{"product_id":"directorate-s","title":"Directorate S","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of the the National Book Critics Circle Award for Non-Fiction\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''Spellbinding  ... a magisterial account of the great tragedy of our age ... it is a classic'' \u003ci\u003eEvening Standard\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''In the finest traditions of American investigative journalism'' \u003ci\u003eThe Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''Spectacular ... makes Bourne movies pale in comparison'' \u003ci\u003eFinancial Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom the Pulitzer Prize winning of the acclaimed \u003ci\u003eGhost Wars\u003c\/i\u003e, this is the full story of America''s grim involvement in the affairs of Afghanistan from 2001 to 2016. In the wake of the terrible shock of 9\/11, the C.I.A. scrambled to work  out how to destroy Bin Laden and his associates.  The C.I.A. had long  familiarity with Afghanistan and had worked closely with the Taliban to  defeat the Soviet Union there.  A tangle of assumptions, old contacts,  favours and animosities were now reactivated.  Superficially the  invasion was quick and efficient, but Bin Laden''s successful escape,  together with that of much of the Taliban leadership, and a catastrophic  failure to define the limits of NATO''s mission in a tough, impoverished  country the size of Texas, created a quagmire which lasted many years.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt  the heart of the problem lay ''Directorate S'', a highly secretive arm of  the Pakistan state which had its own views on the Taliban and  Afghanistan''s place in a wider competition for influence between  Pakistan, India and China, and which assumed that the U.S.A. and its  allies would soon be leaving.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSteve Coll''s remarkable new book  tells a powerful, bitter story of just how badly foreign policy  decisions can go wrong and of many lives lost.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MediaPlace","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57318856491390,"sku":"NW9780718194499","price":15.19,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1379\/1261\/files\/9780718194499.jpg?v=1778726139","url":"https:\/\/mediaplace.com\/products\/directorate-s","provider":"MediaPlace","version":"1.0","type":"link"}