Post 9/11: Pak wanted US to talk to Taliban, but Bush rejected
As the US prepared to invade Afghanistan in 2001 after 9/11 attacks, Pakistan's powerful ISI wanted America to enter into a dialogue with the Taliban, but the then Bush Administration "bluntly" told President, Mr Pervez Musharraf, that it had no inclination to do so. According to classified documents released by the National Security Archive of the George Washington University, two days after Al Qaeda unleashed terror on the US, its envoy to Pakistan Wendy Chamberlin "bluntly" told Mr Musharraf on September 13, 2001 that there was "absolutely no inclination in Washington to enter into a dialogue with the Taliban, which controlled Afghanistan at that time. "The time for dialogue was finished as of September 11," he told Mr Musharraf, the documents said. However, Pakistan, as the Taliban's primary sponsor, disagreed. The documents also say Musharraf, who was facing the US heat because of his support to the Taliban regime, accepted "unconditionally" in 24 hours all seven demands made by the US like stopping at the Al Qaeda at the border, provide the US with blanket landing rights to conduct operations and territorial and naval access and help in "destroying Osama Bin Laden". However, events thereafter, showed that such an acceptance was just a "tactical move" by Musharraf for all practical purposes there was not much change in the polices of his government, the documents say. The then ISI chief Mahmoud Ahmad also told the then US Ambassador to Pakistan Wendy Chamberlin "not to act in anger." "Real victory will come in negotiations...If the Taliban are eliminated...Afghanistan will revert to warlordism," the documents quoted Ahmad as saying. The then ISI chief wanted the US to give Pakistan some time as he was headed for another trip to Afghanistan on September 25, 2001 to meet the top Taliban leadership in this regard, said the classified cable dated September 23, 2001. ISI chief, Mr Ahmad returned to Afghanistan to make a last-minute plea to the Taliban. General Ahmad told Wendy Chamberlin "his mission was taking place in parallel with US Pakistani military planning" and that in his estimation, "a negotiated solution would be preferable to military action." "I implore you," Ahmad told the Ambassador, "not to act in anger. Real victory will come in negotiations..." "(Taliban leader Mullah) Omar himself," he said, "is frightened. That much was clear in his last meeting." The ISI chief told the Ambassador that America's strategic objectives of getting Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda would best be accomplished by coercing the Taliban to do it themselves.
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