I sort of don't believe this story. Afghanistan has been wrecked by instability and civil war for nearing thirty years, and was two-decades into this horrible instability when the Taliban came to power. And they never had control of the whole country, notably the areas bordering the former Soviet Union were not under their control. So it's sort of hard to figure major western Capital would move into a risky project like this - pipelines are quite vulnerable to instability, as the FARC in Colombia and the Iraqi resistance are showing on a near daily basis.

I do not, however, think it impossible that someone from the Clinton state department would say such a thing - competence was not their thing either.

Fai de bèn a Bertrand, te lou rendra en cagant