Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001

I recommend every American read this book. It most likely won't change your mind about what we should or shouldn't do, or who we should or shouldn't vote for. But it will educate you as to what already happened.It is an informative book. It should be mandatory reading for fans of stupid conspiracy theorists like the "Loose Change" idiots, or the "Israel/ Bush planned the whole thing" nutters.The book is also a good chronology of the failures of the CIA in Afghanistan. The same Afghanistan that was also the one of the CIA's greatest successes.The CIA after years of making mistakes and not seeing the threat did come around, and then it was politicians and the State Dept that foiled the CIA's efforts and failed the people of Afghanistan and the US.The Clinton white house engaged Bin Laden the same ineffectual non conscientious way they engaged North Korea. They also ineffectually engaged the genocide being committed by the Serbs in Bosnia, and then later by the Serbs in Kosovo. As well as ineffectually engaging Iraq.OBL declared war on the US and all US citizens in the 1990's. It wasn't a secret declaration of war. And it came as no surprise to US allies in Afghanistan who were enemies of the Afghan Arabs and the Taliban. They had been trying to tell us the same for years.The CIA told the white house that there was a war declared on us. The CIA was slow, but with each attack;The attack on the USS Cole.The attack on the Embassies in Africa.The attack on the Air Force Barracks in Saudi Arabia.Various attacks on CIA personnel in Yemen and Afghanistan.With each attack the lower levels of the CIA became more outspoken. After the embassy bombings, one CIA employee tearfully told Tenet that the blood was on his hands. Guys at the CIA knew an attack on American soil was coming. By the late 90's even the reluctant CIA director had come around (though he never endorsed any of his people's plans against Osama or the Taliban). Tenet did warn his buddy democratic congressman to avoid air travel and to not congregate in public at the end of 1999 because of the imminent Al Qaeda threat. They were a big enough threat to warn a congressman that his life might be in danger around large amounts of US citizens that might be victims. But Al Qaeda was apparently not big enough a threat to warrant helping their opposition the Northern Alliance. Not big enough a threat to OK a strike against them.Well one of the CIA's many suggestions was taken. A cruise missile attack was launched on the day that the FBI came back with the DNA evidence on Monica Lewinsky's dress. Unfortunately the Pakistanis were told about the upcoming cruise missile attack and they in turn told the Taliban, who informed their main benefactor OBL.When the Bush administration came into office, they had in mind to unscrew many of the many many many mistakes of the previous administration (and perhaps some of the mistakes of the administration of the elder Bush).As everyone knows, they did not act swiftly enough. And as I read the book that thought loomed over my head. And truthfully, even though Clinton probably understood the CIA when they told him that an attack were coming, there was not much he could do with an uncooperative military, and a congress that did not trust him on either side of the isle.Clinton knew the CIA was right when customs had the good luck of interdicting a car bomb destined and capable of destroying a third of LAX. The FBI and other agencies were able to thwart attacks of the new millennium. And Clinton understood when the various agencies told him that it was luck alone that had enabled them to stop that Millennium attacks, and that they would most likely not catch the next one. Even if Clinton had done all the right things at that time, still the attack that was 9/11 was already launched. Killing bin Laden at that time would have unlikely stopped anything.When the Clinton cronies left over in the white house told the new occupant, the Bush administration, of the Danger of bin Laden, they did not warm up to the facts fast enough.Like the Clinton administration before it the Bush administration were told of the very likely upcoming attack. I think it was Richard Clark who told them; "act now like you are going to act after the attack, treat our uncooperative allies of Pakistan and the Gulf States, as if the attack had already happened". He said that or something like it. From all accounts I read sometimes Clarke was spot on, but other times he was a selfish toolbag.Condoleezza Rice did eventually push for all the right decisions to be made. She did finally decide that the Taliban was our enemy, and that it was unlikely that any amount of diplomacy was going to change that. Nor was any amount of diplomacy going to make Pakistan and the various Gulf States realize that the Taliban and Al Qaeda were our enemy with our current policies.By the time that Rice decided that Al Qaeda was our enemy, about a decade and a half of various of our Afghan allies constantly pleading to us the same thing. Rice agreed for the CIA to help Ahmed Shah Massoud and a coalition of other Afghan opponents of the Taliban genocide, and their extremist Wahabbi interpretation of Islam. The US finally agreed to help our allies against our sworn enemies, about the same time the Al Qaeda finally figured out how to kill the wily, brilliant and elusive Massaud.It should be noted that despite all the rhetoric of the injustice of the Palestinian situation. That was not the cause of 9/11. The Arab jihadists held the Palestinian cause as an afterthought at best.Also not a motivation for the attack was any Afghan policy that we had. If anything it was a lack of a US policy in Afghanistan that caused the attack. We stood by and did nothing while the most extreme elements in the Middle East and Pakistan funded and equipped a faction in Afghanistan foreign to Afghans and Afghan history. We even did some standing by while Pakistan used our money to fund our enemies.The main motivation of the 9/11 attacks was our policy of containment in Iraq.Also I'd like to note that one of the reasons that the Clinton administration did not want to help Massaud, even when it became clear the abuses that the Taliban were inflicting on women, and even after it became clear that Al Qaeda had attacked US already over seas, and was planning an attack on US soil. The main reason that Clinton did not want to help our ally fight our enemy is the pariah of American liberty, the drug war. To compete with the funding of oil Sheikhs, and the funding and assistance of the Pakistani military, Massaud was benefiting off of the number one cash crop in Afghanistan, opium.If there is one thing today that will ensure that our enemies in Afghanistan stick around a little longer than they should, it is our attempt at eradicating the poppy fields. We are driving the vast profits of the drug trade away from the legal government, and to whoever will oppose us. We are probably not going to stop a single European drug user from getting his fix, and I don't know why we are trying.

Steve Coll offers a fascinating look at the intrigue and internecine rivalries among the intelligence agencies participating unwittingly in the ascendance of the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan during the last two decades of the 20th century. In a shadow world where loyalties wear thin and all is not as it seems, American CIA, Pakistani ISI and Saudi GID agents covertly funnel money, arms, and intelligence to both nascent guerrilla movements and warring Afghan factions through the 1980s and 90s. Coll reveals the events leading to 9/11 not only on the battlefields of Afghanistan, but behind closed doors in the corridors of power in Washington, Islamabad, and Riyadh.Arming the Afghan mujahideen as they wage a vicious and protracted insurgency against the Soviet occupiers in the 80s seems harmless enough. But the untrained Arabs fighting alongside their intrepid Afghan counterparts fall under the sway of a charismatic young Arab sheik with far greater ambitions than merely pushing the stubborn Soviet Bear back to his den. Though he would demonstrate limited ability as a field commander, Osama bin Laden aroused bloodlust in these guerrilla fighters that would result in the most lethal act of terrorism in modern history. Ghost Wars offers an explanation as to how U.S. arms such as Stinger missiles wind up in the hands of those very same guerrillas.After documenting the defeat of the mighty Soviet Army at the hands of the CIA/ISI/GID-supported mujahideen, Coll turns his attention to the intelligence agencies' often misguided efforts to choose sides in an Afghan civil war that eventually destroys much of Kabul and drives many refugees to Pakistan. Incredibly, while American covert operatives support Ahmed Shah Massoud's efforts in the North, our Pakistani 'allies' are funding Pashtun warlords such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in the Southeastern part of the country!An unintended consequence of these actions - as the intelligence agencies become preoccupied - is the emergence of extreme radical Islam in the form of al-Qaeda. Initially intent only on the overthrow of Middle Eastern governments not practicing a pure form of Islam, al-Qaeda's malevolent aims evolve into global jihad against America and her allies and one audacious plot to strike our country. Bin Laden patiently and painstakingly builds his terrorist organization first in Sudan, then in Eastern Afghanistan while the Afghan civil war rages on. On more than one occasion the spy agencies (and their government sponsors) discount al-Qaeda as a serious threat and eventually pass on opportunities to strike Bin Laden's camp. And at one point a U.S. Tomahawk Cruise Missile attack simply misses its mark!It becomes obvious from reading Ghost Wars that American efforts to influence events in Afghanistan subsequent to the 1980s Soviet-Afghan War, largely through clandestine operations, were at times counterproductive. One can easily argue that those efforts indirectly resulted in more, rather than less, instability in Central and South Asia.In this ambitious work, Coll captures in precise detail the events leading up to 9/11 from the early days of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan through the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, and the USS Cole bombing. For that alone, Ghost Wars is worth reading. Through thorough and meticulous research (there are some 50+ pages of endnotes), the author sets an almost impossible standard in reporting. Most of the interviews Coll relies on in the book he apparently conducts himself. And in an effort to ensure accuracy, he repeatedly checks facts against recently declassified documents, updating the newer printing with the corrected information.The reader struggles to keep up with the many characters that move in and out of the murky and byzantine spy world that is the milieu for this 576-page book. However, Coll carefully constructs the most important characters such as William Casey, George Tenet, and Prince Turki bin Faisal, Head of Saudi Intelligence, such that the reader gains an appreciation for not only what these spymasters thought, but how they thought. One is left to wonder how these talented and capable government officials missed so many clues in the run-up to 9/11.The detailed character development (including that of Bin Laden) without a doubt is the most satisfying element of Ghost Wars. It is what truly makes the book worthwhile reading. Highly recommend for that alone!For future generations of politicians intent on committing our nation's considerable intelligence resources to shadow wars in far-flung backwaters like Afghanistan, a careful reading of Ghost Wars ought to make them think twice.A Detailed Account of the Events Leading to 9/11.

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Brilliantly researched and written. Very realistic. Illuminates the dark and shadowy world that was a background to the insurgency in Afghanistan and the bungling hunt for OBL. How the US created more problems in trying to solve another one. Hilarious at times.

Steve Coll, Verlagsdirektor der Washington Post, hat ein sehr lesenswertes Sachbuch geschrieben, in dessen Zentrum jenes Land steht, das von 1979 bis heute nie mehr zur Ruhe gekommen ist: Afghanistan. Coll kennt die Gegend selber aus eigener Erfahrung, da er von 1989 bis 1992 leitender Korrespondent der Washington Post für Südasien war. Er untersucht das für Außenstehende nur schwer durchschaubare Interessengeflecht von CIA, saudi-arabischem und pakistanischem Geheimdienst, von denen jeder sein eigenes Süppchen kochte. Es handelt sich um ein in jeder Hinsicht sehr journalistisches Buch. In jahrelanger Kleinarbeit hat der Autor unzählige Interviews und andere Quellen ausgewertet. Dies hat auch Einfluss auf den Stil des Buches. Es wird eben überwiegend eher "berichtet" als "erzählt".Im Wesentlichen ist das Buch strikt chronologisch aufgebaut. Es umfasst als Ereigniszeitraum die Zeitspanne von der sowjetischen Invasion Afghanistans bis zum 10.September 2001. Es soll somit natürlich auch der Epochencharakter des 11. September 2001 betont werden. Eine Ausnahme vom chronologischen Schema ist geschickterweise der Prolog, der im September 1996 beginnt, zu einem Zeipunkt, als Gary Schroen, nun Stationschef der CIA in Islamabad, seinen ehemaligen Standort Kabul besucht, 6 Jahre nach dem Ende des Kalten Krieges, zu einem Zeitpunkt, als die Taliban auf dem besten Weg sind das ganze Land zu erobern.Daraufhin ist Colls Werk in drei klar unterscheidbare Abschnitte unterteilt. "Blood Brothers" erstreckt sich von November 1979 bis November 1989 und untersucht, wie der Titel suggeriert, im Wesentlichen die Zusammenarbeit zwischen CIA und den Mujaheddin im Kampf gegen die sowjetischen Invasoren. Auch die Beziehung zwischen Bin Laden und dem saudischen Geheimdienst bleibt hier nicht außen vor. Der zweite Teil "The One-Eyed Man was King" beleuchtet den Aufstieg der Taliban unter Führung Mullah Mohammed Omars von März 1989 bis Dezember 1997. Der dritte Teil "The Distant Enemy" schließlich widmet sich der Jagd auf Osama Bin Laden von Januar 1998 bis zum 10.9.2001.Coll verucht alles in seinen größeren Berichtsrahmen zu rücken, ob es sich um die seit den 90er zahrleicher werdenen Terroranschläge der Al-Quaida handelt oder um die zahlreichen Meinungsverschiedenheiten zwischen State Department und CIA. Er zeigt ebenso auf, wie grundlegende Positionen Ende der 90er Jahre oft völlig andere waren als Ende der 80er Jahre. Ein wenig störend waren die teils etwas zu ausführlichen Personenbeschreibungen (er war so und so alt, sah so und so aus und hatte diese und jene Hobbys), ansonsten haben wir es hier mit einem sehr ausführlich recherchierten Kapitel der jüngsten Zeitgeschichte zu tun, das seinesgleichen sucht.

三部構成の大著です。第一部がアフガン戦争とソ連軍撤退まで。第二部がソ連軍撤退後のアフガン内戦、タリバンの誕生と拡大、第三部がCIAと国務省とホワイトハウスの認識の齟齬と足並みの乱れ、諜報戦の失敗というより官僚制度の陥穽と政治的失策の結果としてカタストロフェに向かうアメリカの姿が描かれます。｢タリバンって要はパキスタン軍部の別働隊か｣と目から鱗が落ちて、ソ連軍撤退後のアフガン内戦の意味が見えたような気がしました。あれはアフガニスタンを傀儡国家に仕立てようというパキスタン軍部の策動だったのかと。つまり「アフガン人によるアフガニスタン」を目指したアフマド・シャー・マスードの真の敵はタリバンというよりパキスタンの国家的野望だったのかと。後半、政界引退後にパキスタン政府のロビイストとして雇われているチャーリー・ウィルソンがチラリと登場するのですが、なんたる皮肉。さらなる皮肉は、自軍撤退後のアフガニスタン情勢をアメリカよりも正しく読み憂慮していたのがソ連の方だったということなのですが。本書をそのまま読むと、サウジ情報部やISI（パキスタン統合情報局）との連携を最後まで捨て切れなかったアメリカは自分の首を絞める縄を二十年かけてシコシコと編んでいったということになります。そういえば、私は以前フランス人学者が｢英語話者同士であるが故にアメリカはパキスタンの反北部同盟プロパガンダや偽情報を鵜呑みにしたのだ｣とフランス人らしく指摘するエッセイを読んだ記憶があります。さて、果たして真実アメリカが油断不覚悟以外は責めと負わないイノセントな存在だったのか…。ともあれ、かなりの大著ですが、文章は読み易く、各人物像も生き生きとしており、多端な事象をよく整理して解説していると思います。読後には叙事詩的気分が残ります。オサマ・ビン・ラディン一人に執拗に拘り続けるアメリカの近視眼ぶりを批判し続けたマスードと共に幕を開け、彼の死でもって終わる、地政学の宿命と個人の運と組織的闘争の叙事詩というか。いまだエンドゲームの見えない叙事詩ですが。