Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001

This book offers a very in-depth look at U.S. involvement in Afghanistan prior to 9/11. The story comes across as factual and well-documented; I did not pick up any noticeable traces of a political ideology, just a well-reported story based on facts as presented by the author. The book is well read by Malcolm Hilgartner, to the extent that I would be more likely to purchase an audio book if he is the narrator. The technical production of the book is slightly lacking in a few spots where the audio stops abruptly and restarts, but overall it sounds good and I don't think anything is missed due to these small annoyances.

great story telling, accurate and abundant information, unbiased reporting.

the russian helicopter in the book is a Mil-17, through out the read, he reads it as an MiG 17. for someone with a decent military hardware background, it drove me nuts. couple of other similar misuse of technical terms.

no

glitches in the recording, skipped lines and sentences. could be a bad burn to CD...

This is a wonderfully researched book. I listened to this and The Looming Tower in quick succession. I found it to be the far better of the two. Coll is insightful and is very careful to not overstep or over-interpret his source material. I find him trustworthy and honest and evenhanded. He is also a gifted writer. It was a great listen and was well performed by Malcolm Hillgartner.

Like many others, I want to understand how the United States got into the current mess in Afghanistan. This is the first book I've read that provides, in a truly in depth and objective manner. the always ignored back story. Anyone who cares to voice an opinion on future policy decisions in the Middle East should be familiar with this book. The author's objective presentation makes the story just that much harder to hear.

The author's cold blooded description of the myriad ways in which the United States was manipulated by Pakistan and Saudi Arabia for more than 20 years.

I have,and enjoy his narration. For some reason however, in the first half of this book, sentences were often clipped off at the end, giving the reading a sort of chopped off sound. This problem seemed to disappear in the second half of the book.

No. I actually spent more than 6 months listening to this book, mostly in the car, and I'm glad I took the time to go through it slowly. The tragedy builds slowly, piece by piece, until the eve of 9/11.

No book since a "Bright, Shining Lie" by Neil Sheehan has made a greater impression on me in terms of historical understanding.

It explained with great clarity the complexities of, not only our relations with Afghanistan but also with Pakistan. The only common element seems to be widespread misunderstanding and mistrust.
I also learned that we had clearly identified the threat from Osama Bin Laden back during the mid 1990s but permission to neutralize him was denied by then President Clinton due to his personal political difficulties at that particular time.
The research for this book was extensive and I was astonished that so much of the material is now declassified.

No single character because so many of the characters are facinating.

His tone , his delivery and the facility to smoothly move through so many difficult names and accents added an additional flavor of authenticity to the story

Absolutely

No foreign power has succeeded in this region since Alexander the Great. Even the people in charge today in Pakistan and Afghanistan, are not really in charge. So,...... we must ask ourselves why are we Americans wasting lives and treasury in this ungovernable wasteland?

Mistakes were made, by Bush 41, Clinton and Bush 43. Bush 41's policies put the Taliban in charge of Afghanistan, Clinton kept them there and Bush 43 was distracted by a VP and a Condi who were uninformed and uninterested. We armed the "resistance" fighters and abandoned them when the "resistance" got rid of the Russians. We relied on biased, self-serving "intelligence" from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, both countries supported the Taliban. We gave millions to Pakistan, much of which was diverted to personal accounts, and succeeded in tipping the balance toward the military intelligence side and away from the civil executive/legislative side, destabilizing a nuclear power.

Were there good outcomes? Well, the Russian economy imploded, the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Republic disintegrated. Would the Wall have fallen anyway? Maybe. We'll never know.

Good news? The Cold War was over. Bad news? We entered the era of terrorism. We don't know how this era will end but, thanks to this book, we know how it began.

Painful, depressing great read.

How well it covered the subjects promised in the subtitle.

It's not that kind of book. There are sequences where some of the operator's exploits are described, but mainly it is a steady, factual account of the players and events through this moment of history.

No.

Only the realization that through the abdication of our oversight of how weapons and materiel were being used to the ISI, and how Saudi Arabia was funding the brainwashing of a jihadi fighting force, we fertilized the ground for our enemies to grow against us.

There is a lot that was going on behind the scenes I did not know about until I