Winter could delay bid to capture bin Laden

US and British military planners are running out of time to deploy ground troops inside Afghanistan before winter sets in, ministers admitted today.

Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon conceded that land operations would be all but impossible once the snows came down over the Hindu Kush mountains, cutting off movements inside the country.

With the onset of winter expected from early November, military planners effectively have less than a month if they are to get troops into the country this year to ‘‘root out’’ Osama bin Laden and his al Qaida network.

‘‘Everyone knows that the weather in a few weeks’ time in Afghanistan will be particularly difficult,’’ Mr Hoon told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

‘‘Historically, we know that the civil wars that have plagued Afghanistan tend to close down in the winter months. That is obviously a factor that any military planner must take account of.’’

Junior defence minister Lewis Moonie confirmed that the looming Afghan winter would be a ‘‘decisive’’ factor in the planning process.

If ground troops are not deployed before winter it effectively means that they will have to wait until the snows melt next spring before they can go in, losing the momentum built up the aerial bombing campaign.

British defence sources said it was still possible that land forces could go in this year if there was a rapid collapse of the Taliban regime as a result of the bombing strikes, but they acknowledged there may have to be a delay.

International Development Secretary Clare Short, who sits in Tony Blair’s War Cabinet, said that if troops were sent in, it would not be a large-scale deployment.

She also dismissed reports that they could find themselves fighting the rebel Northern Alliance - frustrated at the lack of direct military support from the coalition forces - as well as the Taliban.

‘‘There are not going to be large numbers of ground troops and they are not going to take on two enemies,’’ she told a Ministry of Defence news conference.