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

56. Author interview with Lieutenant Colonel Edward O’Connell (ret.), October 4, 2007.

57. Author interview with Richard Armitage, October 17, 2007.

58. Gary C. Schroen, First In: An Insider’s Account of How the CIA Spearheaded the War on Terror in Afghanistan (New York: Ballantine Books, 2005), p. 360.

59. See, for example, Seymour Hersh, Chain of Command (New York: HarperCollins, 2004), p. 188; George Packer, The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006), p. 45.

60. Author interview with Robert Grenier, November 6, 2007.

61. Author interview with Lieutenant General Karl Eikenberry, October 27, 2007.

62. Author interview with Dov Zakheim, January 30, 2008.

63. Sarah Chayes, The Punishment of Virtue: Inside Afghanistan After the Taliban (New York: Penguin Press, 2006), p. 155.

64. Ahmed Rashid, “Afghanistan: Progress Since the Taliban,” Asian Affairs, vol. 37, no. I, March 2006, p. 33.

65. L. Paul Bremer III, My Year in Iraq: The Struggle to Build a Future of Hope (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006), p. 143.

66. Letter from Jeb Mason to Ambassador Bremer, Talking Points: Progress in the War on Terror, September 17, 2003.

67. Ali Jalali, “The Future of Afghanistan,” Parameters, vol. 36, no. 1, Spring 2006, p. 5.

68. Andrew M. Roe, “To Create a Stable Afghanistan,” Military Review, November-December 2005, p. 21.

69. David L. Buffaloe, Conventional Forces in Low-Intensity Conflict: The 82d Airborne in Firebase Shkin, Landpower Essay 04–2 (Arlington, VA: Association of the United States Army, 2004), p. 12.

70. On a firsthand account of the Battle for Deh Chopan, see Michael McInerney, “The Battle for Deh Chopan, Part 1,” Soldier of Fortune, August 2004; McInerney, “The Battle for Deh Chopan, Part 2,” Soldier of Fortune, September 2004.

71. Anne Evans et al., A Guide to Government in Afghanistan (Washington, DC: World Bank Publications, 2004), p. 14.

72. On warlords and Afghanistan, see Roe, “To Create a Stable Afghanistan,” pp. 20–26; Government of Afghanistan, Security Sector Reform: Disbandment of Illegal Armed Groups Programme (DIAG) and Disarmament, Demobilisation, and Reintegration Programme (DDR) (Kabul: Government of Afghanistan, October 2005); Mark Sedra, Challenging the Warlord Culture: Security Sector Reform in Post-Taliban Afghanistan (Bonn: Bonn International Center for Conversion, 2002).

73. Several warlords were reassigned as provincial governors, including Sher Muhammad Akhundzada of Helmand (2005), Ismail Khan of Herat (2004), Gul Agha of Kandahar (2004), Haji Din Muhammad of Nangarhar, Muhammad Ibrahim of Ghor (2004), Gul Ahmad of Badghis (2003), and Syed Amin of Badakshan (2003).

74. Combined Forces Command—Afghanistan and Altai Consulting, Afghan National Development Poll (Kabul: Combined Forces Command, 2005).

75. Afghanistan National Security Council, National Threat Assessment (Kabul: Afghanistan National Security Council, 2005), p. 4. Also see Afghanistan Ministry of Defense, The National Military Strategy (Kabul: Afghanistan Ministry of Defense, October 2005).

76. Evans et al., A Guide to Government in Afghanistan, p. 14.

77. Feith, War and Decision, p. 123.

78. Lester Grau, ed., The Bear Went Over the Mountain: Soviet Combat Tactics in Afghanistan (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1996), p. 201.

79. 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 Books, 2004), pp. 131, 167, 202.

80. Ibid., p. 89.

81. Francesc Vendrell, EUSR Vendrell’s Valedictory Report (Kabul: European Union, 2008).

Chapter Eight

1. Author interview with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, February 22, 2008.

2. Mountstuart Elphinstone, An Account of the Kingdom of Caubul and Its Dependencies in Persia, Tartary, and India (Graz, Austria: Akademische Druck, 1969), p. 489.

3. Radek Sikorski, “The Devil You Know,” Newsweek, August 9, 2004, p. 31.

4. Author interview with Ambassador James Dobbins, July 27, 2007.

5. Ibid.

6. United Nations Security Council Resolution 1383, December 6, 2001, S/RES/1383 (2001).

7. “Agreement on Provisional Arrangements in Afghanistan Pending the Reestablishment of Permanent Government Institutions,” December 2001, Annex II.

8. 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. 184.

9. Author interview with Daoud Yaqub, January 2, 2008.

10. David Rohde and David E. Sanger, “How the ‘Good War’ in Afghanistan Went Bad,” New York Times, August 12, 2007, p. A1.

11. Author interview with Lieutenant General David Barno, September 4, 2007.

12. Author interview with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, February 22, 2008; Statement of Zalmay Khalilzad Before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, October 29, 2003.

13. Author interview with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, February 22, 2008.

14. Statement of Zalmay Khalilzad Before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, October 29, 2003.

15. Author interview with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, February 22, 2008.

16. Ali Ahmad Jalali and Lester W. Grau, The Other Side of the Mountain: Mujahideen Tactics in the Soviet-Afghan War (Quantico, VA: U.S. Marine Corps, Studies and Analysis Division, 1995).

17. Ali A. Jalali, “Rebuilding Afghanistan’s National Army,” Parameters, vol. 32, no. 3, Autumn 2002, p. 79.

18. Author interview with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, February 22, 2008.

19. Author interview with Lieutenant General David Barno, September 4, 2007.

20. Michael O’Hanlon and Adriana Lins de Albuquerque, Afghanistan Index: Tracking Variables of Reconstruction and Security in Post-Taliban Afghanistan (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, September 15, 2005).

21. Author interview with Lieutenant General David Barno, January 17, 2008.

22. Lieutenant General David W. Barno, “Fighting ‘The Other War’: Counter-insurgency Strategy in Afghanistan, 2003–2005,” Military Review, September-October 2007, p. 36.

23. Memorandum from Donald L. Evans to the President, Subject: “Recent Visit to Baghdad, Iraq, and Kabul, Afghanistan,” October 24, 2003. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld subsequently wrote a memo to Evans noting that “your report to the President on your visit to Iraq and Afghanistan was excellent. Thanks so much for going. I appreciate it a great deal. Thanks also for letting other folks know what you found.” Letter from Donald Rumsfeld to the Honorable Donald L. Evans, October 29, 2003.

24. Author interview with Lieutenant General David Barno, September 4, 2007.

25. George W. Bush, State of the Union Address (Washington, DC: White House, 2004).

26. Author interview with Lieutenant General David Barno, January 17, 2008.

27. See, for example, International Crisis Group, Countering Afghanistan’s Insurgency: No Quick Fixes (Kabul: International Crisis Group, 2006).

28. ABC News/BBC/ARD Poll, Afghanistan—Where Things Stand (Kabul: ABC News/BBC/ARD Poll, December 2007), p. 6.