Formed in 1994, the Taliban began with only a few followers, mostly religious students who fought with the Mujahideen in the war against the Soviets and who were schooled in Islamic seminaries (madrasahs) in Pakistan. These students, or seekers, as they are referred to in the documents, wanted to rid Afghanistan of the instability, violence, and warlordism that had been plaguing the country since the defeat and withdrawal of the Soviets in 1989.

Today's posting, "The Taliban File," is the seventh volume in the Archive's September 11th Sourcebook series, recognized by the National Journal in December 2001 as one of the top five sites on the Web for terrorism information. The collection of 32 documents obtained through the U.S. Freedom of Information Act by Archive research associate Sajit Gandhi details the rise of the Taliban from its meager start in Kandahar to a full fledged military force and ultimate control of the country. The documents discuss Pakistan's support for the Taliban, U.S. dealings with the Taliban, post 9/11 thinking on military strategy in the War on Terror, and the relationship between the assassination of the Northern Alliance Commander Ahmad Shah Masoud and the terrorist attacks of September 11.

Washington, D.C., September 11, 2003 - Marking the second anniversary of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the National Security Archive at George Washington University today posted on the Web a new collection of recently declassified U.S. documents covering the controversial rise to power of Osama bin Laden's former hosts in Afghanistan, the Taliban. This murky history has particular relevance today, as the Taliban fighters regroup in Afghanistan, and key Taliban leaders remain at large.

The departure of the Soviets, while welcomed by Afghans and the United States, left a political vacuum in Afghanistan. The resulting chaos and civil war led to the involvement of the United Nations which tried unsuccessfully to bring about political transition through the mission led by Special Representative Mahmoud Mestiri. Despite the UN's efforts, and those of the international community, the various factions, as well as the Kabul government led by Barnahuddin Rabbani and Ahmad Shah Masoud, in addition to other outside parties, made a definitive peaceful or military solution difficult.

As a result, the civil war continued with Rabbani and Masoud attempting to fill the government role, while the other warlord remnants of the Afghan resistance, such as the Uzbek commander Abdul Rashid Dostum, Pakistani-backed Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, and Ismail Khan, remained unwilling to cede any power or make concessions that could have resulted in a peaceful solution.

Consequently, outside forces saw instability in Afghanistan as an opportunity to press their own security and political agendas. Among them were terrorist groups such as Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaeda network and states such as Pakistan, Iran, Russia, and India. Pakistan, for example, saw an unstable Afghanistan as a boon for its internal security, allowing it a strategic depth against India. Initially, [See document 25] the Pakistanis supported the Pashtun-Islamicist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an incompetent commander from the Mujahideen days, in order to have influence over the Afghan political landscape. When Hekmatyar failed to deliver for Pakistan, the administration began to support a new movement of religious students known as the Taliban.

The first document dates from November 1994, one month after the Taliban took the strategic post of Spin Boldak on the Afghan-Pakistan border, allegedly with cover fire provided by Pakistani Frontier Corps (see document 5). With that victory, the Taliban, who were being championed by a fellow Pashtun, Pakistani Interior Minister Nasrullah Babar (see document 4), began to make a name for themselves, and also gained a significant amount of military supplies. Pakistan supported the Taliban, not just to restore order to Afghan roads, which would open the way for a possible Trans-Afghan gas pipeline (TAP), but because they also saw the Taliban as a faction that they might have considerable influence over, and who might provide in Afghanistan, a strategic lever for Pakistan against India.

As the documents and history show, Pakistani authorities discovered they had made a blunder. The Taliban were not only uncontrollable, but unpredictable as well. In certain instances the Taliban would declare their desire for peace, willingness to work with the UN, and desire for a non-military solution for Afghanistan, then state that "anyone who gets in our way will be crushed."

The documents also show that the U.S. made tremendous efforts to obtain a political solution for Afghanistan, not just because of the desire for American companies to take advantage of business opportunities (see document 16) with the TAP, but also due to other key concerns: human rights, narcotics, and terrorism (see document 17). In many instances, American officials pressed the Taliban on their counternarcotics strategy, their treatment of women, and on allowing Afghanistan to be used as a base for terrorist operations and home for Osama Bin Laden.

The cable traffic shows the difficulty the U.S. had negotiating with Taliban representatives in all these areas. Cultural and political miscommunication was rampant (see document 18). In one meeting, Ambassador Thomas W. Simons Jr., the U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan -who also had responsibility for Afghanistan- attempted to find common ground with Taliban Foreign Minister Mullah Ghaus, explaining that "Americans are the most religious people in the Western world."

It soon became clear that Taliban rule was detrimental to Afghan and international security, as evidenced by their sanctioning of continuing narcotics production -despite its un-Islamic quality- and shelter for al-Qaeda and other terrorists. Acting Secretary Strobe Talbott described the danger of the Taliban in a February 1996 meeting with Pakistani Foreign Minister Assef Ali when he drew an analogy between Pakistani support for the Taliban in Afghanistan and the militants in Indian-controlled Kashmir. Talbott stated that while such support was undertaken to serve Pakistani interests, there were unintended consequences contrary to Pakistan's and the region's larger interests. These consequences became shockingly clear two years ago, on September 11, 2001.

