FT does Kandahar
Good article in yesterday’s Financial Times newspaper on Amir Mohammad Agha, very much a so-called ‘key player’ in Arghandab district of Kandahar province. Matt Green outlined why he might be important to the viability of US forces in the district, possibly (although I don’t know this) invited down there by the 82nd Airborne to impress on Amir Mohammad Agha the importance of which way he decides to choose. In any case, I don’t imagine any ‘decision’ taken by Amir Mohammad Agha to be public and clear-cut.
I was greatly disappointed, however, that Matt missed out on the key point when it comes to Amir Mohammad Agha — he is Mullah Mohammad Omar’s father-in-law. (and with that, he also missed the extremely important 1980s context and just how involved Amir Mohamad Agha was involved in the early years of the Taliban movement post-1994.
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[...] red highlight is particularly interesting, given Strick van Linschoten’s extra tidbit of information on Agha: …. I was greatly disappointed, however, that (the article’s author)missed out on the [...]
Financial Times on Kandahar: One Missing Tidbit « MILNEWS.ca Blog
5 Feb 10 at 7:29 pm
(Belated) good catch.
Any suggestions where one could read a bit more about AMA’s earlier history/involvement with the Taliban?
MILNEWS.ca
6 Feb 10 at 6:28 am
And the belated is my congrats, not your catch
MILNEWS.ca
6 Feb 10 at 6:34 am
Haha no there’s nowhere you can read about it. If I get the time I’ll write it all up, but it’s the kind of thing that (again) reinforces my desire to put together a decent oral history of the past 35/40 years in southern Afghanistan. All this important stuff is forgotten.
Alex Strick van Linschoten
6 Feb 10 at 1:42 pm
So much cool stuff to be done, so little time to do it in, right?
MILNEWS.ca
7 Feb 10 at 12:06 am