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FEW DAYS after September 11, 2001, US President George W. Bush addressed the nation. “We will find those who did it; we will smoke them out of their holes. We will get them running and we’ll bring them to justice. There is a desire by the American people to not seek only revenge, but to win a war against barbaric behaviour.”⁴⁶ By now the Americans were certain the attacks, which killed approximately three thousand, were the work of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, operating out of Afghanistan. They had America’s full attention.

The search for Bin Laden began in the north.⁴⁷ There was still a small sliver of land there that wasn’t under Taliban control, and it was the only place where the Americans could enter Afghanistan. Although the Northern Alliance had repeatedly asked the Americans for military assistance, the Americans had not shown much interest. After 9/11 everything changed, but simply getting into the country was a challenge.

Two days before 9/11, the Northern Alliance leader, Ahmad Shah Massoud, was murdered. Two Arabs from Brussels, Belgium, posing as journalists, managed to get close

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to him and detonated a bomb hidden in their camera. Al-Qaeda was alleged to have been behind the assassination. The group would have assumed that after the attacks on the Twin Towers the US would start a war in Afghanistan and would need help from the Northern Alliance. By killing Massoud, bin Laden would pre-emptively undermine the morale of the Alliance forces.

On September 17, US President Bush signed a bill making US$1 billion available for this secret war. Most of the action would take place away from the cameras, Bush warned.

It was already difficult for journalists to get visas to enter Afghanistan. At the same time Karzai sent Said to Uruzgan, the first CIA team arrived secretly by helicopter at the Northern Alliance headquarters. With millions of dollars to hand out, the CIA hoped to mobilise the group in the hunt for bin Laden and the Taliban. The American secret agents had an unambiguous mission: “I want to see pictures of Osama bin Laden’s head on a stake,” their boss had told them. “And then I want his head brought here on ice so I can show it to the president.”

The U.S. Embassy in Pakistan also had plenty of money to distribute to Afghans willing to help the Americans in their mission. But all didn’t exactly share the enthusiasm. Several elders and warlords had fought hard in the war against the Soviets, and they were supported by America, but once the mutual enemy had been driven out, they never heard from America again. Many potential insurgents were drawn to the dollars, but they took a wait-and-see approach. The satellite phones the Americans distributed ended up on the black market in Pakistan. It was discovered that at least one

opposition leaders bought a very expensive car and built a nice house for US$1 million.⁴⁸

There were exceptions, such as Abdul Haq, a former mujahedeen leader operating in eastern Afghanistan who was strongly opposed to the Taliban.⁴⁹ He lost a leg in the war against the Soviets. Under the Taliban regime he came home one day to find his wife and child killed. He claimed he already had thousands of armed men available—at least a third of them were the first defectors from the Taliban. Haq wanted to prevent the Northern Alliance from taking all the power in Afghanistan with American assistance. He intended to enter the country without foreign support and oust the Taliban.

At this point, Hamid Karzai was largely out of the picture. Journalists knew him mainly as a helpful diplomat who did odd jobs and interpreted during the Soviet era. He didn’t seem the kind of man to lead an armed opposition movement.

While the money started to flow in the north and in Islamabad, Karzai, like many other leaders in Quetta, was meeting secretly with the CIA. He approached a secret agent who called himself Graig.⁵⁰ He and Karzai already knew one another from before 9/11, and had met a few times in Quetta.⁵¹ But now the atmosphere was much more upbeat.

Many times the US and also Graig had disappointed Karzai, but now they were willing to help. In the Serena Hotel in Quetta, where the red-haired American received ‘numerous’

Afghans, they discussed options for entering Uruzgan.⁵² (Graig would later become the CIA station chief in Kabul) He provided Hamid Karzai support in the form of money

and satellite phones, although it was uncertain whether the CIA agreed with Karzai’s plans. A colleague of Graig’s, then part of the CIA team in the north, asserted that the CIA actually advised him to wait for help from an American commando team. Karzai ignored the advice.⁵³ “I had asked them for help before 9/11 and I asked for it again after. I didn’t tell the CIA the exact date I went in. That was too dangerous and could leak to the ISI.”

The comings and goings of Afghan visitors in Karzai’s kala in Quetta were only mentioned by a few Pakistani media outlets; international journalists barely noticed Karzai at all.

One article by the American journalist Molly Moore in the Washington Post— based on Pakistani accounts—mentions him as the potential new Afghan president. “Pakistani newspapers have speculated that Karzai is campaigning for a presidential nomination with his coalition-building talks.”⁵⁴ Karzai dismissed the suggestion in the same article. Moore’s colleague, the Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid, didn’t share her theory.⁵⁵ Rashid had spoken to the Americans, to the British, and to United Nations people in Islamabad, he said.

“They didn’t take him seriously,” said Rashid, who believed instead that the articles in the Pakistani media were a trap, planted to direct Taliban attention to Karzai’s intentions toward them.

Guido Rampoldi, an Italian reporter with La Repubblica who visited Karzai in Quetta, asked him directly what his ambitions were. “Karzai was excited after the attacks. He immediately understood that history would take a turn and he was pleased for Afghanistan. When I asked him: ‘Are you the new leader?’ he didn’t answer. He only said that now

everyone must participate again. He would even sit down with Gulbuddin Hekmatyar if need be.”⁵⁶

According to Rampoldi, the Americans didn’t consider him the potential president at that time. “In my opinion they felt he had to prove himself first. Still it didn’t seem impossible to me that he would emerge as the leader. Afghan history shows that Kandahar generates a lot of leaders and that they are usually Pashtuns. Karzai had worked hard for his country’s future. He was a genuine patriot and he had good connections with the Americans. That was essential now.”

At the beginning of October, Karzai sent another messenger to the elders in Uruzgan. Mohammed Shah was viewed by many in Afghanistan as an extension of Karzai himself. Officially he was Karzai’s security guard, but in recent years he had been given the authority to welcome people in the kota on Karzai’s behalf. In those instances he often functioned as a kind of personal secretary, operating relatively independently when it came to uncomplicated matters. Karzai also frequently discussed options for entering the south with him. So for Shah, Karzai’s plans weren’t new.⁵⁷

Karzai and Shah were a remarkable duo. Shah had nothing in common with the calm, highly educated Karzai.

His appearance was that of a typical proud Kandahari—he has a loud, harsh voice, a pitted face, bright green eyes, tattoos, and he was missing a piece of one of his thumbs. He had a reputation for being fearless and somewhat unreliable.

He was from the same tribe as Karzai, and he claimed that he had married into Karzai’s clan. There were years when their relationship wasn’t as close. When the Taliban appeared, Shah was aligned with Karzai’s rival Lalai. After Lalai fled

from the Taliban to Iran, Shah turned to Karzai. So it took a while for Karzai to trust him, and for a period it was even forbidden for Shah to enter Karzai’s kota. Still, Shah guarded Karzai’s kala against intruders and regularly accompanied Karzai when he went jogging near the military base outside Quetta, driving their car to the main entrance and waiting until Karzai returned from his workout. Afterward they would often drink a cup of tea at the luxurious Serena Hotel in the city.

Shah understood Karzai’s plans better than most. He grasped what had happened on September 11. He watched the televisions in Karzai’s kala for hours on end, and understood that the Americans would soon intervene in Afghanistan. But like the men from Uruzgan, Shah also believed Karzai would do well to stay in Quetta. He saw grave perils for the man famous for never having held a gun. “I will go in, no problem,” he said, but he felt that it was far too dangerous for his boss. But Karzai would not be dissuaded.

Shah, too, received a little black suitcase with a satellite phone from Karzai. “I will explain to you how it works,” said Karzai. The same evening he called Shah at his home a few blocks away; later, Shah would return the call. The following day Shah also received a big bag full of Pakistani rupees – enough to bribe a few fighters. That same day Karzai accompanied Shah to the bus stop where they flagged down a taxi that would take him to mountainous Uruzgan via Kandahar. He knew where he was going: to his friend Abdul Ghani, who had returned to Uruzgan from Quetta a few days earlier. For security reasons the satellite phone remained behind and would be delivered later by Said.

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