For over 2,500 years, the forbidding territory of Afghanistan has served as a vital crossroads for armies and has witnessed history-shaping clashes between civilizations: Greek, Arab, Mongol, and Tartar, and, in more recent times, British, Russian, and American. When U.S. troops entered Afghanistan in the weeks following September 11, 2001, they overthrew the Afghan Taliban regime and sent the terrorists it harbored on the run. But America's initial easy victory is in sharp contrast to the difficulties it faces today in confronting the Taliban resurgence. Originally published in 2002, Stephen Tanner's Afghanistan has now been completely updated to include the crucial turn of events since America first entered the country. Stephen Tanner is a New York-based military historian who has written several highly regarded books, including Epic Retreats: From 1776 to the Evacuation of Saigon. HistoryWire.com, 5/18/09
"In an age in which events in the Middle East threaten increasingly to spin out of control, few books could be as timely as this history of Afghanistan."
The Middle East, June 2009
"Illuminates the broad historical context into which our forces have been drawn…[A] carefully researched account."
