Decius wrote:

] It IS understood, as presented in the Guardian story, that the
] US was trying to get BL out of Afghanistan, and the use of
] force was on the table, but the idea that they had a specific
] October timetable is rather amazing.

Good catch on the US diplomat saying he didn't know where the details came from. I guess it comes down to the classic case of hearsay then.

Here's Niak in a BBC interview:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/1550000/audio/_1550366_afghan01_arney.ram

The BBC reporter states that Niak quoted former US Assistant Secretary of State Karl E. Inderfurth as follows (why, oh why, are these people never actually put on record?)

This threat was stated more definitively in July by former US Assistant Secretary of State Karl E. Inderfurth at the UN-sponsored international contact group on Afghanistan in Berlin. Inderfuth is quoted by Niaz Niak, a former Pakistan Secretary who was present at this meeting, as saying "if the military action went ahead, it would take place before the snows started falling in Afghanistan, by the middle of October at the latest." Niaz Niak, relayed this in an interview with George Arney of the BBC Press and asserts that there is proof of an evolved plan against Osama Bin Laden 6 weeks before Sept 11.

Here's an article about India joining the military plans in Afghanistan pre 9/11:

http://www.indiareacts.com/archivefeatures/nat2.asp?recno=10∓ctg=policy

Indian officials say that India and Iran will only play the role of "facilitator" while the US and Russia will combat the Taliban from the front with the help of two Central Asian countries, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, to push Taliban lines back to the 1998 position 50 km away from Mazar-e-Sharief city in northern Afghanistan.

Military action will be the last option though it now seems scarcely avoidable with the UN banned from Taliban-controlled areas. The UN which adopted various means in the last four years to resolve the Afghan problem is now being suspected by the Taliban and refused entry into Taliban areas of the war-ravaged nation through a decree issued by Taliban chief Mullah Mohammad Omar last month.

Diplomats say that the anti-Taliban move followed a meeting between US Secretary of State Collin Powel and Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and later between Powell and Indian foreign minister Jaswant Singh in Washington. Russia, Iran and India have also held a series of discussions and more diplomatic activity is expected.

And cross-checking from Janes about the India military action:

http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jir/jir010315_1_n.shtml

I dunno man, where there's smoke there is fire. It just seemed too convenient to me when all the shit went down that all of a sudden, a month later we were invading Afghanistan.

RE: Furor over Bush's 9/11 ad