The Women of Afghanistan under the Taliban Book

I had just finished reading Fawzia Koofi's Favored Daughter for the Utah State Library's book discussion, and was looking for more background.

This was the first book in my reading on Afghanistan after the Koofi book. It was written by an American academic; although copyrighted in 2002 it was obviously written before Sept. 11 and the October US invasion, which are simply alluded to as short additions at the end of one or two chapters. In other words, the book for the most part assumes that the Taliban is in control and will remain in control for the foreseeable future. In a way, this is probably an advantage, in that the book's descriptions of Taliban atrocities can't be suspected of being written to support US war policies.There is much good material here; background and statistics, as well as descriptions of life under the Taliban by a large selection of recent refugees, and statements by a wide variety of persons, both from the UN and US government and various activist groups.

Unfortunately, the book is not well-written; at times it gives the impression of a bad student paper, being put together from random and contradictory quotations without any attempt to decide between them -- indeed, without seeming to realize that they are contradictory, especially on the US role in supporting/opposing the Taliban. Moreover, at times the writing is so ungrammatical it is impossible to tell what is actually being stated.

A few things emerge clearly, however: that the US funded the most violent and fanatical Mujahadeen groups (whether or not intentionally is disputed between various quotations) with billions of dollars in its jihad against the Russians; that US support to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia at least indirectly was benefiting the Taliban right up to Sept. 11; that US (and therefore UN) diplomatic opposition to the Taliban was largely verbal, and apart from the Taliban's support to terrorism against the West and their role in drug trafficking, the US didn't really care what they did in Afghanistan. There is much on the Afghan Women's Network, RAWA (which provided many of the interviews with ordinary women in the book) and other organizations. These are all aspects which the Koofi book downplays or ignores.