OPIUM FUNDS
Bolstered by money from record opium crops and safe havens in Pakistan,
the Taliban have vowed a spring offensive -- including an increase in
suicide attacks -- as the snows melt in coming weeks.
Suicide attacks, virtually unheard of until 2005 when there were 21,
jumped to 139 last year.
With the expected upsurge in fighting, Britain said on Monday it would
send another 1,400 troops to Afghanistan.
In Pakistan, Cheney had pressed President Pervez Musharraf to do more
about the Taliban and other militants using its territory for shelter
and training.
Citing U.S. officials, ABC News reported CIA deputy director Stephen
Kappes had also shown Musharraf "compelling" CIA evidence of al Qaeda's
resurgence on Pakistani soil.
The CIA evidence was said to include surveillance satellite photos
pinpointing the locations of several new al Qaeda camps in the Pakistani
border province of Waziristan, ABC reported.
(Additional reporting by Saeed Ali Achakzai, Ghiasuddin Barez, Sayed
Salahuddin and Terry Friel)