Pelton had been in Afghanistan about a month before Qala-i-Jhangi, hanging out with Dostum and his men while on assignment for CNN and National Geographic Adventure. He says Dostum went out of his way, even defying the U.S., to ensure the safety of the roughly 10,000 Talibs who surrendered in and around Kunduz. "We [the U.S. and Northern Alliance] could have wiped out every Talib on earth and no one would have cared," Pelton says. "There is no cover-up because nothing happened."

Pelton watched along with Special Forces troops at the entrance of the prison as containers which had been fastened shut with chains with just a small gap for ventilation, were opened at Sheberghan: "I counted bodies. I stopped at about 20." The atmosphere at the prison wasn't tense, according to Pelton. "I have photos of American [Special Forces] medics working on these guys. Prisoners were walking around, talking to people. There wasn't any tension, any fear."

Pelton agrees with Dostum's assessment that a total of about 250 Talibs suffocated in the containers. But he points out that the confinement was necessitated by the fact that many of the men were still armed--in accordance with Afghan custom--and thus couldn't be trusted to ride in open-air pick-up trucks through areas where their comrades were still fighting.

What about the remaining 3,300 men?

"There are not that many bodies at Dasht-i-Leili," Pelton says. Most of the 3,300 fighters were Pakistani nationals who either made their way back across the border or returned to Afghan villages where they had relatives. Only the 250 or so suffocated Talibs, "filthy, wounded and sick, many with cholera" before they entered the containers, are buried there. Any additional bodies are likely to be those of the estimated 10,000 Hazaras killed under Taliban rule and/or 2,000 Talibs allegedly shot by commander Abdul Malik in 1997.

There's no love lost here. Pelton paints an ugly portrait of Doran as a cynical publicity hound willing to smear hard-working professional soldiers as war criminals merely to "flog his little documentary." Though he says it's nothing personal, Pelton thought that, in his opinion, Doran--whom he met at Dostum's Khoda Barq guesthouse--was a "pompous, arrogant prick; sucking up to Dostum, who gave him hospitality and protection."

Doran, for his part, calls Pelton "a Dostum apologist."

Who's right?

While I was in northern Afghanistan at the time, I didn't see the Sheberghan operation. I found both Pelton and Doran pleasant and intelligent. But whether a thorough investigation ultimately exonerates the American military or exacts justice for the murdered Talibs, it's essential that it be conducted as quickly as possible to put the accusations to rest. Both Pelton and Doran would like to see the graves at Dasht-e-Leili professionally exhumed and thoroughly analyzed.

So would I.

(Ted Rall is the author of "Gas War: The Truth Behind the American Occupation of Afghanistan," an analysis of the Trans-Afghanistan Pipeline and the motivations behind the war on terrorism. Ordering information is available at amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com.)