New Chief to Take Command of U.S. Troops in Afghanistan

The U.S. military plans to install a new commander of American forces in Afghanistan, marking the first time that a single officer stationed in the region has been designated to oversee most aspects of the ongoing war.

Army Lt. Gen. Dan McNeill, commander of the 18th Airborne Corps, is expected to occupy the new post by month’s end. Pentagon officials said Tuesday that the move is designed to streamline the command structure and replace an arrangement in which the various services report to separate regional leaders.

The change was ordered by U.S. Central Command chief Gen. Tommy Franks, who is based in Tampa, Fla. McNeill will report to Franks, Pentagon officials said.

Franks “wants to have a subordinate who is doing hands-on, day-to-day” management of the war, said Marine Corps Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The change in command structure, Pace said, allows Franks “to spend perhaps a little more time on the rest of his region,” which encompasses 24 other countries.

McNeill will be placed in charge of almost all of the 7,000 U.S. forces in Afghanistan, although special units will continue to report directly to Franks, a spokesman said. McNeill also will coordinate efforts involving thousands of coalition forces from Canada, Britain and other countries.

Separately, Pace said the United States is still trying to identify 32 prisoners captured Sunday in a Special Forces raid near the Afghan city of Kandahar. Five other suspected Islamic militants were killed in the nighttime operation. Pace said U.S. forces were fired on first.

He said the raid was launched after the U.S. obtained information indicating that a senior Taliban commander was in the vicinity, raising speculation that the operation may have been aimed at capturing the elusive former Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar.

But a U.S. intelligence official said Tuesday that Omar was not the target. He declined to say whom U.S. forces were pursuing in the operation but said a Taliban commander did not appear to be among those killed or captured.

Gen. Khan Mohammed, head of the Afghan military in Kandahar, told Associated Press that U.S. troops had captured former Taliban regional commander Abdul Salam in the city late last week after Salam met with U.S. officers and an aide to the city’s governor.

Pace also said U.S. forces had uncovered two large weapons caches over the past week in operations near Herat and Orgun, a town south of Gardez near the Pakistani border.

The materials included five T-54 tanks, hundreds of rocket-propelled grenade and mortar rounds and more than 1 million rounds of machine-gun ammunition.