Afghanistan and Pakistan’ (Starr, 1999). This argument attracted a
stinging retort from US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs
Thomas W. Pickering (Pickering 1999), but it hardly slowed Starr
in his tracks: on 21 March 2001, he actually hosted a Taliban advis-
er to Mulla Omar, the 24-year-old Sayed Rahmatullah Hashimi, at
his institute, and he continued his attacks on the United Front (‘this
sinister alliance’) well after 11 September (Starr, 2001). Another
argument for the arms’ length approach was outlined in an article in
Foreign Affairsby Milton Bearden, who had served as CIA Station
Chief in Islamabad from 1986 to 1989. This article – which man-
aged to discuss the course of the Afghan conflict without making a
single reference to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar – argued that there was
‘no reasonable guarantee’ that the ‘now leaderless’ Northern
Alliance forces could dislodge the Taliban, and that ‘the most like-
ly consequence of a U.S. alliance with the late Masoud’s fighters
would be the coalescing of Afghanistan’s majority Pashtun tribes
around their Taliban leaders and the rekindling of a brutal, general
civil war that would continue until the United States simply gave
up’ (Bearden, 2001: 29).
The Bush Administration fortunately was not swayed by such
arguments, which was just as well, as they were remote from
Afghanistan’s ground realities. Given that Massoud had favoured
institutional rather than patrimonial rule, his death did not trigger a
fragmentation of the Shura-i Nazarcomponent of the United Front.
The likelihood of an American assault on the Taliban gave those
who survived Massoud an excellent incentive to work cooperative-
ly. Three individuals emerged as Massoud’s successors. General
Muhammad Qassem Fahim, one of Massoud’s closest lieutenants,
succeeded him as military commander. Younos Qanuni, who had
long been his principal political plenipotentiary in dealings with
other groups, continued to play the role of negotiator. Dr Abdullah,
by training a medical practitioner, and onetime secretary to
Massoud, filled the position of Foreign Minister. One of their first
steps was to renew contact with former King Zahir Shah in Rome.
This had two merits. First, it held out the prospect of broadening
the base of the anti-Taliban forces by attracting a symbolically-
The Fall of the Taliban 261