Targets Were Terrorist Havens
The United States has not had official relations with Afghanistan since 1979, and the U.S. embassy in Sudan has been closed for security reasons since January 1996.
U.N. Ambassador Bill Richardson became in April the highest ranking U.S. official to visit Afghanistan since relations were broken off. He traveled there mainly to promote an end to the country's protracted civil war.
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Since the radical Islamic Taliban group seized control of virtually all of Afghanistan in September 1996, its relations with the United States in general have been poor.
The Clinton administration does not recognize the Taliban as the legitimate authority in Afghanistan. It also has accused the Taliban of gross mistreatment of women in its application of Islamic law. Another sore point for the United States is the presence of international terrorists in Afghanistan.
Sudan has been on the U.S. list of countries that support terrorism since 1993. A main source of U.S. unease has been the Sudanese government's close relationship with Iran.
Although the U.S. embassy in Khartoum has been closed since 1996, U.S. diplomats make occasional visits there for talks with government authorities. Like Afghanistan, Sudan has been plagued by a long and bloody civil war. In Sudan, the conflict pits the Islamic, Arab-populated north against the black African, Christian and animist south.
Ret. Maj. James Blackwell, a military strategy expert, said in an interview for CBS 'This Morning' that the U.S. is using new strategies in dealing with such terrorism.
"What they have done is discovered new strategies, new ways of using military weapons in the war against terrorism," Blackwell said. "I think we are going to see that revealed more in the coming days."
The State Department's annual report on global terrorism, released in April, listed both Sudan and Afghanistan as refuges for international terror groups.
It said Sudan served as a "haven, meeting place and training hub of international terrorist organizations, primarily of Middle East origin."
The Sudanese government also condoned many of the "objectionable activities" of Iran, such as funneling assistance to terrorist and radical Islamic groups operating in and transiting through Sudan, the report said.
It added that Sudan has continued to harbor several of the most violent international terrorist and radical Islamic groups and also supports regional Islamic and non-Islamic opposition and insurgent groups in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Uganda, and Tunisia.
On Afghanistan, the report said, Islamic extreists from around the world (including large numbers of Egyptians, Algerians, Palestinians, and Saudis) use Afghan territory as training ground and home base from which to operate.
"The Taliban, as well as many of the other combatants in the Afghan civil war, facilitated the operation of training and indoctrination facilities for non-Afghans in the territories they controlled," the report said. The Taliban faction emerged from years of civil war to control most Afghan territory.
The State Department report said several Afghan factions also provide logistical support, free passage and sometimes passports to members of various terrorist organizations.