There are many complicated threads in the Taliban story in Afghanistan. I wonder if we will ever
learn about them all. I doubt it.
Pakistan supported the Taliban but, at one time, the US and the CIA funneled money to the
Taliban through Pakistan and Saudi Arabia because they wanted to run a pipeline through Afghanistan.
In the end, the US lost
Back in 1999, "The problem for Pakistan was that Washington had demonized
Bin Laden to such an extent that he had become a hero for many Muslims, particularly
in Pakistan. US policy was again a one-track agenda, solely focused on Bin Laden,
rather than tacking the wider problems of Afghanistan based terrorism and peace-making.
Washington appeared to have a Bin Laden policy but not an Afghan policy. From supporting
the Taliban the USA had now moved to the other extreme of rejecting them completely.
The US rejection of the Taliban was largely because of the pressure exerted by the feminist
movement at home."
p.182
The above is an excerpt from the book: Taliban Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia
by Ahmed Rashid, published in the United States by Yale
University Press. Copyright 2000 by Ahmed Rashid.
Also, the company that the US supported to build the pipeline through Afghanistan, Unocal,
had problems with the Taliban. It was a big multi-national company. It flew its executives in and
out of the country and they had no personal interest in the ethnic backgrounds of War Lords or the Taliban. The
company, according to Rashid, also pushed the Taliban to focus on women's rights and working
conditions in the workplace. At one time,.the US supported the Taliban through Pakistan and Saudi
Arabia because the CIA didn't have the money and Unocal never offered arms.
Eventually Unocal pulled out of the deal. |
