My memory is that it was a little more complicated than that. The Taliban offered to negotiate handing over bin Laden; e.g., show us some evidence, try him in a neutral third country. The Bush Administration rejected this: hand him over unconditionally or else.
That leaves the NYT some room for maneuver on the "sheltering" claim. More important, though, I think is the question of how much weight whatever the Taliban did or didn't do in 2001 should have against the idea of negotiations now (basically zero, I would argue.) The US does not believe that OBL is in Afghanistan now; anything that the US wants vis-a-vis the Taliban and OBL/al Qaeda can be on the table for negotiations; whatever their relationship in the past, Mullah Omar has strongly indicated that he doesn't have any issues with the US outside of Afghanistan; people close to the Taliban have been saying for some time that they accept the legitimate security interests of the United States relative to Afghanistan (not being attacked from there.) If someone really argues that whatever the Taliban did or didn't do relative to OBL in 2001 should be an obstacle to negotiations now, then what they're saying is that it's all about revenge. And that isn't a just or sane basis for policy going forward; the human costs are too high, particular for those who have little or no say. On Wed, Jan 27, 2010 at 4:06 AM, Bill Lear <[email protected]> wrote: > My understanding of the relationship between Al Qaida, Osama bin > Laden, and the Taliban was that the Taliban was not terribly friendly > with Al Qaida, and did not "shelter" bin Laden after 9/11. However, > this is stated as an assumption in an article in the NY Times today by > Mark Landler and Helene Cooper: > > As the U.S. government pours additional troops into Afghanistan, it > has begun grappling with whether to reconcile with those who sheltered > Osama bin Laden. > > If I remember correctly, the Taliban offered to work with the United > States to hand over bin Laden, but the U.S. rejected the overture. > > Am I remembering things incorrectly? > > > Bill > _______________________________________________ > pen-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l > -- Robert Naiman Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org [email protected] Change.org: End the war in Afghanistan Timeline for Withdrawal and Political Negotiations http://www.change.org/ideas/view/end_the_war_in_afghanistan_establish_a_timeline_for_withdrawal_and_begin_political_negotiations _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
