From a Carrier, Another View of America’s Air War in Afghanistan

By ELISABETH BUMILLER
NYT

ABOARD U.S.S. THEODORE ROOSEVELT, on the Arabian Sea — Every day from the deck of this nuclear-powered aircraft carrier off the coast of Pakistan, two dozen combat planes are catapulted into the sky for the 500-mile trip to southern Afghanistan. There the pilots circle Taliban strongholds like an airborne 911 service and zoom in when American and British troops, spread thin and often panicked, call in airstrikes.

The Navy has been back in these waters providing more air power since August, in large part because the ground reinforcements that commanders have been pleading for have not yet come. From 15,000 feet up, the pilots protect supply lines under increasing attack, fly reconnaissance missions to find what they call “bad guys” over the next hill, and go “kinetic” with bombs that kill three, four or five Taliban fighters at a time. They can always tell when troops who call in airstrikes are under direct fire.

“They’re trying to talk to you at the same time that they’re running and being shot at, so obviously there’s a lot of urgency in their voices,” said Capt. Kevin J. Kovacich, the Roosevelt’s air wing commander.

Captain Kovacich and many of his pilots last dropped bombs in Afghanistan in March 2002, when the American military seemed to have dealt a near fatal blow to the Taliban. Now the United States military is experiencing the limitations of air power in a seven-year war, in which an increasing American reliance on airstrikes against insurgents has kindled growing fury over the civilian casualties that have come with them.

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