What amazing luck! Within 24 hours of attack on InterContinental Hotel, ISAF locates a prime suspect!

Alternative to luck theory:

Hi, I'm just calling to say how much I've enjoyed working with you. Thank you. Yes, I'm cleaning out my desk now. No; no plans at this time to write another memoir. By the way, about that InterCon business; would you mind asking General Pasha if he could maybe check around and get a firm lead on who coordinated the attack and where to find him? Uh huh. Uh huh. Of course he has every right to be angry about all the negative publicity about the ISI but you know Langley is still pretty ticked off about Khost. Look, tell him it's not as if we're asking for Haqqani or Omar; just someone high enough on the food chain to make Centcom happy.

ISAF airstrike kills senior Haqqani Network commander involved in Kabul hotel attack
By Bill Roggio
The Long War Journal
June 30, 2011

Coalition special operations forces killed a senior Taliban commander who was involved in a suicide assault on a hotel in Kabul just two days ago.

Ismail Jan, the Haqqani Network commander, was killed yesterday in "a precision airstrike" in the Gardez district in the eastern province of Paktia. The special operations forces targeted Jan "after receiving several intelligence reports from Afghan government officials, Afghan citizens, and disenfranchised insurgents," the International Security Assistance Force stated in a press release that announced Jan's death.

ISAF described Jan as a deputy of Haji Mali Khan, "the senior Haqqani commander inside Afghanistan." He also commanded fighters in the Khost-Gardez Pass, a strategic area that links the provinces of Khost and Paktia. Khan "moved into Afghanistan from Pakistan in late 2010," ISAF stated. "During this time he led approximately 25 to 35 fighters in conducting attacks against Afghan and Coalition security forces."

Jan provided "material support" for the June 28 suicide assault on the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul that killed 12 people. The heavily armed suicide assault team penetrated security at the hotel and went room to room in an attempt to kill foreigners. ISAF helicopter teams were called in to kill members of the team who were sniping from the rooftop.

ISAF said that the Intercontinental attack was carried out "in conjunction with Taliban operatives," confirming a report by The Long War Journal that the attack was indeed carried out by the Kabul Attack Network.

The Kabul Attack Network is made up of fighters from the Taliban, the Haqqani Network, and Hizb-i-Islami Gulbuddin, and cooperates with terror groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba and al Qaeda. It pools the resources of these groups to conduct attacks in and around the Afghan capital. Top Afghan intelligence officials have linked the Kabul Attack Network to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence [ISI] directorate as well.

The network's tentacles extend outward from Kabul into the surrounding provinces of Logar, Wardak, Nangarhar, Kapisa, Ghazni, and Zabul, a US intelligence official told the Long War Journal.

The Kabul Attack Network is led by Dawood (or Daud) and Taj Mir Jawad, military and intelligence officials told The Long War Journal. Dawood is the Taliban's shadow governor for Kabul, while Taj Mir Jawad is a top commander in the Haqqani Network.

Background on the Haqqani Network

The Haqqani Network operates primarily in the Afghan provinces of Khost, Paktia, and Paktika, and also has an extensive presence in Kabul, Logar, Wardak, Ghazni, Zabul, Kandahar, and Kunduz.

The terror group has close links with al Qaeda and the Taliban, and its relationship with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) has allowed the network to survive and thrive in its fortress stronghold of North Waziristan, a tribal agency in Pakistan. The Haqqani Network has also extended its presence into the tribal agency of Kurram.
[...]
(See LWJ report Pakistan's Jihad and Threat Matrix report Pakistan backs Afghan Taliban for additional information on the ISI's complicity in attacks in Afghanistan and the region.)
[...]

Visit LWJ website for rest of the report and its source links.

Kabul Attack Network is prime suspect in InterContinental Holel attack

This is still such a fast-moving story it can't be established at this time with any certainty which group carried out the attack but Long War Journal's June 28 discussion provides the best guess at this time as to the identity of the perpetrators' gang. See the LWJ website for source links in the report:

[...] Today's suicide attack was likely carried out by the Kabul Attack Network, which is made up of fighters from the Taliban, the Haqqani Network, and Hizb-i-Islami Gulbuddin, and cooperates with terror groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba and al Qaeda.

Top Afghan intelligence officials have linked the Kabul Attack Network to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence directorate as well. The network's tentacles extend outward from Kabul into the surrounding provinces of Logar, Wardak, Nangarhar, Kapisa, Ghazni, and Zabul, a US intelligence official told The Long War Journal.

The Kabul Attack Network is led by Dawood (or Daud) and Taj Mir Jawad, military and intelligence officials told The Long War Journal. Dawood is the Taliban's shadow governor for Kabul, while Taj Mir Jawad is a top commander in the Haqqani Network.

The Taliban have prioritized attacks against hotels in Kabul. In February, a suicide bomber detonated at the Safi Landmark. And in January 2008, a suicide assault team carried out an attack similar to today's at the Serena Hotel. Foreigners were the targets of both strikes.

Today's attack is the second major strike in Kabul this month. On June 18, a heavily armed three-man-strong suicide assault team dressed in military uniforms attacked a police station in the 1st district in Kabul, near the Finance Ministry. Nine people were killed in the attack.

The Taliban have carried out two other major suicide attacks in the capital since the beginning of April. On May 21, a suicide bomber detonated his vest at a hospital that is used to treat Afghan soldiers. Six people were killed in the blast. And on April 2, a suicide assault team attempted to storm Camp Phoenix, a NATO base. The suicide bombers were defeated by US troops guarding the perimeter.

Current death toll from attack on Kabul InterContinental Hotel

From AFP via Australia's ABC News website:

Hotel raid death toll rises
Posted 22 minutes ago

The death toll from yesterday's Taliban assault on a Kabul hotel has risen, with authorities saying 21 people, including the nine attackers, were killed.

Heavily armed Taliban militants stormed the Intercontinental Hotel, sparking a ferocious battle involving Afghan commandos, New Zealand special forces and a NATO helicopter gunship.

Officials said all of the gunmen were killed during the night-time raid on the hilltop hotel, which is frequented by Westerners and Afghan officials.

The state-owned 1960s hotel, which is not part of the global InterContinental chain, was hosting delegates attending an Afghan security conference and a large wedding party when the insurgents struck.

The interior ministry said nine Afghan civilians - mostly hotel workers - and two police officers were killed in the brazen assault and another 18 people were wounded. It said a ninth dead Taliban militant had been identified.

The ministry and the government in Madrid said a Spanish man - reportedly a pilot working for a Turkish airline - was also killed at the hotel.

Interior ministry spokesman Seddiq Seddiqi said the slain hotel workers had been on the first floor and in the lobby at the time of the attack.

Among those staying at the hotel were provincial government officials who were in Kabul for a conference on the handover of power from foreign to Afghan security forces. The process starts next month.
[...]
The attackers steered clear of the normally heavily guarded road snaking up to the hotel, instead picking their way through the trees on the northern slope towards the building around 11:00 pm on Tuesday, police said.

Panicked guests were told to stay in their rooms as the attackers, thought to have suicide vests, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, roamed through the building for about four hours before the raid was quelled.

Major Tim James, a spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force, said ISAF deployed one helicopter at the request of Afghan authorities which circled the hotel, opening fire on a number of insurgents wearing suicide vests.

"We've had reports that there were a number of explosions caused either by the insurgents detonating themselves or the engagement by the helicopter causing that (suicide vests) to explode," he said.

Witnesses identified the NATO aircraft as an Apache attack helicopter.
[...]

Attack on Kabul InterContinental not an example of swarm tactic but this is a good time to review John Arquilla's advice on countering swarms

Illustration: Oliver Munday and Ramell Ross for Arquilla's New York Times piece on swarm/counter-swarm tactics

When I'd first posted about the attack on the InterContinental Hotel, which was while it was still in progress, I'd written that it seemed to be a 'swarm' attack, of the kind launched against Mumbai in 2008. When I read B. Raman's analysis today on the attack I realized I'd been wrong to view it as a swarm tactic because even though it had touched off chaos in Kabul it was lodged against only one site. This realization decided me to review John Arquilla's description of the swarm, which he gave in a February 2009 op-ed for the New York Times (The Coming Swarm):

With three Afghan government ministries in Kabul hit by simultaneous suicide attacks this week, by a total of just eight terrorists, it seems that a new “Mumbai model” of swarming, smaller-scale terrorist violence is emerging.

The basic concept is that hitting several targets at once, even with just a few fighters at each site, can cause fits for elite counterterrorist forces that are often manpower-heavy, far away and organized to deal with only one crisis at a time. This approach certainly worked in Mumbai, India, last November, where five two-man teams of Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives held the city hostage for two days, killing 179 people. The Indian security forces, many of which had to be flown in from New Delhi, simply had little ability to strike back at more than one site at a time.

While it’s true that the assaults in Kabul seem to be echoes of Mumbai, the fact is that Al Qaeda and its affiliates have been using these sorts of swarm tactics for several years. Jemaah Islamiyah — the group responsible for the Bali nightclub attack that killed 202 people in 2002 — mounted simultaneous attacks on 16 Christian churches in Indonesia on Christmas Eve in 2000, befuddling security forces.

Even 9/11 itself had swarm-like characteristics, as four small teams of Qaeda operatives simultaneously seized commercial aircraft and turned them into missiles, flummoxing all our defensive responses. In the years since, Al Qaeda has coordinated swarm attacks in Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Turkey, Yemen and elsewhere. And at the height of the insurgency in Iraq, terrorists repeatedly used swarms on targets as small as truck convoys and as large as whole cities.[...]

Raman's analysis underscores Arquilla's definition of the term and shows the limits of likening the attack on the InterContinental to the ones in Mumbai:

[...]6. The attack resembled the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai, which involved, inter alia, attacks on two hotels, in two respects and differed in two other respects. The resemblances were regarding the selection of a hotel frequented by foreigners as a target and the use of a mix of modus operandi involving the use of explosive devices and hand-held weapons.

7. The important differences were that it was not a swarm tactics involving well orchestrated attacks on multiple targets located at different places by multiple teams of terrorists thereby forcing the security forces to scatter their resources. It was a single target attack by a single team of terrorists. Moreover, whereas in Mumbai there was a conscious attempt to take hostages in order to prolong the exchange of fire with the security forces, there was no such attempt in the Kabul attack.[...]

Raman's description of the circumstances of the death of a Spanish civilian in the hotel leaves unresolved at this point whether there had been hostage-taking:

10. [...] One of the attackers took shelter in a room. After an exchange of fire with the security forces, he blew himself up. As he did so, two policemen and a Spanish guest of the hotel, a commercial pilot, were killed.[...]

If the guest was in the room where the terrorist had taken refuge, that might represent hostage-taking.

I'll note here one other observation from Raman's analysis:

A part of the hotel was undergoing renovation involving employment of labour. Police suspect that the terrorists might have taken advantage of this to circumvent access control and gain access to the hotel.

That could suggest the attack was more a crime of opportunity than one designed with a specific date, event or hotel clientele in mind.

As to the most effective counter-swarm tactics, Arquilla, who teaches at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School and is a proponent of replacing (or at least supplementing) the hierarchical U.S. military structure with a 'networked' one, advised in the same writing for the NYT:

[...] So how are swarms to be countered? The simplest way is to create many more units able to respond to simultaneous, small-scale attacks and spread them around the country. This means jettisoning the idea of overwhelming force in favor of small units that are not “elite” but rather “good enough” to tangle with terrorist teams. In dealing with swarms, economizing on force is essential.

We’ve actually had a good test case in Iraq over the past two years. Instead of responding to insurgent attacks by sending out large numbers of troops from distant operating bases, the military strategy is now based on hundreds of smaller outposts in which 40 or 50 American troops are permanently stationed and prepared to act swiftly against attackers. Indeed, their very presence in Iraqi communities is a big deterrent. It’s small surprise that overall violence across Iraq has dropped by about 80 percent in that period.

For the defense of American cities against terrorist swarms, the key would be to use local police officers as the first line of defense instead of relying on the military. The first step would be to create lots of small counterterrorism posts throughout urban areas instead of keeping police officers in large, centralized precinct houses. This is consistent with existing notions of community-based policing, and could even include an element of outreach to residents similar to that undertaken in the Sunni areas of Iraq — even if it were to mean taking the paradoxical turn of negotiating with gangs about security.

At the federal level, we should stop thinking in terms of moving thousands of troops across the country and instead distribute small response units far more widely. Cities, states and Washington should work out clear rules in advance for using military forces in a counterterrorist role, to avoid any bickering or delay during a crisis. Reserve and National Guard units should train and field many more units able to take on small teams of terrorist gunmen and bombers. Think of them as latter-day Minutemen.

Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Turkey and Yemen all responded to Qaeda attacks with similar “packetizing” initiatives involving the police and armed forces; and while that hasn’t eliminated swarm attacks, the terrorists have been far less effective and many lives have been saved.

As for Afghanistan, where the swarm has just arrived, there is still time to realize the merits of forming lots of small units and sprinkling them about in a countrywide network of outposts. As President Obama looks to send more troops to that war, let’s make sure the Pentagon does it the right way.

Yes, the swarm will be heading our way, too. We need to get smaller, closer and quicker. The sooner the better.

New Zealand special forces played key role in securing InterContinental Hotel in Kabul

Report from New Zealand's 'Stuff' website with combined AP and Reuters reports:

Kiwi Troops wounded in Kabul attack
Last updated 19:32 29/06/2011

Prime Minister John Key says two New Zealand soldiers who were injured during an attack that killed at least 10 Afghan civilians at a Kabul hotel played a “crucial part” in making the building safe.

Suicide bombers and heavily armed Taleban insurgents attacked the Intercontinental Hotel frequented by westerners in the Afghan capital about 10.30pm, local time.

The New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) this evening confirmed New Zealand special operations forces, in support of the Afghan Police Crisis Response Unit, responded to the incident.

Key said a handful of Kiwi troops were initially at the scene in a mentoring role, but engaged when there was a sudden escalation.

The NZDF said throughout the operation, New Zealand soldiers faced small arms fire and explosions and an ISAF helicopter with a sniper team was utilised to confront the insurgents on the roof of the hotel.

Two soldiers received moderate injuries after taking an active role in the incident in making the building safe, Key said.

The soldiers’ families have since been notified.

Key, who this morning denied any Kiwi involvement, this evening said he was not aware of the incident earlier.

Ministers in New Zealand had been informed at 3.30pm and Key was told later.

Since the team had gone into the area in a mentoring capacity, the prime minister’s office was not informed, he said.

“Sometimes in these instances, the situation changes.”

The NZDF said at 3am local time, a fire started on the fifth floor of the Intercontinental Hotel, most likely as a result of explosives set off by insurgents.

By 6.30am, clearance of the hotel was completed with a number of insurgents killed.

HOTEL TARGETED BY SIX SUICIDE BOMBERS

"At least 10 civilians, including hotel staff, were killed when six suicide bombers attacked the Intercontinental," Mohammad Zahir, the head of the Kabul police crime unit, said.

Afghan officials said all the attackers appeared to have been killed. Associated Press reporters on the scene saw at least five bodies removed from the hotel, but could not say whether they were the attackers or their victims.

The Taleban claimed responsibility for the attack.

Jason Waggoner, a spokesman for the US-led coalition fighting in Afghanistan, said the helicopters fired on the roof where militants had taken up positions. He said they killed three gunmen and that Afghan security forces clearing the Inter-Continental hotel worked their way up to the roof and engaged the remaining insurgents.

The helicopters attacked after four massive explosions rocked the hotel.

After the gunmen were killed, the hotel lights that had been blacked out during the attack came back on. Afghan security vehicles and ambulances were removing the dead and wounded from the area.

UP TO 70 GUESTS IN HOTEL

Some Afghan provincial governors were staying at the hotel, which is frequented by Afghan officials and foreign visitors.

Samoonyar Mohammad Zaman, a security officer for the Ministry of Interior, said there were 60 to 70 guests at the hotel at the time of the attack.

"I saw the bodies of two suicide bombers at the main entrance of the hotel," he said.

He said some of the provincial governors who were staying at the hotel had left. But some members of their entourages have remained inside.

"There have been some people who have escaped, but most of the guests are still inside," he said.

Zaman said the insurgents were armed with machine guns, anti-aircraft weapons, rocket-propelled grenades and hand grenades. The were using grenade launchers, he said.

Afghan national security forces moved inside the blacked out hotel slowly as to not frighten or hurt any guests, he said.

Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said all the suicide bombers either blew themselves up or were killed while other gunmen continued to fire from the roof for a while.

"There are foreign and Afghan guests staying at the hotel," Sediqqi said before the Nato helicopters attacked. "We have reports that they are safe in their rooms, but still there is shooting."

Associated Press reporters at the scene said the two sides fought with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades. They saw tracer rounds go up over the darkened hotel and saw shooting from the roof of the five-story building in the rare, night time attack in the Afghan capital.

Police ordered bystanders to lie on the ground for safety.

WE HAVE KILLED AND WOUNDED 50 ENEMIES, TALEBAN CLAIMED

Taleban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack in a telephone call to the AP.

Mujahid later issued a statement claiming that Taleban attackers killed guards at a gate and entered the hotel.

"One of our fighters called on a mobile phone and said: 'We have gotten onto all the hotel floors and the attack is going according to the plan. We have killed and wounded 50 foreign and local enemies. We are in the corridors of the hotel now taking guests out of their rooms - mostly foreigners. We broke down the doors and took them out one by one.'"

The Taleban often exaggerate casualties from their attacks. The statement did not disclose the number of attackers, but only said one suicide bomber had died.

A few hours into the clashes, an Afghan National Army commando unit arrived at the scene.

Initially, the US-led military coalition said the Afghan Ministry of Interior had not requested any assistance from foreign forces. But later, the Nato helicopters arrived on the scene at the hotel on a hill overlooking the capital.

A guest who was inside said he heard gunfire echoing throughout the heavily guarded building. The hotel sits on a hill overlooking the city and streets leading up to it were blocked. The scene was dark as electricity at the hotel and the surrounding area was out.

Azizullah, an Afghan police officer who uses only one name, told an Associated Press reporter at the scene that at least one bomber entered the hotel and detonated a vest of explosives. Another police officer, who would not disclose his name, said there were at least two suicide bombers.

Jawid, a guest at the hotel, said he jumped out a one-story window to flee the shooting.

"I was running with my family," he said. "There was shooting. The restaurant was full with guests."

ATTACK FOLLOWED PEACE TALKS

Earlier, officials from the US, Pakistan and Afghanistan met in the capital to discuss prospects for making peace with Taleban insurgents to end the nearly decade-long war.

"The fact that we are discussing reconciliation in great detail is success and progress, but challenges remain and we are reminded of that on an almost daily basis by violence," Jawed Ludin, Afghanistan's deputy foreign minister, said at a news conference. "The important thing is that we act and that we act urgently and try to do what we can to put an end to violence."

The attack occurred nearly a week after President Barack Obama announced he was withdrawing 33,000 US troops from Afghanistan and would end the American combat role by the end of 2014.

It took place the day before a conference was scheduled in Kabul to discuss plans for Afghan security forces to take the lead for securing an increasing number of areas of the country between now and 2014 when international forces are expected to move out of combat roles. Afghans across the country were in the city to attend, although it's not known if any where staying at the Inter-Continental.

The Inter-Continental - known widely as the "Inter-Con" opened in the late 1960s, was the nation's first international luxury hotel. It has at least 200 rooms and was once part of an international chain. But when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the hotel was left to fend for itself.

It was used by Western journalists during the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

On November 23, 2003, a rocket exploded nearby, shattering windows but causing no casualties.

Twenty-two rockets hit the Inter-Con between 1992 and 1996, when factional fighting convulsed Kabul under the government of Burhanuddin Rabbani. All the windows were broken, water mains were damaged and the outside structure pockmarked. Some, but not all, of the damage was repaired during Taleban rule.

ATTACKS INCREASING

Attacks in the Afghan capital have been relatively rare, although violence has increased since the May 2 killing of Osama bin Laden in a US raid in Pakistan and the start of the Taleban's annual spring offensive.

On June 18, insurgents wearing Afghan army uniforms stormed a police station near the presidential palace and opened fire on officers, killing nine.

Late last month, a suicide bomber wearing an Afghan police uniform infiltrated the main Afghan military hospital, killing six medical students. A month before that, a suicide attacker in an army uniform sneaked past security at the Afghan Defence Ministry, killing three people.

Other hotels in the capital have also been targeted.

In January 2008, militants stormed Kabul's most popular luxury hotel, the Serena, hunting down Westerners who cowered in a gym during a coordinated assault that killed eight people. An American, a Norwegian journalist and a Philippine woman were among the dead.

A suicide car bomber in December 2009, struck near the home of a former Afghan vice president and a hotel frequented by Westerners, killing eight people and wounding nearly 40 in a neighbourhood considered one of Kabul's safest.

And in February 2010, insurgents struck two residential hotels in the heart of Kabul, killing 20 people including seven Indians, a French filmmaker and an Italian diplomat.

- Stuff, with AP and Reuters