Word: pashtun
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After taking the SEAL to Sabari-Minah, Gulab called a village council and explained that the American needed protection from Taliban hunters. It was the SEAL's good fortune that the villagers were Pashtun, who are honor-bound never to refuse sanctuary to a stranger. By then, said Gulab, "the American understood that we were trying to save him, and he relaxed...
...labeled combat. None of his men got Purple Hearts. He was in a hotel in Kazakhstan when word came of the 9/11 attacks. Within weeks his team of 12 special-forces soldiers was dropped behind Taliban lines with little more than weapons, cash and a mission to start a Pashtun insurgency. In one fire fight, Amerine and eight of his soldiers, with the intermittent help of Afghan irregulars, stopped an advance of 1,000 Taliban soldiers. Just as they were descending triumphant on Kandahar, an errant U.S. bomb hit, killing two of his men and leaving Amerine with shrapnel...
...polls, defying Taliban threats of sabotage and terror. "It was a moral and psychological defeat for the Taliban," Olson told TIME. Karzai helped the process along, clipping the wings of regional warlords such as Ismael Khan in Herat province and Uzbek strongman Rashid Dostum, enemies of the Pashtun tribes that are the main backers of the Taliban...
...because the Taliban's paymasters are losing interest. Al-Qaeda's rich backers have "focused their attention elsewhere," says Olsen-by which he means Iraq. Without al-Qaeda's funds to support them, groups of Taliban can now be seen roaming the streets of Quetta begging for food. Khaled Pashtun, the Kandahar security chief, says the Taliban still get a cut of the opium trade and receive donations from sympathizers in Pakistan and the Gulf. But for Islamists wanting to fund jihad, Iraq has become a bigger game than Afghanistan...
...just traveled to Pakistan, says it's possible bin Laden is not in some snowy mountain cave but has melted away into one of the teeming Pakistani cities, as had several other al-Qaeda agents who have been captured. "What we're looking for is some young Pashtun living in a town who knows the value of $25 million and can figure out how to reach us safely," says Kirk. He points out that the lure of a $30 million reward led to the capture and killing in Iraq of Saddam Hussein's sons Uday and Qusay. --By Tim McGirk