On Sat, 15 Sep 2001, Ken Hanly wrote:
> Najibullah's government was not to fall until 1992 and the Taliban did
> not take power until 1996. They immediately hung Najibullah and
> displayed his body in public. So there were over six years of struggle
> for the Taliban during which they were totally abandoned by the US who
> had signed an agreement with the Soviets not to arm the mujahedeen.
I agree with much of your post, Ken, but here you seem to be equating the Taliban with the Mujahadeen in general. The Taliban didn't appear in the country until late 1994. Their ranks were primarily made up of students that had studied in seminaries in Pakistan ("Taliban" means "students.") Thus they overran most of the country in little over a year.
Also, the civil war among the Mujahadeen is usually dated from 1992. Between the ouster of the Russians in 1989 and 1992, the country was relatively at peace, as I understand it.
As far as Pakistan is concerned, the rather opaque question there is who is on the side of the seminarians, and who is against them. My impression is that Musharef belongs to a faction of the army that would like to take the country back from seminarian control, but isn't strong enough. But I certainly don't know any such thing for certain. And you are right to caution that if Pakistan is just used as a jumping-off point to be bullied aside, rather than a long-term project, we risk setting off a civil war in a country that has the bomb as well as a population of a 130 million. Although it can be argued that is also a likely future for the country if outsiders leave the country alone.
Michael
__________________________________________________________________________ Michael Pollak................New York City..............mpollak at panix.com