WASHINGTON: With Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld pressuring the Pentagon to take a more aggressive role in tracking down terrorists , military and intelligence officials are engaged in a fierce debate over when and how elite military units should be deployed for maximum effectiveness.

Under Rumsfeld's direction, secret commando units known as hunter-killer teams have been ordered to "kick down the doors", as the generals put it, all over the world in search of Al Qaeda members and their sympathizers.

The approach has succeeded in recent months in Iraq, as Special Operations forces have helped capture Saddam Hussein and other Baathist loyalists. But in other parts of the world, particularly Afghanistan, these soldiers and their civilian advocates have complained to superiors that the Pentagon's counter-terrorism policy is too inflexible in the use of Special Forces overall and about what units are allowed to chase down suspected terrorists, according to former commandos and a Defence Department official.

In fact, these advocates said the US military may have missed chances to capture two of its most-wanted fugitives - Mohammad Omar, the Taliban leader, and Ayman Zawahiri, deputy to Osama bin Laden - during the past two years because of restrictions on Green Berets in favour of two other components of the Special Operations Command, the Delta Force and SEAL Team Six.

They said several credible sightings by CIA and military informants of Omar entering a mosque this spring in Kandahar, Afghanistan, were relayed to US forces at nearby Firebase Gecko, where a Green Beret team was ready to deploy. But rather than send in the Green Berets, who were just minutes from the mosque, commanders followed strict military doctrine and called on the Delta Force, the team of commandos whose primary mission is to kill and capture targets such as Saddam.

In the several hours it took the Delta unit, based hundreds of miles away near Kabul, to review the information and prepare for the raid, Omar vanished, said the sources, all of whom advise Rumsfeld's senior aides.

Other informants reported spotting Zawahiri in a medical clinic in Gardez, Afghanistan, in the spring of 2002. Green Berets five minutes away were ordered to stand down so SEAL Team Six, another of the hunter-killer teams, could storm the clinic and capture or kill Zawahiri, according to the sources. But too much time elapsed during preparations, and Zawahiri escaped. The Special Operations Command declined to comment on the reports.

Both incidents spotlight the ongoing debate over how best to employ Special Operations forces in the global war against terrorism. Special Operations forces refer to a range of soldiers from the Army, Navy and Air Force who are specially trained for sensitive missions, typically secret in nature and frequently involving rescues or assaults on high-value enemy targets.

The military's policy, in practice, mandates using only "Special Mission Units," such as Delta Force and SEAL Team Six, to apprehend or assassinate specially targeted individuals. It precludes other Special Forces such as Green Berets - who are trained primarily to work with indigenous fighters - from pursuing the most sought-after targets when opportunities arise.

Some experts on counter-terrorism contend that it takes the Special Mission Units too long to deploy for unanticipated raids. Some believe equal, if not more, emphasis should be placed on Special Operations forces to develop relationships with local villagers who supply the bulk of valuable information, which is known as counter-insurgency work. In the past year, poor intelligence has often led to the wrong targets being killed or captured.

"For all of the Special Mission Units' efforts, how many high-value targets did they get in Afghanistan?" asked one adviser, a civilian advocate of aggressive unconventional warfare with the Special Operations Command. "None."

Supporters say units such as Delta are the only ones trained specifically to carry out the apprehension or assassination of high-value targets. "By doctrine and training, targets like that belong to the Special Mission Units," said Richard Shultz, a scholar at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and a Pentagon consultant. "That's what they are for."

The Pentagon's official position is that there is no conflict between the two approaches. Marshall Billingslea, formerly the principal deputy assistant secretary of defence for special operations and low-intensity conflict, said both approaches are being followed and both are vital to achieving success against terrorist organizations. "The hearts and minds element is essential," Billingslea said.

But according to a classified Defence Department policy briefing on the war against the Al Qaeda terrorist network and Baathist insurgents in Iraq, the Bush administration is moving away from work with insurgents and favouring more direct-action strikes.

Rumsfeld has dramatically boosted the budget of Special Operations forces and last year ordered the Special Operations Command to draft a strategy to send hunter-killer teams after terrorist cells.

He is considering expanding their role even more. Among proposals under review is to send the Special Mission Units into areas such as Somalia and Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, where little government authority exists and terrorists congregate, seemingly safe from the long arm of the United States, said officials who are reviewing the plan or have been briefed on it.

"There have been briefings about various operations against various targets," a State Department official said. "We're prepared to go into these areas," he said, but in a careful way.

Over the years, such proposals have faced roadblocks, including a shortage of resources, legal questions on Capitol Hill about assassinations, intelligence shortcomings and worries about the political willpower of some officials at the State Department and Pentagon.

According to four officials who have seen it, a top-secret report by Shultz, the Pentagon consultant, contends that despite reliable intelligence on those responsible for the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, the 1998 bombings of US embassies in East Africa and the 2000 attack on the USS Cole in Yemen, Special Mission Units were never sent to kill or capture the terrorists responsible.

It was not because of President Bill Clinton's reluctance to deploy the secret units, concluded Shultz, who would not discuss the classified study. Rather, the Pentagon's civilian leaders and generals repeatedly came up with what the report called "showstoppers" to dissuade the White House from launching each mission.

Rumsfeld's "manhunter" plan, as described in memos, is more daring than efforts against terrorist networks during the Clinton years, according to those who have seen it or have been briefed. Rumsfeld's plan calls for sending Special Mission Units into a number of countries throughout the world.-Dawn/The LAT-WP News Service (c) The Washington Post.