since the battle occurred during Ramadan, the month when Muslims do not eat or drink during the day. With the Afghan offensive stalled and the CIA and ODA teams overstretched, Franks decided to deploy special operations soldiers from JSOC into the battle on December 9. Forty operators from A Squadron Delta Force deployed forward to Tora Bora and assumed tactical command of the battle from the CIA. With the Delta squadron were a dozen of so members of the British SBS. The Delta operators were deployed in small teams embedded within the militias and sent their own operators out to search for bin Laden. Eventually, with the assistance of Green Berets and CIA operators, the militias made progress. The Delta squadron commander agreed with the Jawbreaker assessment of the situation and requested blocking forces or the scattering of aerial landmines to deny mountain passes to the enemy. Since the deployment of the Ranger battalion had been denied, he requested that his operators carryout the proposed role but all his requests were denied by General Franks. On December 12, two weeks into the battle, Zaman opened negotiations with the trapped al-Qaeda and Taliban in Tora Bora. Against the wishes of the Americans and British, Zaman called a temporary truce to allow al-Qaeda to surrender. This truce was a ruse to allow as many as several hundred al-Qaeda and members of the 055 Brigade to escape over night toward Pakistan. According to journalist Peter Bergen, bin Laden left Tora Bora on the night of December 12 and went to Kunar Province. The following day, a handheld radio recovered from the body of a dead al-Qaeda fighter allowed members of the Delta squadron, SBS, CIA, and MI6 to hear bin Laden's voice – apparently apologizing to his followers for leading them to Tora Bora and giving his blessing for their surrender – thought to be a recording addressed to the terrorists that stayed to fight a rearguard action to allow bin Laden to escape. The leader of the CIA Jawbreaker team at Tora Bora believed that two large al-Qaeda groups escaped: the smaller group of 130 jihadis escaped east into Pakistan, while the second group including bin Laden and 200 Saudi and Yemeni jihadis took the route across the mountains to the town of Parachinar, Pakistan. The Delta squadron commander believed that bin Laden crossed the border into Pakistan sometime around December 16.