On Tuesday, September 23rd, the United Nations painted an alarming picture of life inside Afghanistan: relief agencies shut down and occupied by the Taliban, thousands fleeing their homes in fear and countless others at risk of starvation.
"A humanitarian crisis of stunning proportions is unfolding in Afghanistan," said a UN statement issued in Geneva and Islamabad, capital of Pakistan.
In 1991, a report by Safe (the organisation Support for Afghan Further Education) said Afghanistan was a country in extreme need of rehabilitation and development programmes. It had the highest infant mortality rate in the world; the highest maternal morbidity rate in the world; approximately 30 per cent of its population were refugees in neighbouring Pakistan and Iran; over one million had been killed in the war with Russia; well over a million were homeless or internally displaced etc.
So what has changed?
Well, the Taliban were created and launched into Afghanistan in 1994 by a combination of three elements - the US Central Intelligence Agency, Saudi Intelligence, and the Pakistan Inter Services Intelligence - all part of the 2001 coalition orchestrated by America and Britain.
Kabul, almost destroyed by the Mujahideen (who had been armed by the superpowers) in 1992, was captured by the Taliban in September 1996; Herat, a city of culture and learning, was severely damaged and captured in 1995, and Mazar-e-Sharif in 1998.
Radical Taliban edicts were imposed against women working, and these extended to what women should wear outside the home - including the type of shoes and stockings - a ban on make-up, on girls being educated, on television and on music. Edicts were issued on the length of men's hair and beards.
In addition, Afghans have suffered a severe drought for the last four planting and growing seasons, the worst in over 30 years. Many fruit trees and vines have been killed and crops have failed. Many have been reduced to eating grass and berries, forced to sell their belongings and tread, yet again, the weary road to refugee camps in or outside Afghanistan.
What existed before the Taliban? Warlords, former commanders, ex-Mujahideen fighters, and members of the more extreme religious and political factions funded by the West, Saudi, and Pakistan during the war with Russia. (It was not politically convenient to fund the more moderate parties). There was an extreme lack of security; there was highway robbery, hostage-taking; rape and pillage were the experiences of many Afghans in the provinces. Aid agencies experienced difficulties; many aid programmes were compromised.
The post-war government was a disaster. Riddled with nepotism, corruption and internal strife, it finally gave way to the advent of the Taliban in 1994. Bordering countries have fuelled the ongoing attrition between the Taliban and the former government which is still recognised by the UN. The former regime is headed by Burhanuddin Rabbani, who holds sway in a small enclave in the north and who is part of what is euphemistically called the Northern Alliance, or United Front Forces. There is also a religious divide between the Shia and Sunni sects of Islam, the Taliban belonging to the latter.
Fiercely independent, intolerant of outside interference, deeply religious, proud of their culture and virtually unconquered by any power, the rural population has been ground down through internal strife, foreign interference, drought, disease, ignorance and fear. The urban populations have fared less well. They have no land, no jobs, and no food. Those fortunate enough to have jobs are not paid for months.
The Afghans, proxy soldiers for the UN, fought their war with Russia and suffered over a million dead. Many were left maimed for life through blindness and loss of limbs. Russia, under the terms of the Geneva Accord, withdrew across the northern frontier.
The US followed suit, having achieved its aim. It promptly withdrew aid, leaving behind a country littered with mines, unexploded shells and bombs and destroyed hospitals, clinics and schools. Agricultural areas were in ruins, their traditional irrigation systems needing major rehabilitation after 10 years of war.
This, along with the largest refugee problem the world has seen, was the ghastly and deadly legacy of the US in Afghanistan. Benant Sevan, the UN negotiator, shuffled between Islamabad, Peshawar and Kabul but achieved little. The damage had already been done during the war - the fundamentalist parties were the ones who had been encouraged, armed and funded. The whirlwind began to blow: the battle for Kabul, thousands killed, a city left in almost total ruin. The US and the UN were powerless; the world was uninterested in the plight of the Afghans. The Eastern bloc crumbled but the debt to Afghanistan was forgotten.
But the Afghans remember.
In 1993 the US left a parting gift - a fleet of battered green ambulances, captured from Iraq in the Gulf War. Heavy drilling and earth-moving equipment lent to the Afghans was to be collected and shipped to a country that badly needed it - Russia. You wonder what the Afghans think of America? They have never forgotten how they were deserted in 1989; they have not forgotten first one, then a second list of UN sanctions - and they know who drives the UN.
Do they remember the words of President Bill Clinton promising to rebuild Yugoslavia after the Bosnian debacle?
Many farmers have not forgotten how the US government and US aid agencies rejected their requests for aid to grow alternative crops. The poppy had helped pay for much during the war and the US and UK governments were content to turn a blind eye. The proceeds of opium/heroin sales helped to line pockets and pay for arms.
The Afghans see the competition among the foreign, and sometimes national, non-governmental agencies. Even the methods of aid distribution cause friction among the differing foreign agencies. Some wish to be members of a co-ordinated response; others go their own way. Chaos follows and only as a last resort are the authorities consulted, or involved in planning.
The Taliban were marginalised before bin Laden appeared on the scene. It was the general policy to portray the Taliban as ignorant, incompetent, and to steer clear of engaging them in dialogue. Yet the Afghans know the culture and the nuances of behaviour and custom. There was little room for compromise and often such dialogue led to confrontation.
There were notable exceptions. These occurred among those who had spent many years working among the Afghans; who knew either Dari or Pashto, knew and understood Afghan tribal customs, and identified with them, and were privileged to have Afghans as close friends. Many aid workers are on short-term contracts, often from aid projects in other countries, who take valuable time to come to terms with the situation.
When there is a threat of trouble it is the foreign agencies that are the first to depart, to Peshawar or Quetta, then to Islamabad, and in some cases back home. It is the Afghan national NGOs and their staff who stay; it is the Afghan staff of foreign aid agencies who remain and try to carry out instructions.
Yet what do we hear about on television, radio and in the press? International personnel living in expensive hotels in Islamabad or Quetta! Do we hear anything of their Afghan staff? Do we hear of the severe strain and stress suffered by Afghan NGOs and their staff?
Is it realised or recognised that Afghan NGO staff spend up to three months (often more) away from home, living and sleeping in dormitory conditions, with limited electricity provided by generator and, in many cases, they are unpaid, because international funding has not been sent to NGO headquarters?
What of the future? Many of the Northern Alliance are guilty of atrocities and war crimes from 1992 to the present. They are a mixture of ethnic groups under commanders who have switched sides many times. They are unfit to rule Afghanistan and are to be trusted to an even lesser degree than the Taliban. I hope there are some neutral observers should Alliance troops capture Kabul.
I hope for a broad-based government with moderate Taliban included, for many of the Taliban are also Afghan. They are not all radicals but do have support among a considerable proportion of the population. The problem will be to encourage the moderates to re-emerge.
The former King Zahir Shah as a unifying figurehead is unlikely to be accepted, particularly if backed by the US, UN, Pakistan, Iran or Russia. The eternal question will arise once again: "What is the hidden agenda this time?"
Does the Afghan trust the UN? No. Does the ordinary Afghan trust the US? Emphatically not!
Nobody can condone the terrible atrocity committed in the US. But bin Laden, despite his reputation, has, in the view of many Afghans, been a pawn in the political game for quite some time.
How do the Afghans view the West and the Allies? The answer is with grave suspicion, often coupled with utter rejection and tinged with repulsion over its hypocritical standards and mores. The events of the last two decades have certainly shaped their views.
Besides an enormous humanitarian crisis, which has existed for a number of years and gained scant notice in the West, the world is now faced with the possibility of a catastrophe of global proportions which will make the Twin Towers, Pentagon and Pennsylvania disasters appear small in comparison.
It has taken 12 years for the West to wake up to the greatest long-suffering humanitarian crisis in the world - something that has existed within Afghanistan and on the borders of Iran and Pakistan for much of those past 12 years.
It took a terrorist organisation to give the world a wake-up call. Is there any wonder there is a degree of sympathy for bin Laden? How do the Afghans see us? Should we not ask ourselves now, "How do we see ourselves?"
Terence O'Malley is chairman of the non-governmental organisation SAFE, Support for Afghan Further Education