Elite American troops mounted their first raid on a Taleban stronghold when they thought they had Osama bin Laden pinned down in a "20-by-20-mile" zone.
But when the special operations teams hit a complex used by Taleban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, they found it so full of caves and tunnels that it was impossible to seal.
Details of the weekend raid have emerged in an analysis by Newsweek magazine, citing top intelligence officials.
The raids on an airfield on the outskirts of Kandahar, the Taleban stronghold in southern Afghanistan, and the Omar complex netted information that will help the United States attack bin Laden and the al Qaeda network from the air with greater precision.
In response to the raids, the first major action of the ground war, the Taleban distributed extra rocket launchers, heavy machineguns and anti-aircraft guns to its fighters.
Yesterday, US warplanes changed tactics and carried out their biggest attack yet on the Taleban's front-line troops north of Kabul.
Until now, America and Britain have concentrated on bombing al Qaeda camps, training grounds and Taleban installations.
Defence officials in Washington said the air raids were also designed to demoralise troops recruited by bin Laden from other Arab nations who were manning the positions north of Kabul.
The United Nations issued a fresh appeal to Pakistan to open its borders as up to 15,000 people remained stranded at the Chaman border post.
It emerged yesterday that America's first air strikes on the southern city of Kandahar may have killed the 10-year-old son of Mullah Omar. A Pentagon spokesman said American planes targeted Omar's residential compound because it contained command and control facilities that were "legitimate military targets".
President George W. Bush has given the CIA $US1 billion ($2.43 billion) for the war against terrorism and granted it "new leeway" to do whatever is necessary in covert operations to destroy bin Laden.
Although the order does not say the CIA can kill bin Laden, a senior official told the Washington Post that "the gloves are off".
America's top general, Richard Myers, said troops wanted to capture bin Laden alive if possible, but he might not survive the war.
"If it's a defensive situation, then, you know, bullets will fly. But if we can capture somebody, then we'll do that," said Air Force General Myers, chairman of the Pentagon's Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The General denied Taleban claims it had shot down the US helicopter which crashed in Pakistan on Saturday, although Arabic television station Al Jazeera broadcast pictures of debris and said again that the Taleban had downed it.
A Teleban official claimed last night that up to 70 patients were killed by bombs dropped on a hospital during a US air raid in the eastern Afghan city of Herat.
General Myers also appeared to hint that America was again looking at Iraq and its leader, Saddam Hussein, as targets, telling reporters that the war could go beyond terrorism to halting weapons of mass destruction, from nuclear weapons to bio-terror like anthrax.
The spread of anthrax continued on the east coast of America yesterday. A Washington postal worker, who may have handled infected mail to the US Congress, is ill in hospital.
Intelligence authorities hunting those who carried out the World Trade Center attacks say they have chilling information on terror attacks planned for Europe.
Transcripts presented to an Italian court in evidence against a cell linked to bin Laden contain conversations with members of a Frankfurt cell over a planned chemical attack using liquid hidden in tomato cans.
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