This is one of two books I read while I was visiting Afghanistan. I found the book to be very educational and of great worth.The lack of a "american-centric" point of view is one of the reasons why I would reccomend this book to anyone interested in Afghanistan.

A lot of information, most of it very esoteric to the West. Slanted with Islamic-centric world view that celebrates the Clinton traitors and the impotent UN bureacratics, but full of interesting history and an excellent primer on the Taliban and Afghan history.

Reading this book is essential for understanding the current war between the United States and the Taliban. There are no innocents here. This book documents the betrayal of allegiances by all the participants including the United States and documents the role of Big Oil in bringing about the current conflict. The fact is that to build a pipeline to transport oil from the Central Asia Republics, stability must be achieved in Afghanistan. First the USA backed the Taliban to defeat the Northern Alliance and when that failed, the USA switched to backing the Northern Alliance to destroy the Taliban. It is not important which side wins as long as one side wins to bring about the stability to allow for the construction of the pipeline. This book contains an impressive investigation to reveal this and to also illustrate the brutality of both the Taliban and it's opposition in Afghanistan.

This is an excellent look inside the Taliban - the history, their "idealism," and their aspirations as a group. Any book about the war in Afghanistan about American military units, specific operations should have this as a complement.

It's hard to think of a book that was published with as much good timing as Ahmed Rashid's Taliban. The book itself is heavily academic and therefore largely unexciting, but remains the best treatment of the Taliban up to 2001. Readers wanting analysis of events afterward will obviously have to look elsewhere.

While respecting the author's effort and in-depth research, I found the excuses in the opening chapters in favor of the Taliban unpalatable.I just have quesstion to ask Mr. Fergusson: how would he like his daughters or his grand-daughters to live in a country run by the Taliban?Comparing the Taliban era with the worse pre-taliban period is meaningless. Both should be rid of, if possible.