Download 88 Days to Kandahar: A CIA Diary AudioBook Free
The "first" Afghan Warfare, the CIA's warfare in response to 9/11, was approved by Leader Bush and aimed by the writer, Robert Grenier, the CIA station main in Islamabad. Forging separate alliances with warlords, Taliban dissidents, and Pakistani intelligence, Grenier defeated the Taliban and put Hamid Karzai in power in 88 days and nights. Later, as head of CIA counterterrorism, he watches as bureaucratic dysfunction in the CIA, Pentagon, and the White House lead to failure in Iraq and Afghanistan. In his gripping narrative, we meet Standard Tommy Franks, who bridles at CIA control of "his" warfare; Standard "Jafar Amin", a gruff Pakistani intelligence officer who helps you to save Grenier from committing career suicide; Maleeha Lodhi, Pakistan's great ambassador to the US, who attempts to warn her government of the al-Qaeda menace; "Mark", the CIA operator who guides GulAgha Shirzai to bloody success in the Taliban; Standard Kayani, a cautious man who will become the most effective man in Pakistan, fighting Grenier's demands while trying to safeguard his country; and Hamid Karzai, the puzzling anti-Taliban insurgent, a guy of courage, petulance, and vacillating moods. Grenier's enemies out in front prove only just a bit more lethal than people behind his own lines. This first warfare is won despite Washington bureaucrats who divert resources, deny armed forces support, and try to undermine the only real Afghan allies capable of winning. Later, as Grenier aimed the CIA's role in the Iraq Warfare, he watched the initial success squandered. His previous command line was of CIA's Counterterrorism Centre, as Bush-era terrorism guidelines were being repudiated, as the Taliban reemerged in Afghanistan, and since Pakistan descended into fratricidal assault.
