His extreme ruthlessness, his reputation for skinning prisoners alive, was considered a plus

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_911_timeline&geopolitics_and_9/11=isi

Complete 911 Timeline

Pakistan and the ISI Intelligence Agency

<snip>May 1979: CIA Begins Working with Hekmatyar and Other Mujaheddin Leaders Chosen by ISI As the US mobilizes for covert war in Afghanistan (see 1978 and July 3, 1979), a CIA special envoy meets Afghan mujaheddin leaders at Peshawar, Pakistan, near the border to Afghanistan. All of them have been carefully selected by the Pakistani ISI and do not represent a broad spectrum of the resistance movement. One of them is Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a drug dealer with little support in Afghanistan, but who is loyal to the ISI. The US will begin working with Hekmatyar and over the next 10 years over half of all US aid to the mujaheddin will go to his faction (see 1983). Hekmatyar is already known as brutal, corrupt, and incompetent. His extreme ruthlessness, for instance, his reputation for skinning prisoners alive, is considered a plus, as it is thought he will use that ruthlessness to kill Russians.

December 8, 1979: Soviet Forces, Lured in by the CIA, Invade Afghanistan

The Soviet Union invades Afghanistan. The Russians were initially invited in by the Afghan government to deal with rising instability and army mutinies, and they start crossing the border on December 8. But on December 26, Russian troops storm the presidential palace, kill the country’s leader, Haizullah Amin, and the invitation turns into an invasion. Later declassified high-level Russian documents will show that the Russian leadership believed that Amin, who took power in a violent coup from another pro-Soviet leader two months before, had secret contacts with the US embassy and was probably a US agent. Further, one document from this month claims that “the right wing Muslim opposition” has “practically established their control in many provinces… using foreign support.” It has been commonly believed that the invasion was unprovoked, but the Russians will later be proven largely correct. In a 1998 interview, Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser, will reveal that earlier in the year Carter authorized the CIA to destabilize the government, provoking the Russians to invade (see July 3, 1979). Further, CIA covert action in the country actually began in 1978 (see 1978), if not earlier (see 1973-1979). The US and Saudi Arabia will give a huge amount of money (estimates range up to $40 billion total for the war) to support the mujaheddin guerrilla fighters opposing the Russians, and a decade-long war will ensue.

Early 1980: Pakistan Turns to Islamic Fundamentalism after Invasion of Afghanistan

Muhammad Zia ul-Haq. General Muhammad Zia ul-Haq seized power in Pakistan in a 1977 coup and declared himself president. The US stopped all economic and military aid to Pakistan as a result of the coup and Zia ruled cautiously in an attempt to win international approval. But immediately after the Russian invasion of Afghanistan (see December 8, 1979), the US allies with Zia and resumes aid. This allows Zia to use Islam to consolidate his power without worrying about the international reaction. He passes pro-Islamic legislation, introduces Islamic banking systems, and creates Islamic courts. Most importantly, he creates a new religious tax which is used to create tens of thousands of madrassas, or religious boarding schools. These schools will indoctrinate a large portion of future Islamic militants for decades to come. Zia also promotes military officers on the basis of religious devotion. The Koran and other religious material becomes compulsory reading material in army training courses. “Radical Islamist ideology began to permeate the military and the influence of the most extreme groups crept into the army,” journalist Kathy Gannon will write in her book I is for Infidel. The BBC will later comment that Zia’s self-declared “Islamization” policies created a “culture of jihad” within Pakistan that continues until present day.

1984: Bin Laden Develops Ties with Pakistani ISI and Afghan Warlord

Bin Laden moves to Peshawar, a Pakistani town bordering Afghanistan, and helps run a front organization for the mujaheddin known as Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK), which funnels money, arms, and fighters from the outside world into the Afghan war. “MAK {is} nurtured by Pakistan’s state security services, the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, or ISI, the CIA’s primary conduit for conducting the covert war against Moscow’s occupation.” Bin Laden becomes closely tied to the warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, and greatly strengthens Hekmatyar’s opium smuggling operations. Hekmatyar, who also has ties with bin Laden, the CIA, and drug running, has been called “an ISI stooge and creation.” MAK is also known as Al-Kifah and its branch in New York is called the Al-Kifah Refugee Center. This branch will play a pivotal role in the 1993 WTC bombing and also has CIA ties (see January 24, 1994).

[wildbilln864]

1. k&r! thanks. nt

[Arctic Dave]

2. Kicked and bookmarked for later.

[hootinholler]

3. Interesting background, thanks! Rec'd

[Hydra]

4. I see now that all of our behind the scenes BS is coming home to roost

I wonder where the PR gurus are. They kept this sort of thing under wraps for more than 50 years, and now it's all going public???

[lonestarnot]

5. ISI

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-Services_Intelligence

[starroute]

6. There was also an extensive private pro-mujahedeen movement

There were numerous small groups working to funnel US aid to Afghan refugees, but the one most closely tied to the mujaheddin was the Committee for a Free Afghanistan, which funded the Peshawar Seven -- the groups described in the OP.

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Committee_for_a_Free_Afghanistan

"The invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 by the former Soviet Union was one of the major concerns addressed by National Security Caucus (NSC) lawmakers during the Caucus' early years. Many lawmakers were involved in the formation of a Committee for a Free Afghanistan which successfully advocated United States funding for the resistance. The Committee for a Free Afghanistan was a program of the American Security Council and they sponsored a film crew that spent over one month inside Afghanistan and provided television actualities on the war to commercial and cable stations across the United States." Source: National Security Caucus Foundation.

"The Committee for a Free Afghanistan - CFA- was founded in 1981 in the aftermath of a trip by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Radio Free Kabul founder Lord Bethell to the United States, dedicated to building support for the mujahideen. It provided funds for almost all the Peshawar Seven groups of mujahideen."

Note the involvement of the American Security Council -- a longtime center of activity for military-industrial complex types, Neocons, and crazy generals that was particularly active at this period in trying to breathe new life into the fading Cold War. According to my notes, the infamous James Jesus Angleton, who'd hooked up with ASC after the CIA dumped him in the wake of Watergate, was involved in the creation of CFA as well.

The Committee for a Free Afghanistan also received support at its founding from the World Anti-Communist League (WACL) -- which in the 80's served as Ollie North's major conduit for aid to the Contras, and which was also tight with the Reverend Moon, Latin death squads, and Asian fascists -- and was given office space by the Heritage Foundation.

Despite its general right-wing slant, the group's council of advisors included not only General John Singlaub and General Daniel O. Graham -- founders that same year of a US branch of the WACL and soon to be heads of the WACL as a whole -- and Arnaud de Borchgrave of the Moon-owned Washington Times, but also a broad spectrum of members of Congress, including such strange bedfellows as John McCain, Charlie Wilson, and Barney Frank.