Newsweek profiles, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Taliban’s second in command. Ron Moreau writes:
“In all likelihood, you’ve never heard of Mullah Baradar. The only Taliban leader most people know is Mullah Mohammed Omar, the unworldly, one-eyed village preacher who held the grand title amir-ul-momineen–“leader of the faithful”–when he ruled Afghanistan in the late 1990s. Omar remains a high-value target, with a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head. But he hasn’t been seen in at least three years, even by his most loyal followers, and rarely issues direct orders anymore. In his place, the adversary that American forces are squaring off against in Afghanistan–the man ultimately responsible for the spike in casualties that has made July the deadliest month for Coalition soldiers since the war began in 2001–is Baradar. A cunning, little-known figure, he may be more dangerous than Omar ever was.”
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