In a September 1996 meeting with CIA Islamabad station chief Gary Schroen, Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Massoud complained that, “The CIA and the United States had walked away from Afghanistan, leaving its people bereft, he said. Yes, Massoud and his colleagues were grateful for the aid the CIA had provided during the years of the Soviet occupation, but now they were bitter about what they saw as an American decision to abandon their country. ‘Look, we’re here,’ Schroen said. ‘We want to reopen the relationship. The United States is becoming more and more interested in Afghanistan.’ It may be a year, Schroen told them, or maybe two years, but the CIA was going to return. That’s the way things are moving, he said. One concern in particular was now rising: terrorism.” [The 15th of the month used for date sorting purposes only.]
– Steve Coll, Ghost Wars, Page 9