History of the War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)

This article summarizes the history of the War in Afghanistan.

1978–2001: Prelude

In 2001, Afghanistan had been at war for over 20 years. The communist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan seized power in 1978, and its policies sparked a popular uprising. The Soviet Union, sensing PDPA weakness, intervened in 1979 to support the regime. The entry of the Soviet Union into Afghanistan prompted its Cold War rivals, especially the United States and Saudi Arabia, to support rebels fighting against the Soviet-backed PDPA. While the secular and socialist government controlled the cities, religiously motivated mujahideen held sway in much of the countryside. The most important mujahideen commander was Ahmad Shah Massoud, who led the well-organized Tajik forces. The American Central Intelligence Agency worked closely with Pakistan's Inter-Service Intelligence to funnel foreign support for the mujahideen. The war also attracted Arab volunteers, known as "Afghan Arabs", including Osama bin Laden.
After the withdrawal of the Soviet military from Afghanistan in February 1989, the PDPA regime collapsed in 1992. In the resulting power vacuum, the mujahideen leaders vied for dominance in a civil war from 1992 to 1996. By then, bin Laden had left the country. The United States' interest in Afghanistan also diminished. In 1994, a Pashtun mujahid named Mullah Omar founded the Taliban movement in Kandahar. His followers were religious students and sought to end warlord rule through strict adherence to Islamic law. By the end of 1994, the Taliban had captured all of Kandahar Province.

Taliban Emirate vs. Northern Alliance (1996–2001)

In 1996, with military support from Pakistan and financial support from Saudi Arabia, the Taliban seized Kabul and founded the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. They imposed their fundamentalist interpretation of Islam in areas under their control, issuing edicts forbidding women to work outside the home or attend school and requiring them to abide by harsh rules on veiling and seclusion.
After the Taliban takeover of Kabul, Massoud retreated north to his native Panjshir Valley and formed a resistance movement against the Taliban, called the United Front or the Northern Alliance. In addition to Massoud's Tajik force, the United Front included Uzbeks under the former PDPA general Abdul Rashid Dostum and Hazara factions. The Northern Alliance received varying degrees of support from Russia, Iran, and India. Like the Taliban, Massoud also raised money by trafficking drugs. By 2001, the Taliban controlled 80% of the country, with the Northern Alliance confined to the country's northeast corner.

Al-Qaeda

The 9/11 Commission in the US found that under the Taliban, al-Qaeda was able to use Afghanistan as a place to train and indoctrinate fighters, import weapons, coordinate with other jihadists, and plot terrorist actions. While al-Qaeda maintained its own camps in Afghanistan, it also supported training camps of other organizations. An estimated 10,000 to 20,000 men passed through these facilities before 9/11, most of whom were sent to fight for the Taliban against the United Front. A smaller number were inducted into al-Qaeda.
After the August 1998 United States embassy bombings were linked to bin Laden, President Bill Clinton ordered missile strikes on militant training camps in Afghanistan. US officials pressed the Taliban to surrender bin Laden. In 1999, the international community imposed sanctions on the Taliban, calling for bin Laden to be surrendered. The Taliban repeatedly rebuffed these demands. Central Intelligence Agency Special Activities Division paramilitary teams were active in Afghanistan in the 1990s in clandestine operations to locate and kill or capture Osama bin Laden. These teams planned several operations but did not receive the order to proceed from President Clinton. Their efforts built relationships with Afghan leaders that proved essential in the 2001 invasion.

Change in US policy toward Afghanistan

During the early years of the Clinton administration, the US had no clear policy toward Afghanistan. The 1998 US embassy bombings, however, masterminded by al-Qaeda, provoked President Clinton to order missile strikes on militant training camps in Afghanistan; bin Laden was indicted for his involvement in the bombings. In 1999 both the US and the United Nations enacted sanctions against the Taliban in United Nations Security Council Resolution 1267, which demanded the Taliban surrender bin Laden for trial in the US and close all terrorist bases in Afghanistan. At the time, the only collaboration between Massoud and the US was an effort with the CIA to trace bin Laden. The US provided no support for Massoud's fight against the Taliban.
A change in US policy was effected in early September 2001. The Bush administration agreed on a plan to start supporting Massoud. A September 10 meeting of top national security officials agreed that the Taliban would be presented with an ultimatum to hand over bin Laden and other al-Qaeda operatives. If the Taliban refused, the US would provide covert military aid to anti-Taliban groups to attempt to overthrow the Taliban.

September 11 attacks

On the morning of 11 September 2001, a total of 19 Arab men—15 of whom were from Saudi Arabia—carried out four coordinated attacks in the United States. Four commercial passenger jet airliners were hijacked. The hijackers intentionally crashed two of the airliners into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing everyone on board and more than 2,000 people in the buildings. Both buildings collapsed within two hours from damage related to the crashes, destroying nearby buildings and damaging others. The hijackers crashed a third airliner into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed into a field near Shanksville, in rural Pennsylvania, after some of its passengers and flight crew attempted to retake control of the plane, which the hijackers had redirected toward Washington, D.C., to target the White House, or the US Capitol. No one aboard the flights survived. The death toll among responders including firefighters and police was 836 as of 2009. Total deaths were 2,996, including the 19 hijackers.
Osama Bin Laden masterminded the attacks, and the US desire to hold him accountable became the casus belli for invasion. Historian Carter Malkasian writes that "seldom in history has one man so singlehandedly provoked a war." Bin Laden sought, successfully, to draw the US into an extended war similar to that fought against the Soviets. The Taliban publicly condemned the 11 September attacks. They also greatly underestimated the US's willingness to go to war. The US was mistaken in its belief that the Taliban and al-Qaeda were almost inseparable when, in fact, they had very different goals and leaders.

Diplomatic and political activity

– President George W. Bush addressing a Joint Session of Congress on 20 September 2001.

Immediately after the 9/11 attacks, President Bush and the United States National Security Council agreed that military action would probably have to be taken against Al-Qaeda and Afghanistan. However, Bush decided to issue an ultimatum to the Taliban first, announcing the decision in private on September 12. Mullah Omar was not informed of the decision to attack the United States by Osama bin Laden, and the Taliban had forbidden such attacks from Afghanistan and condemned it afterwards. Omar also agreed to hand over bin Laden to a third country, though the United States demanded he be extradited directly.
The Central Intelligence Agency started negotiating with the Taliban on September 15, while Bush announced his ultimatum publicly on September 20, based on the Authorization for Use of Military Force of 2001, an Act of Congress. The same day, religious scholars were meeting in Kabul, deciding that jihad was obligated if the US would invade, until they retreated. The council also decided that bin Laden should be surrendered. Meanwhile, Omar decided that “turning over Osama would only be a disgrace for us and for Islamic thought and belief would be a weakness”, and that the US would continue making demands after surrendering bin Laden, rejecting both the ultimatum and the council's advice. He claimed bin Laden was innocent and that was under his protection as a guest and due to his oath of allegiance. This decision was accepted by the rest of the Taliban, and sympathy for the Al-Qaeda existed within them.
Abdul Salam Zaeef has claimed that Omar thought there was "less than 10 percent chance" of the US attacking. He remained in Kandahar despite warnings of an immediate invasion. According to Abu Walid al-Masri, bin Laden thought that the United States could be defeated using the same methods as in the Soviet–Afghan War. Beyond the ultimatum, no high-level diplomatic line was opened by the Americans. In public opinion, 67 percent of Americans supported military action with ground troops. Bush pushed for military action in the cabinet, finally deciding to do so on October 5, with military action to start on the 7th with airstrikes. This was followed by the Taliban rallying to Omar and bin Laden.

Planning the invasion

The first plan for the war was made by Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, George Tenet two days after 9/11, which involved CIA paramilitary forces and US Army special forces fighting together with the Northern Alliance and with the support of air strikes against the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. Bush wanted to have ground troops, believing that a mostly air campaign signaled weakness. General Tommy Franks, then-commanding general of Central Command, proposed to President Bush and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld that the US invade Afghanistan using a conventional force of 60,000 troops, preceded by six months of preparation.
Rumsfeld and Bush feared that a conventional invasion of Afghanistan could bog down as had happened to the Soviets from 1979 and the British in 1842. Rumsfeld rejected Franks's plan, saying "I want men on the ground now!" Franks returned the next day with a plan utilizing US Special Forces. On 26 September 2001, fifteen days after the 9/11 attack, the US covertly inserted members of the CIA's Special Activities Division led by Gary Schroen as part of team Jawbreaker into Afghanistan, forming the Northern Afghanistan Liaison Team. They linked up with the Northern Alliance in the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul.