Word: uzbek
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Dates: during 2010-2019
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Karzai also knows that the U.S. commitment in his country is finite, and the need to survive after the Americans leave makes him more inclined to rely on such established hard men as Uzbek warlord General Rashid Dostum and Tajik strongman General Mohammed Fahim - even if that means turning a blind eye to their transgressions. He is also keen to take charge of negotiating a political settlement with the Taliban on his own timetable, and with less of a role for Pakistan than Washington might be ready to concede to Islamabad. Just as U.S. influence in Iraq declined precipitously once...
...worth remembering that Karzai was essentially parachuted into the country in the course of the U.S. invasion, tapped to lead a new post-Taliban government that would be founded largely on the Northern Alliance - the coalition of ethnic Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara former mujahedin warlords who had always fought the Taliban. A chieftain in the Popolzai tribe, Karzai was a prominent leader in Afghanistan's largest ethnic group, the Pashtun, which is also the social base of the Taliban. Still, his power base was limited, and creating an effective government forced him to cut deals with all manner of unsavory...