Part 17 (1/2)

The Taliban had heard demands and complaints from American administrations before. Nothing significant had come of them. ”We don't foresee an attack against us,” said the Taliban foreign minister, ”because there is no reason for it.”22 Taliban officials undoubtedly believed that Afghanistan's forbidding geography would discourage anything but a cosmetic military effort. After all, they had heard President Clinton declare after a previous bin Laden attack in 1998 that Afghanistan had ”been warned for years to stop harboring and supporting these terrorist groups. But countries that persistently host terrorists have no right to be safe havens.... There will be no sanctuary for terrorists.”23 Things were different now. And if the Taliban believed America was bluffing, they miscalculated.

PART IX

Into the Graveyard of Empires

Afghan-Uzbek BorderFEBRUARY 15, 1989 One after another, Soviet soldiers boarded military convoys. Their final withdrawal from Afghanistan was underway. A few waved good-bye as they looked at that country for the last time. Just across the border, in Uzbekistan, the returning troops received flowers, were serenaded by a military band, and sat at long, linen-draped tables for a banquet in their honor.1 Though it was likely not lost on any of the soldiers that the Soviet adventure in Afghanistan had ended in failure, their commander, General Boris Gromov, saluted his men for fulfilling their ”internationalist duty.” Though it was likely not lost on any of the soldiers that the Soviet adventure in Afghanistan had ended in failure, their commander, General Boris Gromov, saluted his men for fulfilling their ”internationalist duty.”2 General Gromov had arranged to be taken back into Afghanistan by helicopter so he could be the last member of the Soviet military to depart the country, making a dramatic exit by walking alone across the inaptly named Friends.h.i.+p Bridge that connected Afghanistan to the Soviet Union. ”There is not a single Soviet soldier or officer left behind me,” he declared. ”Our nine-year stay ends with this.”3 The Soviet ”stay” in Afghanistan officially came to a close on February 15, 1989, at five minutes before noon local time. Appropriately, the USSR's final act in the war was another miscalculation: Gromov's ch.o.r.eographed departure occurred two hours later than had been planned. The Soviet ”stay” in Afghanistan officially came to a close on February 15, 1989, at five minutes before noon local time. Appropriately, the USSR's final act in the war was another miscalculation: Gromov's ch.o.r.eographed departure occurred two hours later than had been planned.4 The Soviet Union put a brave face on its humiliation. But it was obvious to people around the world-and to the Soviet people in particular-that Afghanistan was the rock on which the last empire of the twentieth century had foundered. Lasting just less than a decade, the war had claimed the lives of fifteen thousand Soviet soldiers.5 It disillusioned a generation of young Russians who had been led to believe that the Soviet Army was invincible. Even General Gromov, while distancing his military from the failure, later acknowledged the depth of the calamity, admitting that ”the war was a huge and in many respects irreparable political mistake.” It disillusioned a generation of young Russians who had been led to believe that the Soviet Army was invincible. Even General Gromov, while distancing his military from the failure, later acknowledged the depth of the calamity, admitting that ”the war was a huge and in many respects irreparable political mistake.”6 The legacy of the decade-long Soviet misadventure would not be erased easily. The Soviets had brutalized the country's people, killing one million and displacing five million more. They had also destroyed much of the land, stripping its forests of trees. The prospects of survival for the puppet regime they left behind in Kabul were exceedingly poor. Once the Soviets withdrew, opposition forces, known collectively as the mujahideen (”holy warriors” in Arabic), quickly closed in on Kabul and seized power.

For most of the 1980s the U.S. government channeled funds and materiel to various mujahideen groups as part of the largest covert operation in CIA history.7 As the Soviets completed their retreat, the CIA station in Islamabad, Pakistan, cabled the headquarters at Langley, Virginia, two words: ”We won.” As the Soviets completed their retreat, the CIA station in Islamabad, Pakistan, cabled the headquarters at Langley, Virginia, two words: ”We won.”8 Not long afterward, American activities in Afghanistan ended. After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the administrations of George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton turned their attention away from Cold War preoccupations. In the chaos and civil war that consumed the country after the Soviet departure, the United States emba.s.sy in Kabul closed its doors. As America lost interest in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan poured in millions of dollars to fund roads, clinics, radical Wahhabi madra.s.sas and mosques. The Pakistani government cultivated Afghanistan's Pashtun warlords and, beginning in 1996, supported the regime that became known as the Taliban. None of this caused any noticeable concern at the senior levels of the U.S. government. Few American policy or intelligence officials imagined that they would ever have to concern themselves again with that distant, poor, and abused land.

CHAPTER 27

Special Operations.

When U.S. military action against the Taliban regime and its al-Qaida guests was imminent in late 2001, I mulled over the lessons of the Soviet defeat. The Red Army was only the most recent in a long line of foreign forces that had attempted to secure the country. Afghanistan's tough, martial people and land-locked, mountainous terrain had undone the plans of even the most intrepid invaders. Alexander the Great was nearly killed by the arrow of an Afghan archer. Though Genghis Khan managed to extend his empire into Afghan territory after savage warfare, his successors could not hold it. In 1842, Afghan resistance forced the British military to make an ill-fated retreat from Kabul to its garrison in the city of Jalalabad, a little more than one hundred miles away. Some sixteen thousand British soldiers and camp followers began the trek. Only one man made it to safety.1 After 9/11, a.n.a.lysts in the United States and abroad wondered aloud if American armed forces would also stumble similarly. After 9/11, a.n.a.lysts in the United States and abroad wondered aloud if American armed forces would also stumble similarly.2 Since President Bush had decided to confront Afghanistan, the challenge was to strike our enemies in such a way that it would shock terrorist networks worldwide. We wanted to not only destroy al-Qaida in Afghanistan, but to cause al-Qaida and its affiliates everywhere to scramble for cover, to coerce their sponsors to sever their ties with them, and to persuade our allies and friends to join us in our efforts. Afghanistan would be the opening salvo-our nation's first major foray into a global, unconventional war aimed at preventing terrorists from launching future attacks against Americans.

By the end of September 2001, we had not yet determined exactly how we could best achieve our goals. Some administration officials at State and the CIA argued in favor of allowing the Taliban to stay in power in the interest of maintaining regional stability. But a question, at least in my mind, was whether this might be a time when the United States had an interest in instability if it might bring about needed changes.

The more we considered a policy toward the Afghan regime, the more persuaded I became that there was little prospect of an acceptable accommodation with them. The Taliban leaders were brutal totalitarians who had imposed an extremist Islamic ideology on the Afghan people. Women could not attend school, could not leave their homes without a male family member, and could not see male doctors, which made medical treatment for them next to impossible. Citizens could be jailed for owning a television. A man could be imprisoned in Afghanistan if his beard were not long enough. It was illegal for youngsters to fly kites. Afghan soccer stadiums were used for public stonings and beheadings. The so-called Ministry of Vice and Virtue patrolled the streets, beating any who violated the Taliban's laws. In an act of deliberate and barbaric vandalism, the Taliban dynamited two monumental, carved Buddhas in Bamiyan in March 2001, turning the magnificent sixth-century statues into rubble.

If the Taliban remained in power, we risked sending a message to other nations that harbored and aided terrorists that they could a.s.sist a group like al-Qaida and then negotiate a ”grand bargain” with the United States. Indeed, over the years, a number of governments had successfully bargained with terrorist groups in order to keep their own countries from being attacked. But in my view, rewards of security guarantees and aid in return for dubious promises of better behavior in the future were not the best means of deterring more terrorist attacks.

In the weeks after 9/11, work went forward at the Defense Department on an unconventional military campaign. As we began planning, I came to rely on the incoming chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, d.i.c.k Myers. As a matter of principle that was informed by my experience in the Ford administration, I felt strongly that the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff needed to be closely linked, especially in wartime. And with Myers, it was easy to put that principle into practice. I believe we averaged three or four hours a day together while we held our posts.

Myers and I began working closely with the officer who would lead the military effort in Afghanistan: General Tommy Franks, who had been appointed by President Clinton to head the U.S. Central Command. A big, tall, earthy man with a quick smile, Franks had a colorful manner of speaking-though he could on occasion complete a sentence without an expletive. Born just after the close of World War II, Franks was adopted by a couple in Oklahoma, and the family later moved to Midland, Texas. In 1965, he enlisted in the Army as a private and moved up through the ranks to become a four-star general. He lacked the polish of some of his fellow generals, who had graduated from West Point and spent many years learning the ways of Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C. But on the battlefield Franks was a leader.

We had worked together very little in the eight months I had been in office; as a result, it took some time for us to get used to each other. My habit of asking probing questions was new to Franks; he needed to become comfortable with my queries and confident of my regard for him. After several weeks of daily contact, and at least one sus.h.i.+ dinner, we developed an effective working relations.h.i.+p.

President Bush took to Franks from the start. Once, when Bush asked him how he was doing, Franks replied, ”Mr. President, I'm sharper than a frog hair split four ways.”3 That was the kind of folksy manner they both liked. He and Franks would occasionally joke about how far ”two boys from Midland” had come. That was the kind of folksy manner they both liked. He and Franks would occasionally joke about how far ”two boys from Midland” had come.

Franks knew something about the history of Afghanistan and its long record of defeating outsiders attempting conquest. He also knew that when seeking cooperation from Afghanistan's neighbors in the weeks ahead he would be having many cups of tea with the political and military leaders of the twenty-six countries in CENTCOM's area of operations.

Franks' immediate task was to develop a war plan. Though even the best one off the shelf would have required substantial updating to fit the new realities we faced, the fact was that there was no existing war plan for Afghanistan. Further complicating matters, there was scant current intelligence on the country. Steep and damaging budget cuts to our intelligence community during the 1990s had resulted in American operatives being moved to other matters after the Soviet withdrawal. By 2001, our intelligence personnel did not know the extent to which tribal leaders would tolerate, let alone welcome, American forces into the country. We didn't even have an up-to-date picture of the terrain. In some cases our a.n.a.lysts were working with decades-old British maps. The early information we did receive was spotty: one site might or might not have been an al-Qaida safe house; another may or may not have been a Taliban weapons facility. In addition, few intelligence operatives and a.n.a.lysts spoke the Afghan languages.

We faced other planning issues. The use of our Navy would be limited in landlocked Afghanistan. The high alt.i.tudes and dust would make helicopter operations challenging. Ground forces would have a difficult time trying to operate in the unfamiliar and inhospitable Afghan terrain in the approaching winter months. The United States did not have even modest working relations.h.i.+ps. with most of Afghanistan's neighbors.* The Department of Defense would need to rapidly organize a campaign-in which it could cooperate with local militias, conduct manhunts, and operate with agility-as the enemy reacted and adapted in an environment it knew far better. The Department of Defense would need to rapidly organize a campaign-in which it could cooperate with local militias, conduct manhunts, and operate with agility-as the enemy reacted and adapted in an environment it knew far better.

Several days after 9/11, I asked Franks how long he thought it would take CENTCOM to craft a plan for Afghanistan. We both knew he would need considerably more detail than the sketchy options presented by Shelton at Camp David on September 15.

”Two months,” Franks responded.

The President was not going to wait patiently for another two months to take action. Daily threat reports provided by the intelligence community cautioned that additional terrorist attacks were likely. Therefore, we needed to begin putting pressure on their networks as rapidly as possible. Additionally, the pa.s.ses through the towering Afghan mountains would soon be blanketed with snow, rendering them impa.s.sable.

”General, I'm afraid we don't have that much time,” I told Franks. I asked him to come up with a first cut of a plan in a few days.

On September 21, 2001, Franks and I drove over to the White House to present his initial operational concept. Wanting the meeting to be as confidential as possible, Bush restricted the group to four senior generals-Shelton, Myers, Franks, and Major General Dell Dailey, head of the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC). The President also parted from his normal practice of meeting in the Situation Room and had us meet in his private residence on the second floor of the White House.

Bush was informal, his jacket off and his sleeves rolled up. At one point he lit a cigar as he listened to Franks and Dailey. The President's black dog, Barney, ambled around the room.

As Franks prepared to outline his initial concept, I reminded President Bush: ”You are not going to find this plan completely fulfilling. We don't.”

Bush said he understood that this was a work in progress.

Franks and Dailey led the briefing. Bush would need to be working with them closely in the months ahead, and I thought it important that the Commander in Chief get to know them early on.

A key element of Franks' plan involved linking American special forces teams with Afghan forces. This was a departure from the first concept that had been outlined at Camp David, which focused on using conventional U.S. military might. Wolfowitz and I encouraged Franks to take full advantage of our special operators.4 General Dailey briefed the President on targets that could be handled by the elite squads. General Dailey briefed the President on targets that could be handled by the elite squads.

The President asked how soon a campaign could begin. Franks responded that under this type of plan, his forces could begin to attack in the following two weeks.5 Bush liked that answer. He ended the meeting saying that he would continue to counsel patience to the American people. We were all aware that pa.s.sions were running high.

While the imminent operations in Afghanistan would be challenging, we did have some advantages. An active opposition movement-the Northern Alliance-had been trying to liberate the country from the Taliban and al-Qaida for five years. Joining up with these opposition forces would ally us with seasoned local fighters who knew the languages and the terrain. But this approach also had risks. For years these fighters had been unsuccessful. Some intelligence officials, the CIA's station chief in Pakistan in particular, cautioned that if America allied with the Northern Alliance militias, which were dominated by ethnic Tajik, Uzbek, and Hazara fighters, we ran the risk of uniting the ethnic Pashtuns in southern Afghanistan against us and planting the seeds of a north-south civil war. This was one reason some recommended a continuing role for the Taliban in postwar Afghanistan.

Franks and I looked for opportunities to manage those risks. Though we understood well the need to also reach out to anti-Taliban Pashtuns in the south, the Northern Alliance, comprising some twenty thousand Afghans, remained the most credible and best-organized opposition force in the country. At first glance they appeared to be a ragtag band of unsuccessful, poorly armed guerrilla fighters on the verge of defeat. But they were also tough, motivated, and battle hardened.

For years the Northern Alliance had been led by the ”Lion of Panjs.h.i.+r,” Ahmad Shah Ma.s.soud. Through his audacious combat against Soviet forces during the 1980s and his force of personality, Ma.s.soud commanded the respect of millions of Afghans, and he had pulled together several ethnic groups under the banner of his leaders.h.i.+p. To this day Ma.s.soud's image, with his signature woolen pakol hat and checkered scarf, remains emblazoned on posters, tapestries, and murals in homes and public places across much of Afghanistan. Ma.s.soud struggled to keep his outnumbered Northern Alliance forces in the fight against the Taliban. He had repeatedly asked Western countries for military and financial support. The United States had been less than forthcoming. As a result, the Northern Alliance had an a.r.s.enal that was a small fraction of the Taliban's. During the Clinton administration, CIA officers advised Ma.s.soud not to kill bin Laden if the oppurtunity arose. ”You guys are crazy,” Ma.s.soud reportedly responded. ”You haven't changed a bit.”6 While Ma.s.soud's importance as a leader of the Afghan people was largely lost on Western governments, it was not lost on al-Qaida. The terrorist organization sent operatives into Ma.s.soud's camp disguised as reporters. Once in his presence, they detonated explosives hidden in their equipment, killing him. The a.s.sa.s.sination occurred on September 9, 2001.

As al-Qaida had intended, the death of Ma.s.soud left the Northern Alliance forces with a leaders.h.i.+p vacuum. But other leaders emerged, including: General Fahim Khan, a Tajik and heir apparent to Ma.s.soud; General Abdul Ras.h.i.+d Dostum, an Uzbek; General Ismail Khan from Herat in western Afghanistan; Abdul Karim Khalili of the Hazara minority; Muhammed Mohahqeq; and Muhammed Attah.*

These men were not saints, but saints are in short supply in the world. Though moral considerations in American national security policy are of critical importance, warfare continually poses excruciating moral trade-offs. I recalled Winston Churchill's famous retort to criticism of his alliance with Stalin, an acknowledged butcher of millions, against n.a.z.i Germany. ”If Hitler invaded h.e.l.l,” he said, ”I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.”

My willingness for our forces to work with the Northern Alliance was based on my conviction that we would be making a mistake if our military effort appeared to the Afghans as an American invasion aimed at taking control of their country. I concluded it would be far better to position ourselves as the allies of indigenous Afghan forces. I saw this as the best way to avoid the heavy-handed errors of Afghanistan's past invaders and occupiers.

This was one of the lessons of Vietnam for me. I thought the Vietnamization strategy of President Nixon and Secretary of Defense Mel Laird, to push America's South Vietnamese allies to do more for themselves, would have been far more effective, perhaps decisive, if it had been implemented from the outset of the war. In Afghanistan there was at least a possibility that the United States could play a supporting rather than a leading role in the fight against al-Qaida and the Taliban from the beginning.

On September 30, 2001, I outlined our approach for Afghanistan to President Bush as part of a broader framework for the fight against terrorists. Given the scope of al-Qaida's reach, as well as that of other groups in the web of international networks of Islamist extremists, I thought we needed to start thinking early about how this larger campaign might take shape.

I developed this approach during lengthy consultations with Myers, Franks, and the senior civilians in the Pentagon, including Paul Wolfowitz, Doug Feith, and Peter Rodman. The memo setting out this framework was an example of the constructive working relations.h.i.+ps at the senior levels of the Department of Defense-military and civilian. We would meet and then circulate draft papers. It started with some preliminary ideas that were then reviewed and polished until we were reasonably satisfied with what was truly a collaborative product, though it came under my signature.

Because the global task that lay ahead was too big, too broad, and too multidimensional for us to think we could rely exclusively on American military forces, I suggested the following to the President: The U.S. strategic theme should be aiding local peoples to rid themselves of terrorists and to free themselves of regimes that support terrorism. U.S. Special Operations Forces and intelligence personnel should make allies of Afghanis, Iraqis, Lebanese, Sudanese and others who would use U.S. equipment, training, financial, military and humanitarian support to root out and attack the common enemies.7 In the Afghan war's early phases, it was especially important that the United States work with local groups to develop better intelligence before initiating major air strikes, so as to minimize civilian casualties.8 We did not want our war of self-defense and our fight against extremist regimes, which oppressed their Muslim citizens, to be symbolized by images of Americans killing Muslims. The signal we needed to send, I wrote, was that ”our goal is not merely to damage terrorist-supporting regimes but to threaten their regimes by becoming partners with their opponents.” We did not want our war of self-defense and our fight against extremist regimes, which oppressed their Muslim citizens, to be symbolized by images of Americans killing Muslims. The signal we needed to send, I wrote, was that ”our goal is not merely to damage terrorist-supporting regimes but to threaten their regimes by becoming partners with their opponents.”9

The Northern Alliance was not to be our only support in this campaign. In a matter of weeks, President Bush and the Departments of State and Defense had brought together a coalition of dozens of supportive nations. At CENTCOM headquarters in Tampa, Franks a.s.sembled a ”coalition village,” where representatives from partner nations provided input. Britain, Canada, Germany, and Australia offered infantry, aircraft, naval units, and special operations forces. j.a.pan was prepared to send refueling s.h.i.+ps, destroyers, and transport aircraft. France and Italy each offered to deploy an aircraft carrier battle group. In all more than sixty-nine nations would eventually contribute to the coalition effort in Afghanistan.10 As CENTCOM finalized the war plan, Myers and I communicated daily with Franks and his deputy, Marine Lieutenant General Mike DeLong. I believed that Was.h.i.+ngton policy makers should, as a rule, show considerable deference to the professional judgments of the combatant commander. But the plan being developed for Afghanistan was not an off-the-shelf one that had been war-gamed and practiced. We did not have a longstanding doctrine on how to conduct this sort of war. Therefore, the chiefs and DoD civilians helped hone the approach before Franks presented it to the President and the National Security Council. The hard-charging Franks was not always delighted with what he considered to be an overabundance of advice but, in the end, he told me, he felt the results were worth it.