KANDAHAR: Disagreements and coordination problems high within the international military command are delaying combat operations for 2,500 US Marines who arrived here last month to help root out Taliban forces, according to military officers.

For weeks, the Marines with their light armour, infantry, artillery and a squadron of transport and attack helicopters and Harrier strike fighters have been virtually quarantined at the international air base here, unable to operate beyond the base perimeter.

Within immediate striking distance are Taliban forces that are entrenched around major towns in southern Afghanistan, where they control the narcotics trade and are consolidating their position as an alternative to the US-backed government of President Hamid Karzai.

But disputes among the many layers of international command here a conglomeration of 40 nations ranging from Albania and Iceland to the US and Britain have forced a series of delays.

Unlike many US military operations, even the small details of operations here must first be coordinated with multiple military commands.

There have been larger disputes over strategy. Some commanders want more emphasis on civic action with local Afghans. Others believe security must take precedence.

For Marines, who are accustomed to landing in a war zone and immediately going into action with their own plans, the hold-up has been frustrating.

Frequent changes among command leaders and unclear lines of authority have made it difficult for the Marines to win general approval for the timing, goals and extent of proposed operations.

Marine operations planning, routinely completed in hours or days, has gone on for weeks while they await agreement and approval from above.

“They invite us here and they don’t know how to use us?” said Lt-Col Anthony Henderson, commander of the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines.

“We are trying to keep our frustration in check, but we have to wait for the elephants to stop dancing,” he said, referring to the brass-heavy international command.

Including the Marines, there are 17,522 allied troops in southern Afghanistan, including British, Dutch, Canadians, Danes, Estonians, Australians, Romanians and representatives of nine other nations, according to the high command.

These coalition military forces are assembled under the banner of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), commanded by US Army Gen Dan K. McNeill, headquartered in Kabul with an international staff. Beneath McNeill are five regional commands and numerous national military commands. Coordination on long-term strategy is complex because the commanders and staffs at each level regularly change. The regional command here, RC-South, for instance, rotates every nine months among British, Canadian and Dutch officers.

RC-South declined to comment on any command issues.

In Kabul, Brig-Gen. Carlos Branco, a senior spokesman for the ISAF, said the Marines ‘answer to’ ISAF but are under the “tactical control” of RC-South. He said ISAF was satisfied that this is the best arrangement to “coordinate and synchronise” combat operations.

In case of a disagreement, McNeill would make the final decision, said Branco, a Portuguese officer.

The problems are magnified when Afghan government officials at the national and provincial level weigh in with their judgments. The result, some say, is that the anti-militant operation inherently difficult enough, suffers from the lack of a vision and strategy.

“We don’t understand where we are going here,” said Lt-Col Brian Mennes, commander of Task Force Fury, a battalion of paratroopers leaving Kandahar after 15 months of operations. “We desperately want to see a strategy in front of us.”

Nato’s previous experience with coalition combat came almost a decade ago with the air war against Serbia. Afghanistan is the first time the alliance has attempted to coordinate ground combat among forces that often don’t speak the same language or use the same radio frequencies.

With British, Canadian and US forces fighting in close proximity, their operations officers must agree even on such details as requests for medical evacuation of wounded soldiers. The decisions include who takes the call, whose aircraft responds and where the wounded soldier is taken.

Meantime, the 2,500 Marines train, clean their weapons yet again, take long conditioning runs along the dust-choked perimeter roads and wonder when they’re going to begin what they came for.

“This is killing us,” says a staff sergeant. “There’s only so much training you can do, especially considering that most of my Marines just got back from Iraq.”

But living conditions at this huge base are comfortable, with a well-stocked PX, an off-duty recreation area, a hamburger joint and pizza shop, and an Afghan bazaar. Marines sleep on cots in air-conditioned tents.

“This place is like a resort,” said Lt Shaun Miller, 24, from Austin, Texas, “and that makes the waiting a lot easier.”—Dawn/ The LAT-WP News Service (c) The Baltimore Sun