Ahmad Shah Massoud

Ahmad Shah Massoud
Nickname(s)	"Lion of Panjshir"
Allegiance	United Front (Northern Alliance)
Rank	Commander, Minister of Defense
Commands	Prominent Mujahideen commander during the Soviet war in Afghanistan, Defense Minister of Afghanistan, leading commander of the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan
Awards	National Hero of Afghanistan and Nobel Peace Prize Nominee

Ahmad Shah Massoud (احمد شاه مسعود- Aḥmad Šāh Mas‘ūd; September 1953 – September 9, 2001) was a Kabul University engineering student turned military leader who played a leading role in driving the Soviet army out of Afghanistan, earning him the nickname Lion of Panjshir. His followers call him Āmir Sāhib-e Shahīd (Our Martyred Commander). An ethnic Tajik, Massoud was a moderate of the anti-Soviet resistance leaders.

Following the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet-backed government of Mohammad Najibullah, Massoud became the Defense Minister in 1992 under the government of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani. Following the rise of the Taliban in 1996, Massoud returned to the role of an armed opposition leader, serving as the military commander of the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan (known in the Western and Pakistani media as the Northern Alliance).

On September 9, 2001, two days before the September 11 attacks in the United States, Massoud was assassinated in Takhar Province of Afghanistan by suspected al-Qaeda agents. The following year, he was named "National Hero" by the order of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The date of his death, September 9, is observed as a national holiday in Afghanistan, known as "Massoud Day." The year following his assassination, in 2002, Massoud was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Early Life

The son of police commander Dost Mohammad, Ahmad Shah Massoud was born on September 2, 1953 in Bazarak, Panjshir, Afghanistan. At the age of five, he started grammar school in Bazarak and stayed there until second grade. Since his father was promoted to be police chief of Herat, he attended 3rd and 4th grade at the Mowaffaq School in Herat. He also received a religious education at the "Masjed-e Jame" mosque in Herat. Later, his father was moved to Kabul where he attended the Lycée Esteqlal and obtained his Baccalaureate. Since his childhood, he was considered exceedingly talented; from 10th grade on, his school acknowledged him as a particularly gifted student. He knew many languages including Persian, Pashtu, Urdu, Hindi and French. He also had a good working knowledge of Arabic and English.

While studying in Kabul in 1972, Massoud became involved with the Sazman-i Jawanan-i Musulman ("organization of Muslim youth"), the student branch of the Jamiat-i Islami ("Islamic Society"), whose chairman was professor Burhanuddin Rabbani. This Islamist organization opposed the rising communist and Soviet influence that became especially evident after the coup d'état that brought Mohammed Daoud Khan to power in 1973: the coup was orchestrated by the Parcham faction of the PDPA, the Afghan communist party.

In 1976, the movement split between supporters of Rabbani, who led the Jamiat, and the extremist elements surrounding Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who then founded the Hezb-i Islami. Massoud who had regular and vehement disputes with Hekmatyar joined Rabbani's faction.

The Soviet Invasion and PDPA Communism

Communist Revolution in Afghanistan (1978)

Main article: Saur Revolution

The government of Mohammed Daoud Khan increasingly distanced itself from the Afghan communists and the Soviet Union. That is why in 1978, the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (حزب دیموکراتیک خلق افغانستان) orchestrated a bloody coup assassinating Mohammed Daoud Khan, his family and bodyguards and consequently assuming power. The PDPA soon started reforms along marxist and Soviet lines. At the same time they also imposed a tyranny on the Afghan people. Human Rights Watch estimates that as many as 100,000 people may have been killed in the countryside alone by government troops.

The reforms and the PDPA's affinity to the Soviet Union were met with heavy resistance among the Afghan population, especially as the government attempted to enforce its Marxist policies by arresting or simply executing those who resisted. The repression plunged large parts of the country, especially the rural areas, into open revolt against the new Marxist government. By spring 1979 unrests had reached 24 out of 28 Afghan provinces including major urban areas. Over half of the Afghan army would either desert or join the insurrection.

Having ascertained that an uprising against the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan would be backed by the people, Massoud made his way to the Panjshir and started an insurrection on July 6, 1979. The fight lasted 40 days, during which the whole Panjshir, Salang, and Bola Ghain were in open revolt against the Marxist government. After these 40 days, Massoud's leg was severly injured and the troops under his command had no more weapons and ammunition. In the end the government troops defeated them. Drawing lessons from this failure, Massoud decided to avoid conventional confrontation with larger and better armed government troops and to instead wage a guerrilla war.

Resistance Against the Soviet Union (1979-1989)

Main article: Soviet war in Afghanistan

File:Massoud reading.JPG

Massoud reading the Quran in the 1980s

Following the 1979 invasion and occupation of Afghanistan by Soviet troops, Massoud devised a strategic plan for expelling the invaders and overthrowing the communist regime. The first task was to establish a guerilla force, supported by the people. The second phase was one of "active defense" of the Panjshir stronghold, while carrying out irregular warfare. The third phase, the "strategic offensive", would see Massoud's forces taking control of large parts of Northern Afghanistan. The fourth phase was the "general application" of Massoud's principles to the whole country, and the final demise of the Afghan communist government.

From the start of the war, Massoud's mujahideen proved to be a thorn in the side for the occupying Soviet forces by ambushing Soviet and Afghan communist convoys travelling through the Salang Pass, resulting in fuel shortages in Kabul. To relieve the pressure on their supply lines, the Soviets were forced to mount a series of offensives against the Panjshir. Between 1980 and 1985, these offensives were conducted twice a year. Yet, despite engaging more men and hardware on each occasion, the Soviets were unable to defeat Massoud's forces. In 1982, the Soviets began deploying major combat units in the Panjshir numbering up to 12,000 men, and Massoud pulled his troops back into subsidiary valleys, where they occupied fortified positions. When the Soviet columns advanced onto these positions, they fell into ambushes and suffered heavy casualties. When the Soviets withdrew, they handed over their positions to Afghan army garrisons, and Massoud and his mujahideen forces attacked and recaptured them one by one.

In 1983, the Soviets offered Massoud a truce, which he accepted. He put this respite to good use, extending his influence to areas outside Panjshir, mostly in Takhar and Baghlan Provinces. He also created the Shura-e Nazar (Supervisory Council) which subsequently united 130 commanders from 12 Afghan provinces in their fight against the Soviet army. This council existed outside the fold of the Peshawar parties that were prone to internecine rivalry and bickering, and served to smooth out differences between resistance groups, due to political and ethnic divisions. It was the predecessor of what would ultimately become the United Front (Northern Alliance).

Relations with the party headquarters in Peshawar were often strained, as Rabbani insisted on giving Massoud no more weapons and supplies than to other Jamiat commanders, even those who did little fighting. To compensate for this deficiency, Massoud relied on revenues drawn from exports of emeralds and lapis lazuli, that are traditionally exploited in Northern Afghanistan.

To organize support for the mujahideen, Massoud established an administrative system that enforced law and order (nazm) in areas under his control. The Panjshir was divided into 22 bases (qarargah) governed by a military commander and a civilian administrator, and each had a judge, a prosecutor and a public defender. Massoud's policies were implemented by different committees: an economic committee was charged with funding the war effort. The health committee provided health services, assisted by volunteers from foreign humanitarian non-governmental organizations, such as Aide médicale internationale. An education committee was charged with the training of the military and administrative cadre. A culture and propaganda committee and a judiciary committee were also created.

This expansion prompted Babrak Karmal to demand that the Red Army resume their offensives, in order to crush the Panjshir groups definitively. However, Massoud had received advance warning of the attack through his intelligence agents in the government and he evacuated all 130 000 inhabitants from the valley, leaving the Soviet bombings to fall on empty ground.

With the end of the Soviet-Afghan attacks, Massoud was able to carry out the next phase of his strategic plan, expanding the resistance movement and liberating the northern provinces of Afghanistan. In August 1986, he captured Farkhar in Takhar Province. In November 1986, his forces overran the headquarters of the government's 20th division at Nahrin in Baghlan Province, scoring an important victory for the resistance. This expansion was also carried out through diplomatic means, as more mujahideen commanders were persuaded to adopt the Panjshir military system.

Despite almost constant attacks by the Red Army and the Afghan army, Massoud was able to increase his military strength. Starting in 1980 with a force of less than 1,000 ill-equipped guerillas, the Panjshir valley mujahideen grew to a 5,000-strong force by 1984. After expanding his influence outside the valley, Massoud increased his resistance forces to 13,000 fighters by 1989. These forces were divided into different types of units: the locals (mahalli) were tasked with static defense of villages and fortified positions. The best of the mahalli were formed into units called grup-i zarbati (shock troops), semi-mobile groups that acted as reserve forces for the defense of several strongholds. A different type of unit was the mobile group (grup-i-mutaharek), a lightly equipped commando-like formation numbering 33 men, whose mission was to carry out hit-and-run attacks outside the Panjshir, sometimes as far as 100 km from their base. These men were professional soldiers, well-paid and trained, and, from 1983 on, they provided an effective strike force against government outposts. Uniquely among the mujahideen, these groups wore uniforms, and their use of the pakul made this headwear emblematic of the Afghan resistance.

Major resistance forces against the Soviets 1985 (army-green depicts locations of Jamiat-i Islami. Shura-e Nazar comprised Jamiat but also other groups).

Massoud's military organization was an effective compromise between the traditional Afghan method of warfare and the modern principles of guerilla warfare that Massoud had learned from the works of Mao Zedong and Che Guevara. His forces were considered the most effective of all the various Afghan resistance movements.

Role of the U.S.

The U.S. provided Massoud with close to no support. Part of the reason was that it permitted its funding and arms distribution to be administered by Pakistan, which favored rival mujahideen leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. In an interview Massoud expressed: "We thought the CIA knew everything. But they didn't. They supported some bad people [meaning Hekmatyar]." Primary advocates for supporting Massoud instead were State Department's Edmund McWilliams and Peter Tomsen, who were on the ground in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Others included two Heritage Foundation foreign policy analysts, Michael Johns and James A. Phillips, both of whom championed Massoud as the Afghan resistance leader most worthy of U.S. support under the Reagan Doctrine.

Still, the Soviet army and the Afghan communist army were mainly defeated by Massoud and his mujahideen in numerous small engagements between 1984 and 1988. In 1989, after labeling the Soviet Union's military engagement in Afghanistan "a bleeding wound", Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev began a withdrawal of Soviet troops from the nation. On February 15, 1989, in what was depicted as an improbable victory for the mujahideen, the last Soviet soldier left the nation.

Fall of the Afghan Communist Regime (1992)

Main article: Civil war in Afghanistan (1989-1992)

After the departure of Soviet troops in 1989, the PDPA regime, then headed by Mohammad Najibullah, proved unexpectedly capable of holding its own against the mujahideen. Backed by a massive influx of weapons from the Soviet Union, the Afghan armed forces reached a level of performance they had never reached under direct Soviet tutelage and were able to maintain control over all of Afghanistan's major cities.

By 1992, however, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the regime began to crumble. Food and fuel shortages undermined the capacities of the government's army, and a resurgence of factionalism split the regime between Khalq and Parcham supporters.

A few days after it was clear that Najibullah had lost control of the nation, his army commanders and governors arranged to turn over authority to resistance commanders and local notables throughout the country. Joint councils (shuras) were immediately established for local government in which civil and military officials of the former government were usually included. In many cases, prior arrangements for transferring regional and local authority had been made between foes.

Collusions between military leaders quickly brought down the Kabul government. In mid-January 1992, within three weeks of the demise of the Soviet Union, Massoud was aware of conflict within the government's northern command. General Abdul Momim, in charge of the Hairatan border crossing at the northern end of Kabul's supply highway, and other non-Pashtun generals based in Mazari Sharif feared removal by Najibullah and replacement by Pashtun officers. The generals rebelled and the situation was taken over by Abdul Rashid Dostum, who held general rank as head of the Jowzjani militia, also based in Mazari Sharif. He and Massoud reached a political agreement, together with another major militia leader, Sayyed Mansour, of the Ismaili community based in Baghlan Province. These northern allies consolidated their position in Mazar-i-Sharif on March 21. Their coalition covered nine provinces in the north and northeast. As turmoil developed within the government in Kabul, there was no government force standing between the northern allies and the major air force base at Bagram, some seventy kilometers north of Kabul. By mid-April 1992, the Afghan air force command at Bagram had capitulated to Massoud. Kabul was defenseless and its army no longer reliable.

On March 18, 1992, Najibullah announced his willingness to resign, and on April 17, as his government fell apart, he tried to escape but was stopped at Kabul Airport by Dostum's forces. He then took refuge at the United Nations mission, where he remained until 1995. A group of Parchami generals and officials declared themselves an interim government for the purpose of handing over power to Massoud, who at that time was the dominant military force and very popular.

Massoud, however, transferred power to the political parties to create an interim government. He kept his forces as long as possible outside of Kabul trying to convince other commanders especially Hekmatyar to do the same in order to avoid bloodshed. Massoud was awaiting a political accord. In April 1992 the political leaders finally agreed on a plan for peace: the Peshawar Accords.

Pakistani Intrusion and War in Afghanistan (1992-today)

War in Kabul and Other Parts of the Country (1992-1996)

Main article: Civil war in Afghanistan (1992-1996)

When political leaders finally signed a peace agreement called the Peshawar Accords with which they established the "Islamic State of Afghanistan". Massoud was given the position of defense minister. Burnahuddin Rabbani became president. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who was repeatedly offered the position of prime minister, however, wanted all power for himself dooming the peace agreement to fail. With the strong support of Pakistan, he placed Kabul under intensive rocket bombardment in May 1992. Some sources cite up to 3,000 rockets being fired on Kabul daily, killing many civilians. Meanwhile the U.S. and Europe, after the communist defeat losing interest in Afghanistan, disengaged. U.S. congressman Dana Rohrabacher told the U.S. Congress in 2004: "[I]t was a policy decision to walk away ... even after psychopathic killers like Gulbuddin Hekmatyar rose up as the Soviets departed. ...The Saudis and the Pakistanis supported the arming of these violent extremists. Predictably, what followed was a period of havoc and bloodshed."

Human Rights Watch writes: "The sovereignty of Afghanistan was vested formally in "The Islamic State of Afghanistan," an entity created in April 1992, after the fall of the Soviet-backed Najibullah government. ... With the exception of Hekmatyar's Hezb-e Islami, all of the parties ... were ostensibly unified under this government in April 1992 (but as described below, Wahdat later changed sides, in late 1992, and allied with [Hekmatyar and] Hezb-e Islami). ... Hekmatyar's Hezb-e Islami, for its part, refused to recognize the government for most of the period discussed in this report and launched attacks against government forces and Kabul generally. ... Hekmatyar continued to refuse to join the government. Hekmatyar's Hezb-e Islami forces increased their rocket and shell attacks on the city. Shells and rockets fell everywhere." Well-known Afghanistan expert, Amin Saikal, concludes in his book which was chosen by The Wall Street Journal as 'One of the "Five Best" Books on Afghanistan': "Pakistan was keen to gear up for a breakthrough in Central Asia. ... Islamabad could not possibly expect the new Islamic government leaders, especially Massoud (who had always maintained his independence from Pakistan), to subordinate their own nationalist objectives in order to help Pakistan realize its regional ambitions. ... Had it not been for the ISI’s logistic support and supply of a large number of rockets, Hekmatyar’s forces would not have been able to target and destroy half of Kabul. Yet Hekmatyar’s failure to achieve what was expected of him prompted the ISI leaders to come up with a new surrogate force."

Pakistan, Iran, Uzbekistan and Saudi Arabia played a central role in the war fighting for control over Afghanistan. Pakistan supported Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Iran supported the Hezb-i Wahdat under Abdul Ali Mazari and Karim Khalili, Uzbekistan supported Rashid Dostum and his militia Junbish-i Milli, and Saudi Arabia supported Abdul Rasul Sayyaf and his Ittihad-i Islami. Massoud, who was considered too independent by outside powers, had close to no outside support while he had strong support inside Afghanistan. According to Human Rights Watch, numerous Iranian agents were assisting Hezb-i Wahdat forces, as Iran was attempting to maximize Wahdat's military power and influence in the new government. Saudi agents of some sort, private or governmental, were trying to strengthen Sayyaf and his Ittihad-i Islami faction to the same end. Rare ceasefires, usually negotiated by representatives of Massoud, Mujaddidi or Rabbani, or officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), commonly collapsed within days. Rashid Dostum and Junbish-i Milli meanwhile were backed by Uzbekistan. Uzbek president Karimov was keen to see Dostum controlling as much of Afghanistan as possible especially in the north.

A publication with the George Washington University also describes: "[O]utside forces saw instability in Afghanistan as an opportunity to press their own security and political agendas. ... Initially, the Pakistanis supported ... Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an incompetent commander from the Mujahideen days ... When Hekmatyar failed to deliver for Pakistan, the administration began to support a new movement of religious students known as the Taliban." A documentary reports: "Massoud, whose northern council was the dominant military power tried to keep order while the parties talked, but meantime, Pakistan urged on its Afghan client Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. ... Massoud, with UN help tried to avoid civil war in the early 1990s but ... Hekmatyar rained rockets on Kabul seeking power for himself."

During the war most of Kabul was destroyed and the civilian population was severely harmed. The Afghanistan Justice Project provides some information on the crimes committed by different forces during that time. The Afghanistan Justice Project (AJP) was established in late 2001 as an independent research and advocacy organization whose objective is to document serious war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by all of the parties during the wars in Afghanistan, covering the period from 1978-2001. Some militia fighters (regardless of which party) turned against civilians and committed horrific crimes as Kabul descended into chaos. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Abdul Rasul Sayyaf and Abdul Ali Mazari ordered some of those crimes, Abdul Rashid Dostum allowed them. Massoud was not able to stop all of those crimes from being committed. As Massoud was fighting as defense minister to protect the Peshawar Accords and the Islamic State he gets associated with that gruesome period, which is why some people are keeping him in bad memory. The Afghanistan Justice Project, however, concluded: "As in some of the other instances of violence against civilians documented in this report, there is no indication that senior Shura-e Nazar leaders [which included Massoud] ordered abuses." During that period all structures had collapsed, there was no police, no working justice system and Kabul was under attack from multiple sources and fronts.

Edward Girardet, director of the Global Journalism Network in Geneva, states: "When Massoud operated in the north during the fight against the Soviets, and towards the end of the Taliban period, his Northern Front commanders he watched quite closely and controlled well, but in Kabul, no. Of the people working around him, many were not Panjshiris, and a lot became corrupt very quickly. [...] People who were supposedly supporting Massoud were just using his name to benefit themselves. That was one of the main concerns. He could not control all of them." An Afghan observer further explained: "Massoud was always talking to his people about not behaving badly; he told them that they were accoutable to their God. But because of the rocket attacks on the city the number of troops had to be increased, so there were ten or twelve thousand troops from other sources that came in [...] I think people blamed Massoud because they expected him to test out the reliability of all the troops and at the same time to maintain the [...] hold on Kabul and help all the people [against Hekmatyar and Pakistan, Mazari and Iran, Dostum and Uzbekistan]. Those who criticized him admit they don't have any evidence that Massoud ordered any killings. He not only did not order any, but he was deeply distressed by them. I remember once [...] Massoud commented that some commanders were behaving badly, and said that he was trying to bring them to justice ..." Farid Amin reports the following incident: "One day he [Massoud] was going from Kabul to Shamali, and he saw a trailer truck and somehow got suspicious. He stopped it, and when they opened the back there were goods in it, things that belonged to other people, probably taken from houses or government offices. He accused them: "You are thieves, you are trying to steal." Then he saw his own picture in the back of their truck - you know that people tried to use Massoud's name and picture to gain power or to take advantage of things - and he said, "First remove that picture of your leader, the leader of thieves." In his way he was telling them, listen if you say I am your leader and you do these things, that is what you make me - a leader of thieves."

An American journalist from the Associated Press (AP) and The Economist who was present in Kabul during that time concluded: "He [Massoud] can hardly be blamed for the presence of irresponsible armed groups in the capital, having done everything within his power to prevent it. Until November 1994, I witnessed firsthand the resulting dilemmas he faced, the amazing restraint with which he met them, and the almost willfully feckless manner in which absentee Western "observers" based in Pakistan distorted the situation in accord with ISI [Pakistan intelligence service] propaganda." In early 1992, in a recorded conversation, Massoud had tried to convince Gulbuddin Hekmatyar not to attack Kabul but instead to join a peaceful political process and an interim government. see video Massoud had also tried to avoid war between the Saudi-backed Ittihad and the Iran-backed Wahdat militias. see video

In late 1994 Massoud's forces were finally able to defeat Hekmatyar, Dostum and Mazari militarily in Kabul. In the same year a conference in three parts was arranged by Massoud to discuss the future of Afghanistan and a process leading towards peace. Massoud had united political and cultural personalities, governors, commanders, clergymen and representatives, also in order to deliberate about a future president and his tasks and to reach a lasting agreement. Massoud, like most people in Afghanistan, saw this conference as a small hope for democracy and for free elections. His favourite for candidacy to the presidency was Dr. Mohammad Yusuf, the first democratic prime minister under Zahir Shah, the former king. In the first meeting representatives from 15 different Afghan provinces met, in the second meeting there were already 25 provinces participating. When Hekmatyar failed to achieve what Pakistan wanted, in 1995 they turned towards a new force coming up in the southern city of Kandahar: the Taliban. Hekmatyar consequently was not able to sustain his military campaign against the Islamic State of Afghanistan and subsequently took the long-offered position of prime minister in exchange for finally giving up before fleeing into exile. With the strong support of Pakistan and later Saudi financed Osama Bin Laden meanwhile the Taliban proceeded to Kabul see video, where at first Massoud handed them their first major defeat. Massoud unarmed went to talk to some Taliban leaders in Maidan Shar, but the Taliban declined to join a political process. When Massoud returned unharmed the Taliban leader who had received him as his guest payed with his life (he was killed by other senior Taliban) for failing to execute Massoud while the possibility was there. Some months later, after Taliban forces had again encircled the capital, Massoud ordered a retreat from Kabul on September 26, 1996. Massoud and his troops retreated to the northeast of Afghanistan.

Resistance Against the Taliban (1996-2001)

Main article: Civil war in Afghanistan (1996-2001)

Afghanistan in winter 1996

When the Taliban entered Kabul in fall 1996, the defense minister of the Islamic State of Afghanistan, Massoud, retreated his troops to his home region of Panjshir. The government of the Islamic State of Afghanistan including Massoud would remain the internationally recognized government of Afghanistan (except for Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates which recognized the Taliban Emirate) until December 2001. Initially Massoud had hoped to convince the Taliban to join a peaceful politicals process but the Taliban had declined. The Taliban imposed on the parts of Afghanistan under their control their interpretation of Islam. The Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) analyze: "To PHR’s knowledge, no other regime in the world has methodically and violently forced half of its population into virtual house arrest, prohibiting them on pain of physical punishment ..." Women were required to wear the all-covering chadof, they were banned from public life, denied access to health care and education, windows needed to be covered so that women could not be seen from the outside and they were not allowed to laugh in a manner they could be heard by others. The Taliban, without any real court or hearing, cut people's hands or arms off when accused of stealing. Taliban hit-squads watched the streets conducting brutal public beatings. The Taliban committed massacres, especially among the Shia population whom they regarded as "sub-humans" worse than "non-believers" an thus according to them were without any rights.. Meanwhile, Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri became a virtual state in the Taliban state.

When the Taliban tried to conquer areas not yet under their control, the leaders of the remaining territories were forced to create an alliance. The alliance was later joined by many dissident commanders of territories under Taliban control. The newly created alliance, the United Front (known in the Pakistani and Western media as Northern Alliance), consisted of all major Afghan ethnicities. However, all well-known anti-Taliban leaders fled into exile in the following years (Dostum's territories fell under Taliban control in 1998, Dostum went into exile), except for one: Ahmad Shah Massoud. He would become the undisputed leader of the United Front and the only leader who was able to defend vast parts of his area against the Taliban. The Taliban in their fight against the United Front were supported by regular Pakistani army troops (some sources estimate that up to 28 000 Pakistani nationals were fighting alongside the Taliban) and Arab brigades of Bin Laden. Arab militants under Bin Laden were responsible for some of the worst massacres in the war, killing hundreds of civilians in areas controlled by the United Front.

The Taliban repeatedly offered Massoud a position of power to make him stop his resistance. Massoud declined for he did not fight for the sake of power. He explained in one interview: "The Taliban say: “Come and accept the post of prime minister and be with us”, and they would keep the highest office in the country, the presidentship. But for what price?! The difference between us concerns mainly our way of thinking about the very principles of the society and the state. We can not accept their conditions of compromise, or else we would have to give up the principles of modern democracy. We are fundamentally against the system called “the Emirate of Afghanistan”. I would like to return to the question of the emirate in a moment. In fact it is Pakistan that is responsible for deepening the crack between the ethnic groups in Afghanistan. It is again the old method of “divide and rule”. Pakistanis want to make sure that this country will not have any sovereign power for a long time." Massoud, instead, wanted to convince the Taliban to join a political process which would have ensured the holding of democratic elections in a foreseeable future. His proposals for peace can be seen here: Proposal for Peace, promoted by Commander Massoud. American journalist Sebastian Junger who frequently travels to war zones stated in March 2001: "They [the Taliban] receive a tremendous amount of support by Pakistan. ... without that involvement by Pakistan the Taliban would really be forced to negotiate ..." Massoud stated in early 2001 that without the support by Pakistan the Taliban would not be able to sustain their military campaign for up to a year. "The Taliban are not a force to be considered invincible. They are distanced from the people now. They are weaker than in the past. There is only the assistance given by Pakistan, Osama bin Laden and other extremist groups that keep the Taliban on their feet. With a halt to that assistance, it is extremely difficult to survive." He also said: "There should be an Afghanistan where every Afghan finds himself or herself happy. And I think that can only be assured by democracy based on consensus." In early 2001 Massoud employed a new strategy of local military pressure and global political appeals. His plans was for his allies to seed small revolts around Afghanistan in the areas where the Afghans wanted to rise against the Taliban. Resentment was increasingly gathering against Taliban rule from the bottom of Afghan society including the Pashtun areas. Massoud would publicize their cause "popular consensus, general elections and democracy" worldwide. Massoud was very wary not to revive the failed Kabul government of the early 1990s. Instead, already in 1999, he started the training of police forces which he trained specifically in order to keep order and protect the civilian population in case the United Front would be successful.

The areas of Massoud

Life in the areas under direct control of Massoud was different from the life in the areas under Taliban or other commander's, i. e. Dostum's, control. see video In contrast to the time of chaos in which all structures had collapsed in Kabul Massoud was able to control his troops very well during the period starting in late 1996. Human Rights Watch cites no human rights crimes for Massoud's troops in the period from October 1996 until the assasination of Massoud in September 2001. Massoud always controlled the Panjshir, Takhar, parts of Parwan and Badakhshan during the war. Some other provinces (notably Kunduz, Baghlan, Nuristan and the north of Kabul) were captured by his forces from the Taliban and lost again from time to time as the frontlines varied. He created democratic institutions which were structured into several committees: political, health, education and economic. Still, many people came to him personally when they had a dispute or problem and asked him to solve their problems.

Massoud signed the Women's Rights Charta in the year 2000. In the area of Massoud, women and girls did not have to wear the Afghan burqa. They were allowed to work and to go to school. In at least two known instances, Massoud personally intervened against cases of forced marriage. While it was Massoud's stated conviction that men and women are equal and should enjoy the same rights, he also had to deal with Afghan traditions which he said would need a generation or more to overcome. In his opinion that could only be achieved through education.

In 2001 one million people had fled the Taliban, many to the areas of Massoud where they sought protection from the Commander. There was a huge humanitarian problem because there was not enough to eat for both the existing population and the refugees. In 2001 Massoud and a French journalist described the bitter situation of the refugees and asked for humanitarian help. see video

International relations

U.S. policy regarding Massoud, the Taliban and Afghanistan remains ambiguous and differed between the various U.S. government agencies.

In 1997, U.S. state department's Robin Raphel told Massoud he should better surrender to the Taliban. She obtained a clear answer with Massoud stating that as long as he controlled an area the seize of his hat he would continue to defend it. Robin Raphel eventually became a lobbyist and adviser at Cassidy & Associates. The firm had a $1.2 million contract with the Musharraf military regime of Pakistan. At Cassidy & Associates she lobbied and advised Congress and the State Department for Pakistan on issues such as Afghan policy, Pakistan's relations with India, judicial independence and U.S. perceptions and congressional views of the Pakistan government. In late 2009 Raphel was (again) appointed to the Af-Pak region as deputy to Richard Holbrooke, the US. Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, by the Obama administration. Raphel will be the main person overlooking the $1.5 billion U.S. aid package "for non-military purpose" to Pakistan.

At one point in the war, in 1997, the Taliban were vulnerable and the road to the capital, Kabul, was wide open. Two top foreign policy officials in the Clinton administration flew to northern Afghanistan to convince - without success - the United Front not to take advantage of a opportunity to make crucial gains against the Taliban. Before the United Front could strike, Assistant Secretary of State Rick Indefurth and American U.N. Ambassador Bill Richardson flew to northern Afghanistan and tried to convince the leadership of the United Front that this was not the time for an offensive. Instead, they insisted this was the time for a cease-fire and an arms embargo. At the same time Pakistanis began a "Berlin-like airlift to resupply and re-equip the Taliban", financed with Saudi money.

On another note an analyst with the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), Julie Sirrs, had visited Afghanistan, but only in those areas controlled by the Taliban. After returning, she had realized that this was a one-dimensional view of Afghanistan and there were gaping holes in the DOD's understanding of the situation. In 1998, she requested to officially go back to northern Afghanistan to the areas controlled by Commander Massoud. Subsequently she was denied the permission to go there. So she went to the Panjshir Valley on her vacation and paid the journey on herself (in 1998). U.S. congressman Dana Rohrabacher describes: "When she got to the Panjshir Valley, she found ... something vital to America's security was happening, something she was not really able to discover when she visited the Taliban-controlled areas before. Commander Massoud told her that he was facing a new enemy in Afghanistan [meaning foreign esp. Arab forces]. ... Apparently, bin Laden, who was making Afghanistan into his base of operations, was importing Islamic radicals from all over the world, training them as terrorists and killers and then sending them up against Massoud's troops. ... She only had a short time, but she collected enough information for a preliminary report, and she headed home. The minute she got back, she found herself under severe restrictions at the Defense Intelligence Agency and restricted to whom she could brief or show any of her reports. ... The commanding officer of the DIA labeled her as insubordinate, he fired her; and when she fought her dismissal, he set out to destroy her. Amidst the fight to save her job, the DIA commanding officer told her what really upset him most was her contact with Massoud, who, according to the DIA general, was one of the bad guys. This general was sending his people to be briefed by the Taliban, but any contact with Massoud was a cause for dismissal. ... It was a mind set of the man who headed the Defense Intelligence Agency. Something is terribly wrong with this picture."

In the meantime, the only collaboration between Massoud and another U.S. intelligence service, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), consisted of an effort to trace Osama bin Laden following the 1998 embassy bombings. The U.S. and the European Union provided no support to Massoud for the fight against the Taliban.

A change of policy, lobbied for by CIA officers on the ground who had visited the area of Massoud, regarding support to Massoud was underway in the course of 2001. According to Steve Coll's book "Ghost Wars" (who won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction) "the CIA officers admired Massoud greatly. They saw him as a Che Guevara figure, a great actor on history’s stage. Massoud was a poet, a military genius, a religious man, and a leader of enormous courage who defied death and accepted its inevitability, they thought. ... In his house there were thousands of books: Persian poetry, histories of the Afghan war in multiple languages, biographies of other military and guerilla leaders. In their meetings Massoud wove sophisticated, measured references to Afghan history and global politics into his arguments. He was quiet, forceful, reserved, and full of dignity, but also light in spirit. The CIA team had gone into the Panshjir as unabashed admirers of Massoud. Now their convictions deepened ..."

U.S. Congressman Dana Rohrabacher also recalls: "[B]etween Bush's inauguration and 9/11, I met with the new national security staff on 3 occasions, including one meeting with Condoleezza Rice to discuss Afghanistan. There were, in fact, signs noted in an overview story in The Washington Post about a month ago that some steps were being made to break away from the previous administration's Afghan policy." CIA lawyers, working with officers in the Near East Division and Counterterrorist Center, began to draft a formal, legal presidential finding for Bush’s signature authorizing a new covert action program in Afghanistan, the first in a decade that sought to influence the course of the Afghan war in favour of Massoud. This change in policy was finalized in August 2001 when it was too late.

After Pakistan had funded, directed and supported the Taliban's rise to power in Afghanistan, Massoud and the United Front received some assistance from India. India was particularly concerned about Pakistan's Taliban strategy and the Islamic militancy in its neighborhood; It provided US$70 million in aid including two Mi-17 helicopters, three additional helicopters in 2000 and US$8 million worth of high-altitude equipment in 2001. Furthermore, the alliance supposedly also received minor aid from Tajikistan, Russia and Iran because of their opposition to the Taliban and the Pakistani control over the Taliban's Emirate. Their support, however, remained limited to the most needed things. Meanwhile Pakistan engaged up to 28 000 Pakistani nationals and regular Pakistani army troops to fight alongside the Taliban and Al Qaeda forces against Massoud.

In April 2001, the president of the European Parliament Nicole Fontaine (who called Massoud the "pole of liberty in Afghanistan") invited Massoud with the support of French and Belgian politicians to address the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium. In his speech, he asked for humanitarian aid for the people of Afghanistan. Massoud further went on to warn that his intelligence agents had gained limited knowledge about a huge-scale terrorist attack on U.S. soil being imminent.

September 9, 2001 (Death)

Massoud's tomb in Bazarak in the Panjshir Valley.

Massoud, then aged 48, was the target of a suicide attack at Khwaja Bahauddin, in Takhar Province in northeastern Afghanistan on September 9, 2001. The attackers' names were alternately given as Dahmane Abd al-Sattar, husband of Malika El Aroud, and Bouraoui el-Ouaer; or 34-year-old Karim Touzani and 26-year-old Kacem Bakkali.

The attackers claimed to be Belgians originally from Morocco. However, their passports turned out to be stolen and their nationality was later determined to be Tunisian. Waiting for almost 3 weeks (during which they also interviewed Burhanuddin Rabbani and Abdul Rasul Sayyaf) for an interview opportunity, on September 8, 2001, an aide to Massoud recalls the would-be suicide attackers "were so worried" and threatened to leave if the interview did not happen in the next 24 hours (until September 10, 2001). They were finally granted an interview. During the interview they set off a bomb that had been hidden in their videocamera. Commander Massoud died in a helicopter that was taking him to a hospital. The explosion also killed Mohammed Asim Suhail, a United Front official, while Mohammad Fahim Dashty and Massoud Khalili were injured. One of the suicide attackers, Bouraoui, was also killed by the explosion while Dahmane was captured and shot while trying to escape.

Despite initial denials by the United Front, news of Massoud's death was reported almost immediately, appearing on the BBC, and in European and North American newspapers on September 10, 2001. On September 16, however, the United Front officially announced that Massoud had died of injuries in the suicide attack. Massoud was buried in his home village of Bazarak in the Panjshir Valley. The funeral, although happening in a rather rural area, was attended by hundreds of thousands of people. Sad day (video clip).

Afghan journalist Fahim Dashty summarized: "He was the only one, ever, to serve Afghanistan, to serve Afghans. To do a lot of things for Afghanistan, for Afghans. And we lost him ..." see video

The assassination on September 9, 2001, was not the first time Al Qaeda, the Taliban, the Pakistani ISI and before them the Soviet KGB, the Afghan communist KHAD and Hekmatyar had tried to assassinate Massoud. He survived countless assassination attempts over a period of 26 years. The first attempt on Massoud's life was carried out by Hekmatyar and two Pakistani ISI agents in 1975 when Massoud was only 22 years old. In early 2001 Al Qaeda would-be assassins were captured by Massoud's forces while trying to enter his territory.

Connection to September 11, 2001

The assasination of Massoud is considered to have a strong connection to the September 11, 2001 attacks on U.S. soil which killed nearly 3000 people and which appeared to be the terrorist attack that Massoud had warned against in his speech to the European Parliament several months earlier.

John P. O'Neill was a counter-terrorism expert and the Assistant Director of the FBI until late 2001. He retired from the FBI and was offered the position of director of security at the World Trade Center (WTC). He took the job at the WTC two weeks before 9/11. On September 10, 2001, John O’Neill told two of his friends, "We're due. And we're due for something big. ... Some things have happened in Afghanistan. [referring to the assassination of Massoud] I don’t like the way things are lining up in Afghanistan. ... I sense a shift, and I think things are going to happen. ... soon." John O'Neill died on September 11, 2001, when the south tower collapsed.

U.S. Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (R), who has a long experience in Afghanistan and even fought with the mujaheddin there, later will claim that he immediately saw the assassination of Ahmad Shah Massoud as a sign that "something terrible [was] about to happen." He was only able to make an appointment to meet with top White House and National Security Council officials for 3:00 pm. on 9/11. The events of that morning would make the meeting moot. Rohrabacher recounted his convictions in a 2004 speech to congress: "[A]s I mourned his loss, I struggled to fully understand the significance of his death. Then it dawned on me. It dawned on me why Massoud had been assassinated. America was going to be attacked. It would be so monstrous that bin Laden's gang in Afghanistan wanted to cut us off from a means of counterattacking them in their base of operations in Afghanistan. We would have turned to Massoud if we were attacked. That is what we would have done, and they were cutting us off from turning to Massoud, but now Massoud was dead. Perhaps his death was a signal to set the planned attack on our country in motion. ... [O]n September 10 I tried to alert anyone and everyone who would listen to me. I tried to give my warnings of an imminent terrorist attack. A few people listened as a courtesy, but for most people their eyes simply glazed over as I tried to warn them. The gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood) stood behind me in an elevator and overheard me lamenting that something horrible was about to happen and that I could not get anyone to take my warnings seriously. ... And as I got off the elevator, he lightheartedly patted me on the back and with a smile told me not to be so melodramatic and certainly not to be so apocryphal. Undeterred, I called the White House and asked for an emergency appointment with Condoleezza Rice in order to warn of an impending terrorist attack, a major attack. Her office apologized that she was incredibly busy that day but she respected my opinion and would see me the next day at 3:00 p.m. The next day was 9/11. The planes began flying into the buildings at 8:48 a.m."

Analysts believe Osama bin Laden ordered the assassination to help his Taliban protectors and ensure he would have their protection and co-operation in Afghanistan. Following the assassination, Osama bin Laden had an emissary deliver a cassette of Dahmane speaking of his love for his wife and his decision to blow himself up as well as $500 in an envelope to settle a debt, to the assassin's widow. The Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, an Afghan Wahhabi Islamist, have also been mentioned as possible organizers or collaborators of the Massoud assassins. The assassins are said to have entered United Front (Northern Alliance) territory under the auspices of the Abdul Rasul Sayyaf and had his assistance in bypassing "normal security procedures."

Investigative Commission

In April 2003, the Karzai administration announced the setup of a commission to investigate the assassination of Massoud, as the country celebrated the 11th anniversary of the defeat of the communist government The French secret service revealed on October 16, 2003 that the camera used by Massoud's assassins had been stolen in December 2000 in Grenoble, France from a photojournalist, Jean-Pierre Vincendet, who was then working on a story on that city's Christmas store window displays. By tracing the camera's serial number, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation was able to determine that Vincendet was its original owner. The French secret service and the FBI then began working on tracing the route the camera took between the time it was taken from Vincendet and the Massoud assassination.

Legacy

National Hero of Afghanistan

Massoud was the only main Afghan leader who never left Afghanistan in the fight against the Soviet Union and later in the fight against the Taliban Emirate. The National Geographic about that time concluded: "The only thing standing in the way of future Taliban massacres [wa]s Ahmad Shah Massoud." see video In the areas under his direct control such as Panjshir, some parts of Parwan and Takhar Massoud established democratic institutions. One refugee who cramped his family of 27 into an old jeep to flee from the Taliban to the area of Massoud described Massoud's territory in 1997 as "the last tolerant corner of Afghanistan". About his life in Massoud's area he stated:"I feel freedom here. I like ... you know, nobody bothers me. I do my job. I take care of my family. The way which I like I live in this area."

In 2001, the Afghan Interim Government under president Hamid Karzai officially awarded Massoud the title of "Hero of the Afghan Nation". One analyst in 2004 put it this way: "One man holds a greater political punch than all 18 living [Afghan] presidential candidates combined. Though already dead for three years ... Since his death on September 9, 2001 at the hands of two al Qaeda-linked Islamic radicals, Massoud has been transformed from mujahedin to national hero -- if not saint. Pictures of Massoud, the Afghan mujahedin who battled the Soviets, other warlords, and the Taliban for more than 20 years, vastly outnumber those of any other Afghan including those of Karzai." Dr. Abdullah Abdullah, one of the closest friends of Massoud, was Karzai's strongest rival in the Afghan Presidential Elections of 2009. Dr. Abdullah said about Massoud: "He was everything. He was a friend. He was a leader. He was a teacher without acting as a teacher."

Well-known journalist Sebastian Junger reports: "A lot of people who knew him felt that he was the best hope for that part of the world." Junger who traveled to Afghanistan in 2000 to profile Massoud further states: "Afghanistan's government has been accused of being corrupt and weak. Massoud had a reputation for integrity and strength ... He would have been very hard for the [insurgents] to intimidate." Shorish-Shamley, a women's rights activist, says: "If they [al Qaeda leaders] were hiding under a rock, he would have found them. He was that type of person. He would have found bin Laden." Among supporters of the Taliban or Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hezb-i Islami he is obviously seen differently. Still, a 2009 CNN report concludes: "He remains today a hero on the streets of Kabul among a people who have more faith in a leader from the past than the leaders of the future." see video

Today Panjshir - the home of Massoud - "is arguably the most peaceful place in the entire country. A small US military reconstruction team is based here, but there are none of the signs of foreign occupation that exist elsewhere. Even Afghan soldiers are few and far between. Instead, the people like to boast about how they keep their own security," observes the United Arab Emirates newspaper The National. The people of Panjshir (and Takhar) remain realistic however: "We are very sure that if they [the Taliban] come back they will not leave one man in Panjshir alive. If we don’t fight they will kill us, so if we fight we will at least die with glory." The National further states: "Those who knew him say he would never have accepted the Taliban’s return to power and they have vowed to defend his memory."

Many documentaries, books and movies have been made about Ahmad Shah Massoud. Massoud is the subject of Ken Follett's Lie Down With Lions, a novel about the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. He also plays a significant role in James McGee's thriller Crow's War. Another is Fire by Sebastian Junger. Junger was one of the last Western journalists to interview Massoud in depth. The bulk of this interview was first published in March 2001 for National Geographic's Adventure Magazine, along with photographs by the renowned Iranian photographer Reza Deghati.

The Massoud Foundation was established in 2003, as an independent, non-aligned, non-profitable and non-political organization by people who have been affected by Massoud. It provides humanitarian assistance to Afghans especially in the fields of health care and education. It also runs programs in the fields of culture, construction, agriculture and welfare.

Lion of Panjshir

Massoud was named "The Afghan who won the cold war" by the Wall Street Journal. He defeated the Soviet Red Army nine times in the Panjshir. The Soviet Union’s defeat was not only a defeat in Afghanistan, but led to the collapse of the Soviet system and was followed by the liberation of the Central Asian and Eastern European countries from Moscow’s control. His struggle against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan earned him the name "Lion of Panjshir". that's nice... and then what happened?

"Lion of Panjshir", is a rhyme and play on words in Persian, which alludes to the strength of his resistance against the Soviet Union, the mythological exaltation of the lion in Persian literature, and finally, the place name of the Panjshir Valley, where Massoud was born. The place name of "Panjshir" Valley in Persian means (Valley of the) Five Lions. Thus, the phrase "Lion of Panjshir", which in Persian is "Shir-e-Panjshir," شیر پنجشیر is a rhyming play on words, with the connotation "Lion of the Five Lions".

Warning the World (September 11, 2001)

In spring 2001, Ahmad Shah Massoud addressed the European Parliament in Brussels stating that behind the situation in Afghanistan there was the regime in Pakistan. He also stated his conviction that without the support of Pakistan, Osama Bin Laden and Saudi Arabia the Taliban would not be able to sustain their military campaign for up to a year, also because the Afghan population was ready to raise against them. Addressing the United States specifically he issued the warning that should the U.S. not work for peace in Afghanistan and put pressure on Pakistan to cease their support to the Taliban, the problems of Afghanistan would soon become the problems of the U.S. and the world.

Declassified Defense Intelligence Agency documents from November 2001 show that Massoud had gained "limited knowledge ... regarding the intentions of [al-Qaeda] to perform a terrorist act against the US on a scale larger than the 1998 bombing of the US Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania." They also point out that he warned about such attacks.

The well-known French musician-songwriter-author Damien Saez wrote a song called "Massoud" in 2002. Massoud also was featured in the ABC Television mini-series The Path to 9/11, which aired commercial-free in the USA in 2006, on the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. The mini-series depicts Massoud warning U.S. intelligence agents of the coming U.S. attack by al-Qaeda and Massoud's September 9, 2001 assassination.

Personal

Massoud was married to Sediqa Massoud. They have one son (Ahmad born in 1989) and five daughters (Fatima born in 1992, Mariam born in 1993, Ayesha born in 1995, Zohra born in 1996 and Nasrine born in 1998). Nowadays, his wife and his children live in Iran. In 2005 Sediqa Massoud published a personal account on her life with Massoud (co-authored by two women's rights activists and friends of Sediqa Massoud, Chékéba Hachemi and Marie-Francoise Colombani) called "Pour l'amour de Massoud" in which she describes a very decent and loving husband.

The family has a great deal of prestige in the politics of Afghanistan. Of his six brothers, Ahmad Zia Massoud was a vice-president of Afghanistan under Hamid Karzai and Ahmad Wali Massoud is Afghanistan's ambassador to the United Kingdom. There have been unsuccessful attempts on the life of Ahmad Zia Massoud in 2004 and late 2009. The Associated Press reported that 8 Afghans died in the attempt on Ahmad Zia Massoud's life.

After his death, Massoud was interred in a mausoleum in Panjshir Valley. A larger mausoleum is currently being constructed to replace the current one.

Further reading

• Marcela Grad (2009): Massoud: An Intimate Portrait of the Legendary Afghan Leader; Webster University Press, 310pp (recommended)
• Sediqa Massoud with Chékéba Hachemi and Marie-Francoise Colombani (2005): Pour l'amour de Massoud; Document XO Editions, 265pp (in French) (recommended)
• Amin Saikal (2006): Modern Afghanistan: A History of Struggle and Survival; I. B. Tauris, 352pp ("One of the "Five Best" Books on Afghanistan" - Wall Street Journal)
• Roy Gutman (2008): How We Missed the Story: Osama Bin Laden, the Taliban and the Hijacking of Afghanistan; United States Institute of Peace Press, 304pp
• Coll, Steve (2004): Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 9, 2001; Penguin Press, 695pp, ISBN 1-59420-007-6. (won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction)
• Stephen Tanner: Afghanistan: A Military History from Alexander the Great to the Fall of the Taliban
• Christophe de Ponfilly (2001): Massoud l'Afghan; Gallimard, 437pp (in French)
• Gary C. Schroen (2005): 'First In' An Insiders Account of How The CIA Spearheaded the War on Terror in Afghanistan; New York: Presido Press/Ballantine Books, ISBN 978-0-89141-872-6.
• Peter Bergen: Holy War, Inc.
• Ahmed Rashid: TALIBAN - The Story of the Afghan Warlords; ISBN 0-330-49221-7.
• A. R. Rowan: On The Trail Of A Lion: Ahmed Shah Massoud, Oil Politics and Terror
• Ken Follett: Lie Down With Lions
• James McGee: Crow's War
• MaryAnn T. Beverly (2007): From That Flame; Kallisti Publishing
• Roger Plunk: The Wandering Peacemaker
• References to Massoud appear in the book "A Thousand Splendid Suns" by Khaled Hosseini.

External links

• Massoud's Letter To The People Of America 1998
• "MEANWHILE: Remembering Massoud, a fighter for peace," The New York Times, September 10, 2002.
• The Assassination of Ahmad Shah Massoud Paul Wolf, Global Research, September 14, 2003
• AhmadShahMassoud.com
• Jawedan.com (Pashtu, Persian & English)
• 60 Years of Asian Heroes: Ahmad Shah Massoud Time, 2006
• Profile: Afghanistan's 'Lion Of Panjshir' Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, September 5, 2006
• The Last Interview with Ahmad Shah Massoud Piotr Balcerowicz, early August 2001
• "Breakfast with Massoud" by Roger Plunk The Source, December 1, 2001
• Bharat Rakshak Monitor - Ahmad Shah Mas’ud (1953-2001)
• Proposal for Peace, promoted by Commander Massoud, in English in Dari (Persian)
• Ahmad Shah Massoud at Curlie

Afghanistan - the Squandered Victory (documentary film) by the BBC

(documentary film directly from the year 1989 explaining the beginning of the turmoil to follow)

• Massoud and Afghanistan 1989

Commander Massoud's Struggle (documentary film) by Nagakura Hiromi

(from 1992: one month after the fall of the communist regime, after Hekmatyar had been expelled to the southern outskirts of Kabul, before he restarted his heavy bombardment of Kabul with Pakistani support)

• Hekmatyar attacks Kabul but is repelled
• Massoud is popular among the people who also trust him to rebuild their country
• Massoud tries to prevent war between Ittehad and Wahdat
• Massoud talks about his convictions

Massoud's Conversation with Hekmatyar (original document of 1992)

• Massoud tries to convince Hekmatyar not to attack Kabul

Massoud l'Afghan (documentary film) by Christophe de Ponfilly

• Massoud l'Afghan part 1
• New York Times Film Review
• rottentomatoes.com Film Review
• Theatrical Release

Who Killed Massoud? (documentary film) by Didier Martiny

• Who Killed Massoud? part 1

Ahmad Shah Massoud - Destiny's Afghan (documentary film) by Iqbal Malhotra

• Scene from the movie
• Ahmad Shah Massoud, Destiny's Afghan

The Lion Of Panjshir (Symphony No. 2) for narrator and symphonic band by composer David Gaines

• Information, concert program, newspaper reviews, available recordings and scores

From That Flame (historical fiction)

• From That Flame by MaryAnn T. Beverly

Photographs

• Photographs of the Lion of the Panjshir

See also

• Malika El Aroud
• Reagan Doctrine
• Sebastian Junger's "Fire"