Review of Ghost Wars

Introduction

Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 by Steve Coll is a book of investigative reporting and narrative building that reflects upon and examines in critical detail the political, social, and bureaucratic policies of the United States in regards to the Middle East, particularly Afghanistan during its Russian occupation and conflicts, to today. As a former Washington Post reporter, Coll’s work is factual but also easy to read, and the narrative he lays out is interesting. By the end of the book, the reader is left with some questions about the policies of the government and some critical questions about foreign policy and the role, oversight, and direction of America’s intelligence organizations, particularly the CIA. The review for this book shall be divided into two parts, an overview and an analysis, and within each part it shall follow the book’s formatting, consisting of subsections and detailing the details and information of each part as it relates to the book and the criteria for review.

Summary of Content

Prologue

In the prologue, Coll gives a condensed version of the events of Afghanistan that led up to September 11th, 2001 through the narrative of Ahmed Shah Massoud, a guerilla fighter and leader who opposed the Soviets during the 1970s and then opposed the Taliban during the 1990s. Coll does not lay out the main thesis of the book, instead giving a flavor of the events in the writing style, such as the opening line, “In the tattered, cargo-strewn cabin of an Ariana Afghan Airlines passenger jet streaking above Punjab toward Kabul sat a stocky, broad-faced American with short graying hair” (12). Coll is good with details, creating vivid pictures that are easy to understand. Likewise, Coll also gives a lot of facts that are connected, in this case following the career and life of Ahmed Shah Massoud. This is how his style remains through the book, detailing events and then connecting why they are important.

Blood Brothers

The first section of the book opens with a Pakistani riot in late November 1979, Coll then traces back other unrest, including the assault on the embassy and the shooting of Corporal Stephen Crowley the sacking of the U.S. embassy in Tehran (20–22). As Croll explain, “By the end of the 1970s Islamic parties like Jamaat had begun to assert themselves across the Muslim world as the corrupt, failing reigns of leftist Arab nationalists led youthful populations to seek a new cleansing politics” (21). Croll tells a harrowing account of the people trapped inside the embassy and then moves to the topic of Soviet interest and action.

Coll introduces the reader to KGB chief Yuri Andropov and sets the timetable back a few months to March 1979, in anticipation for the revolt in Afghanistan against Soviet occupation. He explains the history of Soviet occupation in Afghanistan and then establishes what the Soviets and the United States knew during the period of 1979 and later, explaining that both could make little sense of the others’ intentions or presence in Afghanistan (29).

Coll describes the policy of American aid and intervention in the Middle East as it passed from Carter to Reagan, as the United States delivered weaponry through Pakistani channels to the Afghani rebels resisting the Soviet forces. Coll describes the political pressures between hawks such as Howard Hart, the CIA’s chief of station in Afghanistan during this time, who wanted to expand the war in Afghanistan and the people who were still cautious so soon after the debacle in Vietnam. However, the United States continued to transfer weapons through the Pakistanis for a number of years. However, “By 1983 some diplomats within the U.S. embassy in Islamabad had begun to worry that the CIA’s dependence on ISI was creating disunity within the Afghan resistance” (37). Coll then shifts the scene in the book to the Saudi intelligence community and the actions it took and the role it played in the Middle East region during the 1970s and 1980s, describing the rise in power and ability thanks to oil revenues and enlightening the reader with some of its intentions for the region at that time. Coll introduces Osama bin Laden in this context, explaining how the bin Laden and Saudi royal family regime came to know one another (43).

In Chapter 5, Coll lays out what was happening in Washington D.C. during the early 1980s and the lines of thinking and proposed action for the conflict of Afghanistan. Some wished for secrecy while others wished to expand the operation further and escalate (45–46). Here Coll establishes one of the dominant theories for Soviet occupation in Afghanistan—to target the oil fields, “which are the lifeline of the Western alliance” (48). This in turn eventually led to the run up of the largest budget the CIA had ever received for its operations in Afghanistan (50). The reader then catches up to Massoud, introduced first in the prologue, again at the end of the chapter.

Coll uses Chapter 6 to detail much of Massoud’s life and upbringing as a way of developing him and providing context for his life and views. The next chapter focused on the continuing development of the CIA’s involvement in Afghanistan and of the rift between Michael Pillsbury and CIA staff who, “saw Pillsbury and his cowboy civilian ilk as dragging the CIA out of its respectable core business of espionage and into the murky, treacherous realm of an escalating dirty war” (57). Coll then helps explain how terrorist organizations began to rise and first develop.

Coll develops more of Bin Ladin’s life and also writes about the complication following CIA director Casey’s death. After the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, around 1988, the CIA allowed itself to believe it had one and didn’t pay attention to the shifts in power, influence, and control that were happening in the Middle East. The section ends with the premonition for a bad fate for the president of Afghanistan.

The One-Eyed Man Was King

This section of the book focuses on the time period of 1989 to 1997. Again, the CIA’s program had to be reauthorized, this time by President Bush. Its mission was different now. “The Reagan-era objective of Soviet withdrawal had been achieved. Under the revised finding, the most important purpose of continuing CIA covert action was to promote ‘self-determination’ by the Afghan people” (86). Coll develops Osama bin Laden a little more and then discusses Peter Tomsen, and his role of distancing the U.S. from Pakistan during this time. Croll details Osama bin Laden’s hardening and the unraveling of relations between the major powers in the region (94). He describes the battle between Masoud and Hekmatyar over Kabul in 1990 (101–102). Under the Clinton administration, Coll contends that the administration and officials were slow to catch the rise of the militant terrorist movement, instead again looking at the bigger actors on the stage.

Coll describes the role Pakistani Prime Minister Bhutto played during this time and, ultimately, how bin Laden was able to take Kabul from Massoud in 1992 (138). American policy, as Coll describes, was to engage the Taliban. After the Taliban took control of Kabul, Bhutto was ousted by Pakistan’s army and president (144). American policy in 1996 was to leave Afghanistan alone, refusing to even recognize it as a government. Meanwhile, the administration and the CIA were at odds, with Clinton unsure about the role of a covert operation.

The Distant Enemy

The third part of the book opens with a history of the first plan on the hunt for bin Laden. Under the threat of blowback, the attempt to capture bin Laden was scrapped, even though he intensified his public rants against America. Saudi Arabia also realized that bin Laden could be dangerous, and relationships between the two countries deteriorated (173–175). Bin Laden and Pakistani authorities-maintained control over and promoted fear and tactics such as killing families (200).

Coll writes that by the late 1990s, Tenet lived in fear of bin Laden’s capabilities against the United States. Massoud again became an unlikely and somewhat unwelcomed ally of the United States against bin Laden. By the end of the Clinton administration, the efforts of the administration had done little to remove bin Laden’s power. Massoud tried to reassure the U.S. he was their ally, but Tenet remained unconvinced.

As Bush takes office, Massoud tries to court interest in the problems he sees with bin Laden’s position and ambitions. Bush, however, is portrayed as being rather clueless about the whole affair in the Middle East. His relationship with Tenet is described as new but more natural because of their similar personality traits (218). The CIA proposes drone strikes, but the program is too nascent and untested to win approval. Meanwhile, Massoud continues his struggle against bin Laden, continually asking for more support. The narrative ends with the acknowledgement of the death of Massoud, on the evening of September 10, 2001.

Analysis of Content

Author Bias

In reading Ghost Wars, it becomes apparent that the author does show some bias against American policymakers and engages in a little bit of mythmaking over the character who appears repeatedly through the book, Ahmed Shah Massoud. Coll’s use of Massoud as a framing element for the book is interesting, but beyond that, Coll introduces Massoud at key points in the book’s development as a figure who should have always been paid more attention to, and whose actions seemed important at the time, though Coll doesn’t acknowledge this as hindsight.

Furthermore, the author is critical of each presidential administration, especially the Bush administration, making a point to call out the gaffes in Bush’s and Rice’s knowledge or misspeak about Afghanistan (216, 223). While it is obviously true that the Bush administration was not focusing on Afghanistan, it might be unfair for Coll to represent the administration is such a buffoonish light, and the treatment almost seems stereotypical at this point, making many of the same types of “insights” about Bush being unintelligent and coarse and oblivious.

Key Points

One huge insight from the book that is implicit rather than explicit is how the role of history is slow to reveal itself, and that it takes decades for problems to develop. From the introduction of Osama bin Laden as a mostly docile young man to a hardened and vicious military ruler in the midst of turmoil in the Middle East, the development of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and the changing of several administrations, Coll does an excellent job of providing context for the issues. The causes, effects, and people and circumstances that set plans and things into motion are revealed and connected in a way that makes the reader appreciate the passage of time.

Another key point that comes form the book is how used to patterns the military and leaders are. Even with the evidence of a new type of enemy and new type of warfare, almost every governing agency on both the Soviet and American sides were concerned about each other and other large players in the region because this was the pattern of how it had been. Therefore, policy and action seemed to follow patterns that, in light of the evidence and what was truly happening and being recorded and observed by people on the ground, the agencies such as the KGB or CIA as a whole would bumble and continue to be slow to change because the thinking and planning and workflow in these organizations could not adapt.

A third important piece gleaned from this is related—the short-sightedness of American foreign policy seems to land the United States in trouble as years progress. Coll makes a compelling case for how the CIA was short-sighted, calling their victory over the Soviets in Afghanistan “Pyrrhic”: “It rapidly proved Pyrrhic. By 1992 there were more personal weapons in Afghanistan than in India and Pakistan combined. By some estimates more such weapons had been shipped into Afghanistan during the previous decade than to any other country in the world” (102). By responding to an old threat and not understanding or thinking about future consequences, the CIA had created its own problems in the Middle East.

The final insight gleaned form this book is about how the threat level of a person, institution, or cultural or political movement has to escalate to too high of a margin in order for it to be noticed or dealt with. Though the book ends on the eve of September 11, 2001, the implication is that much of everything that the United States suffered under bin Laden was their own doing because he had not yet become as important as Iraq, Russia, or another “heavyweight” contender. Had the United States understood his potential sooner, if such a thing were even possible, it might have done a better job of anticipating and preventing the problem he would pose for both the United States and the people who suffered under his brutal Taliban rule in Afghanistan.

Implications

Ghost Wars does not change the cultural understanding of terrorism, though it does put into clear light how long in the making terrorist threats were and how government did have access to the information. The idea that the terrorists are shadowy figures working in shadowy networks is misleading to a degree based on how much information many intelligence groups—including those of Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Russia, and the United States—had on the political development and changes happening Afghanistan.

There is also a common public misconception that the government did not know much about the terrorists who committed the September 11 attacks, though it seems clear from this book that much more was known than was related to the American people. One thing the public can learn from this book is to not trust the government’s story on terrorist activity and to assume they know a lot more than they are letting on (or even more than they realize).

Failings

Without being an expert on Middle East history and policy, it’s difficult to ascertain what failings are in the book. Information about what, if anything, Iraq, Israel, Egypt, and other powers were doing at this time would have been interesting, and Coll could have provided more cultural context for what life was like daily for Afghanis and Americans and how that lack of awareness could also feed to the intelligence community’s lack of awareness—in other words, where Coll paints the agency as inept, had he provided more cultural context, it might have appeared as if the intelligence community had other concerns. However, the book is well documented, and while it does assume a lens and stance that gives it a focused narrative, this is not so much a failing as an attempt to make the book readable and relatable.

Conclusion

Steve Coll’s careful researched, documented, and crafted book Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 establishes a long view of the history of the middle east and exposes how slow to change agencies such as the CIA are and how difficult it is for them to assess new threats until they become a problem. Though the book idolizes Ahmed Massoud and does not give as much cultural context as it could during key events and time periods of the 30 years the book covers, it manages to document a compelling narrative for how the events of September 11, 2001, came to pass.

Reference

Coll, S. (2005) Ghost wars: The secret history of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden, from the Soviet invasion to September 10, 2001 [ePub version]. Retrieved from Amazon.com.