Having infiltrated into Afghanistan during the night of 19-20 October, the team linked up with the two Northern Alliance cornmanders on 21 October at Bagram air base and began looking for vantage points on the plains to call in close air support. They soon found an ideal position and established an observation post in the old air traffic control tower for the airfield. From that location, they could clearly see the Taliban positions in the Shamali Plains spread out before them and immediately began calling in air strikes on the entrenched enemy. From 21 October through 14 November 2001, the Special Forces directed almost continuous CAS missions against the dug-in enemy. The constant air attacks degraded the Taliban/al Qaeda command and control, killed hundreds of entrenched front-line troops, and disrupted their support elements. General Fahim Khan was encouraged to begin thinking about an immediate move against Kabul while the enemy was in disarray.
The Northern Alliance leaders originally planned a multiday, five-phased operation to take the Afghan capital. However, it soon became apparent to them that their foes were so weakened by U.S. air strikes that operations could be accelerated. When the attack was launched on 13 November, the enemy defenses quickly crumbled. By noon on the first day of the offensive, the operation had achieved all of its phase three objectives. Twenty-four hours later, to the surprise of the world press and the delight of the Northern Alliance, General Khan's ground forces liberated Kabul without incident. The Taliban and al Qaeda had fled in disarray toward Kandahar in the south and into the supposed sanctuary of the nearby Tora Bora Mountains to the east near Jalalabad. By early December U.S. troops were assisting in a ceremony reopening the U.S. embassy in Afghanistan's capital.
