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The Alliance
Afghanistan: Graveyard of Empires
2001-09-25
  • Washington Times
    Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the other co-president of Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islami, yesterday was in Chaman, the border town on the road that links Quetta and Kandahar, headquarters for Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar. He had gone there to address Afghan refugees.

    "Before dipping its toes in Afghanistan's treacherous waters, Washington should always remember that these fierce warriors defeated two of history's mightiest empires — Great Britain and the Soviet Union."
    When asked what he thought might defuse the immediate crisis, Mr. Khattak said, "the United States must talk to Taliban leaders with a high-level delegation." Told that it was too late for what would probably be seized upon by Omar as a pretext for more dilatory tactics, Mr. Khattak said, in a barely audible voice, "It won't take much at this stage for our extremists to light the fuse of civil war."

    Mr. Khattak also said that U.S. support for the Northern Alliance battling Taliban forces in the hope of taking Kabul and bringing back old king Zahir Shah, 88, "would be a tragic mistake." The alliance, he explained, "is made up of minority Tajik and Uzbek tribes who can never control the dominant Pashtuns. Before dipping its toes in Afghanistan's treacherous waters, Washington should always remember that these fierce warriors defeated two of history's mightiest empires — Great Britain and the Soviet Union."
    • Posted by:Fred Pruitt

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