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....   READ FULL 

Reviewr: John Miller"

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....
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"Source: From Library Journal
Reviewr: Marcia L. Sprules, Council on Foreign Relations Lib., New York "

One learns ... 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

"Source:The New York Times
Reviewr: Richard Bernstein"