December 4, 1997: Taliban Representatives Visit Unocal in Texas
Representatives of the Taliban are invited guests to the Texas headquarters of Unocal to negotiate their support for the pipeline. Future President George W. Bush is Governor of Texas at the time.
The Taliban appear to agree to a $ 2 bn pipeline deal, but will do the deal only if the US officially recognizes the Taliban regime. The Taliban meet with US officials. According to the Daily Telegraph, "the US government, which in the past has branded the Taliban's policies against women and children 'despicable,' appears anxious to please the fundamentalists to clinch the lucrative pipeline contract."
A BBC regional correspondent says that "the proposal to build a pipeline across Afghanistan is part of an international scramble to profit from developing the rich energy resources of the Caspian Sea." [BBC, 12/4/1997; Daily Telegraph, 12/14/1997]
It has been claimed that the Taliban meet with Enron officials while in Texas (see 1996-September 11, 2001). Enron, headquartered in Texas, has a large financial interest in the pipeline at the time (see June 24, 1996).
The Taliban also visit Thomas Gouttierre, an academic at the University of Nebraska, who is a consultant for Unocal and also has been paid by the CIA for his work in Afghanistan (see 1984-1994 and December 1997). Gouttierre takes them on a visit to Mt. Rushmore. [Dreyfuss, 2005, pp. 328-329]
February 12, 1998: Unocal VP Advocates Afghan Pipeline Before Congress
Unocal Vice President John J. Maresca -- later to become a Special Ambassador to Afghanistan -- testifies before the House of Representatives that until a single, unified, friendly government is in place in Afghanistan, the trans-Afghan pipeline will not be built.
He suggests that with a pipeline through Afghanistan, the Caspian basin could produce 20 % of all the non-OPEC oil in the world by 2010. [US Congress, 2/12/1998]
Mid-April 1998: US Official Meets with Taliban; Promote Afghan Pipeline
Bill Richardson, the US Ambassador to the UN, meets Taliban officials in Kabul. (All such meetings are illegal, because the US still officially recognizes the government the Taliban ousted as the legitimate rulers of Afghanistan.)
US officials at the time call the oil and gas pipeline project a "fabulous opportunity" and are especially motivated by the "prospect of circumventing Iran, which offers another route for the pipeline." [Boston Globe, 9/20/2001]
Richardson tries to persuade the Taliban to hand over bin Laden to the US, promising to end the international isolation of the Taliban if they cooperate. [Reeve, 1999, pp. 195]
July 21, 2001: US Official Threatens Possible Military Action Against Taliban by October if Pipeline Is Not Pursued
Three former American officials, Tom Simons (former US Ambassador to Pakistan), Karl Inderfurth (former Deputy Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs), and Lee Coldren (former State Department expert on South Asia) meet with Pakistani and Russian intelligence officers in a Berlin hotel. [Salon, 8/16/2002] This is the third of a series of back-channel conferences called "brainstorming on Afghanistan."
Taliban representatives sat in on previous meetings, but boycotted this one due to worsening tensions. However, the Pakistani ISI relays information from the meeting to the Taliban. [Guardian, 9/22/2001]
At the meeting, Coldren passes on a message from Bush officials. He later says, "I think there was some discussion of the fact that the United States was so disgusted with the Taliban that they might be considering some military action." [Guardian, 9/26/2001]
Accounts vary, but former Pakistani Foreign Secretary Niaz Naik later says he is told by senior American officials at the meeting that military action to overthrow the Taliban in Afghanistan is planned to "take place before the snows started falling in Afghanistan, by the middle of October at the latest." The goal is to kill or capture both bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Omar, topple the Taliban regime, and install a transitional government of moderate Afghans in its place. Uzbekistan andRussia would also participate.
Naik also says, "It was doubtful that Washington would drop its plan even if bin Laden were to be surrendered immediately by the Taliban." [BBC, 9/18/2001]
One specific threat made at this meeting is that the Taliban can choose between "carpets of bombs" -- an invasion -- or "carpets of gold" -- the pipeline. [Brisard and Dasquie, 2002, pp. 43]
Naik contends that Tom Simons made the "carpets" statement. Simons claims, "It's possible that a mischievous American participant, after several drinks, may have thought it smart to evoke gold carpets and carpet bombs. Even Americans can't resist the temptation to be mischievous." Naik and the other American participants deny that the pipeline was an issue at the meeting. [Salon, 8/16/2002]
August 2, 2001: US Official Secretly Meets Taliban Ambassador in Last Attempt to Secure Pipeline Deal
Christina Rocca, Director of Asian Affairs at the State Department, secretly meets the Taliban ambassador in Islamabad, apparently in a last ditch attempt to secure a pipeline deal. Rocca was previously in charge of contacts with Islamic guerrilla groups at the CIA, and oversaw the delivery of Stinger missiles to Afghan mujahidin in the 1980s. [Irish Times, 11/19/2001; Brisard and Dasquie, 2002, pp. 45; Salon, 2/8/2002]
