Who Paid

3 Jul 1979

July 1979

Almost six months before the invasion, Washington began a secret program for Afghan fighters. A CIA report of August 1979, printed by the State Department, says the President signed “Findings on Afghanistan” on 3 July. It lists radio and propaganda work, and “cash and nonlethal support,” with the first cash handed to Afghan contacts; State Department historians call it “a modest beginning.” Brzezinski, Carter’s national security adviser, said in a 1998 interview (an English translation of a French text) that he warned Carter that day it would draw in a Soviet intervention. That is his account alone.

25 Dec 1979

Kabul, December 1979

At the end of December Soviet troops took control of Kabul and much of the country, the State Department’s historians write. They call it the only time the Soviet Union invaded a country outside the Eastern Bloc. Why Moscow went is still argued: the National Security Archive, posting a Russian book and Soviet documents in 2012, says the record shows “mission creep,” not a plan to reach warm-water ports.

27 Dec 1979

Through Pakistan

After the invasion Carter approved lethal aid, and Pakistan was the way in. The 9/11 Commission says Pakistan’s military intelligence, the ISI, helped train the rebels and distribute the arms. Human Rights Watch adds that the CIA gave Pakistan wide discretion over where the money went, and says Pakistan favored Islamist parties over nationalist ones.

1984

Two paymasters

The 9/11 Commission says Saudi Arabia and the United States both paid, through Pakistan. Prince Turki al-Faisal, Saudi Arabia’s former intelligence chief, told Arab News in 2001 that the kingdom gave “financial, military and moral support,” and the paper reported it was on the government’s orders. A National Security Archive essay says the Saudi government deposited many of its contributions into a CIA Swiss bank account. The Commission describes a private channel too, a “Golden Chain” of financiers in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.

billions of dollarsSecret aid from Saudi Arabia and the U.S. to Afghan rebels, by the 9/11 Commission’s account

27 Mar 1985

1985

A White House directive on Afghan policy opens with that line, and tells agencies to “Maintain good working relations with Pakistan,” since there was no other route for supplies. A National Security Archive essay says Congress ultimately provided nearly $3 billion in covert aid, that Representative Charlie Wilson added $50 million in 1984, and that the CIA supplied Stinger missiles in 1986 after pressure from several congressmen and State and Defense officials. Human Rights Watch puts the CIA channel through Pakistan at $2 to 3 billion. Obituaries credit Wilson more; ABC notes that historians dispute how crucial he was.

Aug 1988

Volunteers

Volunteers from around the world went to Afghanistan to fight the Soviets, and the Commission says the largest numbers came from the Middle East. Some were Saudis, and among them was Osama bin Laden, who arrived in 1980. With the cleric Abdullah Azzam he helped create the “Bureau of Services,” which channelled recruits. As the Soviets began to leave in 1988 they set up what they called a base, al Qaeda.

1988

Did the CIA deal with him?

A common version says the CIA built or paid bin Laden; the Christian Science Monitor’s obituary of Wilson, for one, says he directed funds to rebels “including Osama Bin Laden,” without a source. A State Department cable of 1998 answers a Taliban aide who made that claim: the U.S. “had never heard his name” then and “did not support him.” The 9/11 Commission found that he and his comrades “received little or no assistance from the United States,” and its endnote adds that CIA officials recall “having little to do with him,” and that Ayman al Zawahiri, later bin Laden’s deputy, wrote that the U.S. financed or trained none of the Arab fighters. One is a CIA officer’s recollection, the other an al Qaeda leader’s memoir; the endnote cites a single interview for the CIA side.

1993

What is documented

The Commission says bin Laden and the Arab volunteers drew largely on the Golden Chain, private money from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf. It also records links on U.S. soil: al Khifa, an outpost of the Bureau of Services in a Brooklyn mosque, recruited in the United States, and Ali Mohamed, a former Egyptian officer and then a U.S. Army instructor at Fort Bragg, later led al Qaeda’s casing of Nairobi. Those are links to America, not CIA payments. No source here shows CIA money to bin Laden; the record cannot rule out that funds reached commanders he fought beside.

15 Feb 1989

1989

The last Soviet forces left on 15 February 1989. Counts of the dead differ: RFE/RL gives more than 14,000 Soviet soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Afghan combatants and civilians; a National Security Archive essay says one million deaths; the State Department says millions of lives. In 1998 Brzezinski was asked if he regretted arming “future terrorists.” He called the operation “an excellent idea” that drew the Russians into “the Afghan trap,” and answered with the question quoted here. The interviewer’s side was that Islamic fundamentalism had become a world menace.

Oct 1994

Kandahar, 1994

The mujahideen won, then fought one another. In September 1991 the U.S. and the Soviet Union agreed to stop military aid to both sides from 1 January 1992. In 1994 a new movement, the Taliban, took Kandahar; Human Rights Watch says its nucleus was former mujahidin, that Pakistan, which had favored the commander Hikmatyar, was “searching for a new partner,” and that Pakistan backed the Taliban by October 1994, with Saudi help after. So the 1980s program and the Taliban are linked by people and by Pakistan’s channel; no source here shows U.S. money going to the Taliban.

Sep 1996

Kabul, 1996

In May 1996 bin Laden left Sudan for Jalalabad. In September the Taliban took Jalalabad and then Kabul, and the Commission says he “cemented his ties with them.” It estimates that he gave the Taliban $10 to 20 million a year “in return for safe haven,” while HRW says the Taliban’s main official income was duties on trucks from Pakistan, about $75 million in 1997 from the smuggling trade by a World Bank estimate, and the Commission adds that the drug trade was a source of income for it.

Oct 1996

Pakistan’s part

A U.S. intelligence report of October 1996 says the ISI was supplying the Taliban with munitions, fuel and food. Human Rights Watch, in 2001, listed funding, training, recruiting and supplies, said that under Prime Minister Bhutto support had sat mainly in the interior ministry, and noted that Pakistan’s government denied giving military support and that most of its own interviewees would not be named. The 9/11 Commission says Pakistan’s rulers hoped the Taliban could bring order and give Pakistan “strategic depth” against India. HRW also lists Russia and Iran as backers of the Taliban’s opponents.

26 May 1997

Three governments

In May 1997 Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates recognized the Taliban, one a day. No other government did. The 9/11 Commission, drawing on interviews with the diplomats, says U.S. diplomats “did not favor the Taliban over the rival factions” but were willing to “give the Taliban a chance,” while Secretary of State Albright, it says, made no secret of thinking the Taliban “despicable.”

12 Feb 1998

The pipeline

Unocal and partners planned a gas pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Pakistan. A Unocal vice president was quoted in 1997 on “non-cash bonus payments” to members of the regime; a Taliban delegation visited its Texas offices in late 1997 and, the State Department record shows, met Assistant Secretary Inderfurth on 8 December. At a House hearing in February 1998 an Energy Department official said “we do support the project,” while Unocal’s Maresca said nothing could be built without a recognized government. Unocal’s former pipeline chief says it sought to work with all factions; the Commission says the State Department’s South Asia bureau hoped the project’s profits would draw them to a table, though there was “probably never much chance” of it. Unocal quit the project months after the August 1998 strikes, Mother Jones writes.

Jun 1998

Saudi money

Human Rights Watch finds that Saudi Arabia became the Taliban’s main financial supporter from about July 1996 and was a major one until the 1998 embassy bombings; official aid then reportedly ended under U.S. pressure, and private Saudi money went on. It calls the extent of Saudi help uncertain, and says Western journalists saw what they took to be Saudi aircraft delivering ammunition at Kandahar in 1996.

Jun 1998

The 1998 request

In 1998, the Commission says, CIA director Tenet asked the Saudis for help against bin Laden, and Prince Turki followed up with Mullah Omar that summer, apparently using “a mixture of possible incentives and threats.” Turki says he asked Omar in June to hand bin Laden over and that Omar agreed; HRW, citing a British newspaper, alleges he also pledged money to buy off commanders. In September, the Commission says, Omar refused; Riyadh withdrew its ambassador and suspended relations, though the Taliban’s embassy in Riyadh stayed open until 2001.

20 Aug 1998

August 1998

On 7 August bombs destroyed the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam; the Commission says the evidence soon fixed responsibility on bin Laden and his associates. In April, the Commission says, the Taliban told the U.S. ambassador to the UN, Bill Richardson, that bin Laden “was not a threat to the United States.” On 20 August Navy ships fired cruise missiles at camps in Afghanistan; Mullah Omar said two days later the strikes were counterproductive but that he would be open to talks on bin Laden, and the U.S. warned the Taliban it would be held responsible for attacks by his network. The National Security Archive counts 33 U.S. attempts to get the Taliban to hand him over, all failed; Omar denied knowing of evidence that bin Laden had planned attacks from Afghan soil.

14 Apr 1999

The charge

This is where the claim that the U.S. backed the Taliban was made on the record. In April 1999 Representative Dana Rohrabacher told the same Senate hearing he believed the administration kept a covert policy of supporting the Taliban, tied, he said, to pipeline hopes; Assistant Secretary Inderfurth denied any U.S. support, “no arms, no training.”

14 Apr 1999

Rashid and 1999

Ahmed Rashid said in 2000 that he did not think the Americans gave the Taliban material aid, but that they encouraged Pakistan and Saudi Arabia to back it; the mood in Washington turned, he said, after Kabul fell in 1996 (the transcript runs question and answer together). The Commission adds that two senior State officials suggested asking the Saudis to offer the Taliban $250 million for bin Laden; Clarke objected, and the idea “quietly died.” In July 1999 President Clinton issued an order the Commission describes as “effectively declaring the Taliban regime a state sponsor of terrorism.”

25 Sep 2001

September 2001

On 11 September 2001, the Commission says, 2,973 people died, the largest loss of life on U.S. soil from a hostile attack. Nine days later President Bush said the evidence pointed to al Qaeda, and told the Taliban to hand over its leaders. On 25 September Saudi Arabia cut “all of its relations with the Taliban government,” and the UAE had done so over the weekend, leaving Pakistan as the only state with formal ties. On 7 October, Bush said his demands had not been met, and U.S. strikes began.

30 Dec 2009

A cable

In December 2009 the State Department sent a secret request to its diplomats in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, the UAE and Pakistan, signed “CLINTON,” the secretary of state’s name. It says Saudi Arabia “remains a critical financial support base” for al-Qa’ida, the Taliban and others, which “probably raise millions of dollars annually from Saudi sources.” It says Riyadh had made “important progress” against al-Qa’ida’s funding but taken “only limited action” against fundraising for the Taliban. It speaks of donors in Saudi Arabia, not of the Saudi government paying; for what the government did, see 1996 to 1998.

29 Feb 2020

Doha, 2020

On 29 February 2020 the United States and the Taliban signed an agreement in Doha. The United States committed to withdraw all its forces within fourteen months; the Taliban committed to stop al Qaeda and others using Afghan soil against the U.S. and its allies. The text describes the Taliban as “not recognized by the United States as a state.”

16 Aug 2021

August 2021

On 16 August President Biden said Afghan leaders “gave up and fled the country” and the army “collapsed.” He said he stood by the decision to follow the deal he had inherited. “We spent over a trillion dollars,” he said, and the mission “was never supposed to have been nation building.”

17 Aug 2021

Where the money went

SIGAR, the inspector general Congress created for the job, counted $145 billion on reconstruction and $837 billion more by the Defense Department on warfighting. It found that private security contractors paid to protect U.S. assets diverted “a substantial percentage” of their awards to insurgents, “making the insurgents in effect unofficial subcontractors,” and that U.S. money “flowed to the insurgency through a web of corruption.” SIGAR attributes this to U.S. misunderstanding of the incentives of “local allies.”

May 2024

Payments since 2021

Since August 2021 the U.S. has given more than $2.8 billion in aid. SIGAR asked 144 aid groups what they paid the Taliban-controlled government, and 65 answered; 38 of them reported paying at least $10.9 million in taxes, fees and utilities from August 2021 to May 2023, as a condition of operating. SIGAR says both the Ghani administration and the Taliban-controlled government taxed U.S. aid, and calls the sum likely only a fraction of the total, because UN agencies kept no such data.

$10.9 millionAt least what 38 U.S.-funded aid groups paid the Taliban-controlled government in taxes, fees and utilities, August 2021 to May 2023, by SIGAR’s 2024 count

Aug 2021

Was it for the money?

A common version says the U.S. made enemies in order to spend trillions. No source gathered here says that, and none was asked to. They show the order of events: al Qaeda’s attacks, the Taliban’s refusal to hand over its leaders, then war. SIGAR lists the aims as eliminating al-Qaeda, decimating the Taliban that hosted it and denying safe haven; Biden says nation building was never the mission. SIGAR also found that projects “even inadvertently funded insurgents.” Costs of War counts over $2 trillion on Afghanistan, and an estimated $8 trillion on all the post-9/11 wars once veterans’ care is included. Who gained from that spending is a different question, which the story The Cost of War takes up.

over $2 trillionU.S. spending on the war in Afghanistan, 2001 to 2019, by Brown University’s Costs of War project