[Nettime-bold] FW: US 'planned attack on Taleban'

["wade tillett" <super89@bigfoot.com>]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/south_asia/newsid_1550000/15503
66.stm

US 'planned attack on Taleban'
The wider objective was to oust the Taleban
Tuesday, 18 September, 2001, 11:27 GMT 12:27 UK
By the BBC's George Arney

A former Pakistani diplomat has told the BBC that the US was planning
military action against Osama Bin Laden and the Taleban even before
last week's attacks.

Niaz Naik, a former Pakistani Foreign Secretary, was told by senior
American officials in mid-July that military action against
Afghanistan would go ahead by the middle of October.

Mr Naik said US officials told him of the plan at a UN-sponsored
international contact group on Afghanistan which took place in Berlin.

Mr Naik told the BBC that at the meeting the US representatives told
him that unless Bin Laden was handed over swiftly America would take
military action to kill or capture both Bin Laden and the Taleban
leader, Mullah Omar.

The wider objective, according to Mr Naik, would be to topple the
Taleban regime and install a transitional government of moderate
Afghans in its place - possibly under the leadership of the former
Afghan King Zahir Shah.

Mr Naik was told that Washington would launch its operation from bases
in Tajikistan, where American advisers were already in place.

He was told that Uzbekistan would also participate in the operation
and that 17,000 Russian troops were on standby.

Mr Naik was told that if the military action went ahead it would take
place before the snows started falling in Afghanistan, by the middle
of October at the latest.

He said that he was in no doubt that after the World Trade Center
bombings this pre-existing US plan had been built upon and would be
implemented within two or three weeks.

And he said it was doubtful that Washington would drop its plan even
if Bin Laden were to be surrendered immediately by the Taleban.



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