Released State Department Documents Mention ‘Failed Pipeline Negotiations’ With The Taliban Righ, page 1

Released State Department Documents Mention ‘Failed Pipeline Negotiations’ With The Taliban Right Before 9/11

Alternative Headline: Newly Disclosed Documents Shed More Light on Early Taliban Offers, Pakistan Role

U.S. government documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and recently posted on the website of the George Washington University National Security Archive shed some additional light on talks with the Taliban prior to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, including with regard to the repeated Taliban offers to hand over Osama bin Laden, and the role of Pakistan before and after the attacks.

One of the recently released State Department documents, from March 2000, notes that a proposed “gas pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Multan, Pakistan figured prominently in discussions” about the mutual goal between the U.S. and regional players of stabilizing Afghanistan. Discussions on another proposed pipeline from Iran to India via Pakistan had also been proposed that were “more advanced”, and the Pakistanis had gone to Tehran to meet with Iranian officials “to pursue these negotiations”. But neither “pipeline is likely to go forward in the mid-term”, the documented concluded.

A Pakistani official told the U.S. that “Pakistan ‘will always support the Taliban’”. This “policy cannot change, he continued; it would prompt rebellion across the Northwest Frontier Provinces, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, and indeed on both sides of the Pashtun-dominated Pak-Afghan border.” But the Taliban were “‘looking for a way out’ of the problem with bin Laden”. The U.S. was urged to “find a way to compromise with the Taliban”, and possible “ways that the U.S. and the Taliban might use to break the impasse” were suggested, including “the possibility of a trial in a third (Muslim) country”, “U.S. assurances that bin Laden would not face the death penalty”, and “a U.S. outline of what the Taliban would gain from extradition of bin Laden”.

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So the US wanted bin Laden before 9/11 for what reasons? Take a look at the article for yourselves and read the whole thing (I didn't want to post such a large article in one post).

To be honest I'm a bit confused at the moment after reading this, but I had a feeling I should share this because I know someone else will be able to make sense of it more than I, and I'd like to understand it better myself so... here ya go.