Taliban: Islam, Oil and The New Great Game in Central Asia
- original title -
Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia
by Ahmed Rashid
Read by Nadia May
10 cds | 11.2 hrs | unabridged |
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About the book
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Yale University Press:
Shrouding themselves and their aims in deepest secrecy, the leaders of the Taliban movement control Afghanistan with an inflexible, crushing fundamentalism. The most extreme and radical of all Islamic organizations, the Taliban inspires fascination, controversy, and especially fear in both the Muslim world and the West. Correspondent Ahmed Rashid brings the shadowy world of the Taliban into sharp focus in this enormously interesting and revealing book. It is the only authoritative account of the Taliban and modern day Afghanistan available to English language readers.Based on his experiences as a journalist covering the civil war in Afghanistan for twenty years,
traveling and living with the Taliban, and interviewing most of the Taliban leaders since their emergence to power in 1994, Rashid offers unparalleled firsthand information. He explains how the growth of Taliban power has already created severe instability in Russia, Iran, Pakistan, and five Central Asian republics. He describes the Taliban’s role as a major player in a new ”Great Game”—a competition among Western countries and companies to build oil and gas pipelines from Central Asia to Western and Asian markets. The author also discusses the controversial changes in American attitudes toward the Taliban—from early support to recent bombings of Osama Bin Laden’s hideaway and other Taliban-protected terrorist bases—and how they have influenced the stability of the region.
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IB Tauris:
The tragic events of September 11th brought the Taliban into sharp focus as the most radical and extreme Islamic movement in the world, but little is still known about them because of the deep secrecy that always surrounded their organization and leadership. Ahmed Rashid, who has been reporting on Afghanistan since 1979, is one of the few international journalists to have interviewed the Taliban leadership. His book "Taliban" has been translated into over 20 languages. In this revised edition, Rashid has expanded his account to cover the defeat of the Taliban government and their resort to guerrilla warfare in the eastern mountains of Afghanistan. He examines the bewildering complexity of Afghan politics while western nations and companies are competing to build oil and gas pipelines to western and Asian markets.
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Blackstone Audio | Synopsis:
Correspondent Ahmed Rashid brings the shadowy world of the Taliban, the world's most extreme and radical Islamic organization, into sharp focus in this enormously insightful book. He offers the only authoritative account of the Taliban available to English language readers, explaining the Taliban's rise to power, its impact on Afghanistan and the region, its role in oil and gas company decisions, and the effects of changing American attitudes toward the Taliban. He also describes the new face of Islamic fundamentalism and explains why Afghanistan has become the world center for international terrorism.
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Acclaim
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"Anyone contemplating new adventures in Afghanistan—whether to save its women from persecution, rescue the state from further fragmentation, or save themselves from terrorist backlash—might first consult Rashid's book."
--Paula R. Newberg, San Francisco Chronicle
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"The broader story here is powerful... a great deal from Mr. Rashid's book about the nature of local Central Asian politics and the consequences of interference by outside powers...valuable and informative work."
--Richard Bernstein, New York Times
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Editorial Reviews
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Amazon.com
This is the single best book available on the Taliban, the fundamentalist Islamic regime in Afghanistan responsible for harboring the terrorist Osama bin Laden. Ahmed Rashid is a Pakistani journalist who has spent most of his career reporting on the region--he has personally met and interviewed many of the Taliban's shadowy leaders. Taliban was written and published before the massacres of September 11, 2001, yet it is essential reading for anyone who hopes to understand the aftermath of that black day. It includes details on how and why the Taliban came to power, the government's oppression of ordinary citizens (especially women), the heroin trade, oil intrigue, and--in a vitally relevant chapter--bin Laden's sinister rise to power. These pages contain stories of mass slaughter, beheadings, and the Taliban's crushing war against freedom: under Mullah Omar, it has banned everything from kite flying to singing and dancing at weddings. Rashid is for the most part an objective reporter, though his rage sometimes (and understandably) comes to the surface: "The Taliban were right, their interpretation of Islam was right, and everything else was wrong and an expression of human weakness and a lack of piety," he notes with sarcasm. He has produced a compelling portrait of modern evil.
-John Miller From Library Journal
Afghanistan's position as a crossroads in Central Asia made it part of the 19th-century Great Game of imperialism and brings it to international strategic prominence once again. Rashid is a correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review who has covered Afghanistan's changing fortunes since the 1978 Soviet invasion. In his second book, he covers the origin and rise of the Taliban, its concepts of Islam on questions of gender roles and drugs, and the importance of the country to the development of energy resources in the region. His account of the Taliban's origins among the Pashtun refugees in Pakistani camps and their minimal education in Koranic schools from poorly educated teachers explains their lack of knowledge of the history and culture of their own country and of what it means to govern. The failed state that is now Afghanistan threatens to destabilize its neighbors by exporting both drugs and extremist views. Unlike Peter Marsden's Taliban: War Religion and the New Order in Afghanistan (Oxford Univ., 1998), this new work emphasizes the international implications of the Taliban and its government.
A lucid and thoroughly researched account, it is recommended for academic and most public libraries.
-Marcia L. Sprules, Council on Foreign Relations Lib., New York (c)2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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About the author
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Yale University Press:
Ahmed Rashid is a correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review and Daily Telegraph reporting on Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia. He is the author of The Resurgence of Central Asia: Islam or Nationalism?
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Contents | Track titles (25)
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0101 _ Blackstone Audio _ Taliban _ Ahmed Rashid
0102 _ Islam, Oil and The New Great Game in Central Asia
0103 _ Preface _ Read by Nadia May
0104 _ Introduction _ Afghanistan's Holy Warriors
0105 _ Part 1 _ History of the Taliban Movement
0106 _ Ch 01 _ Kandahar 1994 _ The Origins of the Taliban
0202 _ Ch 02 _ Herat 1995 _ God's Invincible Soldiers
0203 _ Ch 03 _ Kabul 1996 _ Commander of the Faithful
0302 _ Ch 04 _ Mazar e Sharif 1997 _ Massacre in the North
0303 _ Ch 05 _ Bamiyan 1998 to 2000 _ The Never Ending War
0402 _ Part 2 _ Islam and the Taliban
0403 _ Ch 06 _ Challenging Islam _ The New Style Fundamentalism of the Taliban
0501 _ Ch 07 _ Secret Society _ The Taliban's Political and Military Organization
0502 _ Ch 08 _ A Vanished Gender _ Women, Children and Taliban Culture
0503 _ Ch 09 _ High on Heroin _ Drugs and the Taliban Economy
0602 _ Ch 10 _ Global Jihad _ The Arab Afghans and Osama Bin Laden
0701 _ Part 3 _ The New Great Game
0702 _ Ch 11 _ Dictators and Oil Barons _ Taliban and Central Asia, Russia, Turkey, Israel
0703 _ Ch 12 _ Romancing the Taliban 1 _ Battle for Pipelines 94 to 96
0802 _ Ch 13 _ Romancing the Taliban 2 _ Battle for Pipelines 97 to 99 _ USA and Taliban
0803 _ Ch 14 _ Master or Victim _ Pakistan's Afghan War
0902 _ Ch 15 _ Shia vs Sunni _ Iran and Saudi Arabia
0903 _ Ch 16 _ Conclusion _ The Future of Afghanistan
1002 _ Appendix _ A Sample of Taliban Decrees
1003 _ Blackstone Audio _ Taliban _ Ahmed Rashid
Chapter 0-2 Chapter 3-5 Chapter 6-8 Chapter 9-11 Chapter 12-14 Chapter 15-16 e-book Thanks to original uploader neutronstar at Bitme
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