Brahma Chellaney is a geostrategist and author of nine books, including "Asian Juggernaut: The Rise of China, India and Japan."
On the day two airplanes crashed into New York's World Trade Center in 2001, Chinese officials signed an economic and technical cooperation accord with Afghanistan's then-ruling Taliban, in the latter's capital, Kandahar. The 9/11 attacks led the United States, in partnership with Afghanistan's Northern Alliance, to launch a military campaign that ousted the Taliban regime.