Steve CollKirja-arvosteluja

Who created Al-Quaeda? Would you believe it was the CIA? I do. After reading this book.

Make no mistake, this book is not a small undertaking. The density of information, whilst impressive, is tiring. I found it best to read in chunks, between other books. Fortunately, each chapter stands alone rather well, whilst still bringing the complex threads of the ExxonMobil (post Exxon Valdez) story together in a cogent manner. It took a while to read through it in this way, but I don't think the experience suffered for it.

Steve Coll brings a very high level of journalistic expertise to the table and it shows. This book is astonishingly well researched, pretty much every assertion made is backed up with citations from sources such as interviews carried out specifically for this book, FOIA requests and Wikileaks cables. Coll maintains a relatively objective voice throughout as well, something I wasn't expecting so much. I was anticipating something rather more overtly damning than is presented, though there can be no doubt as to the conclusions Coll expects you to draw, both in relation to 'Big Oil' generally and ExxonValdez in particular. This book is a fascinating insight into that world and it's machinations. Recommended for those with the interest and patience to stick it out.

Heavy in details of all the political incompetence, unavoidable errors, and easy-to-make mistakes that compounded in the lead up to 9/11. The similarities to what Afghanistan looks like now and the public facing policy of the current POTUS administration makes it all feel so much worse.Â

Also a really good portrayal of Massoud, but definitely biased in his favor. Author has a noticeable soft spot for the CIA.

excellent student reviews (best book I ever read)

boy that was depressing

Coll, in 'Ghost Wars,' confirms what we knew all along-that 9/11 and Islamism is a byproduct of the CIA's sponsorship of the Mujhaideen backfiring. While it is bulky (a plethora of jargon), it is also riveting on account of the fact that it discusses the lead up to the War On Terrorism and after factually and with comprehensive evidence. A must read for all military analysts and scholars.

Mjög áhugaverð bók eftir Steve Coll en með mjöög langan titil: Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001.
Titillinn segir kannski dálítið um stærð bókarinnar því hún er 712 bls. en ítarleg og í henni er starfsemi leyniþjónustu BNA, ríkisstjórnarinnar og utanríkisþjónustunnar fylgt vel eftir þegar hún reynir að beita sér með misjöfnum árangri og visku í Mið-Asíu. Fékk Pulitzer-verðlaunin 2005 og er vel að þeim komin.
Það er nokkuð magnað að fá svo góða innsýn í málefni sem hafa verið efst á baugi í fjölmiðlum á Vesturlöndum síðustu árin og ekki síst nú þegar islamskir öfgamenn beita sér jafngrimmilega og áberandi.
Rannsókn Colls byggir á fjölda skjala sem létt hefur verið leynd af, viðtölum við þátttakendur í leynistríðum BNA og rannsóknarskjölum þingnefnda eftir árásirnar á Tvíburaturnana. Vel skrifað og ekkert dregið af við útskýringar á forheimsku bandarískra stjórnvalda þegar þau velja frekar að styðja islamska öfgamenn gegn Sovíetherjunum í Afganistan heldur en hófsöm öfl innan afganskra ættbálka. Það er líka margvert að sjá hvað spilling innan pakistanskra valdaafla hefur verið mikil og að þar eru öfl sem unnu gagngert gegn vestrænum þjóðum.

This book followed the Bin Laden family from 1900 to 2007. The Bin Ladens is a pretty rich family and enjoyed prominent status not only in Saudi Arabia but was also well respected by European and U.S. politicians. The rise of the Bin Laden family was closely dependent on the country's political and economic situation. (But the Bin Ladens, interestingly, are not Saudis. Their patriarch grew up in Yemen.) I learned a lot about the history, geography and politics of Saudi Arabia from 1900 to 2007 -- not enough to make me an expert, but definitely more than I ever knew! It was a fun and engaging read.

Although the most famous member of the family to the rest of the world is obviously Osama Bin Laden, he did not play an important role in this family at first, as he is merely one of the patriarch's over 50 sons, and he was one of the younger sons, without full brothers, without a mother of esteemed family background. The book started by following the life trajectory of his father, Mohamed Bin Laden, who made his fortune as an immigrant operating a construction company building palaces and roads and renovating holy cities for the Saudi royalty. After the death of Mohamed, the book focused on Salem Bin Laden, one of Mohamed's older sons and his apparent heir. After the death of Salem, the book did not focus on one single person but rather attempted to describe the many businesses conducted by the Bin Laden Group both in Saudi Arabia and worldwide. (They owned U.S. real estate and prestigious U.S. hotels!)

Mohamed and Salem had distinct personalities and shone as protagonists of the book. Osama's activities did get mentioned, and sometimes entire chapters were devote to his activities, but they did not take center stage. Even in depictions of events after 9-11, the book mostly reported how members of the Bin Laden family reacted to and recouped from the tragedy. The author identified similarities between Osama and his father and older brother: "Ambition, energy, natural talent, and a gift for managing people had made Mohamed Bin Laden wealthy. Reinterpreted by Salem, these characteristics had girded a secular life of singular creativity and financial success. Reinterpreted through a prism of Islamic radicalism by Osama, they.....prove just as transforming."

As a business nerd, I was drawn into this tale of personal and professional drama whose actions had profound effects on the M&A market in the late 1980's. The inner workings and high-stakes games between major stockholders, executives, investment bankers, and lawyers receiving exorbitant amounts of money for wounding and destroying companies while professing to save them, reveals the ugliness of greed and fragility of oversized egos among the elites. When the reader thinks the story cannot get more confounding or convoluted, the next chapter will open a door into the deeper mire of the events. Thankfully, the writer does an excellent job of keeping the reader on the path and despite the interwoven tales of intrigue and host of characters, I never felt lost or confused.

The more business experience and knowledge you have, the more likely you are to appreciate the nuances and complexities of what happened in the businesses and courtroom. The author does a good job of explaining some of the arcane information and technical jargon of Wall Street and Madison Avenue without making the story too simplistic for non-business experts. I think this is a great strength of the book because, beyond the narrative, a business person can learn much about what to do, and not to do, as a fiduciary, member of the board of directors, or executive. It should make one wise to the behavior and words that might reflect duplicity in others.

Beyond the book itself, the author had an excellent essay in the back of the book on the ethical use of dramatic dialogue in narrative non-fiction. He discusses his views on the proper and improper use of constructed dialogue including manipulating a reader by constructing a dialog that reflects the writer's bias. He provides great insight into the process of careful and ethical construction of non-fiction dialog that would be helpful to writers and non-fiction readers alike.

I read or skimmed through about the first third of the book. I agree with another Goodreads reviewer that the writing was a bit dry. I normally enjoy books of this type but I could not get into this narrative. Maybe it had something to do that the story is a bit dated and that I was not familiar with many of the principals in it. It read like a textbook, not a story.

Not sure what I missed by not reading the last 2/3 of the book but I could not muster up enough interest or enthusiasm to finish it.

Looong book, but still an enjoyable and informative read that gives a number of background stories and human connections which when read in conjunction with other works such as Ahmed Rashid's "Taliban", gives another window into Afghanistan before September 11th 2001. Particularly interesting for the CIA's point of view and the intricacies of the international political situation. deserves a longer review

This book is a comprehensive documentation of CIA, Pakistani ISI, and various elements of Afghan intelligence and government from 9/11/01 to around 2016. It is at least 95% accurate based on my knowledge (it got some minor military/technical details wrong), and includes more detail than anything else I’ve read covering the entire arc. It is probably too detailed for most people who just want to know “why” Afghanistan was so fucked up in so many ways, vs the intricate day by day details of how, but it is still quite a good book. (As an audiobook, at 3x, it lasted me ZRH-HEL-JFK).

With a father who spent nearly his entire career at ExxonMobil, obviously my youth and upbringing have been influenced in small or larger ways by this "private empire". This me buying and reading the book. Of course, also the author's name instilled justified interest.

I only read part one, however.

This is undeniably a thorough investigation into a notoriously closed corporation and well written as such. Still, I could never shed the feeling that I was just reading a very long, and ultimately to me boring, newspaper article. So I left it at that.

Essential, bloody, real and tragic.

One important underlying issue is what this means for the future, because there are similarities between the inflation of the Afghan government with western cash and the situation in South Vietnam during the 1960s and early 1970s. Does an Afghan security force left to fend for itself go the way of the South Vietnamese military after "Vietnamisation"? Before you say you don't care, ask the family of every casualty in Afghanistan what their sacrifice was for.

The CIA has been doing this stuff for a long time. In fact, when Afghans were fist trying to rid themselves of the Taliban, (even today roughly 7% want them), the US had helped them with money, and paid Massoud to do it. Finally, AQ helped the Taliban assassinate Massoud, on 2001. Even now, I suppose, Karzai needs a bit of money to do things. The Trumptards shell out a lot more to Palestinians.

The West had a strange fascination for 20th century Afghanistan. This small, poor but unbelievably robust country became a symbol for foreign misadventure, mistakes, misguided policy and misplaced ambition. The sun never began to set on the Portuguese Empire here, like it did in Macau, Mozambique, Angola, Brasil, São Tomé and Príncipe, East Timor, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, etc.; in Afghanistan the mighty Red Soviet Bear got trapped in the mountains, and the American eagle got its wings clipped. This astonishing account of these invasions, resistances, shadowy leaders and chess moves fully deserves its Pulitzer Prize. As well as a thorough, analytical military and political history, it's also something of a page turning thriller. There are CIA agents handing over briefcases of dollars in desert tents, disappearing American missiles, secret exchanges and coded messages. This is an essential read for anyone with an interest in foreign policy, the misery of modern realpolitik and the tragedies of war itself. There's the blood of many nations in these pages.

More than one article I've read online has observed that the West's obsession with it, dates back to Britain's pre-eminent geostrategist of the late 19th century Halford Mckinder who called Afghanistan 'the hinge of the earth' and that whoever controlled the hinge, controlled the world. He also called that area the Heartland, or the pivot, and is considered the father of geostrategy and geopolitics.

As this books amply shows, early conquerors, monarchs, republics couldn't govern without the "world's second oldest profession".

An outstanding, riveting, and (surprisingly) nonpartisan account of the world's most powerful corporation. The author does an excellent job of describing the extent of that power, which operates on a scale that can otherwise be difficult to imagine. Seriously, you have no idea.

Also an oddly enjoyable read, in that Coll litters his account with colorful, memorable anecdotes.

Recommended for anyone remotely interested in current affairs, global politics and/or environmentalism.

The subtitle explains this book. The title is misleading as you'll learn very little about ISI.

Steve Coll’s latest book, Directorate S: The CIA and America’s Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan, is a sequel to Coll‘s Pulitzer Prize-winning Ghost Wars, an excellent chronicling of the CIA's involvement in Afghanistan from the Soviet invasion through September 10, 2001.

As Coll painstakingly explains, U.S. relations with Afghanistan and Pakistan are, and have been, extremely complex due in no small part to the number of groups with conflicting interests. Pakistan perceives itself in a life and death struggle with India, its neighbor to the east, with whom it has had three unsuccessful wars since its founding in 1947. Its rivalry with India is largely based on religious differences; Pakistan originally split from British India to carve out an Islamic State.

Pakistan’s neighbor to the west is Afghanistan, a country that is nearly 100% Muslim. But Afghanistan is riven with tribal differences (Pashtuns vs. Tajik vs. Uzbek, etc.) as well as different versions of Islam. The capital, Kabul, is relatively modern and sophisticated; much of the hinterland is dominated by an almost medieval, primitive version of Islam practiced by the Taliban. Indeed, Afghanistan is embroiled in a long-lived civil war between the Taliban and a more moderate, enlightened government in Kabul.

Pakistan considers a friendly, or at least neutral, Afghanistan to be essential to its well being in its struggle with India. Pakistan has exerted its influence in Afghanistan through the ISI, its Inter-Services Intelligence agency, which has found common ground with the Taliban largely through religious affinity.

The United States became involved in Afghanistan in the 1980s in a proxy war against the USSR by supplying arms to insurgents fighting the Soviet-sponsored communist government. Those insurgents often were religious fundamentalists. The Soviets purposefully decimated the country’s educated elites, leaving the country to radical preachers and armed opportunists. Some of these morphed into Al Qaeda members after the defeat of the Russians.

The US supplanted the Soviets as invaders shortly after September 11, 2001, after it became known that Osama bin Laden had been operating as a guest of the Taliban, which at the time controlled the capital, Kabul, and most of the rest of the country. Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda operated training camps for terrorists in Taliban controlled areas.

By supporting the Northern Alliance, a rival of the Taliban, the US was able to drive the Taliban out of the capital, Kabul, and secure control of much of the country. Osama bin Laden was forced to go underground and eventually escaped to Pakistan, as it was learned much later. Then thing got "interesting" as the US and its allies failed to completely irradicate the Taliban, which underwent a "rebirth" of sorts and began to take back portions of the country. The US is still mired in that horrible quagmire seventeen years later.

The actual “Directorate S” is the section of Pakistan’s ISI that deals with the Taliban. It is thought to be responsible for helping create the Taliban’s safe harbors within the borders of Pakistan. Those safe harbors have immensely complicated the task of the American military in defeating the Taliban in Afghanistan.

In a section of the book entitled “Losing the Peace,” Coll blames the Bush administration for failing to bolster the nascent Afghan government that replaced the Taliban in 2002. It refused to pay even 10% of the war’s cost to secure the peace with new Afghan forces. One American observer noted, “You get what you pay for, and we paid for war.”

Some of America’s lack of success in Afghanistan can be attributed to the Bush administration’s emphasis on Iraq even though it had been the Afghan Taliban that had sheltered Osama bin Laden. For example, the CIA increasingly deployed lightly experienced officers in Afghanistan while sending the heavy hitters to Iraq. The US was never able to obtain the complete cooperation of Pakistan, which (in Coll’s words) played a double game—assisting both the US and the Taliban.

By the time Obama replaced Bush, Hamid Karzai, the man the Americans had put in place to head the new Afghan government, had soured on America’s participation in the war. His primary rationale was that American’s tended to kill too many innocent Afghans in their pursuit of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Karzai also blamed Pakistan for its support of the Taliban.

Another complication in trying to make sense of Afghanistan is that that country’s most profitable industry is opium production. The Americans tried to destroy the poppy fields to deprive the Taliban of a source of income, but in doing so they also greatly depressed the economy of their Afghan allies.

One of the most moving sections of the book deals with “green on blue” murders—the phenomenon of Afghan army trainees turning their weapons on their American or European trainers. The cultural differences between the two groups were extreme, with the exaggerated respect shown to the Q'uran by the Afghans being one of the most intractable aspects of the relationship. Many religious Afghans simply could not tolerate the presence of large numbers of infidels (Americans) in their midst. For their part, many Americans showed an insulting lack of respect for Islam and the Q'uran.

The book also recounts an event in 2014 that should send shivers down the spines of all Americans. Apparently, two fervently religious Pakistani naval officers hatched a plan to commandeer a Pakistani warship that may have had a small nuclear weapon aboard. They planned to use the vessel, which also had a large naval gun and several missiles aboard, to attack American ships conducting joint maneuvers with the Pakistani navy. Fortunately they were thwarted by alert Pakistani commandos assigned to guard the ship, but their efforts represent the first armed terrorist attack against a facility holding nuclear weapons. Coll warns ominously, “Judging by Pakistan’s trajectory, it was unlikely to be the last.”

Coll asserts that the war became a “humbling case study in the limits of American power.” He argued that “the failure to solve the riddle of ISI and to stop its covert interference in Afghanistan became, ultimately, the greatest strategic failure of the American war.” He concludes that about the best the U.S. can hope for in Afghanistan is a sort of stalemate with the Taliban as long as it is supported by the ISI. The situation may come to resemble Mexico’s struggle with narco-traffickers or Colombia’s long war with the F.A.R.C. In each case the state, although fragmented and corrupt, remained more or less intact and continued to cooperate with the US and Europe.

Evaluation: Coll’s masterful study is carefully researched. It provides much more detail than can be duplicated in a (relatively) short review. In Ghost Wars, we learned that events in the region could be characterized as missed opportunities, owing, as Coll suggested, to "indifference, lassitude, blindness, paralysis, and commercial greed" that shaped America's foreign policy in Afghanistan and South Asia. Similarly in this book, we read about an endless number of strategic reviews and studies commissioned by the White House, Pentagon, CIA, and State Department, with no immediate effect.

The bleak assessment of this book is hard to gainsay in light of Coll’s thorough presentation. This is an important book for Americans who hope to understand the complications involved in intervening in foreign, particularly Islamic, lands.

(JAB)½

This book chronicles the rise of the jihadist movement, starting with mujahedin fighters in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. It continues with the rise of the Taliban and the influence and collaboration with bin Laden. The book ends on September 10, 2001. When reading this book you’ll find yourself continually asking why THEY didn’t listen to THOSE who were shouting warnings.½

The short of it is that this is a massive, densely packed book which gives a good overview of what happens after the USA decides to go to war in Afghanistan after 9/11. Coll's [Ghost Wars] was THE definitive book on the history of the CIA engagement in Afghanistan up to 9/11 and this book certainly stakes a claim to being the definitive account of American involvement from 9/11 up to the end of Operation Enduring Freedom and the American-led International Security Assistance Force's combat mission in December 2014.

If there is one complaint it is that the titular Directorate S (The arm of the Pakistani military's Inter-Services Intelligence that is tasked with establishing influence in Afghanistan) does not feature as much as one would hope or expect. Or rather it features heavily by its behind-the-scenes, mysterious absence - its actions or lack thereof and influence over events are seen by Coll (and many of the various US military commanders and CIA officials who troop through Kabul) as being a major, if not the main, contributor to the USA's lack of success in achieving its mission. I hoped there might be insights in to its activities, debates and decision-making but its all really an area of speculation which I suppose is not really surprising given the opacity of the Pakistani intelligence services to western reporters.

Obviously written with Osama in mind, but it is the other parts of the story that fascinated me. Note: published in 2008 before the death of Osama Bin Laden.

Interesting and important reading even in 2017 with the basic facts leading up to 9/11 pretty well known by anyone who has devoted even modest attention to the subject. Where the book excels in my opinion is in describing just how U.S. policy is crafted at the highest levels. And it does not make for reassuring reading. Competing agencies, agendas, philosophies and personalities at the highest levels of the U.S. Government make policy really, really difficult to get right or to change. That is just the nature of our system. The big takeaway from this book is how little has changed since those years. We remain tethered to Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in a way that almost defies belief. They were both shown in this book to have had huge roles in the rise and success of Islamic extremism whether through support of the Taliban or the funding of ideological madhouse madrassas that generated countless volunteers for the worldwide Jihad. Neither of those salient facts have changed in 16 years. The Saudis (and others) continue to fund Wahabist thought worldwide, the Paks (ISI) still support the Taliban and the U.S. continues to pretend both are our 'allies'. They say that generals like to fight the 'last war', especially if they won. The U.S. seems to still want to fight the last war (Cold War) as a national strategy, i.e. vs. the Russians. The only war that matters in the world today is the one against the ideology of Islam, which clearly seeks to dominate the world. It's kind of like reading Mein Kampf, the Koran spells out with great clarity the plans and goals of Islam but the West prefers to bury it's collective head in the dirt and scream about 'the Russians are coming'!

Fascinating and depressing read--This is a good one for anyone who thinks that foreign relations aren't that complicated or who misses out on the necessity of knowing a region's history before entangling his or her country in a conflict.

It took a while, for me to finish this book. Partly because Xmas gifts fluttered down and demanded immediate reading and precedence, partly because it is a 'tough' and demanding read. I kept thinking that there might be a test at the end. But, conversely, I could not put it aside and enjoyed the investment in my reading of this author, the bureau chief for the Washington Post.

I doubt if there is another 'Westerner" that can so clearly - and entertainingly - write and educate us about the tortuous, writhing, violent and murderous evolving of South Asian politics and religious intercines.

Nor one with more direct and valid, deep, experience.

Worthy of reading, and of investing the time to understand a little of its significant message for all of us in the cultures of the West. Certainly recommended and valued.

This is an impressive, if depressing, book. Journalist Steve Coll has done exhaustive work painting a comprehensive picture of the policies, actions and operating philosophies of one of the largest, and most ubiquitous, corporations in the world, covering the years from the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska through the disastrous explosion of BP's floating oil rig out in the Gulf of Mexico. Coll tells the story through a series of mostly individual stories of ExxonMobil's dealings in African countries like Chad and Equatorial Guinea as they negotiate with repressive dictators while dealing with issues of security against insurgents in their own compounds and doing their best to ignore the horrific social conditions they see around them. We read of the corporation's years-long stubborn refusal to acknowledge the problem of climate change, and in fact see create purposefully disingenuous studies designed to confuse the issue and delay social/government action. We see them go their own way, sometimes at cross purposes with American diplomatic policy, often arrogantly declaring themselves a global corporation not tied to the U.S. government in terms of aims or policies, and then just as quickly lobbying for government support when such support is deemed necessary to enhance corporate goals. Those are just a few examples. In sum, one arrives at a relatively nuanced picture of what this corporate behemoth is capable of. That cuts both ways, in fact, as Coll also points out positive developments, such as the company's eventual acknowledgment of global warming (under new corporate leadership) and support for the idea of a carbon tax to help cut emissions. The book is well written and makes for smooth reading. At 642 pages, reading this book represents a considerable time commitment, but I believe it's a worthwhile endeavor. I feel like I gained not just a realistic picture of ExxonMobil, but of the oil industry as a whole, and how that industry fits into and affects global economy and politics.

Incredible outline of what the U.S. is up against in the Middle East.