US finalises three-phased cross-border raids into Pak: Report

The US has firmed up an "aggressive" three-phase plan to conduct cross-border raids into Pakistan from Afghanistan to strike at the elusive Osama bin Laden and other top al-Qaeda leaders believed to be hiding in the tribal region, a media report said today.      
Last week's "snatch and grab" raid by helicopter-borne US Special Operations forces in Pakistan was not an isolated incident but part of a three-phase plan, approved by President Bush, to strike at al-Qaeda's top leadership, the National Public Radio (NPR) reported.      

The plan calls for a much more aggressive military campaign, it quoted a source familiar with presidential order, which allowed the US military to conduct the raids, as saying.      

The plan represents an 11th-hour effort to hammer al-Qaeda more aggressively as the Bush administration's term ends in January next, two officials were quoted as saying.      
"Definitely, the gloves have come off," said a source who has been briefed on the plan. "This was only Phase 1 of three phases."      

Pentagon and White House officials have declined to discuss the new plan. The intelligence community already had approval from Bush to carry out operations inside Pakistan, which included attacks by Predator drones, the report said.      

The latest US move has caused much concern in Islamabad with Army Chief Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, in an unusually strong public statement recently, vowing to defend the country's sovereignty and territorial integrity "at all cost".      

The NPR report also said that CIA personnel from around the world were being pulled into the Afghan-Pak border area, an intelligence-community "surge" to go after bin Laden and other al-Qaeda figures.      

Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress this week that he is drafting a new military strategy for both Afghanistan and Pakistan.