There’s been a lot of attention focused on the role played by the Special Forces in getting rid of the Taliban, and the role of smart bombs and JDAMs and Daisy Cutters and all manner of military materiel. But what about money? When I was in Kandahar in December I learned that cash played an unusual role in winning the allegiance of key warlords and their fighters. For example, the arsenal of Gul Agha, who seized Kandahar from the Taliban, included a Land Rover filled with money, apparently provided by his friends in the Special Forces.
The Los Angeles Times is weighing in with a delightful story about the money trail in Afghanistan, noting that “the CIA’s small army of operatives often has worked less like James Bond than like bagmen, handing out bundles of $100 bills–often with sequential serial numbers–to purchase intelligence and support.” The story quotes a CIA officer as saying, “The Taliban conquered the country with bribery and negotiation, and basically, that’s the way we reconquered it–with help from air power.” The piece includes a wonderful anecdote about a CIA officer handing $10,000 in cash, plus a Thuraya satellite phone, to a powerful warlord. “Is that all?” the warlord replied. “Is that all you give to someone who knows where to find Osama bin Laden?”
Anyway, it became a source of amusement in Kandahar to notice the shiny satellite phones and GPS gizmos and new weapons and realize that my tax dollars paid for these things. The CIA might have been a bit too generous, though. One evening, a soldier approached me, showed me a satphone and GPS locator and asked me what they were and how much they were worth. Another day, a commander I was interviewing asked me to teach him how to use his new Iridium satphone. When I showed him how, he was mightily impressed and treated me with the deference usually accorded to a member of the Special Forces, which I’m sure he thought I was.
