In 1997, when Taleban commander Abdul Wahed led a Taleban column attacking Bamian, then held by the Shia alliance Hezb-e Wahdat, he declared his intention to destroy the Buddhas [....] In 1998 when the Taleban did shoot their way into the Bamian valley, Abdul Wahed established a presence in the town and prepared to deliver on his threat. He had holes drilled around the head of the small Buddha ready for the placing of explosives. However Mullah Omar [....] gave the order to stop further drilling. That time round the combination of local mujahedin commanders within the Taleban structure and a supportive Mullah Omar saved the Buddhas before the world was even aware of the threat.
In the autumn of 2000, in one of my meetings with the Taleban authorities in Bamian, among other projects which they proposed, they requested United Nations assistance to reconstruct the network of drainage ditches around the top of the niches in which the Buddhas rested. They were concerned at the prospect of erosion damage if the ditches were not maintained. I agreed to pass on the various projects (our bit of the UN of course did not have any money!) meanwhile I recall quipping that in the current atmosphere Buddas were troublesome and so it might be better to brick up the niches and pretend to the Kandahari brothers that the Buddhas had left.
[....] The first sign of this war on idols came when news leaked out of the Kabul Museum that a party of senior Taleban had forced their way in and sledge-hammered part of the museum’s collection of ancient statues. There was much speculation over whether this was genuine iconoclasm or a cover for smuggling antiques [....] Next the Taleban rhetoric started against idols in general and the Bamian Buddhas in particular. It was widely discussed and commented on. Everyone knew it was coming. Various Taleban friends also described meetings they participated in, in which some tried to argue in favour of saving the heritage again, until it became clear that, unlike 1998, this time the leadership had decided to sanction an assault on the Buddhas.
When the Taleban really did start to prepare to blow up the Buddhas, the rhetorical international operation, for all and sundry to be seen to be condemning it, started. The most sincere effort was, I believe, that of a Japanese parliamentary delegation. Three parliamentarians based themselves in Islamabad and started a shuttle diplomacy to Kandahar where they met with the same Mutawakil who had failed to get permission to visit Kabul Museum. Mullah Omar enjoyed teasing them, international supplicants whom he could string along with impunity. I had multiple sessions discussing with this pure-hearted delegation. They kept on thinking of new theological arguments to persuade the mullahs, even as they shifted their demands, just to be allowed to pay respect one last time before the demolition. And at one rather pathetic moment, even before the destruction, the delegation asked my assessment of the prospects of Japanese technology being able to piece the Buddhas together again.
But the issue was not about theology. Politics were destroying the Buddhas. An isolated regime, which had foisted itself on its own population and was being encouraged by al-Qaida to take on the world, had found a brilliant source of international publicity where it could strike a successful pose of defiance. Our condemnation made it all the more important for the confrontationist leadership to go ahead with the destruction. The public arguments were barely relevant.
