American policy for Afghanistan

8/14/2019 American policy for Afghanistan

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Afghanistan

• Case study in changing geopolitics

• Monarchy until 1973 (Zahir Shah) – On top of ethnic and tribal structure

• 1973-1978: Republic led by Muhammad DaudKhan

• 1978: Communist coup--People’s DemocraticParty

– Significant reforms (replace tribal structure, landreform, reduced power of Islamic clerics)

– Instability (tribal, business, and Islamic resistance)

– Possibility of government’s fall







Soviet Occupation

• December 1979, 85,000 Soviet troops invade

Afghanistan

• Install communist regime

• Disparate resistance groups

– Islamic groups, tribal groups, business groups

• Mujihadeen —Islamic resistance

• Brutal, long struggle until 1989 – Soviets withdraw from Afghanistan beginning in 1988









Anatomy of Mujihadeen

• Several components:

• Afghani Islamic groups in Afghanistan

• Islamists recruited mostly from Arab countries(Algeria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, etc.)—the Afghanis

• Taliban (students) and similar groups – Afghani refugees in camps in Western Pakistan (mostly

Pashtun)

– Saudi aid and expertise—2500 madrassas

• Wahhabi Islam – CIA financial aid

– Overseen by ISI, Pakistan’s security organization• Looking to create an ally in the west





Post-1988 Afghanistan

• Soviet withdrawal in 1988-9

• Fall of Soviet Union, 1991

• U.S. withdraws much funding and interest in Afghanistan – No longer of cold war importance

• Afghanistan’s Communist government falls in 1992

• Mujihadeen and ethnic groups struggle to take power

• Rise of Taliban from 1994 with extensive ISI backing – 1996 capture Kabul

– Control ~90% of Afghanistan until recently

– Recognized as legitimate only by Pakistan and Saudi Arabia



bin Laden’s role

• During Soviet occupation (1979-1989): leader of Harakat ul-Ansar (volunteers movement) – Recruited non-Afghanis (mainly Arabs) to fight the

Soviets in Afghanistan

– Funding: his own fortune, CIA, ISI

– CIA expertise, training through ISI

– Engaged in guerrilla warfare, terrorism against Sovietswith support of U.S., Pakistan, Saudi Arabia

– Notion that Islamic resistance defeated the Soviet Unionand brought about its collapse



More bin Laden

• Soviets defeated; next threat to Islam: U.S.• Bin Laden returns to Saudi Arabia

– Has established new organization: al-Qa’ida (the base)

– Many other Afghanis return to their home countries

• bin Laden critical of – U.S. air strikes and sanctions against Iraq

– U.S. support of Israel

– U.S. backing of pro-western autocrats in Egypt, SaudiArabia, Algeria

– Saudi government allowing U.S. troops on the Arabian peninsula



U.S. troops in peninsula

• Some 5,000 troops and equipment in Saudi

Arabia

– 4,000 in Kuwait, 1,300 in Bahrain, 50 in Qatar • To enforce no fly-zone in Iraq

• To protect against a coup in Saudi Arabia





bin Laden moves• His strident protests against Saudi government

• Leaves for Sudan in 1991 (taking ~$250 million in assets)

• 1993 first WTC bombing

• Saudi government strips him of Saudi citizenship in 1994 – 1995 bomb at Saudi National Guard base in Riyadh

• 1996, Taliban gain control of Afghanistan

• 1996 U.S. and Saudi Arabia pressure Sudanesegovernment, he is expelled

• Returns to Afghanistan under protection of Taliban andMullah Omar (related by marriage) – 1996 truck bomb near Dhahran air base (19 American soldiers

killed)



Further attacks

• 1998 embassy bombings in Tanzania, Kenya (212 killed,most Kenyan and Tanzanian) – Clinton launches cruise missile attacks against bin Laden camps in

Afghanistan• 2000, U.S.S. Cole bombing off Yemen (15 killed)

• 2001, WTC and Pentagon (thousands killed)

• U.S. begins war against Taliban regime and al-Qa’ida

• Returns its attention to Afghanistan as a strategic area – Except, now fighting bitterly against its former proxies (mujihadeen)

– Russia and Putin now allies

• Further U.S. operations in Yemen, Sudan, Iraq?

Documents

American policy for Afghanistan