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In 1998, after the defeat of Abdul Rashid Dostum's faction in Mazar-i-Sharif, Ahmad Shah Massoud remained the only main leader of the United Front in Afghanistan and the only leader who was able to defend vast parts of his area against the Taliban.
Sep 10, 2021 · On Sept. 9, 2001, Ahmad Shah Massoud — the last major commander of the resistance against the Taliban — was assassinated by two al-Qaeda operatives posing as reporters.
Sep 29, 2021 · While the British set out to find an “Afghan Napoleon,” what had Massoud set out to do? How did he come to lead forces against the Soviets?
- Catherine Putz
Sep 1, 2024 · He is the son of Ahmad Shah Massoud, who led the Afghan resistance to the Taliban more than two and half decades ago when the Taliban first seized power in Afghanistan in 1996.
- Massoud's Childhood and Youth
- Mujahideen Leader Against The USSR
- Personal Life
- Defeating The Soviets
- Minister of Defense
- Northern Alliance Commander
- Proposal For Peace
- Massoud's Assassination and The Aftermath
- Sources
Ahmad Shah Massoud was born on September 2, 1953, to an ethnic Tajik family in Bazarak, in Afghanistan's Panjshir region. His father, Dost Mohammad, was a police commander in Bazarak. When Ahmad Shah Massoud was in the third grade, his father became the chief of police in Herat, northwest Afghanistan. The boy was a talented student, both in element...
On December 27, 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. Ahmad Shah Massoud immediately devised a strategy for guerrilla warfare against the Soviets (since a frontal attack on the Afghan communists earlier in the year had failed). Massoud's guerrillas blocked the Soviets' vital supply route at Salang Pass, and held it all through the 1980s. Ever...
During this period, Ahmad Shah Massoud married his wife, called Sediqa. They went on to have one son and four daughters, born between 1989 and 1998. Sediqa Massoud published a loving 2005 memoir of her life with the commander, called "Pour l'amour de Massoud."
In August of 1986, Massoud began his drive to liberate northern Afghanistan from the Soviets. His forces captured the city of Farkhor, including a military airbase, in Soviet Tajikistan. Massoud's troops also defeated the Afghan national army's 20th division at Nahrin in north-central Afghanistan in November of 1986. Ahmad Shah Massoud studied the ...
In the new Islamic State of Afghanistan, created upon the fall of the communists, Ahmad Shah Massoud became Minister of Defense. However, his rival Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, with Pakistani support, began to bombard Kabul just one month after the installation of the new government. When the Uzbekistan-backed Abdul Rashid Dostum formed an anti-government ...
As Minister of Defense, Ahmad Shah Massoud tried to engage the Taliban in talks about democratic elections. Taliban leaders were not interested, however. With military and financial support from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, the Taliban seized Kabul and ousted the government on September 27, 1996. Massoud and his followers retreated to northeastern Af...
Early in 2001, Ahmad Shah Massoud proposed again that the Taliban join him in supporting democratic elections. They refused once more. Nonetheless, their position within Afghanistan was growing weaker and weaker; such Taliban measures as requiring women to wear the burqa, banning music and kites, and summarily cutting off limbs or even publicly exe...
Thus it was that the al-Qaeda operatives made their way to Ahmad Shah Massoud's base, disguised as reporters, and killed him with their suicide bomb on September 9, 2001. The extremist coalition of al-Qaeda and the Taliban wanted to remove Massoud and undermine the Northern Alliance before making their strike against the United States on September ...
AFP, "Afghan Hero Massoud's Assassination a Prelude to 9/11"Clark, Kate. "Profile: The Lion of Panjshir," BBC News online.Grad, Marcela. Massoud: An Intimate Portrait of the Legendary Afghan Leader, St. Louis: Webster University Press, 2009.Junger, Sebastian. "Sebastian Junger on Afghanistan's Slain Rebel Leader," National Geographic Adventure Magazine.- Kallie Szczepanski
Sep 9, 2011 · In the north of Afghanistan, suicide bombers posing as journalists killed Ahmad Shah Massoud, the most famous leader of Afghan resistance against Taliban rule. Today, posters of Massoud...
US agents held secret talks with the fabled hero of Afghanistan’s resistance against the Soviets and the Taliban – Ahmad Shah Massoud, the guerrilla commander who famously warned the West...
