Looking for New Partners
Although not all CIA officers had lost faith in the tribals' capabilities-many
judged them to be good reporters-few believed they would carry out an ambush of
Bin Ladin. The chief of the Counterterrorist Center compared relying on the
tribals to playing the lottery.
168 He and his associates, supported
by Clarke, pressed for developing a partnership with the Northern Alliance, even
though doing so might bring the United States squarely behind one side in
Afghanistan's long-running civil war.
The Northern Alliance was dominated by Tajiks and drew its strength mainly
from the northern and eastern parts of Afghanistan. In contrast, Taliban members
came principally from Afghanistan's most numerous ethnic group, the Pashtuns,
who are concentrated in the southern part of the country, extending into the
North-West Frontier and Baluchistan provinces of Pakistan.169
Because of the Taliban's behavior and its association with Pakistan, the
Northern Alliance had been able at various times to obtain assistance from
Russia, Iran, and India. The alliance's leader was Afghanistan's most renowned
military commander, Ahmed Shah Massoud. Reflective and charismatic, he had been
one of the true heroes of the war against the Soviets. But his bands had been
charged with more than one massacre, and the Northern Alliance was widely
thought to finance itself in part through trade in heroin. Nor had Massoud shown
much aptitude for governing except as a ruthless warlord. Nevertheless, Tenet
told us Massoud seemed the most interesting possible new ally against Bin Ladin.170
In February 1999, Tenet sought President Clinton's authorization to enlist
Massoud and his forces as partners. In response to this request, the President
signed the Memorandum of Notification whose language he personally altered.
Tenet says he saw no significance in the President's changes. So far as he was
concerned, it was the language of August 1998, expressing a preference for
capture but accepting the possibility that Bin Ladin could not be brought out
alive. "We were plowing the same ground," Tenet said.171
CIA officers described Massoud's reaction when he heard that the United
States wanted him to capture and not kill Bin Ladin. One characterized Massoud's
body language as "a wince." Schroen recalled Massoud's response as
"You guys are crazy-you haven't changed a bit." In Schroen's opinion,
the capture proviso inhibited Massoud and his forces from going after Bin Ladin
but did not completely stop them.172 The idea, however, was a long
shot. Bin Ladin's usual base of activity was near Kandahar, far from the front
lines of Taliban operations against the Northern Alliance.
