Does this do?
It somehow doesn't seem right...
There was also a repeated broadcast of a 1980 segment on the Afghan War then, but that wasn't it, either.
quote:SHOW: ABC News: Nightline (11:35 PM AM ET) - ABC
September 26, 2001 Wednesday
TYPE: Profile
LENGTH: 6504 words
HEADLINE: Targeting Afghanistan As America Fights Back; Familiarizing ourselves with Afghanistan as US dispatches forces within striking distance of Taliban-controlled country; Richard Mackenzie, investigative reporter, discusses Afghanistan
ANCHORS: CHRIS BURY
REPORTERS: JOHN DONVAN ; MIKE LEE ; JOHN McWETHY ; HILLARY BROWN ; MARTHA RADDATZ
BODY:
Announcer: September 26th, 2001.
CHRIS BURY, host:
They used to be our friends.
Offscreen Voice #1: ABC News has learned that a massive buildup of Soviet troops is taking place in Afghanistan, leading some to conclude that a Soviet invasion is under way.
BURY: They were our allies against the Soviet Union.
President RONALD REAGAN: (From file footage) Those are freedom fighters. Those are people fighting for their own country. BURY: Now, they are the enemy.
President GEORGE W. BUSH: By sponsoring, sheltering and supplying terrorists, by aiding and abetting murder, the Taliban regime is committing murder.
BURY: Tonight, Targeting Afghanistan As America Fights Back.
Announcer: From ABC News, this is NIGHTLINE. Substituting for Ted Koppel and reporting from Washington, Chris Bury.
BURY: The enemy of my enemy is my friend. That ancient Arab adage pretty well sums up the American relationship with Afghanistan. Back when the Russians invaded, the US was happy to provide arms and money. When the Cold War ended, so did the American friendship. Now, of course, the Taliban support of Osama bin Laden has put Afghanistan in the American cross hairs. It also has the US sorting out enemies and friends all over again. Today, for example, the White House sided with Russia in a big way. It demanded that rebel leaders in Chechnya, long a thorn in Russia's side, cut all ties to terrorists, including bin Laden. The move is widely seen as a diplomatic thank you for Russian President Vladimir Putin who has promised broad support in the US war on terrorism.
In other developments today, ABC News has learned a suspect arrested in Dubai has disclosed plans for terrorist attacks across Europe later this year. The alleged targets include the American Embassy in Paris, the US consulate in Marseilles, and the NATO headquarters in Belgium. President Bush is set to announce new air safety measures including stronger cockpit doors and sky marshals, but not permission for pilots to carry guns.
The government of Iran, Afghanistan's neighbor to the west, ruled out any help in a US-led attack. The leader of the Taliban, Mullah Mohammed Omar, asked thousands of fleeing refugees to return home, saying he sees less likelihood of a US attack.
In Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, a protest outside the deserted American Embassy turned ugly and violent. These scenes, broadcast live on the Al-Gazira network throughout the Middle East show how the protest escalated. At first demonstrators, mainly students and government officers, simply threw stones at the walled compound. American diplomats left the embassy in 1989, but a local maintenance staff remained and, strictly speaking, the compound is still US sovereign territory. Even the Taliban government had respected that diplomatic status until today.
Police made no effort to restrain the demonstrators. They scaled the walls of the compound and set fires to abandoned cars inside. Taliban fighters used a crowbar and hammer to rip off the United States seal that remained hanging from the pillars of the building. By the time camera crews were forced some distance away from the scene, a thick plume of smoke rose from what was left of the embassy compound.
The former embassy is a relic of a warmer American relationship with Afghanistan during the Cold War. Back then the United States supplied arms to Afghan rebels. It was called "a proxy war," that is a way for the US to engage the Soviets militarily without resorting to nuclear weapons. And as NIGHTLINE's John Donvan reports, the ghosts of that proxy war are coming back to haunt us now.
JOHN DONVAN reporting:
(VO) Twenty-one years ago in July of 1980, even as the Cold War raged, the Olympic Games were played in Moscow. And for all the races won and all the medals given, the real story of these Moscow games was how the US team did not show up to play. The Americans stayed home and so did the athletes of 44 other nations. And it was all because of what had just happened in a place called Afghanistan.
Unidentified Reporter: (From Dec 27, 1979, file footage) The president of Afghanistan was overthrown in a Soviet-backed coup today, then tried and promptly executed.
DONVAN: (VO) The Soviet army had invaded to prop up a communist government in Kabul that had only recently taken power and was now in danger of falling. Overnight, the Afghan people gained America's sympathy when they became refugees and America's admiration when they fought back.
Pres. REAGAN: (From file footage) I think they're freedom fighters, not rebels.
DONVAN: (VO) A US president would pay them one of his highest compliments.
Pres. REAGAN: (From file footage) On behalf of the American people, I salute Chairman Kalis (ph) his delegation and the people of Afghanistan themselves. You are a nation of heroes. God bless you.
DONVAN: (VO) In reality, most Americans knew practically nothing about who the Afghan people were or their history or their ways, but that didn't matter back then. What mattered to the US was who the invaders were, the Soviets, and how to make trouble for them in Afghanistan.
Mr. FRANK ANDERSON: I'll ask you to just accept that the Soviet Union was an evil empire.
DONVAN: (VO) Frank Anderson headed the CIA's Afghan task force in the 1980s.
Mr. ANDERSON: The opportunity was a strategic one. It was to inflict and defeat on the Red Army and thereby inflict a serious defeat on the Soviet Union.
DONVAN: The first steps the United States took in response were largely symbolic, like boycotting the Olympics and canceling some huge grain sales to the Soviets and condemning the invasion in the United Nations. But then people here in Washington began to notice that the Afghan people were actually putting up a fight.
(VO) It was a desperate struggle. They were losing to superior Soviet weaponry, helicopters, tanks. And yet they kept on fighting. And in Washington, it was like a light bulb went on. Former Representative Charles Wilson would become the leading voice in Congress for arming the Afghan fighters.
Mr. CHARLES WILSON (Former US Representative): The Soviets were taking casualties with--from stones and lives and old World War I rifles. If they had made the decision to fight, then it was just obscene to let them sell their lives too cheaply and we must help them.
DONVAN: (VO) Aid money flowed from Congress, through the CIA, into the hands of the Afghan fighters in the form of weapons and training. Gradually, the Soviets bogged down and a long history began to repeat itself. The terrain of Afghanistan has always come to its defense. In the 19th century, the invading British were massacred by poorly equipped Afghan fighters who knew the terrain and how to use it to advantage. The British were driven out. In the 1980s, no one expected that the Afghans could do it again.
(OC) Did you ever in a million years think that the Afghan fighters would defeat the Red Army?
Mr. WILSON: Not at first.
DONVAN: (VO) But that was not taking into account what drove these fighters on. They were, most of them, devoutly religious Muslims, what the West calls 'fundamentalists.' They were joined from around the Muslim world by others who saw the fight against the Soviets as a holy war against atheists. They included a Saudi millionaire's son named Osama bin Laden who, it is said, fought little, but spent freely on humanitarian aid. They called themselves mujahedeen, which comes from the word Jihad, struggle, often used to mean Holy War. That the US was putting weapons into the hands of people who were fundamentalists, many of them anti-Western and anti-US, was considered less important than making the Soviets bleed.
Mr. WILSON: But the agency and the Pakistani agencies that determined who got the weapons based their decisions on who was causing the most damage to the Russians.
DONVAN: So it wasn't who was America's friend, it was more who's the Russian's worst enemy?
Mr. WILSON: That's exactly right. It was who was--to put it bluntly, it was who was killing the most Russian soldiers. And the more fundamentalist Islamic fighters seemed to be the ones that were the fiercest and the most willing to die.
DONVAN: (VO) By 1986, millions of Afghans were living in refugee camps in Pakistan next door. Hundreds of thousands of Afghan citizens had been killed. Thousands of Soviets had been killed or wounded. But the Soviets were not leaving. It was a bloody stalemate. Then the Stinger missiles arrived and everything changed. Made in the United States, they could be carried by one soldier and they were capable of bringing down an aircraft by zeroing in on heat from its engines.
Mr. WILSON: Well, the Stingers, once President Reagan made that very difficult decision, the Russians had lost the war.
DONVAN: How quickly after the Stingers were introduced did the tide of the war change?
Mr. WILSON: Oh, on September the 26th of 1986, four...(unintelligible)...helicopters came in to land in Jalalabad, and the muj shot down three of them. And from then on, it was one or two a day.
DONVAN: (VO) It wasn't over right away, the war had more years to run yet, but the Afghan men who received their weapons from Washington and their strength from Allah, had turned the tide in America's proxy war and their holy war.
BURY: So America had a huge stake in Afghanistan during that holy war, but the friendship proved fleeting. That in part two of John Donvan's report when we come back.
(Commercial break)
BURY: The commitment of Afghan fighters and the firepower of American missiles stopped the Russians, but then the United States all but abandoned its Cold War ally, as we hear in part two of John Donvan's report.
DONVAN: (VO) In February of 1989, the Soviets gave up the fight for Afghanistan. The Red Army's ranking general in the field made it a point of honor to be the last Soviet soldier to leave. It was a stunning defeat for a superpower that was soon to collapse for good.
Mr. WILSON: A lot of illiterate tribesmen and shepherds defeated the unconquerable, irresistible Red Army.
DONVAN: And you...
Mr. WILSON: And sent them home ignominiously across the bridge in February of 1989. Now they made a huge contribution to the world.
DONVAN: (VO) And if that's how the US saw the Afghan people at that point, how did they repay them for their contribution? To be blunt, they didn't repay them. Afghanistan was physically wrecked, millions were still mired in refugee camps, lawlessness was already filling the vacuum left when the Soviets departed. And just at that point, US assistance fell off in practical terms to nothing.
Mr. BARNETT RUBIN (New York University): We declared victory and walked away. We made no effort to marshal political or economic support for the reconstruction of a totally devastated country.
DONVAN: (VO) Rather, America's Soviet experts turned their attention to everything else that happened in 1989. And by his own admission, Charles Wilson was one of the people who should have stayed more focused on Afghanistan but did not.
Mr. WILSON: Then we just absolutely walked away. We should have stayed and been patient and just worked it out and not taken no for an answer. And insisted that we clear the mines, insisted that we plow the fields, furnish the fertilizer, all the things that America is really good at. We should have built an opportunity for the--for the refugees who were living in great misery. We should have made it possible for them to have hope to come home.
DONVAN: Afghanistan quickly splintered into many competing fiefdoms that were run almost like mafia operations. The opium trade flourished. There were kidnappings and rapes. And only one group stood up to fight all of that, the Taliban movement, the very people the US is now threatening to attack, started out with a reputation that was like something out of "Robin Hood." Islamic theology students, who were mostly educated in Pakistan, took up weapons and began fighting back against the warlords and their corrupt ways, literally rescuing kidnap and rape victim, the story goes, and punishing brutally those who had been brutal. At least in parts of Afghanistan they were seen as the first good guys after several waves of wickedness.
Mr. LARRY THOMPSON (Refugees International): The Taliban represented order and stability to a lot of the people. And to the more conservative Islamic elements, they also represented an--an inspirational type government. So they did--did, when they took control in 1996, I think, have quite a bit of popular support.
DONVAN: (VO) But once in control of the capital and about 90 percent of the country, the Taliban began to rule in extreme ways. They closed girls schools and they ordered women not to work. Women not complying were treated brutally. They banned television and alcohol. They showed no mercy to their opponents. They destroyed anything that represented a threat to the extreme form of Islam they were espousing, even a pair of ancient statues of the Buddha...
Offscreen Voice #2: (Foreign language spoken)
DONVAN: (VO) ...that were considered art treasures by the rest of the world. In part, some believe the Taliban had come under the influence of Osama bin Laden. Bin Laden was providing the movement with money, and he became close to the Taliban's leader.
Mr. RUBIN: What happened is a perso--a strong personal relationship developed between Mullah Omar, the leader of the Taliban, and Osama bin Laden. It is said that Osama bin Laden married one of his daughters to Mullah Omar, which is a traditional way of solidifying solidarity between a fugitive and the powerful person who is--who is protecting him. So at this point, I think that we can say that Mullah Omar and Osama bin Laden are almost inseparable.
DONVAN: (VO) The Taliban does have opposition. An armed movement called the Northern Alliance made up of veteran fighters who still control a small part of the country, and which has been mentioned as a possible US ally. ABC's Mike Lee has been in the field with this group and reports tonight from northern Afghanistan.
MIKE LEE reporting:
I get the sense that the Northern Alliance fighters aren't counting on any US help. In many cases, in sort of a bravado way, don't even want it. They're out there to fight with their small arms. And it's become their life. Because after all, most men under 40 were born into war in this country. It is virtually the only job they've known. And so to dump a lot of sophisticated equipment on them and expect them to be able to use it right away could be wishful thinking.
DONVAN: (VO) But the Taliban has its own problems. Its popularity is waning rapidly among ordinary Afghans.
Mr. RUBIN: Suddenly there are many people who joined the Taliban not because they support them, but because they thought it was the only possibility. Now that they see signals that the Taliban is not the wave of the future, they'll be looking to move in another direction. And they are looking for something else to which they can show their support.
DONVAN: (VO) Clearly, US leaders are hoping the Taliban will be overthrown by other Afghans. This was President Bush yesterday.
Pres. BUSH: One way to do that is to ask for the cooperation of citizens within Afghanistan who may be tired of having the Taliban in place or tired of having Osama bin Laden.
DONVAN: (VO) But the demise of the Taliban is not something that can be counted on. Its fighters, if they remain motivated, are deadly. And that, says Charles Wilson, who remembers how Afghanis fought the Soviets, is something the US must never forget.
Mr. WILSON: We do not want to have any daylight frontal confrontation with infantry in those mountains with these guys.
DONVAN: Because we can't beat them on those terms?
Mr. WILSON: Well, we--the casualties would be unacceptable in my judgment. There's no sense in--in killing American boys like that would happen.
DONVAN: Because they're that good.
Mr. WILSON: They're that good.
DONVAN: That's the lesson of the Soviet experience in the 1980s, but there is also a lesson from the US experience. You can find allies, you can arm them, you can get them to defeat your enemy, but you can't control who fills the vacuum. The Taliban may fall, but you cannot guarantee that whoever takes power next will not also come to call America "The Great Satan." I'm John Donvan for NIGHTLINE in Washington.
BURY: When we come back, advice on doing battle in Afghanistan from people who have been there.
(Commercial break)
BURY: As the American military targets Afghanistan, we sought out three people who can speak to the lessons of the past: a reporter who covered the Russian/Afghanistan war, a British soldier who helped train the Afghan army, and a former Soviet officer, a veteran of Russia's defeat there.
Mr. BEN ROONEY (Defense Reporter The Telegraph): It's a bleak, inhospitable, mountainous terrain. Pretty well the last place on Earth, if you chose to, you'd want to fight a war in there.
Mr. TOM CAREW (Former British Special Forces Soldier): The actual enemy is two things. It's the Taliban and the mountains, the terrain. It's a natural fortress. And if you're going to go into the Taliban on your own, they're going to take to the mountains. Then you've got two enemies as opposed to one.
Mr. YEVGENY KHRUSHCHEV (Soviet-Afghan War Veteran): Mines and booby traps, that's number one major threat that is coming from Afghanistan. And it's riddled and peppered with the min--mines.
Mr. ROONEY: If you're going to use helicopter mounted troops, they've got to be able to fly. And winter is fast, fast approaching. And we saw this--and we saw the effect of winter in--in Bosnia, offensive operations that really start to grind to a halt. And if it was bad in Bosnia, where the terrain, you know, is considerably easier than it is in Afghanistan...
Mr. KHRUSHCHEV: Extreme cold, believe it or not. The winter is coming and just the physical endurance will--will be biting at American resolve 24 hours, relentlessly.
Mr. CAREW: You need a lot of water and also food. You're going to use a lot of calories. So therefore, you're carrying a lot of weight. And to get into contact with that, and all the time you're climbing you're losing--you're getting altitude. You'll get the--the air is getting thinner, you're becoming a little bit dizzier. They don't because they travel so light.
They are really a ferocious enemy. When you're their friend, they will protect you, they will die for you. When you're their enemy, not a good day if they catch you. They're really--the Geneva Convention is something which they have never heard about and they don't care about, you know.
Mr. ROONEY: They are a warrior nation, without a doubt. They are extremely--an extremely bellicose nation. They're great fighters. They are, however, extraordinarily difficult to discipline, incredibly fractious. So will--will--squabbles will break out on the whole, over all sorts of areas.
Mr. KHRUSHCHEV: They have an undoubtful competitive edge that they grew up--their knowledge, their intricate knowledge of local environment and both, you know, the terrain and they're extremely effective local intelligence, as well. They still use their mirror signs sitting on top of the mountains just to report any informations of the hostile force. And you cannot jam it using advanced equipment. And you have to understand it. You just cannot stop it, doing it.
Mr. CAREW: So they just shoot and scoot. They just engage you and gone. Engage, then gone. But the trouble was you always had to be on your guard. And so you got worn down and you get bogged down as well because they would lead you--they would a little bit of firefight, and pull back. A little bit of firefight and pull back. And they would lead you into culverts and valleys. And many a Russian col--armored column got decimated.
Well, the best option I would say would is to go down with--with the Northern Alliance. Look, there's a large population there that have been suppressed. They don't want to be under the Taliban.
Mr. ROONEY: There's a hard way and there's a very hard way. I would think that the very hard way would be to send in massive ground troops. The simply hard way would be to use the existing civil war and try and exploit that to your end.
Mr. CAREW: It's like a massive game of chess with a touch of Russian roulette, you know, you've got to really play your cards right. For me, the longer people take in going in, then the better the plan.
Mr. KHRUSHCHEV: If you fail your heart and mind campaign, you will fail in everything else. First of all, you have to build up your trust with your opposite members, your--the lack of populous, with the lack of sympathizers of American incoming involvement. So build up the trust and loyalty of the local pop--people, minimize collateral damage. Take care of their humanitarian needs. And only then you can rely on them as--as your path finders and your shepherds as those who can provide on the ground human intelligence.
Mr. ROONEY: The history of alliance in Afghanistan is as bleak as the history of warfare over there. The united front, you know, of the Northern Alliance, is a great name for them. But, I mean, to--you know, they're not really united in any way--in any way, shape or form. And the mujahedeen, you know, used to fight each other--when they were fighting the Soviets, they used to fight each other almost as much as they fought the Soviets. And maybe the only card you've got, it's not the card you necessarily choose to play.
BURY: With those warnings in mind, I turn now to ABC News correspondent John McWethy at the Pentagon.
John, we've heard these warnings about the--the rugged terrain in Afghanistan and the fierce fighters. To what extent does that kind of talk frame the debate for the military planners?
JOHN McWETHY reporting:
Certainly, the military planners are paying a lot of attention to history. They're paying a lot of attention to the details of the difficult terrain and the tough fighters. They can't ignore all of that. But they say there are some fundamental differences that they hope will make a huge difference in what the US is trying to do here. First of all, the United States does not intend to conquer and occupy Afghanistan. That's what the Russians or the Soviets in their time were trying to do and they failed miserably. And second of all, the Americans are saying US troops are trained to fight in a very different way. They plan to do it in a very particular, specialized way, and not engage the entire population. So there's a huge difference.
BURY: Jack, one of those differences, you have described the--the Pentagon strategy as 'The Big Squeeze'--in other words, exerting military pressure on the Taliban from many different directions. Give us a sense of what that might look like.
McWETHY: Well, actually, 'The Big Squeeze' involves the entire smorgasbord of things the United States is trying to do--all of the economic, the law enforcement and all of that. But there is a military squeeze as well. What they are going to attempt to do as we understand it at this point, is to insert special operations forces from a number of different directions into the country to provide a higher level of intelligence to hook up with some of the rebels that have been fighting against the Taliban, and to get a much better lay of the land than the US currently has. All of the air power could also be used to either assist the special operations forces, to protect them if necessary, to go after targets that they may find, or to suppress the Taliban's military if that becomes necessary.
BURY: John McWethy at the Pentagon.
When we come back, even though not a single American shot has yet been fired, thousands of Afghans are attempting to flee their war-torn country. More on that when we come back.
(Commercial break)
BURY: In the few days immediately following September 11th, some 15,000 Afghans fled across the border into Pakistan fearing an imminent American attack. The Pakistani government has since closed the border, but that has not stopped thousands more from gathering there. I'm joined now by ABC News correspondent Hillary Brown in the Pakistani City of Quetta on the Afghanistan border where it is now early Thursday morning.
Hillary, early we heard that the Taliban leader has suggested that the Afghan refugees go back into the cities of Afghanistan. Any sign that they are hearing that message or that they're heeding it?
HILLARY BROWN reporting:
They could be hearing it because they do listen to the BBC, Pashtun Service and also the Voice of America. But what they're telling us is that the Taliban is actually press ganging young men into service. And so, of course, that is what they are fleeing or that is what the young men are fleeing. They also tell us that the Taliban itself, the leaders--some of the leaders are coming across the border with their families.
BURY: Give us a sense, if you will, what life is like for the refugees on the border in terms of the basic humanitarian conditions.
BROWN: Well, there are about 10,000 to 20,000 who are just in--just inside the Afghan border. They're living in the open, they have access to water, but the conditions are not very good. It's very hot during the day, very cold at night. They do have access to water, but there have been two known deaths--one known death. Two babies have been born. And it--it--it is not very comfortable for them. The relief agencies say they're ready to--to--to accommodate them the moment the Pakistani authorities allow them in. But Pakistan wants to screen them for weapons and for Taliban militia. The relief authorities are talking about colossal numbers, in the millions, huge humanitarian crisis. They estimate that there are a million, possibly a million Afghans on the move inside Afghanistan, plus a million who have already been displaced by the famine. So there's two million who may well try to get out across Afghan's five borders.
BURY: And though it looks like a beautiful morning in Afghanistan or on the border, right now a winter is known to be very brutal.
BROWN: Well, that's it, yes. Winter is not very far away and winter is very, very harsh here. There's snow, wind. And there's not very much food. In fact, the refugees who have managed to slip across the border, because it is, of course very porous, have--have spent all their money just getting to the border and getting across. We talked to one woman who showed us what she had left, which was 32,000 Afghanis, which is 50 cents. And most of them are in that position. They're absolutely destitute.
BURY: Hillary Brown in Afghanistan, thank you very much.
I'm joined now by ABC News State Department correspondent Martha Raddatz.
Martha, this buildup of refugees--we've been hearing about that. What kind of a diplomatic problem is that for the United States?
MARTHA RADDATZ reporting:
Well, it's not only a diplomatic problem, it's a military problem. The United States doesn't want to create all these refugees. We have world opinion on our side right now. If we have millions of refugees who are in real trouble, world opinion goes away. And right now, the United States is trying to build this coalition, build worldwide support, this really would complicate it. And militarily, too, if you have all these people on the move.
BURY: Where does the United States stand now in this coalition? The Taliban are virtually isolated. Even Saudi Arabia has cut off diplomatic relations. They seem to have no friends left.
RADDATZ: Well--well, that's true. But the United States is not so confident that they'll say they have the whole world by a string yet. What they're doing is building this brick by brick. They have hit no major walls with any other country, but they still say it's a frustrating process. They have all these countries who want particular things or don't want to get involved in particular ways, and the United States is trying to appease them and keep them coming forward.
BURY: What are American diplomats waiting for? What shoes have to fall into place before they give the president the green light to tell the military it's OK to begin action?
RADDATZ: Chris, there's actually still this tug of war going on. And I think what you've seen in the last couple of days is the State Department prevailing. From the very beginning, Colin Powell has urged caution in this. Don't move ahead too quickly militarily, you'll ruin the coalition, you'll ruin worldwide opinion. So in the last couple of days, I think you've seen a softening of the language even from the Pentagon. So Colin Powell is prevailing here it seems at this point.
BURY: All right. Martha Raddatz at the State Department. Thank you very much.
BURY: When we come back, an Afghan soldier who fought the Russians with US support in his own words.
(Commercial break)
BURY: Neamatollah Nojumi is an author and an Afghan refugee living in Boston. He works to support the opposition movement and its attempts to overthrow the Taliban. Mr. Nojumi fled his country in 1991 after fighting for the US supported mujahedeen for 10 years.
Mr. NEAMATOLLAH NOJUMI: I'm coming from a sort of prominent family in Afghanistan. My dad worked for the National Assembly.
BURY: (VO) It was 1978, Neamatollah Nojumi was imprisoned for speaking out against the new communist regime. He was only 14 years old.
Mr. NOJUMI: When I was in jail, I met very distinguished Afghan politicians, community leaders and some of my teachers. And I was a little boy just sitting in the corner listening the whole night. They were discussing politics. That probably was my first class in politics.
BURY: (VO) Two weeks after he was released, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.
Mr. NOJUMI: When I got out from jail, I was very bruised emotionally, in my heart, in my mind about all those good people they took them out and executed. And I joined the movement, bear arms, and stayed with the Afghan mujahedeen in many different areas.
BURY: (VO) Nojumi went on to fight with the mujahedeen for the next 10 years rising to the rank of commander.
Mr. NOJUMI: I became to believe this is what I am supposed to do and it was an obligation, I have to do it. And that was a time that I really didn't care about dying or being injured or anything happens. And there were many that they even didn't think, including myself, that there is going to be a tomorrow.
BURY: (VO) With the eventual help of US money and weapons, the mujahedeen ultimately defeated the Soviets, but that's where American support ended.
Mr. NOJUMI: Suddenly, the US turned its back and left Afghans with a completely destroyed country and shattered civil society. And it is an environment of fear, desperation and also hopelessness. The only way--the only way a young man could bring food on the table was to bear arms again and take a part in some sort of fighting.
BURY: (VO) A civil war began with more than a half dozen factions fighting each other. One army was the Taliban, many of its soldiers were refugees who fled to Pakistan during the Soviet occupation.
Mr. NOJUMI: The brand of Islamic movement the Taliban represents is foreign for the average Afghan people. In the history of the country, you never seen or have any evidence that the authority, local or national, beating women on the street. Bringing women and executing them on the public. And also destroying the artifacts, all the historic heritage and forcing the people to--for men to grow beards, running gender apartheid against women.
BURY: (VO) Nojumi, who has just finished writing a book on the Taliban, says the majority of Afghans do not support the regime.
Mr. NOJUMI: People, ordinary Americans did not understand what is the position of Afghans. And I do believe that Afghans themselves has been held hostage by the Taliban and this militant networks of bin Laden. 'War against Afghanistan,' for example, this is the phrase that I've heard several times. It is wrong. And those who are putting these types of statements should be careful. It's very painful. And during all these years, in the past six years especially, it was the Afghan people who were fighting bin Laden and the Taliban, without any international support.
BURY: So given all of the dire warnings about fighting in Afghanistan, what is the best way for the US to proceed? That conversation when we come back.
(Commercial break)
BURY: Joining me now, Richard Mackenzie. Mr. Mackenzie has spent the last 15 years covering Afghanistan, producing four television documentaries on that country and its conflicts. He joins us here in our Washington studios.
We've heard varying reports about the popularity of the Taliban. Based on your travels in the country, what's your sense of whether the Taliban's support is eroding at all?
Mr. RICHARD MACKENZIE (Investigative Reporter): I think it definitely is eroding. I think that they came in with enormous popularity at first because they were providing security, but it became the same sort of security that you get in a prison. And the rules and restrictions that they imposed on the Afghan people, particularly on women, is a large part of what has eroded their popularity over the years.
BURY: What about the Northern Alliance, this military group that we heard earlier described as kind of a ragtag army. Are they any more popular in Afghanistan?
Mr. MACKENZIE: They are certainly more popular in their own area, but you have the ethnic divide that they are--they are Tajiks, and the people in the south are Pashtuns, so the people in the South are never going to turn to their military leaders in the North as--as their--as their leaders.
BURY: What was your sense about the--the military competence of the--the Northern Alliance? Obviously, they are now looking to American weapons, American military support. Is it your sense that they would know what to do with it if they got it?
Mr. MACKENZIE: Yeah, they certainly would know what to do with it if they got it. If you look at the background, that same alliance, when it was led by Ahmed Shah Masood, who was just assassinated recently, fought off the Soviets and nine times the Soviets sent contingents of 15,000 troops and more up the Pansheer Valley to try to eradicate Masood and that northern--northern military group. In fact, they never succeeded, they never could catch him. But to say, as I've heard, that they could suffice for the Americans, I think is a--is a little doubtful.
BURY: What about the Taliban's ability to withstand the kind of enormous pressure, not only military perhaps, but the diplomatic isolation that they're undergoing, the financial isolation? Are they going to we able to withstand that, or is it your sense that it's inevitable the Taliban are going to collapse.
Mr. MACKENZIE: I think there's been some--a sort of an eroding or fractures in the Taliban coming for some time. And this, obviously, exacerbates it dramatically. I don't think the Taliban can withstand the type of isolation and the type of pressure that they're under now for very long.
BURY: You've heard President Bush say in the last couple of days, he may not be eager for the United States to overthrow the Taliban, but he wouldn't at all mind if other Afghanis overthrew the Taliban.
Mr. MACKENZIE: Yeah. I think one of the things that the president and others have to be very careful about here is the fact that he said--you know--they say, we're not going to get into nation building. Well, if you destroy the Taliban you'd really better have somebody to step in. You better help some infrastructure to step in to take their place because all the other--all you're going to do otherwise is--is--is revert back to the chaos and the anarchy and the mayhem that ruled Afghanistan before they--before they came to the fort.
BURY: Well, that raises the question, what kind of obligation will the United States have to whatever is left, presumably if the--if the Taliban do suffer some kind of defeat.
Mr. MACKENZIE: Yeah, I think the United States failed miserably in its obligations to Afghanistan in 1989, early '90s, when the Soviets withdrew and then when communism collapsed. And the leaders who--who took over from the communists were left isolated without any support, without any infrastructure. The United States is definitely going to have an obligation if we go in there in some military fashion and--and get rid of the Taliban.
BURY: Richard Mackenzie, thanks for coming in tonight. We appreciate that.
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