Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September Ten to Two Thousand and One

Steve Coll

Penguin, 2004 - Political Science - 695 pages

From the managing editor of the Washington Post, a news-breaking account of the CIA's involvement in the covert wars in Afghanistan that fueled Islamic militancy and gave rise to bin Laden's al Qaeda.

For nearly the past quarter century, while most Americans were unaware, Afghanistan has been the playing field for intense covert operations by U.S. and foreign intelligence agencies-invisible wars which sowed the seeds of the September 11 attacks and which provide its context. From the Soviet invasion in 1979 through the summer of 2001, the CIA, KGB, Pakistan's ISI, and Saudi Arabia's General Intelligence Department all operated directly and secretly in Afghanistan. They primed Afghan factions with cash and weapons, secretly trained guerrilla forces, funded propaganda, and manipulated politics. In the midst of these struggles bin Laden conceived and then built his global organization.

Comprehensively and for the first time, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Steve Coll tells the secret history of the CIA's role in Afghanistan, from its covert program against Soviet troops from 1979 to 1989, to the rise of the Taliban and the emergence of bin Laden, to the secret efforts by CIA officers and their agents to capture or kill bin Laden in Afghanistan after 1998. Based on extensive firsthand accounts, Ghost Warsok is the inside story that goes well beyond anything previously published on U.S. involvement in Afghanistan. It chronicles the roles of midlevel CIA officers, their Afghan allies, and top spy masters such as Bill Casey, Saudi Arabia's Prince Turki al Faisal, and George Tenet. And it describes heated debates within the American government and the often poisonous, mistrustful relations between the CIA and foreign intelligence agencies.

Ghost Warsanswers the questions so many have asked since the horrors of September 11: To what extent did America's best intelligence analysts grasp the rising threat of Islamist radicalism? Who tried to stop bin Laden and why did they fail?

What people are saying

Review: Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001

User Review  - Dan Lee - Goodreads

I can't imagine that there could ever be a more definitive and authoritative history of US involvement in Afghanistan between 1979 and 2001. Magnificently researched and extremely well written.

Review: Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001

User Review  - Hathal - Goodreads

Many names mentioned in this book are familiar to me from the news since childhood but I never managed to see a glimpse, not to mention the whole picture, of what Afghanistan and its chronic troubles ...

Contents

• Were Going to Die Here: 29
• Lenin Taught Us: 38
• Go Raise Hell: 53
• Afghanistan xriiixix: 74
• Dont Make It Our War: 89
• Who Is This Massoud?: 107
• Massoud at War 19831985: 115
• The Terrorists Will Own the World: 125
• Inshallah You Will Know My Plans: 147
• PART TWO THE ONEEYED MAN WAS KING: 187
• A Rogue Elephant: 205
• We Are in Danger: 225
• A Friend of Your Enemy: 240
• Maintain a Prudent Distance 237: 257
• A New Generation: 266
• Slowly Slowly Sucked into It: 280
• Dangling the Carrot: 301
• We Couldnt Indict Him: 314
• Were Keeping These Stingers: 336
• Does America Need the CIA?: 353
• PART THREE THE DISTANT ENEMY: 369
• You Are to Capture Him Alive: 371
• Bin Ladens Tarnak Farm 592: 392
• The Kingdoms Interests: 397
• We Are at War: 416
• Lets Just Blow the Thing Up: 437
• The Manson Family: 451
• That Unit Disappeared: 470
• The CIA in the Panjshir 19972000: 478
• You Crazy White Guys: 487
• Is There Any Policy?: 504
• Daring Me to Kill Them: 520
• What Face Will Omar Show to God? m: 538
• Many Americans Are Going to Die: 553
• What an Unlucky Countrv: 567
• Notes: 577
• Bibliography: 653
• Acknowledgments: 665
• Index: 669

About the author

Steve Coll, winner of a 1990 Pulitzer Prize for explanatory journalism, has been managing editor of the Washington Postsince 1998 and covered Afghanistan as the Post's South Asia bureau chief between 1989 and 1992. Coll is the author of four books, including On the Grand Trunk Roadand The Taking of Getty Oil.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September Ten to Two Thousand and One
• Author: Steve Coll
• Edition: illustrated, reprint
• Publisher: Penguin, 2004
• ISBN: 1594200076, 9781594200076
• Length: 695 pages
• Subjects: Political Science / International Relations / General