No Rain No Rainbows

This morning… I wake to my cell phone beeping. The battery was dieing. Half asleep now, the phone beeped again. This time it’s a text message from one of my coworkers, “No movements today.” That tells me there’s a security threat and we’re staying at home for the day. I fall back asleep.

 

It’s Friday, the High Holy Day and my day off. Ninety minutes later I was woken up by my roommate entering the room, “You missed all the excitement,” he tells me. Come to find out there was a VBIED at Camp Phoenix, the one US installation we typically visit to drop mail off or run to the PX for anything we need to buy. The news drained me, a car bomb at Phoenix when just five days ago I went through that same check point to send a hard drive back to the states. A group of brothas where working the gate, about 4 or 5 that day. I can’t say I knew them but it was very sobering.  

 

I went to brunch. Since the news my mood has been a dark blue. I sat by myself. I’ve gotten sick of sitting with my coworkers. Nothing against them, I’ve just begun to be more reclusive. I finished eating and even though he saw my plate was empty a friend of a friend sat down. No mind, I was planning on getting a cup of coffee anyway. He’s a Kiwi. I asked him if he heard anything about the “Vbid.” He said all the details weren’t yet clear to him but he heard the attack occurred just before 8am, about 8 or 10 casualties and the Army cleared the wreck out pretty quick. He made it sound like a routine car accident on the Mass Pike. I mentioned the Army’s security detail, the soldiers at the checkpoint. He didn’t think the car exploded at the checkpoint, probably still on the main road and the only casualties were Afghan civilians. I know a lot of cars drive down the road off the driveway to the checkpoint. People on foot, motorcycles, and bicycles are always an obstacle when making the turn in. 

 

A car bomb went off at another military installation that he said you could still see where the bomb went off because the trees nearby had all the leaves blown of. He made the comparison with a car bomb in Iraq, “if that was in Iraq those trees wouldn’t be there anymore.” Car bombs kill in the range of 50-100 people in Iraq, here they’re in the range of 10-20. In both cases usually local nationals better known as civilians.

 

Kiwi had just gotten back from shopping at the markets in town and was enjoying his extra helpings of sausage and Canadian style bacon. The threat certainly didn’t deter him from doing a little Friday morning shopping. I think he’s a good guy all in all. He once aptly called an asshole for the asshole he was, so I respect Kiwi’s thoughts.

 

Yesterday there was a controversial leaked statement from the US ambassador Karl Eikenberry stating he did not recommend sending more US troops here until Hamid Karzai started fixing corruption within his government, which dove tailed into what I heard earlier that morning that Karzai had announced he had a list of 100 people he was ready to fire. That tells me they’re on the same page the list of 100 seems only token. Real reform is going to need a lot more than 100 people taking early vacations.  Kiwi said it’s common knowledge that one of Karzai’s brothers is a known drug dealer in the heroin trade. Another of his brothers owns a major bank in Afghanistan and when the government auctioned off the cement factories a few years ago, hours before the auction was conducted it was required that any buyers needed to pay in cash. Of course Karzai’s brother was the only buyer that showed up with cash and he now controls the cement industry here.

 

Before the most recent election the Ministry of Defense (MOD) and the Anti Narcotics Police arrested about 5 men dressed in police uniforms, driving a police vehicle and transporting a bunch of heroin. Afghan security forces were proud of a job well done and the good press, the five men were charged and convicted (yeah) but where promptly pardoned by Hamid Karzai. It turns out one of the five drug dealers was Karzai’s nephew.  Another guy, the Minister of Defense was a former Taliban military commander who saw the light quickly after the “Liberation of Afghanistan,” got down with the program here and has not been an ally of Karzai’s, that could be good… could be bad. According to Kiwi this guy, the current Minister of Defense had been on the CIA’s payroll to the tune of a quarter million in cash a month and when he took the top position in the MOD he gave his son the money to purchase a large fleet of tactical vehicles that were then leased to the MOD. Sounds like something out of Dick Cheney’s playbook.  

One Small Cog

The temperature dropped and the wind picked up this evening. Three days ago my coworkers and I arrived t Kabul International Airport, the acronym of which does not bode well. I’ve arrived here to start work on a new contract that should keep me here in Afghanistan over the next year, maybe longer.

Similar to when I arrived in Iraq last January I've come with a book in hand. I was luckily flying commercial into KIA which allowed me to bypass the earthly purgatory of Ali Al Saleem in Kuwait and last year “The Quiet American” helped pass the time while there. Now I have the added pleasure of reading a book written by a good friend. “Still The Monkey” tells the story of a Vietnam Veteran sharing his story, as a mentor to an Iraq veteran rehabilitating from the loss of his legs. Coincidentally both books centers around wars in Vietnam, and the importance of learning from history to repair the present.

Yesterday marked the 8th year anniversary of the United States and NATO invading Afghanistan to dispose of the Taliban controlled government. Ironically more progress has been made in Iraq even though Iraq was invaded almost a year and a half later. I imagine much can be learned from mistakes and success made in Iraq that can be applied to the strategy in Afghanistan. But that’s not my job. I haven’t been put her to win the war. Which doesn’t mean I’m here to lose it either.

Over breakfast I was that silent third person introduce to a friend of a coworker as they conversed over eggs, sausage and coffee. He was a United Kingdom National Policeman commenting about how often he has witnessed commanders ending their tours and new commanders scrapping the methods of their predecessors to implement their own “bight ideas” – Ego is a hell of a drug – and making the same mistakes as the last guy. Later over coffee I sat with a quiet, seasoned contractor. Perhaps he was more pickled than seasoned. Our program hasn’t started as smoothly as some would want. “It’s putting a square peg in a round hole,” he said with an odd stare. Forget about why we’re here. Sometimes I wonder are any of us really here at all?

It has been a slow start for my colleagues and I. “Still the Monkey” has been a reprieve from the lack of activity. The living quarters remind me of my freshman college dorm, Nickerson. This afternoon I sat in the courtyard outside the MWR smoking a cigarette in the sun when I noticed there was a turtle walking around the grass. This must be his home but this entire compound with its rose bush lined courtyard seems so artificial like Hazelnut Coffeemate. If I am here/anywhere I suppose [for now] he and I are home.