Taliban pressures Afghan cell networks into 5PM curfew
By Nilay Patel 
posted Mar 12th 2008 7:19PM
posted Mar 12th 2008 7:19PM
After a series of attacks on mobile phone towers, it appears life in Afghanistan has gotten even harder: the four privately-owned Afghan cell companies have all cowed to the Taliban's demands and begun shutting off their networks between 5PM and 7AM every night. The Taliban claims that the companies are aiding Afghan and NATO troops by leaving the networks operational, and has attacked 10 towers in the past few weeks, completely destroying six. We're not sure how big an impact the shutoff has on troops, but there's no denying the effect on Afghan citizens, many of whom rely on mobile phones to contact loved ones and summon medical services. The Afghan government has said it's encouraging the phone companies to resist the Taliban tactics, and that it will "persuade the companies to turn the signals back on again," but it's not clear when that might happen.[Via Textually.org; Image courtesy of Talking Proud]
wow. I read the other day that we spend something like $12bn a day in Iraq. and here, we have the actual Taliban (not some fringe group or some associated radical party or some muslim cleric screeching "death to america" from his backyard hideout) going blowing up cell towers in Afghanistan because technology is evil. Can we say "messed up priorities"???
absolutely disgusting.
They're not blowing up the towers because they're anti-technology. The Taleban actually make use of cell phones for communications, as they're much less expensive and much easier to replace than portable military communications gear. However, the Taleban are saying that the network is making it easier for coalition forces to find their forces at night (a time when the Taleban are at a severe fighting disadvantage), and are thus demanding that the towers be turned off. While it's possible to use towers to roughly locate a particular phone, NATO forces (and possibly Afghan forces as well) have gear that can key in on a particular phone without using the towers, tracking it with much greater precision than a few cell towers. What the Taleban are also missing is that with the lack of transmitting towers in the area, their phones will go to ever-higher transmission powers, making them detectable from an even longer distance. This is what you get from a fundamental lack of understanding of the technology.
Nice info Martin. You spend any time in the 'stan?
No, I've never been in the military. But I am a little bit of a military buff, and know a few people who have gone through some of the ELINT programs of a couple of branches. They're very guarded about details, of course, but in the original invasion of Afghanistan, key targets were often located by tracking their mobile phones. Army Rangers or Special Forces would be moved into place to verify and either provide coordinates for JDAMS or paint a target so that laser-guided munitions could be dropped on them. It's not always as precise as that; aircraft could triangulate positions for gunships or aircraft to hit, or sometimes local patrols would be vectored over to deal with it, especially if arrests were preferred. This is the reason that senior members of the Taleban and al Qaeda not only do not use mobile phones, but don't allow anyone around them to do so, either.
they xmit in higher power mode, unless the taliban have figured out the "off" switch
They should be turning them off if they want to stay hidden, but it doesn't always work that way. Operational issues mean that some of the Taleban foot soldiers -- and sometimes even the senior staff -- will either forget to turn theirs off (or even better for them, remove the battery), or will briefly turn it on to check something on the phone. This can give away their position, if only briefly, possibly bringing unwanted attention to the whole unit.
I misread this at first to say "Afghan citizens [...] rely on mobile phones to contact loved ones and summon medieval services."
lolocaust... yea well thats basically accurate enough
"&#*#$&^@...and here I just forked out an extra 493 Afghani for unlimited talk after 5pm..."
Apparently not enough of their tickets have been punched to stop them from running people's lives.
President Bush FTW, NOT!!!
I still can't believe everyone is harping about how we have to establish democracy in Iraq when we haven't even caught Osama Bin Laden. It's not like Iraq's measly oil supply or stopping them from switching to the euro has stopped our economy from heading down shit street.
I say we nuke the entire region women, children and all. I'm tired of this shit quite honestly. I never thought I could be so heartless but yeah I think hearing about shit like this in the middle east for the passed 10 yrs has made me become this way.