US 'planned attack on Taleban' before last week's attacks.

[Guest guest]

http://www.afghan-web.com/aop/today.html

US 'planned attack on Taleban'

BBC News

By the BBC's Arney

9/18/01

A former Pakistani diplomat has told the BBC that the US was planning

military action against Osama Bin Laden and the Taleban even before last

week's attacks.

Niaz Naik, a former Pakistani Foreign Secretary, was told by senior

American officials in mid-July that military action against Afghanistan

would go ahead by the middle of October. Mr Naik said US officials told

him of the plan at a UN-sponsored international contact group on

Afghanistan which took place in Berlin.

Mr Naik told the BBC that at the meeting the US representatives told him

that unless Bin Laden was handed over swiftly America would take

military action to kill or capture both Bin Laden and the Taleban

leader, Mullah .

The wider objective, according to Mr Naik, would be to topple the

Taleban regime and install a transitional government of moderate Afghans

in its place - possibly under the leadership of the former Afghan King

Zahir Shah.

Mr Naik was told that Washington would launch its operation from bases

in Tajikistan, where American advisers were already in place. He was

told that Uzbekistan would also participate in the operation and that

17,000 Russian troops were on standby.

Mr Naik was told that if the military action went ahead it would take

place before the snows started falling in Afghanistan, by the middle of

October at the latest.

He said that he was in no doubt that after the World Trade Center

bombings this pre-existing US plan had been built upon and would be

implemented within two or three weeks.

And he said it was doubtful that Washington would drop its plan even if

Bin Laden were to be surrendered immediately by the Taleban.