“…in March 2002, as preparation for the Iraq War was well underway, CIA deputy director John McLaughlin told senior members of [President] Bush’s national security team that the CIA’s presence in Afghanistan would be scaled back. Thereafter, the CIA closed bases in Herat, Mazar-e Sharif, and Kandahar and delayed an $80 million plan for training the Afghan intelligence service. The Washington Post reports [on October 22, 2004] that the commando unit Task Force 5, which took the lead in hunting for bin Laden at the time, lost around two-thirds of its personnel.” [The 15th of the month used for date sorting purposes only.]
– Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, Bin Laden’s Legacy, Page 106