KABUL: Fighting in Afghanistan has escalated with US andAfghanistan officials tipping 2018 to be a ‘game-changer’ as relentlessairstrikes pummel Islamist militant groups — but others warn the 16-yearwar has simply become a more violent stalemate.

A traditional easing in fighting during the freezing winter months has beenabsent this year as the Taliban and Islamic State group respond tointensifying US and link>Afghanlink> air assaults.

Since US President Donald Trump announced his new strategy for Afghanistanin August, giving the US Air Force more leeway to go after militants,American pilots have been bombarding Taliban and IS fighters, theirtraining camps and drug-making laboratories.

‘The gloves are off,’ Brigadier General Lance Bunch, who directs future airoperations in Afghanistan, told reporters recently.

The new policy has ‘definitely been a game-changer and the Taliban isdefinitely feeling it’, he added.

The US is deploying more troops and aircraft to Afghanistan, which hasbecome the main theatre of operations for the US Air Force following adrawdown in Syria and Iraq. At the same time it is beefing up Afghanistan’sfledgling air capabilities.

US aircraft dropped 4,361 munitions across the country in 2017 — includingmore than 2,300 since August, which exceeded the combined total for 2015and 2016.

With the help of huge B-52 bombers, the US has expanded its campaign to farnortheastern Afghanistan near the China and Tajikistan borders where it isalso targeting the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, which neighbouringChina blames for launching attacks on its soil.

‘The days of old where you had fighting seasons are gone,’ Major GeneralJames Hecker, head of NATO’s Air Command in Afghanistan, told AFP in Kabullast week. – APP/AFP