The fall of Mazar-i-Sharif (or Mazar-e-Sharif) in November 2001 resulted from the first major offensive of the Afghanistan War after American intervention. A push into the city of Mazar-i-Sharif in Balkh Province by the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan (Northern Alliance), combined with U.S. Army Special Forces aerial bombardment, resulted in the withdrawal of Taliban forces who had held the city since 1998. After the fall of outlying villages, and an intensive bombardment, the Taliban and al-Qaeda forces withdrew from the city. Several hundred pro-Taliban fighters were killed. Approximately 500 were captured, and approximately 1,000 reportedly defected. The capture of Mazar-i-Sharif was the first major defeat for the Taliban.
Preparation
The Taliban captured Mazar-i-Sharif on 8 August 1998 and controlled it thereafter. After taking the city, Taliban fighters committed a massacre against its Shia population. This led to widespread international condemnation, and further isolation of the Taliban regime.
The campaign to capture Mazar-i-Sharif began on October 17, 2001, when the CIA's eight-member Team Alpha landed in the Dari-a-Suf Valley, about 80 miles south of the city, to link up with General Abdul Rashid Dostum. They were joined three days later by ODA 595 (later portrayed in the film 12 Strong). One of the CIA officers was Johnny Micheal Spann.
In the days leading up to the battle, Northern Alliance troops advanced on population centers near the city, such as Shol Ghar, which is 25 kilometers from Mazar-i-Sharif. Phonelines into the city were severed, and American officials began reporting accounts of anti-Taliban forces charging Afghan tanks on horseback. On November 2, 2001, Green Berets from ODA (Operational Detachment Alpha) 543 and three members of the CIA's Team Bravo inserted into the Dari-a-Balkh Valley, after being delayed by weather for several nights. Their role was to support General Mohammed Atta Nur and his militia. Together they fought through the Dari-e-Souf Valley and had linked up with Dostum and his force and ODA 595 and the CIA Team Alpha, who had also battled through the valley.
Dostum led the ethnic-Uzbek-dominated faction of the Northern Alliance, the Junbish-i-Milli Islami Afghanistan, in an attack on the village of Keshendeh southwest of the city on November 4, seizing it with his horse-mounted troops. General Noor, meanwhile, led 2,000 men of the ethnic-Tajik-dominated Jamiat-e Islami forces against the village of Ag Kupruk directly south of the city, along with six Special Forces soldiers and seven others who directed bombing from behind Taliban lines north of the city. It was seized two days later. Ethnic Hazara forces of Mohammad Mohaqiq's Hezbe Wahdat took part in the offensive.
Propaganda leaflets were dropped from airplanes, showing a woman being struck by a man and asking if this was how the Afghans wanted to live, and listing the radio frequencies over which Americans would be broadcasting their own version of events. Meanwhile, U.S. Special Forces set up laser designators to serve as beacons for guided munitions, highlighting targets around the city.
On November 7, the New York University's Director of Studies on International Cooperation, Barnett Rubin, appeared before a hearing of the American House Committee on International Relations on "The Future of Afghanistan". He claimed that with Mazar-i-Sharif on the brink of invasion, the US was responsible to ensure that there were no reprisal killings of Taliban members by the Northern Alliance. He noted that when the city had been overrun (in 1997 and 1998), thousands had been murdered by both sides.
Bombing campaign
On November 7 and 8, as the Taliban were moving 4,000 fighters across the countryside towards Mazar-i-Sharif in preparation for battle, American B-52 bombers bombed Taliban defenders concentrated in the Cheshmeh-ye Shafa gorge that marked the southern entrance to the city, as well as the Haji Gak pass, which was the only Taliban-controlled entrance to the city. This was one of the heaviest campaigns up to that point. In 2009, former Taliban commander Maulvi Abdul Akhundzada shared a chilling account of the horrors they witnessed during the bombing:
"When the bombing started, I was commanding some 400 fighters on the front lines near Mazar-e Sharif. The bombs cut down our men like a reaper harvesting wheat. Bodies were dismembered. Dazed fighters were bleeding from the ears and nose from the bombs' concussions. We couldn't bury the dead. Our reinforcements died in their trenches."
Nevertheless, the Taliban claimed they had infiltrated 500 fighters into the city to prepare for the coming battle.