Last week, we looked at the beginning of a 34 year old war in Afghanistan. (Read: Terrorism, A Remnant of The Cold War : Part 1)

Afghanistan, ranked amongst the world’s 15 poorest nations (in lists that Kenya just scrapes the bottom 30). The bottom four seems to be a favourite of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Zimbabwe and Liberia (not in that order, but all lists agree DRC is last). The lists do agree with my argument last week - The United States with a production of $ 45,000 (Ksh. 3.8 million)per citizen per year and the DRC producing $ 350 (Ksh. 30,000) per citizen per year all show no difficulty in their ability to afford war. There is however remarkable difference in the ability for rich and poor countries in their ability to afford health care, or clean piped water for their citizens.

In addition, when it comes to wars, we found that the well to do nations were quite willing to help their poorer counterparts in funding wars. Since September 11 2001, the United States had spend about $570.9 billion (Ksh. 48.7 trillion) in Afghanistan. In 1992, the Communist Afghan government collapsed after the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) could no longer afford to its annual Ksh. 100 billion plus and fuel supplies contribution to the then government at war.

In 1992, Afghanistan had been at war since 1978. The was was more of a proxy war, where the USSR was keen on expanding its territory and the US and its allies were trying to stop the USSR from expanding. Pakistan, Afghanistan’s neighbors, did not like the USSR since they were funding India, Pakistan’s long time rival. The Pakistan strongly opposed the then government in power and provided resources to those fighting it. More resources came in from the US and others, and these were channeled through Pakistan.

The mode of operation was to fund Mujahideen, who were strong religious fundamentalists to topple the Afghanistan government.

When the Afghanistan government finally fell in 1992, Kabul was left for the Mujahideen. The US, with their mission apparently accomplished, also left.

In the first 14 years leading to 1992, the USSR had been Afghanistan’s biggest problem. The next decade, it’s other and closest neighbour, Pakistan would become its biggest problem.

Most of the Mujahideen came together to form a joint government in 1992. However, Pakistan did not like this government. A 2005 thesis by Khawar Hussain says that Pakistan, always at loggerheads with India since the separation of the two in 1947, was quite keen in having a friendly government in Kabul.

Pakistan therefore funded the Hezb-e Islami, one of the Mujahideens, to wage war against the other Mujahideens. In 1990, Pakistan had come up with a plan to topple the Afghanistan government - rain tens of thousands of rockets in Kabul. Almost all Mujahideens went red with anger on hearing this plan, and the US was also very critical about it.

In 1992, with the US out, and Pakistan and Hezb-e Islami targeting the other Mujahideens, the rockets were brought out to launch. Between April 10 and 11 1992, more than 1,000 rockets were fired in Kabul while a single day in August 1992 saw the Kabul Airport receiving lots of air traffic with 150 rockets landing in it. In comparison, the current period of war between Israel and Hizbollah staring 2002 has seen Israel receive over 12,000 rockets in total.

Hezb-e Islami was often accused as having spent most of their fighting on war against other Mujahideen and barely fighting any of the communists.

By the end of 1992, half of Kabul had been destroyed. In addition to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, home of the majority Sunni Muslim sect was supporting one of the Mujahideens and so was Iran, which is is home to the minority Shia Muslim sect. Civilians were targets of indiscriminate rocket firing and massacres from other muslim sects.

Things did cool down  a bit after 1992 for Afghanistan. However, despite the thousands of rockets it supplied, Pakistan was disappointed that the group they were supporting had failed to gain power. They then turned their support to the Taliban, who become successful and were able to rule over most of Afghanistan by 1996.

The Taliban are known as students of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, a religious conservative party Last week, we looked at the beginning of a 34 year old war in Afghanistan. Afghanistan, ranked amongst the world’s 15 poorest nations (in lists that Kenya just scrapes the bottom 30). The bottom four seems to be a favourite of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Zimbabwe and Liberia (not in that order, but all lists agree DRC is last). The lists do agree with my argument last week - The United States with a production of $ 45,000 (Ksh. 3.8 million)per citizen per year and the DRC producing $ 350 (Ksh. 30,000) per citizen per year all show no difficulty in their ability to afford war. There is however remarkable difference in the ability for rich and poor countries in their ability to afford health care, or clean piped water for their citizens.

In addition, when it comes to wars, we found that the well to do nations were quite willing to help their poorer counterparts in funding wars. Since September 11 2001, the United States had spend about $570.9 billion (Ksh. 48.7 trillion) in Afghanistan. In 1992, the Communist Afghan government collapsed after the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) could no longer afford to its annual Ksh. 100 billion plus and fuel supplies contribution to the then government at war.

In 1992, Afghanistan had been at war since 1978. The was was more of a proxy war, where the USSR was keen on expanding its territory and the US and its allies were trying to stop the USSR from expanding. Pakistan, Afghanistan’s neighbors, did not like the USSR since they were funding India, Pakistan’s long time rival. The Pakistan strongly opposed the then government in power and provided resources to those fighting it. More resources came in from the US and others, and these were channeled through Pakistan.

The mode of operation was to fund Mujahideen, who were strong religious fundamentalists to topple the Afghanistan government.

When the Afghanistan government finally fell in 1992, Kabul was left for the Mujahideen. The US, with their mission apparently accomplished, also left.

In the first 14 years leading to 1992, the USSR had been Afghanistan’s biggest problem. The next decade, it’s other and closest neighbour, Pakistan would become its biggest problem.

Most of the Mujahideen came together to form a joint government in 1992. However, Pakistan did not like this government. A 2005 thesis by Khawar Hussain says that Pakistan, always at loggerheads with India since the separation of the two in 1947, was quite keen in having a friendly government in Kabul.

Pakistan therefore funded the Hezb-e Islami, one of the Mujahideens, to wage war against the other Mujahideens. In 1990, Pakistan had come up with a plan to topple the Afghanistan government - rain tens of thousands of rockets in Kabul. Almost all Mujahideens went red with anger on hearing this plan, and the US was also very critical about it.

In 1992, with the US out, and Pakistan and Hezb-e Islami targeting the other Mujahideens, the rockets were brought out to launch. Between April 10 and 11 1992, more than 1,000 rockets were fired in Kabul while a single day in August 1992 saw the Kabul Airport receiving lots of air traffic with 150 rockets landing in it. In comparison, the current period of war between Israel and Hizbollah staring 2002 has seen Israel receive over 12,000 rockets in total.

Hezb-e Islami was often accused as having spent most of their fighting on war against other Mujahideen and barely fighting any of the communists.

By the end of 1992, half of Kabul had been destroyed. In addition to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, home of the majority Sunni Muslim sect was supporting one of the Mujahideens and so was Iran, which is is home to the minority Shia Muslim sect. Civilians were targets of indiscriminate rocket firing and massacres from other muslim sects.

Things did cool down  a bit after 1992 for Afghanistan. However, despite the thousands of rockets it supplied, Pakistan was disappointed that the group they were supporting had failed to gain power. They then turned their support to the Taliban, who become successful and were able to rule over most of Afghanistan by 1996.

The Taliban are known as students of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, a religious conservative party in Pakistan that ran Madrassas for Afghan refugees. In Kandahar, Afghanistan, Mullah Omar led about 50 former Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam students in an uprising, angry at the general disorder and corruption in the reigns of the other Mujahideens.

Pakistan backed the Taliban, with the Pakistani Secret Police (ISI) providing about 30,000 Pakistani nationals as support for the 15,000 Afghan nationals. The ruling militia in Afghanistan was thus made up of more Pakistanis than Afghans. Pakistan also supported the Taliban in air raids and the ISI helped the Taliban set up camps and even trained them.

The Al Qaeda also supplied the Taliban with about 3,000 troops, before the two later fell out. Meanwhile, Al Qaeda was starting its global operations in Afghanistan, and would later direct the attention of dozens of countries back to the War in Afghanistan, and also scale the same war to other nations.

Pakistan, meanwhile would find itself facing the Taliban back home, and probably fighting them too.

Join us next week for the final link on the modern terrorist’s emergence from The Cold War and the War in Afghanistan.

Article largely sourced  from Wikipedia entries. Other resources are Yahoo Answers, Quora