11.   In other places, orchards were destroyed during fighting between rival warlords and scorched-earth campaigns by the Taliban.

12.   Kidnapping is one way that rival warlords can discredit the transitional government, which has a long way to go in making Somalia whole again.

13.   Just this week, the CIA warned in a classified report that Afghanistan could again plunge into chaos if steps were not taken to restrain and disarm rival warlords.

14.   One theory is that the wrong information was deliberately fed to the Americans by a rival local warlord eager to see his opponents killed.

15.   Over the weekend, for instance, Agha was involved in a tense power struggle with a rival warlord that nearly led to a new round of fighting.

16.   Rival Pashtun warlords jostled for control, seizing separate parts of the city and later trying to sort out the claims in a shura, or council.

17.   Rival warlords have continued to vie for power.

18.   Sadly, the shared interest in peace proved weaker than the distrust, greed and ambition of rival warlords, whose forces resumed fighting earlier this month in Monrovia.

19.   Rival warlords began fighting over the capital city.

20.   Senior American officials insisted Tuesday that the United States did not have a new policy of using airstrikes to quell fighting among rival warlords in Afghanistan.