In the Graveyard of Empires: America's War in Afghanistan

Human Rights Watch, 1993).

16. U.S. Department of State, Cable, “Discussing Afghan Policy with the Pakistanis,” December 22, 1995. Released by the National Security Archive.

17. Ibid.; U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan and Sectarian Violence Contribute to a Souring of Pakistan’s Relations with Iran,” March 13, 1997. Released by the National Security Archive.

18. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan and Sectarian Violence Contribute to a Souring of Pakistan’s Relations with Iran,” March 13, 1997. Released by the National Security Archive.

19. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan: Taliban Seem to Have Less Funds and Supplies This Year, But the Problem Does Not Appear to Be that Acute,” February 17, 1999. Released by the National Security Archive.

20. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan: Russian Embassy Official Claims Iran Interfering more than Pakistan,” November 30, 1995. Released by the National Security Archive.

21. U.S. Intelligence Assessment, [date and title unknown] Mori DocID: 800277, U.S. Central Command. Released by the National Security Archive.

22. U.S. Department of State, Cable, “Discussing Afghan Policy with the Pakistanis,” December 22, 1995. Released by the National Security Archive.

23. Ibid.

24. U.S. Department of State, Cable, “A/S Raphel’s October 4 Meeting with Assef All on Afghanistan,” October 13, 1995. Released by the National Security Archive.

25. U.S. Department of State, Cable, “Discussing Afghan Policy with the Pakistanis,” December 22, 1995. Released by the National Security Archive.

26. Khalilzad, Prospects for the Afghan Interim Government, p. 2.

27. Author interview with Ambassador Robert Oakley, February 1, 2008.

28. Quoted in Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 (New York: Penguin Press, 2004), p. 239.

29. Author interview with Ambassador Robert Oakley, February 1, 2008.

30. Peter R. Blood, ed., Afghanistan: A Country Study (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2001).

31. Rubin, Search for Peace in Afghanistan.

32. Mountstuart Elphinstone, An Account of the Kingdom of Caubul and Its Dependencies in Persia, Tartary, and India (Graz, Austria: Akademische Druck, 1969), p. 434.

33. Zalmay Khalilzad, “Afghanistan: Time to Reengage,” Washington Post, October 7, 1996, p. A21.

Chapter Four

1. Central Intelligence Agency, Biography of Mohammad Omar, December 21, 1998. Released by the National Security Archive.

2. Gilles Kepel, Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002), p. 54.

3. Ahmed Rashid, Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000), p. 20.

4. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Knights Under the Prophet’s Banner, translated by Laura Mansfield (Old Tappan, NJ: TLG Publications, 2002), p. 130.

5. Ayman al-Zawahiri, “Supporting the Palestinians,” Statement released June 2006.

6. Osama bin Laden, “Message to the Peoples of Europe,” Released November 2007.

7. Olivier Roy, Islam and Resistance in Afghanistan, 2nd ed. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 57; Kepel, Jihad, p. 58.

8. S. V. R. Nasr, The Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution: The Jamaat-i Islami of Pakistan (London: I. B. Tauris, 1994), p. 7. Also see, for example, Syed Abul Ala Maudoodi, A Short History of the Revivalist Movement in Islam (Lahore, Pakistan: Islamic Publications, 1972); Sayyid Abula’la Maududi, Al-Jihad fi al-Islam (Dihli: Markazi Maktabah-yi Islami, 1988).

9. Mariam Abou Zahab and Olivier Roy, Islamist Networks: The Afghan-Pakistan Connection, translated by John King (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), pp. 22–23.

10. Kepel, Jihad, pp. 224–25.

11. S. V. R. Nasr, “Islamic Opposition to the Islamic State: The Jama’at-i Islami 1977–1988,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 25, no. 2, May 1993, p. 267; Kepel, Jihad, pp. 100–1.

12. Jamal Malik, Colonialization of Islam: Dissolution of Traditional Institutions in Pakistan (New Delhi: Vanguard Books, 1996).

13. Zahab and Roy, Islamist Networks, pp. 22–23.

14. Rashid, Taliban, p. 17.

15. Ibid., pp. 22–23.

16. Zahab and Roy, Islamist Networks, p. 13.

17. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan and Sectarian Violence Contribute to a Souring of Pakistan’s Relations with Iran,” March 13, 1997. Released by the National Security Archive.

18. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan: [Excised] Describes Pakistan’s Current Thinking,” March 9, 1998. Released by the National Security Archive.

19. Abdulkader Sinno, “Explaining the Taliban’s Ability to Mobilize the Pashtuns,” in Robert D. Crews and Amin Tarzi, eds., The Taliban and the Crisis of Afghanistan (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008), pp. 59–89.

20. Jason Burke, Al-Qa’ida: Casting a Shadow of Terror (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2003), p. III.

21. Decree Announced by the General Presidency of Amr Bil Maroof Wa Nahi An al-Munkar, Religious Police, Kabul, November 1996.

22. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Scenesetter for Your Visit to Islamabad: Afghan Angle,” January 16, 1997. Released by the National Security Archive. The document was a background note for an upcoming visit of Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia Robin Raphel. The cable summarizes the political and military state of affairs in Afghanistan.

23. Zalmay Khalilzad and Daniel Byman, “Afghanistan: The Consolidation of a Rogue State,” Washington Quarterly, vol. 23, no. 1, Winter 2000, p. 65.

24. Decree Announced by General Presidency of Amr Bil Maruf, Religious Police, Kabul, December 1996.

25. Privy Council Office (PCO) [Ottawa, Canada] [Released by the U.S. National Security Agency], “IAC Intelligence Assessment—IA 7/96,” “Afghanistan: Taliban’s Challenges, Regional Concerns, October 18, 1996.” Released by the National Security Archive.

26. Rashid, Taliban, pp. 68–76.

27. Quoted in Rashid, Taliban, p. 50.

28. Ibid., pp. 119–20.

29. Quoted in Ahmed Rashid, Descent into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation- Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia (New York: Viking, 2008), p. 317.

30. U.S. Department of State, Cable, “Osama bin Laden: Taliban Spokesman Seeks New Proposal for Resolving bin Laden Problem,” November 28, 1998. Released by the National Security Archive.

31. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Scenesetter for Your Visit to Islamabad: Afghan Angle,” January 16, 1997. Released by the National Security Archive.

32. U.S. Department of State, Cable, “Discussing Afghan Policy with the Pakistanis,” December 22, 1995. Released by the National Security Archive.

33. U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan: Pakistanis to Regulate Wheat and Fuel Trade to Gain Leverage Over Taliban,” August 13, 1997; U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Scenesetter for Your Visit to Islamabad: Afghan Angle,” January 16, 1997; U.S. Embassy (Islamabad), Cable, “Afghanistan: [Excised] Briefs Ambassador on his Activities. Pleads for Greater Activism by U.N.” August 27, 1997. Released by the National