Reply #10: More on reasons for going to war in Afghanistan

[Time for change]

Two French intelligence analysts, Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquie, offer clues to the reasons for the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in their book, '' Bin Laden, la verité interdite'' (''Bin Laden, the forbidden truth''). They were told by former FBI Deputy Director John O’Neil that ''the main obstacles to investigate Islamic terrorism were U.S. oil corporate interests and the role played by Saudi Arabia in it''.

Julio Godoy summarizes Brisard’s and Dasquie’s book with respect to the background behind the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan:

The two claim the U.S. government's main objective in Afghanistan was to consolidate the position of the Taliban regime to obtain access to the oil and gas reserves in Central Asia… Until August, the U.S. government saw the Taliban regime ''as a source of stability in Central Asia that would enable the construction of an oil pipeline across Central Asia'', from the rich oilfields in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan, through Afghanistan and Pakistan, to the Indian Ocean.

But, confronted with Taliban's refusal to accept U.S. conditions, ''This rationale of energy security changed into a military one… At one moment during the negotiations, the U.S. representatives told the Taliban, 'either you accept our offer of a carpet of gold, or we bury you under a carpet of bombs'.''…

The government of Bush began to negotiate with the Taliban immediately after coming into power… The last meeting between U.S. and Taliban representatives took place in August, five weeks before the attacks on New York and Washington.