On October 29, 2001, while the Taliban's rule over Afghanistan was under
assault, the regime's ambassador in Islamabad gave a chaotic press
conference in front of several dozen reporters sitting on the grass. On
the Taliban diplomat's right sat his interpreter, Ahmad Rateb Popal, a
man with an imposing presence. Like the ambassador, Popal wore a black
turban, and he had a huge bushy beard. He had a black patch over his
right eye socket, a prosthetic left arm and a deformed right hand, the
result of injuries from an explosives mishap during an old operation
against the Soviets in Kabul.
But Popal was more than just a former mujahedeen. In 1988, a year before
the Soviets fled …