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(S//SI) Success Against Terrorists along Afghanistan/Pakistan
Border
FROM:
Deputy Division Chief, Afghan Shop at NSA/CSS Georgia (GS2A)
Run Date: 02/24/2006
(S//SI) The story of how SIGINT directly contributed to the targeting of terrorists in the Af/Pak
border area.
(S//SI) NSA's role as a leader in the Global War on Terrorism, particularly the campaign against
Taleban extremists along the Afghanistan/Pakistan border, continues to experience great
success. A recent victory came on 21-22 December 2005 when SIGINT provided actionable
information that led to the deaths of at least 35 terrorists.
(TS//SI) On 21 December, NSA-Georgia intercepted COMINT revealing that
extremists planned to attack coalition forces along the border. NSA-Georgia
immediately alerted warfighters in Afghanistan so that they could take appropriate forceprotection measures.
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(TS//SI) About five hours later, personnel in SID's Office of Target Reconnaissance and Survey (
OTRS - S316 ) tipped NSA-Georgia to additional SIGINT which indicated that a coalition forwardoperating base near Lwara, Afghanistan would most likely be the extremists' target. This and
other threat warning information was tipped to Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force
(CJSOTF) forces in Afghanistan, using zIRCon chat prior to and throughout the engagement.
(S) Just five minutes later, CJSOTF personnel informed NSA-Georgia that Lwara Firebase and
Observation Post 1 were both under attack and that coalition forces there were fighting to repel
the enemy.
(TS//SI//REL) In order to expedite the flow of SIGINT to the warfighters, NSA-Georgia mission
leaders coordinated with OTRS and arranged for VHF communications from the region to be
forwarded in real-time to NSA-Georgia. The site also focused AIRHANDLER (i.e. a SIGINTcollection package developed by OTRS that is installed on the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle,
or UAV) on the area, to produce geo-locational information and pinpoint the whereabouts of the
terrorists.
(TS//SI//REL) Within six minutes, the first AIRHANDLER cross-mission geolocation was tipped to
CJSOTF via KLEIGLIGHT reporting. Subsequent geolocations were tipped forward as well,
and COMINT was used to confirm the identity of the targets. With this information in
hand, coalition air forces launched a series of effective bomb and missile strikes.
Aircraft dropped JDAMs (Joint Direct Attack Munitions) that resulted in the deaths of at least 12
extremists who were attempting to flee across the border into Pakistan. In addition, a Predator
UAV fired Hellfire laser-guided missiles, killing more terrorists.
(S//SI) As this success demonstrates, the fusion of SIGINT from multiple sources, supplied in
near real-time to warfighters, amounts to a potent weapon in the Global War on Terrorism.
(U//FOUO) If you have questions about this article, please contact
).
(U//FOUO) Note: these attacks were unrelated to the mid-January strikes--widely reported in
press - aimed at al-Qa'ida #2 leader Al-Zawahiri.
"(U//FOUO) SIDtoday articles may not be republished or reposted outside NSANet
without the consent of S0121 (DL sid_comms)."
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DERIVED FROM: NSA/CSSM 1-52, DATED 08 JAN 2007 DECLASSIFY ON: 20320108