The Other Side of the Mountain: Mujahideen ... - Tribal Analysis Center

VIGNETTE 1
MUJAHIDEEN DEMOLITION METHODS
by Commander Mulla Malang
The Mujahideen would move heavy unexploded bombs (250-500 kilograms)
at night by tractors to the road and bury them under bridges,
underpasses and viaducts. The bombs were remotely controlled, usually
by home-made detonators, fired some 500 meters from the road.
Several such bombs would be detonated under a passing enemy convoy
to heavily damage the vehicles. Tanks and other armored escort
vehicles were the primary target for remote-controlled bombs.
If remote-control detonation was unfeasible, the Mujahideen used
another method to selectively attack the tracked armored vehicles.
The Mujahideen would stretch two metal wires across the paved road.
The wires were spaced close together and hooked to an electric battery.
The rubber tires of civilian and military vehicles would pass over the
wires, but the metal tracks of tanks and BMPs would close the electrical
circuit and set off the explosion. (See diagram)
Abdul Wali, a Mujahideen from Kandahar, was known for his
creative bomb-making. Once in 1986, he sent a floating bomb down
the Nosh-e Jan creek (which runs in the western suburbs of Kandahar
city from northeast to southwest) to destroy a government outpost at a
hotel'. Abdul Wali strapped a 250 kilogram bomb onto some truck tire
inner tubes. He measured the distance from the outpost to his release
point upstream where he would launch his floating bomb. The bomb
was hooked to a wire whose length was the length from launch point
to outpost. Once the floating bomb stretched out the full length of the
wire, it was exactly under the outpost. Abdul Wali remotely-detonated
the bomb and destroyed the outpost.
In well-defended enemy areas, the presence of minefields and other
obstacles did not allow Mujahideen to raid enemy bases. In this case,
delay-fired rockets hit the enemy positions. Kandahar air base, which
became a major Soviet military base, was one of these difficult targets.
The Mujahideen used delay-firing mechanisms so that they could leave
the area before the rocket fired and the Soviet counter-fires began.
Initially, only field-expedient delay-firing mechanisms were available.
Mulla Malang was one of the most famous commanders of the Kandahar area. He was an
adherent of Maulavi Mohammed Yunis Khans-Islamic Party (Hezb-e-Islami Khalis).
1 Gul Sardar Hotel near Sarpuza.