15/11 (14:42) U.S. WILL SOON BE DESTROYED - TALIBAN LEADER Prime Minister Tony Blair warned the Afghan campaign was far from over today after the Taliban leader vowed his men would fight to the death. Mullah Mohammed Omar said they would never accept the "evil" coalition government the US-coalition is attempting to establish in the Taliban's place. And he gave a chilling warning that the US would be destroyed "within a short period of time" in an interview with the BBC World Service. Speaking from his movement's spiritual home Kandahar he said: "You, the BBC, and American public radios have created a sense of concern but the current situation of Afghanistan is related to a big cause - that is the destruction of America. "The plan is going ahead and God willing it is being implemented, but it is a huge task that is beyond the comprehension of human beings. "If God's help is with us this will happen within a short period of time - keep in mind this prediction." His defiance was echoed by Sohail Shaheen, his deputy Ambassador in Pakistan, who warned the Taliban would wage a guerrilla war from the near-impenetrable Afghan mountains. And Defence minister Geoff Hoon later told ministers nobody should be "under any illusion" that the military action was over. There were still "pockets of resistance" in Northern Afghanistan, with the situation in the south "very fluid", he told the weekly Cabinet meeting. Clare Short said British troops should be deployed "within days" to bring the stability necessary for the humanitarian effort. Speaking after attending the Cabinet and War Cabinet had met, the International Development Secretary said "speed is of the essence". "We need troops on the ground, both bringing order and bringing reassurance to the Afghan people who are haunted by what happened when the Soviets withdrew," she said. "We need to move in days." But while Ms Short focused on humanitarian concerns the Prime Minister said he could not rule out an "offensive role" for the thousands of British soldiers on stand-by for action in the region when he addressed MPs yesterday. Deputy ambassador Sohail Shaheen spelt out what that role could involve in an interview with BBC Radio 4's Today programme. History showed "no imposed person or regime can be established or can sustain in Afghanistan over the shoulder of the Afghanistan people," he told BBC Radio 4's Today. The fall of Kabul did not meant the end for the Taliban, the deputy ambassador warned. "The Taliban is itself a nation ... if you try to smash a nation then the nation will strike back and then it will have very negative consequences as it had for the former Soviet Union," he said. "Of course the tactic will be changed. It will not be a regular war." The Prime Minister's official spokesman said after the last 24 hours "it is clear the momentum of the campaign has continued". = It was "significant" the release of the eight aid workers had come about with "local support on the ground", he said. And there was some evidence that people in Pushtun areas had been declaring for the exiled King Mohammed Zareh Shah and supporting a role for the United Nations in the future of their country, he added. Mr Blair had talks with European Commission President Romano Prodi early this morning and was meeting Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Shussel this afternoon. As well as discussing EU business, Mr Blair thanked Mr Prodi for the commission's role in driving through European anti-terror initiatives and for the work it will do in future to help rebuild Afghanistan, the spokesman said. Mr Blair believed Osama bin Laden was still in Afghanistan, he continued. "That is our belief and the efforts will continue to achieve the campaign objectives, which include bringing him to account." Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said he was "relatively optimistic" that a stable, broad-based multi-ethnic government could be formed in Afghanistan. He compared the war-torn country to Germany following the Second World War. After the war Germany was devastated and collapsed as a state, and had to recover from having been ruled by the Nazis in the same way as Afghanistan now had to recover from having been ruled by the Taliban, Mr Straw told the BBC Radio 4 programme The World at One. "It is bound to take some time to rebuild what is an almost completely devastated state. That happened in Germany after the war. It is almost bound to happen here now," he went on. "The important thing is that we get on with the job right away, not suggest that there is no alternative to the chaos which has befallen that poor state for the last 20 years. "I am relatively optimistic, because of the behaviour of the troops so far and because of the clearly expressed will of the international community to be united in a common endeavour here." The future Afghan administration should be based on yesterday's UN Security Council resolution calling for a broad-based, multi-ethnic government which respected the country's territorial integrity, he added. -- DOCUMENTS with detailed designs for missiles, bombs and nuclear weapons were found in Kabul safe houses used by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network, it was reported today. The partly-burnt papers were found by The Times in a hastily abandoned house in the Karta Parwan quarter of the city, the newspaper reported. There are descriptions of how the detonation of TNT compresses plutonium into a critical mass, sparking a chain reaction, and ultimately a thermonuclear reaction, it said. Documents were found in two of four al Qaida houses which has been used by Arabs and Pakistanis and even reportedly by bin Laden himself, the newspaper said. They included studies into the development of a kinetic energy supergun capable of firing chemical or nuclear warheads, external propulsion missiles, preliminary research on the creation of a thermonuclear device, and many instructions for making smaller bombs. The discovery of the detailed instructions, written in Arabic, German, Urdu and English, confirms the West's worst fears of an attack far worse than the September 11 atrocities, the newspaper noted. Nuclear experts say the design suggests bin Laden may be working on a fission device similar to Fat Man, the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, but they emphasise it is extremely difficult to build a viable warhead, it added. The houses were abandoned on Monday night as Taliban units and their allies fled the city as the Northern Alliance advanced. Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Menzies Campbell said: "We cannot be sure that Osama bin Laden does not have nuclear weapons, but the events of September 11 tell us that he is unlikely to show any scruples about using, or threatening to use, such weapons. "No-one should be in any doubt that, in bin Laden and al Qaida, we are dealing with the most unscrupulous enemy that modern democracy has seen."
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