On November 15th, 2001, several weeks into the US war in Afghanistan, there was an odd incident.

In Northern Afghanistan, Northern Alliance commanders outside Kunduz reported seeing Pakistani aircraft fly into the city.

There, writes Ahmed Rashid, hundreds of ISI officers, Taliban commanders, and Al Qaeda personnel

boarded the planes.

Perhaps as many as 1,000 people escaped.

The New York Times confirmed the flights at the end of the month,

though the Pentagon would deny that they ever took place.

Was Pakistan undermining the U.S. campaign by sneaking agents out of Afghanistan?

Apparently not. Seymour Hersh reported that these commanders and soldiers, quote,

were indeed flown to safety in a series of nighttime airlifts,

but that they were approved by the Bush administration.

Hirsch reported that the Taliban by the Bush administration.

Hersh reported that the Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders were indeed among those who escaped.

Hamid Karzai would later confirm this.

A U.S. analyst told Pakistani journalist. would later confirm this, a US analyst

told Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid.

The request was made by Musharraf to Bush,

but Dick Cheney took charge.

The approval was not shared with anyone at the State Department, including Colin Powell, until

well after.

The CIA could have insisted, Rashid writes, that it monitor all those who got off the

planes in Pakistan, but it made no such demand.

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