Unholyland News

Another Bad Morning

2011-11-24T14:57:00.001+02:00

FOB Joyce, Kunar Afghanistan – Combat Outpost Nevada

Ok, getting caught with your pants down whilst under attack is bad enough, what the hell could be worse than that.

Take this morning, after a sleepless night and a chopper to catch further into the mountains to a remote Combat Outpost on a mountaintop in a couple of hours.

This was a good chance to have a shower before a few days of basically living in the dirt and having to ablute without porcelain, (a polite way of having to shit in a bag then throw into a fire pit to burn slowly).

So enjoying the warm caress of hot water cascading down, and feet slipping in my flip-flops.

The gentle hiss of water was broken by the deafening scream of the siren.

Incoming Waa Waa, Incoming Waa Waa

Great, f…ing fantastic bad enough getting caught with your pants down the other day, now buck naked in flip-flops in the shower.

So stumble out wrap the micro fleece towel around and collect my stuff and try to get back to the shelter. Out the door and naturally in wet feet slipping one of the flip-flops breaks within two steps.

Back at the tent, into clothes and then the reality if nothing has gone bang in the last few minutes. What the hell, I am going to get dressed.

Two minutes later the all clear is broadcasted, and life on the base returns too normal.

Half an hour later with kit packed ready to go and up at the landing zone waiting for the chopper to the Combat Outpost. I had managed to get to the DFAC and grab a cup of coffee and taken it up to the chopper pad. Putting it down on the bench I turned to watch a heavy lift chopper with a sling come into to transport fuel drums.

The down draught then hits and my coffee is basically flying through the end and naturally lands on my body armor at the end of the bench. Great what else can go wrong?

Then again it only takes a simple sign on the back of the Portaloo door to restore the Zen of the day, as they say.

I write this from the top of a mountain at the edge of the Pech Valley in Afghanistan, perhaps one of the most remote and dangerous places in this war zone. Food is no longer at a DFAC three times a day across the base, but is delivered in the morning on the back of a donkey.
Home for the next two days is in a pit depression on the mountain, with twelve soldiers and a lot of mountains around us.

Caught with my Pants Down

2011-11-20T18:52:00.002+02:00

November 20, 2011

FOB Joyce
Kunar
Afghanistan

There is the expression getting caught with your pants down. Normally associated with acts that have absolutely nothing to me this morning.

Having woken at a normal time around 7am, not that you know inside the tent with partitioned into small rooms with plywood walls (think Ikea natural pine) and a stretcher for a bed, thou some interior designer has come in and added some ambience by putting some nails in the wall studs so you can hang stuff up, a minimalist wardrobe approach is the best way to describe the nails.

With the sun shining in the valley as I walked back from the Conex (Container) Box that serves as the Latrine, rather than the Portaloo on the corner. It was time for a shower also in a Conex Box next to the Latrine, every two to three days it is nice to wash and change clothes. Not mandatory by any stretch of the imagination. But given the sun was out and the golden rays shined across the valley on the mountains, it felt that why put off today what I have put off the last three days.

Having flip-flopped my way over thru the rocks and dirt, I enjoyed the hot water cascading over me and dried off. I flip flopped my way back into my suite in Tent 13 and looked at the clean clothing on my stretcher. I had decided on a khaki look for the day around the Forward Operating Base to blend in and not clash with the camouflage of the Army uniforms.

And just as I was reaching down to pull up my pants …..

“BOOM, BOOM, ratta tat tat, ratta tat tat”…. Gunfire and explosions erupt in the valley

“INCOMING Waa Waa Waa INCOMING Waa Waa Waa”

The base is under fire and the warning siren is set to Volume 12 on the Spinal Tap scale of amplification.

So with my pants around my ankles, decisions have to be taken. Do you kick them off and run for the bunker or pull them up and run the risk of being unlucky.

“Waa Waa Waa” the sirens continue

I honestly thought that at one stage, the Robot’s voice was going to come over and come out with the classic “Warning Will Robinson Danger, Danger”.

Pants up, grabbed the camera and out the door, behind the concrete barrier, film for a few minutes. Then in a lull head for the nearest bunker to find Conor in his shorts straight out of bed. But suitably attired in his flak jacket and Kevlar helmet.

With sleep in his eyes we filmed a quick piece to camera describing but was happening.

Gunfire and mortar booms gradually ceased.

The robot came back on and proclaimed “All clear, return to your duties”.

All this before a cup of coffee on a Sunday morning or as someone pointed out it is in fact the equivalent of a Taliban Monday. As someone wisely pointed out always avoid the DFAC (Dining Facility) for the first hour of daylight as the bad boys constantly try to target it early in the morning thinking it will be full of hungry souls.

I will sleep in tomorrow an extra hour to allow for this new found wisdom, and also have my pants ready just in case.

84 Hours

2011-11-18T10:47:00.002+02:00

1:50 am Friday November 18th 2011
Bagram Air Base
Afghanistan

You just wait, and when you are tired of waiting you wait some more. The misconception of arriving in Afghanistan is that from the moment you arrive you are under gunfire from Taliban or Insurgents can be misleading to say the least.

We arrived at the base here Tuesday afternoon and had high hopes of catching a flight to the East later that night only to have all hopes dashed as the Air Force just cancelled that flight, remember that they do not have to give a reason they can just cancel. And the wait begins in the aptly named Hotel California that is the media holding rooms on Disney Road the main road in the base.

Now the word, Hotel is somewhat of a misnomer. In fact a wooden shack divided by ply wood into four rooms, three bunks in each room, a mattress and a pillow, no sheets or pillow cases so God only knows what creatures are from head lice to bed bugs are free to breed. Though I do add we had Room 1, which is considered the suite, as it is few square feet larger, and the luxury of a metal folding chair. Each room has a small fridge with a few bottles of water, I should add though that according to the energy consumption labels still on the door indicated that energy efficient rating was about as bad as you could possibly seek out.

There are no windows in any buildings as glass and bombs are not a good combination in the case of a rocket attack. So you have no concept of day or night. The heating and air conditioning is pumped into the building via by what sounded like a pre cold war jet engine. The tranquility of the environment is rocked every ten to fifteen minutes by this rush of noise more than heat or cold air.

The routine of waiting to hear that the next flight has been cancelled or that there are no flights to where we want to go, usually means being woken up by a knock at the door at 11pm, 1am or 6am. Flight schedules for daily flights are posted at different times and only 24 hours in advance. So if there is no flight you know that the wait to try again is 24 hours away.

There are no stories to be done at the base here as after ten years of war every story has been done at least five times and no one has any interest in day-to-day operations, because in a word nothing has changed, so you wait.

Breakfast in the DFAC (Dinning Facility) is followed by Lunch at the DFAC, wait and then dinner at the DFAC. The walk from Hotel California to the DFAC is about 8 minutes down Disney Road. More anything it kills time. The food is good, but obviously the big issue at the base here is obesity, as you enter the DFAC there are signs trying to explain portion size, which to some members of the Armed Forces and Contractors needs to be enforced. An extra large serving of fried onion rings is not considered 2 of your 5 daily requirements.

Of course there is option of Pizza Hut, but to the consternation of many on the base is not open for breakfast. Popeye’s another fast food chain is closed but reopening soon.

The other popular time wasting pastime, shopping. And the PX store is the same as it was 5 years plus again, from chewing tobacco to knives. Then just down the road is the local Afghan equivalent to the PX store, where every known dodgy DVD is available for $3 along with more aftershave and perfume than a duty free store at an airport. But the best sign in the bazaar is a note posted everywhere from the Base Commander stating that claiming something is fake is not a reason for demanding a refund.

The most disliked people on the Base seem to be the MP’s (Military Police) these people are more diligent than a traffic warden in London. Caught not wearing a seat belt, even in the back seat and your car is compounded for ten days and you must do a self criticism and how you will change your ways. Maximum speed 5 mph is enforced, no wonder service personnel have trouble adjusting to the real world after a tour of duty, spend a year driving the same roads at 5 mph. I suspect that a private wheel-clamping contractor is not that far away.

Finally after 84 hours we boarded our flight to Jalalabad, as they say a mere elevator ride less than 25 minutes in the air. The irony is that we could of driven from Kabul to Jalalabad in just over two hours. And saved 82 hours, nothing moves easy, in which you are part of a 32,000-person jigsaw that is the US Military.

The Pizza Deliveryman

2011-06-28T23:21:00.003+03:00

Your normal pizza deliveryman does not check his AK47 before he starts a delivery and makes sure it is cocked and the safety is off. The again Ahmad is getting ready to make a delivery to the rebel soldiers on the frontline.

The Pizza factory in an abandoned building is less than 3km from the front, we cannot show the exterior of the building for security reasons as they do not want Gaddafi’s army to recognize the area and shell them out of business as they say.

Filming pizza making is not normally a dangerous assignment, but here I was in a flak jacket shooting a truly bizarre scene, 20 young men all volunteers under the watchful eye of a pizza chef of Libyan descent who until a few weeks ago was living and making pizza in Sweden.

The call of the revolution had bought him back to his hometown of Misrata, Ehmad Daiki had never fired a gun or any type of weapon and when asked by leaders what he could do, he replied I can make pizza.

And thus for the last two weeks, with his team he has been turning out 6000 slices of pizza a day for fighters. A production line chops olives, breaks up fresh garlic by banging it in a plastic bottle, crushes fresh tomatoes, knead and roll out dough. People and shopkeepers in Misrata as part of their war effort donate each and every ingredient.

Every time a rocket is launched in the area or even worse an incoming rocket lands in an adjacent field the whole production line celebrates by yelling

“Allah Akhbar”

Three ovens run non stop thru the late morning and lunch, each tray is cut up and five to six slices of fresh hot pizza are wrapped in tin foil to keep warm and within half an hour they are delivered up the road.

My producer and security advisor, refused to let me go up to the front for the delivery footage. Despite my annoyance of not being able to go up and film the final scenes.

The reason being

“Mal, How in the hell am I going to explain to New York, that you got injured or killed for a story on pizza, no you cannot go”

Even I had to agree after a short sulk, risk and reward as they say. No story or single shot is worth risking your life for, and a pizza story is not how I want to be remembered.

We gave a small camera to the delivery guy with the AK47.

Mal
Misrata, Libya

The Victim's

2011-06-28T02:05:00.002+03:00

Misrata, Libya.

Viewer Discretion advised

“We wish to advise that some images in this story…………….”

If the image is shocking to watch on a TV News bulletin, image being in the hospital room and having to physically experience the pain, suffering and anguish of the victim.

9-year-old Faraz Abu Shaba is staring at the lens and his face fills the frame, it is a haunting image of a young boy suffering 2nd degree burns; every feature is burnt and discolored. Every few seconds his expression changes and is contorted with pain. His head is listless and his eyes are elsewhere.

You have to distance yourself and somehow the lens becomes a shield that helps break the reality of where you find yourself.

His father lay in a bed next to him, eyes in a catatonic stare to nowhere. And again I filled the frame so that only his eyes gave the window to his soul and despair.

It is the first hospital we are to visit on this day.

Farazs’ older brother Ibrahim is dead, cut in half by ball bearings that had been packed in a grad rocket and fired into Misrata from Gadaffi’s forces outside the city. He had been standing at the sink outside the kitchen of his modest house in the Eastern section of the city, when the rocket landed less than 10 meters away. A steel propane tank in the yard is full of holes, from the ball bearings; Ibrahim did not stand a chance as he washed to get ready for evening prayers.

Relatives show us a passport photo of Ibrahim as a 9 year old; he looked almost angelic in that photo.

Shrapnel razor sharp is gathered and displayed on the base of what remains a wall, so that everyone who visits can examine the evidence of another war atrocity.

From the roof of our hotel in the centre of the city, we can hear and see these rockets coming in. You become accustomed to the sound of war in a weird and disjointed way. In Misrata there is no escape, you cannot simply drive away and escape, surrounded on three sides by Gadaffi troops, and the sea on the fourth side. It was one of these rockets that had hit the Shaba family home. A distant boom and smoke cloud as dusk fell the night before.

Across town in the second hospital, as I walked into the ward room it was the sound of Faraz and Ibrahim’s youngest brother that drew my attention, 2 days old and lying in his grandmother’s arms and making new born squeals and lifting his arms and legs.

On the other side of the room his mother lay, burnt head to toe and wrapped in bandages, only her face and toes exposed charred and raw. She had probably been standing in the kitchen when the rocket hit and a fireball engulfed her after killing Ibrahim a second beforehand. I remember standing in her kitchen only an hour ago, everything black, mangled metal plates half melted and a pool of aluminum on the floor that had melted in the firestorm.

She cannot open her eyes due to the burns and swelling.

In a whisper barely audible thru cracked and burnt lips, she says

“God will take care of the people responsible”

It is hard not to want to show the close up because, the impact of the horrors of war are not some computer game whereby if you die you get another life, when you are hit the impact is forever and all that matters in life is shattered.

I walk out and back to the car, it has been a tough morning and more rockets fall that afternoon, from the roof I wonder if another families life has been destroyed.

I send the edited story back to Washington, and at the end I include extra video of wide shots of the hospital rooms in case the close-ups are too graphic they can decide, for at the frontlines of a war zone, you find yourself with a different acceptance of what war is really like. Close ups of faces and eyes show the doorway to the soul and without seeing into the soul you cannot feel the pain of innocent victims.

Mal
Misrata

The Field Hospital

2011-06-21T17:46:00.000+03:00

June 21st 2011

Misrata Libya

You can get used to things in life, but the constant drone from the Mosque next door is starting to wear thin. From mid morning to night it plays a constant loop of call to prayer, repeated every 60 seconds, the same again and again and again.

Then again there are the Grad Rockets fired by the Gadaffi forces who are surrounding this city, from the roof of the hotel you can see them impact some a few km’s away towards the port and steel mill appear as plumes of smoke, whilst with closer ones you feel the impact and the smoke is much closer. As I was writing that sentence another landed close by, heard and felt the thump.

The attacks on the city itself are sporadic and come at anytime. Go to the frontlines outside the city and it is a constant barrage, both incoming and outgoing. At a field hospital 5km (3miles) from the frontline separating the Loyalists and the Rebels yesterday, a grad came in low and fast, hearing the incoming it’s a matter of dropping and preying because it is close, very close.

The field hospital is a converted tractor repair workshop. The doctor in charge, Mohammed Al Bayra is in his mid twenties and before the revolution worked in Oncology, asked how many rebels he has seen come arrive by ambulance or on the back floor of cars and pick ups, injured or dead. His response “Thousands”.

Frontlines are not “Lines in the Sand”, what was a safe distance can be become a disaster zone in the matter of minutes. The first indicator is normally the rebels fleeing back down the road in the back of trucks, faster than rats up a drainpipe. This is always a good cue for us to likewise consider a tactical relocation just in case, not to mention the Grad Rocket that came way to close for comfort.

An hour later we are back at the field hospital, and 6 ambulances and pickups arrive within ten minutes carrying more wounded back, Wounds to the arms, legs, chest and stomach evident as they are wheeled into the makeshift frontline hospital. They are patched up by the young doctor and his team of students and sent back into Misrata half an hour back down the road.

We leave too, there are only so many injured you need to film for a story and the scene will not change in the coming hours or days.

Back in Misrata. NATO jets are heard thousands of feet up in the sky, but even their noise does not drown out the mosque next door, the call continues and likewise the rockets will continue to fall around us, for the foreseeable future.

The Crossing

2011-06-18T01:44:00.000+03:00

Libya June 17th 2011

Benghazi as a story has been stagnant for while now, just as the frontline has varied little since the last time I was here at the start of the Civil War. However on the western coast is the third largest city in Libya, Misrata after Tripoli the capital held by Gaddafi loyalists, and Benghazi held by the rebels.

It has been the scene of some of the fiercest fighting and clashes, rebels despartely trying to hang on whilst being pounded by Gadaffi loyalists from three sides. The only side left to them is the sea. The port has become the lifeline for the people and rebels. And the only way into Misrata is by sea, a twenty hour crossing from Benghazi.

9:30pm Thursday 16th June Benghazi Port.

There is a scene of complete chaos and confusion as 700 people congregate in darkness the stern. As families, the injured and rebel reinforcements try to board the C/F Azzurra, a Turkish gambling ship. Shouts of Allah Akbar ring in the air as the mob pushed against barrier in the humid. People waving tickets in the air and screaming at the top of their voices illicit blank responses, from the men on the stern ramp. The only way onto the ship.

Finally the last truck is loaded with what looks like ammunition, we are told its food but I have my doubts. And the crowd surges, all trying not to fall off the edge of the ramp into the harbor waters.

And in the midst of this scene I have the camera out trying to film at the same time as get on the ship. Rick’s line as the crowd momentum finally pushes us thru is “That was insane”.

We had managed to get two small cabins, rather than sleep on the deck but until you have the door opened to your cabin nothing is assured and somehow we had left the vital cabin receipt down in the car deck at the bottom of the 4x4 Land cruiser we have bought with us.

“No paper, no cabin opened”

Was the response from the ship member who we quickly christened Side Show Bob from The Simpson’s, due to his hair.

Martin disappeared down to the bowels and ten minutes later came back brandishing the prize receipt as if it was a Willy Wonka Golden Ticket. And cabin doors were opened.

Perhaps saying the place smelt of shit was a bit harsh, and that the sheets pillow and blanket looked they had been rearranged rather than changed. But it is far batter than sleeping on the deck.

Enquiries about when we would depart and met with a shrug and the standard “Inshallah” response. A round of heavy tracer fire lights the sky over Benghazi before I head back to the cabin.

Lying in the dark, I thought to myself this has to be one of the craziest ways to a frontline. Once there, you simply cannot leave when you want. Because the ship is the only way and if they stop running then we will be trapped like every other citizen of Misrata. And we have only bought a one-way ticket.

2:30am, Benghazi. Thru the haze of half sleep I feel the Azzurra slip the berth and head out of harbor. Rolling over, I feel my stomach start to cramp and spasm.

“What a great time to start getting the shit’s”

11:00am “Some where in the Gulf of Sirte, Med Sea”

Shoes lie in piles, men sleep on the floor, under tables, and children run around, as children do on an adventure. Babies cry behind doors and young men watch home made videos of battles against Gadaffi forces on their cell phones. Dreaming of glory and ignorant of the reality of recent rebel losses.

5:30pm “Still some where in the Gulf of Sirte, Med Sea”

Closer but no cigar as they say, the trip is a slow 240 miles, just off the coastline of Libya. Story done, edited all but final piece to camera. Another black coffee and stare out to sea. We are due to dock at 9:39pm, according to the crew; given the state of the ship I have my doubts to the accuracy of their chronometers.

Lying on my bunk, writing this and at the same time realizing that in four hours. I will be in a war zone under potential rocket fire. The handover at the border seems a long time ago.

9:30pm Could be anywhere, pitch black outside but still at sea

You get to a point where you have no bearings or clues as to where you are, ship messages are only in Arabic and feeling the ship slow it is obvious that we are close. Managed to set up the bgan and transmit tonight’s story back to New York whilst still traveling, incredible to consider that in the middle of the med sea you can still transmit.

Strange but have no nerves at the moment, a sense of calm before the storm. Not based on any rationale. Could do with a shower though at least the runs have stopped for the time being.

Postscript

Misrata 9:39 pm we arrive to the minute as planned, fuck me stranger things have happened in this world. Shouts of Allah Akbar echo around the decks.

Turning to Ken, our security guy,

“Game on”

“To fucking right”

We enter Misrata, one-way ticket, our only escape back via sea.

The Handover Libya June 2011

2011-06-15T21:51:00.002+03:00

Everyone has excuses and I am no different. But it is time to start writing again, things may be a little different as times have changed. Posts may be late or written after events, the reason is security. Life is not what it was back in the old days now and in the media we find ourselves in more and more inhospitable places, with people who consider the media as another enemy.

I have always kept extensive notes of observations of places and events and they will come forward as I go back read and remember those times.

140 characters is not an option, as I see and bring to life events from good and evil places.

Mal
Benghazi Libya
June 15th 2011

Libyan War June 2011 Second Trip

1. The Handover

The Handover is a relatively short affair in conflict zones. The team leaving wants to get out as fast as possible, as freedom and safety is normally a short walk across a border with only your personal bags. For the incoming team, Rick Levanthal, correspondent, Martin Francis, producer and it, myself is the beginning of another rotation in country and the dangers of entering a war zone.

I had been in Libya chasing the rebels a few months back and this was my second foray into this conflict. The handover was planned for the Egypt / Libya border at the Saloume Border Crossing, a seven hour drive from Cairo. Basically head North from Cairo, hit the coast turn west and eventually you will come to Libya. There are no other roads so getting lost is not an issue there are no other roads.

The customs and clearance in Egypt is a matter of being patient, things do not move quickly, it could be fifteen minutes, and it may take two hours. Nothing is checked, you simply sit and wait. All we had was our personal bags, as the kit that the Network has slowly built up and smuggled into Libya over many trips stays in country to avoid problems with Customs, who on a whim will confiscate a Camera or Bgan (the small Satellite Communication dish we carry, slightly bigger than a laptop). Thus creating major issues and problems.

The Cameraman I replacing Rich Harlow, was waiting for me on the Libyan side with all the kit plus body armor.

After watching an Arabic woman in the full black Niqab scream at an Egyptian Boarder Policeman, with such venom that she must have been questioning the hereditary of the man’s mother. Martin came out with our passports cleared for exit, drive to the next gate and then the short walk into Libya a final glance at the passport exit stamp and then you are in a country in full on War.

The other team was next to the cars, as planned. Handshakes and man hugs happen and then its business, they want out and for a few minutes. Each member of the team huddles down with their respective other.

What’ where in what case, What’s happening where, from editorial to money, from logistics to security and it happens in a few short minutes. Questions answered with no bullshit, the stakes are real and everyone knows it. This meeting is not a sit down around a table and discussing options back in New York, but in a car park on the border of a country engaged in civil war under a blazing sun, no subject is taboo. And it happens quickly.

We still have another seven hours drive ahead of us to Benghazi and the other team faces an equally long drive to Cairo. Forget the Hollywood hype of News teams turning up in exotic war zones after a montage over music. Basically getting to war takes time and frustration. You find yourself driving thru inhospitable parts of the planet at hi speed with a driver who normally does not speak the same language, listening to local music on the radio and trying to keep comfortable.

You find relief at the occasional stop for petrol and then realize that the toilet at the Gas Station is also the shower. A shower head limply hangs over the foot print squat toilet and I always find myself re affirming my vow that I will never shit and shower on the same spot, unless I have a pair of flip flops and even then I doubt that I could.

You finally shake hands and man hug again, the final words of a departing team are always the same “Keep Safe and Be Careful” and then they walk off and it’s done.

Standing in the no mans land between Egypt and Libya, a simple road with concrete barriers between the nations on either side. We have Security man with us, a fact of life now in dangerous zones, just like you read about these guys are normally ex SAS or Special Forces who have found a new career in the highly lucrative and dangerous world of the security in global hotspots. They are in fact the fourth member of the team; you do nothing without them and rely on them to make judgment calls for your safety and life.

Safety briefings and situation updates become part of daily life; to ignore them is to place the team at risk. “What blood group are you Mal, and are you allergic to any drugs?” Ken asked. Security guys normally do not swop out at the same time as teams so there is always a reassuring continuity.

We get back in the car and enter Libya. New York wants a live shot in two hours so we will just stop by the side of the road in a town. Benghazi is 7 hours away across the desert.

Ahmed one our local drivers turns on the radio and luck has changed, we must of grown up in the same era, as Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water” blares out as we watch stunning sunset engulf us on the horizon. Ahmed even slows down as nightfall’s; camels wandering onto the road at night are a greater threat than Gadaffi’s forces, for the final leg.

The Winnable War

2009-12-22T14:01:00.000+02:00

Reflections from 36,000 ft
Afghanistan Dec 2009

The Winnable War

The irony is that the largest explosion I heard in terms of enemy attacks in this war in 30 days on the frontline was this morning on the day we were to leave Kabul. In the capital not 300m from our bureau/residence, Greg & I were just editing our final piece before 10am when suddenly the whole room and building just went blank.

Describing a bomb blast like this morning is like trying to explain the first time you hear or experience a car crash. For a second your world collapses down into microseconds, as your brain comprehends before you feel the shock wave of the actual explosion. The sound traps you before the concussion holds you, and this all takes place inside a few seconds and then realizing that you have survived the next mode of capturing the story and pictures kicks in.

It is if your mind is in a fog for those first few seconds, reality is the sound of the explosion, which is not as loud as Hollywood makes it out, but your senses combine in that one moment to terrify you before you realize that you have survived.

Welcome back to Afghanistan Conor Powell.

Half undressed, half asleep Conor looked thru the window, as I looked the camera lens. Conor our Kabul/Afghanistan Correspondent had been back in the country less than 24 hours, arriving only the late evening before after a months holiday back in the states whilst Greg Palkot & I covered for him.

Conor has seen and experienced bombs in Kabul before so being thrown out of your bed by a morning explosion is nothing new, but the look on his face portrayed that this suicide bombing is yet one step closer to the our reality of living and working in Kabul.

A city so corrupted by corruption, that to find someone not asking for a bribe is the exception. Example for a quick ten dollars at the airport the check in guy will reduce your excess baggage quota, hard cashes no questions. Just hand over the dollars quietly.

Want to drive your car thru check points with a suicide bomber ready to go, would not require much more. In we had heard that there were three bombers/bombs ready and in place in Kabul prior to this mornings attack. And that is only the media’s grapevine; as per usual all the so-called security experts with their contacts knew nothing or had any warning.

Reality check. Foreign or International Security Companies in Kabul/Afghanistan are now (8 years into this war) are having trouble holding onto there own staff. Run by foreign companies that are only in Afghanistan to suck money from International organizations from the NGO’s (Non Government Organization’s) to Multi National Companies. These Security companies under pay their local so badly that it is now common knowledge that the Taliban pay a monthly salary that is 25% more than foreign security companies offer the majority of its security staff.

The Taliban is clearly and openly offering better employment opportunities, rather than the corrupted official channels or even worse foreign security companies who are sucking the blood out of the capital and this country.

It is pathetic to try and grasp how bad it has become in the capital, you are know at this point that honestly, it is dog eat dog. Yes you survive for today is today, tomorrow is tomorrow. Nobody cares as long as someone is making more money.

This is the “Winnable War” reality check.

Flying back to London offers no solace for within months no doubt I will be back there and it will only be worse.

Military & Govt Officials will massage figures to give the appearance of it is all going to plan in the coming months, I have honestly given up on truth in any respect to do with Afghanistan.

Covering war zones I get to see a very small but honest part and after a month in country the gut feeling is that after 8 years of rebuilding, reconstructing, retraining, 98% of the population hates and loathes the US and its Allies, for what it has done and is doing now.

In regard to the other 2% I have seen, all is well, by the way in a mountain village high in the mountains of Southern Afghanistan with no water or power the local school bus has a farm tractor and you know what children laugh as they climb up to go home.

A six year old asks nothing more than a chance to grow old and prosper. In Kabul on that, 8 people lost that chance and multiple more injured will never get the chance to grow old and prosper.

The Highway to ($)War

2009-12-11T06:17:00.000+02:00

Zabul Province
Afghanistan

It is not the fighting season, but more than anything the war of words thousands of miles away seem to dominate issues here. Sitting in a FOB (Forward Operating Base) in Southern Afghanistan we have been affected by weather for the last week, missions planned are cancelled due to weather. So far we have had everything from rain to snow and freezing winds blowing off the mountains, which means that air assets cannot fly and without air all missions are grounded.

If anything this has given me time to look behind some issues in this war, whilst Senior Administration figures continue their drive to put more troops into the battlefield here, figuring that more numbers will solve the war here, it is also a desperate gamble of a punter on a losing streak who believes that eventually luck will turn his way

Perhaps it is time to start looking at issues that they would like to ignore for on the ground the reality can be only to obvious.

It should be noted that the US Government via the Dept of Defense is funding the Taliban. Forget the Opium and Poppy trade that is small money compared to what Uncle Sam is indirectly giving the Taliban.

Food, water, toilet paper and anything else you care to think about has to be trucked from the main US Military Base in Bagram, just North of Kabul to the main battle arena of Kadahar and Helmend in the South. There exists one and only one road, Highway 1. A never ending procession of trucks bring supplies down this route every day.

As part of reconstructing the economy of Afghanistan it was decided to award the trucking contract to six local companies. All very well connected with the upper echelons of the Government here, via family or tribal connections. The value moving the logistics required to fight the war is estimated to be worth close to $2.2 billion.

These civil convoys by law are not allowed to arm themselves with anything more than a rifle such as an AK47. And the warlords who control vast stretches of these roads have no such morals, together with the Taliban they control the Highway to War.

Thus the local trucking companies who want to ensure their lucrative multi million dollar contracts are happy to pay between 10 and 20% to ensure that their convoys reach the battlefield. Taking the low percentage 10% of $2.2 billion dollars, means that the $220 million dollars is going indirectly from Uncle Sam to the Taliban to support their war efforts against the foreign troops here.

It is not a matter of the US Military turning a blind eye to the issue, they know it is happening and whilst it annoys them deeply, they are with like so many other issues in Afghanistan, powerless to end it let alone figure out how to stop it.

In the coming months, thousands more troops will be deployed, meaning that more trucks will be making the trip down the “Highway to War”. More trucks, more corruption, more money for the Taliban. Whilst we wait out the winter, the Taliban may not be as active fighting the war, but their war chest will be reaping the benefits of the surge, one truck at a time.

Life in Gitmo

2009-12-07T06:43:00.002+02:00

Kandahar

Starting another embed involves moving sometimes accross the country on mujltiple flights taking days, Saturday's move to our next embed was a simple matter of being picked from our hooch/bunkhouse/room driving five minutes across the airfield base and turning into another camp, within a base.

Now not all room are created equal and our room was basically a 10 x 8 feet (not meters or yards) plywood box, in a building that must of been built around Sept 12th 2001. These were without doubt the oldest buildings I had come across at Kandahar. within the block there are 6 identical plywood boxes, no windows but a plywood square over a hole cut in the wall.

Sparsely decorated is a way to describe the bunk bed and nailed up table in the corner. For Greg and I it was easier if either one of us wanted to get anything out of a box or bag for the other to step out of the suite. After Greg had lost the pick which hand the bullet is in as to who gets the bottom bunk in Khost a couple of weeks ago. He immediately grabbed the bottom bunk, the only thing he forgot was that the only heater in the room was directly above the top bunk, effectively he had chosen the coldest spot in the whole Gitmo cell with a cold breeze coming in through gaps in the plywood.

By 4:30 am, he could stand it no more and asked to change bunks a i was lying there with barely my sleeping bag on. Given that any movement on the top bunk made enough noise to wake the dead, we swopped over. I barely noticed the cold and slept for a few more hours.

Come 7 am I wanted to get a run in before the day started and we were to move to another province with the embed. Closing the door to the Gitmo cell i put the latch across as i did not want to let the door swing open and cold air in the cell.
50 minutes later getting back from my run the door is till closed, I open it to find Greg there cross legged holding up a water bottle that is green in color. I had by mistake locked him in the cell and the call of nature in the morning had found him a prisoner.

So another night was over and if anything a funny start to another day in the war zone.

Under the Boardwalk

2009-12-05T14:42:00.000+02:00

Kandahar Air Field
Afghanistan

There is no doubt that General Mc Crystal is not happy with the lifestyle of troops at the ISAF base here in Kandahar. The reality is that whilst many consider that Kandahar is a key strategic location in the war, the place at times resembles a shopping mall.

Consider what is on the main area known as the boardwalk, a wooden enclosed square purpose built entertainment area. Starting by the Tim Horton’s (Canadian) Coffee shop overlooking the rink, where hockey and football are played. Past the Kebab shop whose slogan is Gyros for Heroes, next to the 24/7 Pizza Hut, which attracts a crowd of all night and day. They also offer home delivery to your bunkhouse or office. Then there is the Subway store and the Burger King, which has a sign apologizing that the Whopper is not available at the moment.

Sunglasses or lingerie no problems available at the Oakley franchise on the corner. Continuing along there is the Canadian PX store, no to mention the German PX and the French PX, which also includes a patisserie offering smoked salmon baguettes and croissants freshly, baked. The Dutch PX is off the boardwalk but like the French is a two storey complex where Play Station and Plasma TV’s are available.

The American PX is modest by the standards set by other nations, offering the necessities of life here similar to other American PX’s in Afghanistan.

If there is a danger at Kandahar then obesity rates higher than the threat faced by Taliban. Watching soldiers from various nations shoveling pizza down at 8am is not unusual, and these are not guys who are dirt encrusted from days out on operations.

When you consider that to put a US soldier into the war her costs approx a million dollars per deployment, you do start to question what the hell is the need for a shopping mall in war zone. It seems like some are more concerned with the frills of life than the mission.

There are DFAC’s (Dining Facilities) all around the base offering food and drinks over four meal sittings a day. All fully paid for and staffed by third world nationals earning a minimum wage catering to troops based at Kandahar.

For soldiers on the frontline a meal from a bag and water sustain them and they enjoy a far greater satisfaction from their efforts than the troops based at Kandahar Air Field. If as much effort was put into the war itself and less emphasis on maintaining a lifestyle enjoyed at home, then after 8 years would we still be bogged down in a war that is going from bad to worse with each passing month.

I have learnt to tune out to the words of Senior Officers as they describe how well it is going, because I heard the same words eight years ago. One soldier barely twenty years old by his appearance told us that the US defeated the Taliban after seven months. Which puts the war at an end in July 2002. Well a 300% increase in attacks on coalition forces between 2007 to 2009, a figure stated by General Mc Crystal reveals the ignorance of some soldiers, as to how the fight is going.

Perhaps that is why we are hearing that the boardwalks days are numbered and whilst it may only be a small step, hopefully actions like that may refocus some soldiers minds on the operation, because if things have not turned around drastically within a year the war can be clearly be termed a complete failure and hundreds of lives will have been lost for no reason and the Taliban, like the Viet Cong in Vietnam will claim victory and world opinion will be with them.

I never doubt the resolve of the young soldiers I meet and film at Combat Outpost’s for they are true heroes. But for a dose of reality the big news of Boardwalk yesterday was that donuts were once again available at the Tim Horton’s Coffee Shop.

The war continues.

Airport Chaos

2009-12-01T05:26:00.000+02:00

Kabul Airport
The fact that a taxing plane wing misses the terminal building by less than a meter. Gives you any indication of the safety standards that operate at the airport.
Travelling here is never easy and lets face it flying from Kabul to Kandahar is not a route or destination of ones own choosing .
It was decided yesterday that we should cover the troop surge announcement from Kandahar rather than the bureau in Kabul, which was a former brothel called Paradise. Now online or telephone booking is impossible because you cannot factor in bribes and corruption online .
So a 4:30 start involves traipsing to the airport waiting in the cold damp dawn whilst our fixer does what he has become an expert at obtaining the impossible at a benefit to the airline staff, paying twice the ticket price and getting a boarding pass that has no destination, no name and no seat number.
As he said just sit anywhere
Another day in Afghanistan begins

Night Letters

2009-11-28T15:06:00.001+02:00

Khost, Afghanistan

Like shadows in the night, they deliver warnings to villagers, side with the foreign forces and we will kill you and or your family. Whilst US Forces in Khost Province in South East Afghanistan, may claim they have superior technology and thermal cameras to protect themselves and their bases. Out in the villages the Taliban deliver their messages with no one capable of preventing them.

Talk with any Afghani and without hesitation they tell you things are getting worse from security to corruption. The optimism of 2002 – 2003 has long gone, from translators to waiters we hear nothing but negativity in regard to the future of Afghanistan.

Transpose this with what the US Military continue to tell you in countless briefing after briefing and honestly you start to think they are talking about a different country to the one they are in. Reality is an inconvenient truth that every officer seems to ignore.

Things are getting better, we are working with the Afghan Army and Police to develop an effective and stable nation, is a mantra that is well past its use by date. Eight years on in this war, and yet the Afghan Army is in any way capable of enforcing security.

The Police are despised and loathed by every local, and petty issues are more important than major events. The other day we went out on a patrol and the Police did not come along, not due to staffing or morale issues but because they could not be bothered. The Afghan Army set up a roadblock outside of a small village and started checking cars. Sure enough fifteen minutes later two men are caught with an AK 47, four magazines, two pistols, a knife and two hand grenades.

The question then arose did the army have the authority to seize he weapons, what would happen to the two guys. It short it was a balls up, in the end the Army flexi cuffed the two guys and took then back to their base and not the Police Station.

Once the Police heard about this they were pissed to say the least, the main reason they were annoyed was that the Army kept the weapons and would not hand them over to them. The two guys well they were friends of someone in some high position and within half an hour of getting to the Army base they were drinking tea and having a good old laugh by all accounts.

Whilst this incident is one small event in the grand scheme it also highlights the simple fact that on the ground these are the issues that the Afghans deal with because it is something they control and each and everyone has there turf. The locals here do not care what is happening in the next province because it has never affected their life.

Everyone knows that each US Unit is only there for around a year and that after they leave another Unit will replace them and try to reinvent the wheel. With new ideas and new plans, again a simple case of taking four steps backwards follows the progress of the current unit.

The incident that best captured the lack of respect the Afghan’s have for the US Forces was etched on hundreds of faces the other morning. The celebration of Eid-ul-Ahza is on the Muslim calendar a major holiday and everyone goes to the Mosque to give thanks and enjoy friends and family, as they were leaving their Mosque to go home for lunch. The US troops decided that they had to go back to the main camp, so loaded up in four MRAP’s they drove through the people tooting horns and waving guns to get out of the way, cursing them for walking on the road and getting in their way.

The look of disgust for these foreign invaders was all to clear to see, but the soldiers in the vehicle I was in were blind to the obvious, a mission had to take place. For all the goodwill they believe that they have created they have once again set themselves back another year in this valley.

People will not forget the disregard for their religious holiday soon and those letters in the night will not seem as threatening.

Listening to Leaves fall

2009-11-19T14:59:00.003+02:00

It was bad enough to see the General goose stepping, as the President inspected the guard of honor, what was even more funny was when he realised he was on the wrong side of the President and had to break step trot behind and commence the goose stepping again.

In yet another complete failure of democracy. President Karzai was today inaugarated for his second 5 year term. In any flourishing democracy the inaugaration ceremony is a time when the people can share the moment, cast your mind back to the scenes in Washington in January, when President Obama took the oath of office.

Today in Kabul, under a crisp winter sun, you could hear the leaves fall to the footpath. The solution to any potential problem here is to close the city and ban cars, to prevent suicide and or car bombs. The ceremony was such a controlled event that even TV cameras were not permitted into the Palace, and as such we were herded into the old Radio Television studios built in the classic Soviet style of the 1950's. the walls adorned with old black and white pictures from what looked like the 50's and 60's.

Technically it was a nightmare, but the staff there did there best with old equipment then told us about there new facility which was a state of the art gift from a foreign country. Why we could not use the new facility is still a mystery. The quality of audio reminded me of watching television with a deaf aunty, whose solution is to turn the sound up fully when there is no sound then to have it tear your ears apart when something actually does happen.

The guests can best be described as a b grade status of nations, the only other leader there was from Pakistan, whilst most of the nations involved in fighting the war here were represented by their Foreign Ministers. The Inaugaration speech was written for the West and the first clapping from the audience came after 13 minutes when Karzai promised a crackdown on corruption, but everyone here knows that words are cheap. Corruption is far more profitable.

As far as an end to the war and foreign troops, five years from now will become the mantra, as the President pledged that Afghanis will take control of all of the nations security by then. As he spoke a car bomb went off in a Southern Province killing two US service members.

As left we tried to gauge the mood on the streets, using the most ineffective method known to poll, known as Vox pops only to be told by the first person we asked as to whether he had watched the ceremony

"No, we had no electricity, I hope to be able to see it later tonight".

In a city that was empty of life, apart from Army and Police on every corner, an historic day has passed and yet failed at the same time. But it was nice to listen to the leaves fall and rustle along the footpath for a change.

A Clock Ticking to Failure?

2009-11-18T14:16:00.003+02:00

“Westerners are occasionally targeted by criminals or Taliban sympathisers, and kidnapping can be a threat. The target of suicide bombers are mostly military convoys, stay far away. Riots happen occasionally and are often accompanied by looting - stay well away from them as authorities will respond with lethal force. Avoid walking after dark, and vary your routes during the day. Kabul is generally considered one of the safer parts of the country, but bombings have increased somewhat since late 2006”

You would at first read consider the quote to have come from a security briefing, or a travel warning issued by a Government source. But no the above actually comes from the inflight magazine of Safi Airways, which flies into Kabul, from Dubai.

Not exactly a happy picture of a destination that is to be home for the next month. Then again it reflects a true picture of just how bad things are getting here in Afghanistan.

This is my third trip this year to Afghanistan and no matter how I try to reflect on the positive side the negatives of the situation here outweigh everything. Yesterday we met with US military and Western Diplomats, for once it would be good if they were to give an honest and truthful account of just how bad it is going here.

Forget the war for one moment and consider the domestic issues. Here you have a population that considers it’s own Police force not as partners in society, but as predators and according to a senior US Military Commander, “People here consider the police as worse than the Taliban”.

The level of corruption starts at the very bottom and extends to the highest levels. In fact whilst filming a story on corruption, we walked away from our vehicles to film in the market. Only to find out that the local police had shaken down our driver for 200 Afghanis or 4 dollars.

Want a passport, pay the bribe. Need hospital treatment then consider a donation as a precursor to treatment. Need to register your car then take extra to the office. According to diplomatic sources the average person here is spending a minimum of 20% of their annual income on paying corrupt officials.

In fact the Government department that is charge of monitoring corruption is regarded as “Inept and Useless”. To placate Western donors the Government has relaunched for a third time a task force to investigate corruption. Laws here do not have any legal status for any official to declare any of his assets. On a previous trip we learnt that govt officials on a salary of approx $600 a month had somehow managed to get assets worth in excess of 20 million dollars. .

You get tired of hearing Diplomats and Military Leaders saying “It’s a start” or “They have good intent”, whenever there is a relaunch of a taskforce here.

There has only been one issue on which everyone has agreed, the clock is ticking down to failure here. Victory will not be measured in Military success but by the willingness of Afghan’s and the West to “settle for an imperfect state” according to sources here.

Certain failure and the complete collapse of society is predicted to be less than twelve months away, unless things change. Eight years in the war here and the reality of expectations is at an all time low.

One reality check for Afghanistan, is that is now ranked 179th out of 180 countries in the world for “Corruption” according to the monitoring group “Transparency International”. The only country that is considered worse is Somalia.

Operation Eastern Resolve Day 2 - Compound Day

2009-08-26T17:32:00.004+03:00

Operation Eastern Resolve 2
Day 2
Dahaneh, Helmand, Afghanistan

It was the flies that woke me up before dawn, lying on the floor of a filthy piece of carpet covered in dirt and broken glass. These were not the type of normal domestic flies, but the ones that seemed intent on landing on the corners of your eyes or the edge of your mouth.

The day had not even begun and the filth of deprivation had begun.

You become so exhausted that any gunfire outgoing from the roof of the compound does raise anymore of a thought than I must film some more of that later.

There is no cup of coffee, no breakfast and for a toilet, go and relieve yourself on that old car tire in the corner of the compound. The concept of even changing clothes is not on the cards, I had bought on extra t-shirt and a pair of trousers but decided to save them, as there had been no talk at all about when we would be able to get out, as this was only the morning of day 2 of the Operation. So I wanted to save them for a future day.

Perhaps if there was one luxury I could point too, was that there was a well. Yep a plain old fashioned, been around for two thousand years type of well, hole in the ground, bucket on a pulley, lower it and lift it and you have water.

Water that was actually cool and you could wash in, as for drinking it. Well no one tried, as there was only one WAG room and hundreds of Marines.

Morning is often a time for reflection; everyone after the adrenaline of yesterday’s firefight was flat. Those who could not claim that had a shot a Taliban were jealous of those who had, and those who had been on the trigger on the roof knew that they had shot a lot of rounds into mud brick walls but would not admit it.

The greatest damage to the Taliban the previous day had come from the sky, via a large J Dam bomb. One enormous explosion but given the situation in the village no one had been out to try and assess the number of Taliban that had actually been killed. Even when they did get out no traces of bodies were ever found or reported on, numbers were always so vague and variable that I did not bother to write down them. The estimated claim for the first day had been according to Operations Commander Captain Zachary Martin had been “at least a dozen Taliban have been killed”.

Logic would have it that any operation in the heat, given that it would rise into the high 120’s within hours, should logically take place earl in the morning or later in the afternoon. But enter the ANA (Afghan National Army) of which I wrote about in the entry “Rambo’s Pink Mirror”. The ANA would not be able to get ready before 11:30am and thus the mission to search every compound in the village would take place during the hottest period of the day.

The Marines privately would not hold back in their stinging criticism’s and complaints about the performance of this ANA unit, turn a camera on and ask a question and it was as if they discussing a completely different army.

This mission was dangerous by any definition, apart from the threat of having your legs blown off by an IED or shot from the hills around the village as you tried to run across fields between compounds. A third threat was that we would be going out and trying to get the ANA to enter the compounds and conduct the searches for the Taliban.

To win the hearts and minds of the residents of Dahaneh, well those who had remained after the first day, during which they had been bombed, strafed from Apache helicopters, had more ammunition fired within their homes than in history.

It was considered politically correct for the ANA to enter and search the Compounds, putting an “Afghan Face” on the operation, whilst the US Marines would provide security outside.

The Marines were ready to start at 11:30 and standing in the sun slowly cooking inside our body armor and Kevlar helmets, we waited and waited for the ANA to get ready. They had no desire to leave the shade and start anything.

The operation was divided into 2 patrols, and Greg and I were with the second patrol. As the first team left they were greeted with gunfire and from behind the walls of the compound it was not a nice sound to hear.

Finally after getting the half a dozen ANA assigned to our patrol to get into formation we too walked out and made for the first compound. As the gunfire began around us, you just kept low and kept moving searching for a wall to provide shelter. The Marines maintained tight formation, the ANA for their part did not have a clue and it was not unusual to hear a Marine screaming at an ANA soldier to stop pointing his weapon at a Marine. The wording of these pleas soon descended into out and out swearing, which mattered little to the rag tag fighters.

The Marines would kick or blow in a door and stand back; the ANA would then enter and find the first piece of shade and somewhere to sit down. We would wait a few minutes them in frustration enter and try to get them to search. It was repeated time after time.

The heat was now at its zenith and every movement was becoming soul destroying. Each run across the open drained me to the point of exhaustion. After one sprint the Marine medic with us dropped to the ground and vomited everything in his stomach up, losing any precious liquid in his body.

Two hours into the search and I was finished, my body was just closing down in the heat. I had stopped sweating and my skin was dry, I had trouble even focusing my eyes and leaning against a wall, I realized that heatstroke was rapidly overcoming me.
I had the video and material we needed and after the patrol returned to the sanctuary of the compound I collapsed. Removing my body armor my t-shirt crusted in sweat and salt I knew that to go back out would have only endangered my own life and potentially those of the Marines if I collapsed.

Drinking water hot enough to make coffee in, is no cure and I dropped for half an hour,

The patrol went back out for a few more hours, and the ANA became so ineffective that the Marines took on all responsibilities including searches.

We spent the remainder of the afternoon on the roof watching attempts to bomb the hills were the Taliban had positions, editing material and doing a live shot from the compound.

The mission “Operation Eastern Resolve 2” had perhaps accomplished its goal to drive the Taliban out of the village, but it seemed that little had been achieved. And if anything it was becoming bogged down. Observing the Captain and XO of Golf Company locked in a conversation it was apparent that even the Generals back at the Marines HQ at Camp Leatherneck were questioning just what had been achieved in two days of fighting given the new directives of how to fight this war.

We heard word that a convoy was going back to FOB Now Zad that night and that it could be the last one for three day, given we had to get back to Kabul for the Elections. We made the decision to leave Dahaneh; the kinetic fighting was all but over.

Lying on a steel grate for a bed and a water bottle for a pillow, I looked up at an amazing sky of stars and thought long and hard about the previous two days. There were few positive thoughts that evening.

I never question the attitude of the fighting Marine, for they are each and everyone of them are heroes fighting as they are directed.

The problem is that this war, after eight years has if anything gotten worse and to which a solution seems further away. And those in charge truly have no clear cohesive strategy to bring it to an end, all we have to look forward too in the coming months and years, are more reports of young brave men being injured and dying.

Fire in The Hold

2009-08-21T17:56:00.008+03:00

Operation Eastern Resolve 2
Dahaneh, Helmand Province, Afghanistan

Ten km’s (6 miles) from FOB (Forward Operating Base) Now Zad lays the village of Dahaneh. To get there you must enter thru what is know as Devil’s Pass, according to the Marines of Golf Company, Alexander the Great, the British of a 100 years ago and the Russian’s thirty years ago had been defeated trying to enter the “Devil’s Pass”.

However we did not have the heart to tell them that despite exhaustive research, there has been no record of any of the above armies ever mentioning “Devils Pass”.

The objective of the mission was to enter and control the village of Dahaneh, where no form of Government or law had existed for years and was in affect in the control of the Taliban. Secure the village, eliminate the Taliban threat and enable free and fair elections to take place. Given that the good residents of Dahaneh have never voted before in history and have probably never felt the need too. The village Shura and Jirga system had served them well for centuries, only the Taliban were causing problems for the locals.

Thus the powers to be that run this war decided that Dahaneh was a critical lynch pin in the “Surge” and close to 500 US Marines and 20 or so ANA (Afghan National Army) were to establish democracy, law and order, build an Outpost, win hearts and minds and kill as many Taliban as possible all in time for the Election.

August 12th 2009, 2 am FOB Now Zad.

The mission was already running late before we had even started, the reason was that the ANA were running late and were not ready. Under a waning moon Greg Palkot and I stood and waited frustrated by the fact that we were assigned to the last vehicle in convoy, a 7 ton truck that was also carrying the ANA. Which given there track record meant that the chances of us seeing kinetic action and the assault were greatly diminished?

If I heard one more cliché speech that included lines like “ A watershed moment or a critical point in time” I would of vomited. Standing in the dark a Marine to hide his nerves stood on a truck and sang Neil Diamond songs as if he were auditioning American Idol.

Eventually the ANA came to the Convey rendezvous point with about as much interest for this mission as one has going for a root canal treatment at the dentist. In the event of trouble or actually running into Taliban I had no doubt that these troops would have been totally ineffective and more of a danger to us than the Taliban.

With the Commanders stretcher safely on the truck and a box of RPG’s to clog the benches so that they could not get out the convoy, we began the very slow and painful trip to Devils Pass.

The frustration of being at the back of a convey for a cameraman trying to cover war is dreadful, as I commented to Greg as we approached we might as well be doing radio for what I could see thru the lens.

Dawn broke as we entered the pass and the sound of gunfire suddenly increased dramatically, there was a lot going down as the first Marines had gone in by chopper under darkness and where coming under stiff resistance. With each 100 yards closer to the village the sound of gunfire reverberated around the truck, at least one good thing was that the ANA never bought their weapons up into any offensive posture and the risk for us of being accidentally shot was negated.

As we entered the village outskirts it became apparent that things were spinning wildly and the Taliban resistance was stronger than originally anticipated and waves of gunfire swept around us from the mountains.

Villagers were seen fleeing from compounds as more bullets cracked from heavy guns and recoilless rifles. A RPG went screaming between two Marine MRAP's and exploded on the hill behind us. The compound of the base of operations that the Marines had set up in was under serious attack and from a hundred yards away I stood in the back of the 7-ton truck and filmed Marines ducking and running as the Taliban bullets kicked up dust around their feet.

The worst thing is that you realize in a few minutes we would both be having to do the run ourselves from truck to compound, not a happy thought as I could see from my viewfinder what was going down.

On the rooftop a line of Marines could be seen and the noise from the gunfire echoed around the valley and village. I needed to get there and get the action as soon as possible, the smell of cordite is a lure to a cameraman that is hard to avoid. And knowing that it is safer to be at the front rather than stuck in a truck exposed also weighed on my mind.

When it came time to disembark, my mind switched off from the scenes I had been filming minutes before and it was a fast crouching weaving run across the 30 yards to the sanctuary of the compound.

“Where is the rooftop?” was my first question panting and dripping from sweat. Greg was to get the equipment into the compound I was to get to the roof and start filming. Climbing thru a hole blown between compound walls I raced thru the building and up onto the roof.

8 Marines were stationed behind a three-foot wall on the roof; the floor of the roof was littered with spent ammunition. And every few seconds another volley was spewed into the village. Keeping low I dashed across the roof to the wall and took cover next to the Marines. Bathed in sweat and dirt they looked happy this was the action that every one of them craved.

One Marine stood up with binoculars exposed and started calling directions for fire, at that moment a Taliban bullet hit the wall inches from him and flew up, missing him by inches. Another volley from there machine guns bought a few minutes of silence from the Taliban.

And so for the next hour or so it was volley, counter volley. I crawled up and down the line trying to anticipate the salvo. Greg joined me on the roof next to the wall; keeping low we filmed a couple of on cameras and talked with the Marines as they improvised ways of trying to keep their ammunition out of the dirt.

By now the sun was a furnace above us, and Marines poured water down there backs trying to keep cool, none of them wanted to be relieved as this was were the action was going down. I realized that soon Greg and I would start getting heatstroke if we did not get off the roof soon and crouching low we ran to the stairwell and down.

It was now past noon and I needed to get the footage to New York, the incredible thing is that with todays technology we carry a small satellite dish about the size of a briefcase that gives us a direct uplink and hooked up to a computer, I can edit, compress and send the files direct to New York.

The room we found in the compound had been stormed earlier and the dirt floor was covered in broken glass, window frames hang loosely, old rags and a frayed piece of rug were the only things in the room. And old tin box became my workspace out of the wreckage that existed.

First footage sent in and a live shot from the safety of the garden outside, every few minutes another volley of gunfire echoed around, to a bizarre extent you can become immune to the noise, as if it were just the norm.

The next phase for us was to edit a feature length piece for the Evening Primetime broadcast, and sitting in the shell of the room we were piecing together a spot, when all of a sudden there was a loud scream around the compound.

“Fire in the Hold”

What the f…! . Every single person suddenly ducks down into a fetal position and puts their fingers in their ears. You close your eyes not sure of what are about to happen.

Boom !!!!

A explosion blasts thru every single nerve in your body, it shakes every organ and the room simply disappeared in a barrage of dirt, dust, rubble and even pieces of window frame exploded and shattered around us. The computer was blown almost to the ground and the dish outside was now in a new position.

A wall had been blasted to allow more movement round the compound.

Picking ourselves back up Greg took a photo of the aftermath.

You cannot dwell on what has happened, the explosion had blown the computer around so much that I lost half the work I had done and had to start again. Brushing the debris off it. I started again. Five minutes later…

“Fire in the Hold,” screamed from room to room. Grasping a bit of rag I covered what I could in the few seconds. Computer on the ground this time. Running for the door we ducked down and covering our ears waited for the explosion again.

Kaboom !!!!

The building shook around us as dirt and dust once again engulfed us. Like Pig Pen from a Peanuts cartoon we stood up and looked back into our room half expecting that everything would have been destroyed.

But as the dust cleared the computer and camera gear came into sight, looking the worse for wear yet still working. Daylight was fading fast and I told Greg “ Forget the next live shot to New York”, we were basically trying to stay alive.

With no power the computer and little satellite transmitter were running on battery and it was a race against time. As I started the file transfer to New York the computer low battery warning came on, as did the satellite battery. It was a race against time and as darkness fell the story made it to New York, and a minute later the sat dish went dead.

As we lay down amongst the rubble and broken glass for the night, drinking a hot bottle of water, the gunfire continued from the roof above us. Exhaustion swept over us and in clothes crusted with salt from sweat I slipped into a sleep on the floor. Sharing the space with a company of young Marines we all had just enough room to stretch out.

Dawn was a few hours away and for a few brief hours we both slept. Tomorrow we knew was when we would begin foot patrols around the village to clear out the Taliban compound by compound.

Rambo's Pink Mirror

2009-08-19T21:08:00.002+03:00

Everyone has to be diplomatic whenever they raise the issue of the ANA (Afghanistan’s National Army). To quote correspondent Greg Palkot “ they are a work in progress ”.

Military leaders whenever asked about how the ANA perform seem to come up with metaphors that make this rag tag collection of “now you see them now you don’t weekend warriors” to be the 300 Spartans ready to take on the global struggle of counter terrorism single handed.

Even Company Commanders have to publicly praise their performance with gritted teeth, as it is the politically correct thing to do. When in doubt anyone tries to draw comparisons between Afghanistan and Iraq, the trouble is that this is a ridiculous contrast that even a 5th grader can understand.

Afghanistan has population of around 32 million people is 50 percent larger than Iraq, and has a combined Military and Police force of approx 220,000. Iraq; smaller population 28 million, yet it has now close to 600,000 troops in its various branches of service. In 2007 Iraq’s own Security Forces grew by a staggering 100,000 members in one year, this is why the “Surge” was so successful.

After nearly 8 years, Afghanistan’s Military is believed to have over 130,000 members according to various reports, but you would have to be an eternal optimist to actually believe this number is accurate. For no one wants to offend or rock the sensitive political correct types, who are trying to talk up the success of a continuing failing project, which has cost billions of dollars, and every six months or so a new plan is drawn up at a substantial cost to try and solve the issue.

If a basic drug test was done on the members of the ANA, it is estimated that 85% would fail straight up.

On the recent US Marine Operation, in Dahaneh in Helmand I had the opportunity to observe the ANA again in operation. Marines would literally be screaming at them to stop aiming there weapons at US forces. They were considered so completely ineffective that when the Marines were setting up defensive positions, the ANA were completely ignored, as they could not be trusted to obey simple instructions.

One key objective was a search compound by compound of the village to rout out any Taliban; the mission had the ANA taking the lead and entering the compounds so as to put an Afghan face to the operation. There own main objective was to enter a compound find any available shady spot, sit down and relax. Whilst US Marines stood in the heat and sun protecting them, time and time again after a few minutes we would enter the compounds and find them lazing around with absolutely no interest in the mission. After a few hours the Marine Lt. in charge of the squad gave up on them and had his own troops do the searches. The only thing the ANA wanted to do was go back to the base, as they were “too tired”.

The ANA members on this mission had absolutely zero apparent interest in being they’re trying to win the hearts and minds of their own people.

When in the heat of the Compound Objective, I only managed to get two reasonable shots of the ANA in action, the first was they trying to kick a door to a compound in, and the door did not budge.

The second was of a kid soldier barely looking sixteen years old who somehow was a member of the ANA, we nicknamed him Rambo, because like many here, they like to strap ammunition around themselves in a bandoleer fashion from a spaghetti western. As he took up a watch position with a gun as big as himself, without the slightest care in the world or concern for the bullets coming from the Taliban in the mountains above, he took out a small pink plastic mirror and for the next two minutes preened and checked his hair. Not once did he look around the battlefield, his hair was far more important.

It is easy to be cynical and there is no doubt that some elements of the Afghanistan Army are trying, but from what I have seen and heard they are truly a work in progress and the timeline for there success is not promising.

River City

2009-08-18T20:25:00.004+03:00

Forward Operating Base: Now Zad
Northern Helmand Province
Afghanistan

At all bases the Marines operate in there is an expression they use “River City” to describe what happens when a Marine is killed or injured. All contact with the outside world ceases to be available all phone lines and Internet connections are cut until the next of kin are notified.

At Forward Operating Base Now Zad, it is almost the norm, rather than the exception. Life continues for the Marines, another day passes and it is one day closer to going home. The majority of the Marines I talked with “going home,” meant safe and still intact, whilst they all grieve for fallen comrades there is also an acceptance that what they do entails risk.

Whilst they may be Rambo one minute, the next minute reflection replaces reality. When we arrived at Now Zad, 2/3 Marines Golf Company had already lost 2 Marines and a further 7 had been wounded in action, including 3 double amputations. All had been killed or injured as a result of IED’s. Any foot patrol was forbidden as the risk was to high to quote Captain Martin of Golf Company, “We will not walk in the area”.

Now Zad is a ghost town, not a soul lives there, or has done for the past couple of years, where once approx 15,000 Afghans once lived, not a soul is there. The British and Estonians have held ground there and the Marines are now on their third rotation there. With a casual ease Marines would point to a spot 100 yards away and say there is a high possibility that the Taliban are there now and watching us. What separates the two is often just a minefield of IED’s. They are so randomly set and spread out that even the Taliban to a degree now will not enter certain areas.

And so in temperatures that destroy any remaining part of your soul, a stand off exists in Now Zad. As if it was the 1st World War, a no mans land of death separates the adversaries. The only thing that moves between the two sides apart from bullets, mortars and rockets are the wasps. For some reason Now Zad has a plague of them. Any water or liquid and you are surrounded by them, and for someone like me who has a certified terror of bee’s let alone wasps, this was no happy place.

Showers and the basic laundry facility was closed between 11am and 2 pm, not to conserve water but to minimize wasp attacks. Hesco barriers and concrete walls may stop Taliban attacks but not wasps.

Unlike large bases back at Leatherneck and Bastion or even in the capital Kabul, FOB Now Zad has no luxuries, most rooms are plywood boxes with no air conditioning, and the temperature inside the rooms can easily reach 42 degrees Celsius close to 108 degrees Fahrenheit. There is no dining facilty for meals apart from some netting on poles, two meals a day are served out of trays, miss the meal time and it is MRE’s. I saw the trays of food just lying around in the dust like discarded waste next to a dumpster, no doubt tomorrows meal.

Water is measured in degrees of bath water, and tepid is something you actually crave. There were fridges around, but they were closely guarded secrets and rarely if ever would anyone ever offer Greg and I a cold drink, they were just too precious, I did not begrudge them this as it made me realize how hard it actually is for them. And how pathetically easy Soldiers, Sailors, Marines and Airmen have it at the bigger bases, where 24 hour meals are available and signs on the fridges ask you to limit yourself to two cold cans of soda a meal, but no one ever counts.

And yet not one Marine at FOB Now Zad wanted to be anywhere else but there, at the frontline in the fight against the Taliban. In adversity they become a true “Band of Brothers”, and to be honest you never hear a word of despair or frustration from them.

The only thing they do not like is “River City” because it means one of there own has fallen.

Death and Taxes , plus Wag Bags

2009-08-17T13:24:00.004+03:00

Death and Taxes are the two things in life that we can be sure of, and well there is a natural third. What goes in most go out, and at FOB (Forward Operating Base), in Now Zad Afghanistan, what starts in plastic ends in plastic.

MRE rations come in brown plastic bags, with yet more plastic bags inside that then contain more plastic wrapping different items from a spoon to the salt. The thing about MRE’s is that is like grown up’s baby food, sometimes there is consistency more often not the meal resembles what’s on the label, just do not read the ingredients, to keep meals from spoiling no chemical compound is forgotten.

Eating on this trip is a challenge; not because the meals are bland and monotonous, but the heat makes your appetite just disappear. It is hard enough to keep drinking enough water to stay hydrated and alive.

But nature does take its course and in the middle of the desert with nearly 400 US marines, you simply cannot have everyone defacting wherever they wanted, as sickness would spread fast. Portaloos would be useless as they cannot be emptied and the proverbial taken away and disposed off.

Enter plastic bag Number 2 the “Wag Bag”. WAG naturally is a military acronym for “Waste Alleviating Gel”. Porcelain is a distant memory and a plastic frame greets you as you enter the little room. Open your Wag bag Kit take out of the plastic bag from inside the plastic bag and fit over the frame. Let nature take care of itself, sans fluid.

Take out the plastic WAG and seal it in another zip loc plastic bag and walk up to the drums and deposit the WAG in the drum.

Perhaps one of the least glamorous job for any Private is being assigned to burn the bags, but every evening you would see a couple of Marines pour diesel in the bins and setting fire to the Wag Bags. Not exactly back breaking hard work but a key function on the frontline.

The guys would sit there, talk and occasionally stand up grab the shit stick and poke the bags to complete the “Cycle of Plastic”.

Death and Wag Bags, two facts of life in the War on Terror in the Helmand Desert

Around 8 Hours

2009-08-16T11:30:00.002+03:00

Getting to the Frontline in Afghanistan is not easy; you take what ever you can, whenever you can. Competition amongst all Media agencies whether TV, Print, Stills or Radio is intense. We all want to get there before the others and get the preverbial scoop.

Sitting in the tent at Camp Leatherneck in Helmand Province, South Afghanistan, Correspondent Greg Palkot and I where grouped with 3 members of Associated Press and Radio Reporter from NPR. We had already waited at Kabul Airport for 37 hours trying to get ahead of the rest of the pack only to have had two flights cancelled and had become known as the “Kabul Two” for being stranded there and waiting.

To get forward the usual method is by helicopter, inevitably at some insane hour of the morning like 2am, and without doubt we are generally classified as “Space A” passengers. Meaning that if Space is Available you can get a seat on the bird, if not you are bumped to the next flight, which can be 24 hours later or more.

To get to our FOB (Forward Operating Base) at Now Zad, in Northern Helmand we were told that we might have chance in the next 36 hours, but as we saw other media going to other areas returning to the tent we shared at Camp Leather neck coming back after being bounced time and time again. Greg had an idea, if you cannot fly then what about driving up in a Convoy, the FOB is only sixty miles North of Leatherneck.

Without letting on we managed to find a Supply Convoy heading out that Afternoon (August 6th 2009), a forty one-vehicle log train driving through the “Desert of Death” as the Helmand Desert is called for being one of the most inhospitable places on the planet, carrying everything from ammunition to food and water. It would stretch over 2 km’s long.

It should take no longer than 8 hours was the word from the PAO (Public Affairs Officer) organizing logistics. That’s do able, I agreed with Greg, anything beats sitting around and waiting. And we could also do a story on the Convoy itself.

Cutting the number of bags we were traveling with to seven (Five equipment and Two personal) we were taken to the Convoy staging area and introduced to the guys who were to become relatively close friends in the confines of the MRAP we were to travel in.

Sgt James Mitchell or (Terrets) was the Vehicle Commander, Lance Corporal Chris Lance (Old Man) driving the beast, sharing the gun of the roof were Lance Corporal Raul Lustre from California and (Dr J) Lance Corporal Jaron Hester.

They simply laughed when I asked about the 8 hour drive, “Man the record for this trip is 17 hours, the longest trip 53 hours” replied the Sarge. Something you should know is that we expect to get hit by IED bombs, we have done this convoy four times and only once have we not been hit. “Welcome to the most dangerous trip you can do in the world”. Seatbelts not required but you must wear your body armor at all times, these vehicles are designed to withstand IED blasts but we hoped not to test the theory”.

The Chaplain for the HQ, came and lead the prayers for all traveling, and we loaded up closed the thick armored door behind us, together with 131 Marines we began the trip.

There would be no road traveled we where to make our own new road across the Desert to avoid IED’s as is the normal practice here now. A bulldozer scrapes a path and everyone stays in tracks ahead of them.

“Old Man” finally touched the gas pedal at 3:40pm, it took forty minutes to actually get out of the Base and past the final strand of Razor Wire less than a mile and the sixty to go did not start till the gate.

We approached the main East West Highway and the only two hundred yards of road we would be on. It was considered safe as the Base had “eyes” on this stretch. Greg and I had actually driven on this road back in May 2001, when the Taliban were in power, we had simply hired a couple of taxi’s and driven from Heart to Kandahar, with no security or for that matter concerns about safety.

Before the second hour was up we stopped, not for an IED but simply a vehicle had broken down, not one but three trucks were in trouble. Thirty minutes later we rolled forward 50 meters and stopped again a fourth vehicle now had a problem, then a fifth.

As the last light faded, we had covered less than 300m in two hours. I started to question our decision to convoy and began to plot just how long this could take, had we made a bad choice.

5 hours after leaving the Base and we could still see the lights clearly, things were not going well and there was no turning back, only the tracks of the vehicle ahead in the sand.

Just before Midnight the convoy halted to refuel, the convoy travels with its own gas tanker. And the lights of the Base were still on the horizon, nearly eight hours after leaving

There is only so much room and so many positions you can try to get comfortable in, imaging two economy class seats facing each other with even less legroom than a cheap charter plane crams in, and that is your world, your body armor plates dig into your back making sleep near impossible, two minutes here five minutes there, the next bump wakes you as we tumble into each other. At times it became a Pilates Stretching class as you try to find that extra inch to stretch out a cramping muscle.

Lance Corporal Lustre, 19 from California, joined the Marines not because of 9/11 he vaguely remembers being at school and watching the aftermath on TV in the hall, but because he wanted to “Make a difference”. President Reagan once commented, “Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they had made a difference, Marines don’t have that problem”. And that’s why he joined, his Girlfriend and Parents are not excited about him being here in Afghanistan, however was he excited about being here, he answered “Yes”.

We were yet to enter what the Marines called “Hell Pass” and the beginning of Taliban controlled territory, over the radio you could hear muffled messages from the Intelligence guys warning of trouble looming.

Twelve hours into the trip, we had stopped asking how far or how much further, first light was coming, we had not eaten since Lunch the day before, it is too hard to digest when every 15 seconds or so you go over another bone jolting bump. Conversations in the vehicle became less and less, exhaustion was setting in. Boredom a fact of life as was my body armor chaffing my skin red.

We had requested to move up in the convoy after dawn as there is only so much video you can shoot from the back. And after 16 hours we bade farewell to the guys and moved into “Vic 2” the second vehicle after the clearance team in the convoy.

I could now stand up through the exit hatch at the back and see why we had taken so long to get such little distance. We were know approaching the most feared part of the trip for the convoy the “Wadi Zone”. Dried river and creek beds where the Taliban favored planting IED’s the previous attacks had all taken part in this area.

The armored bulldozer with almost trepidation descended into the first of the Wadi’s plowing a road for us to follow. The theory being that if there is an IED then the front scoop will take the blast. I tried to imagine just what must being going through the drivers mind as you plow ahead and expect to hit a bomb, and then you think the person driving this suicide plough is probably only 19 years old and not yet legal to drink alcohol in States back home.

We crossed without incident and I expected that tension would ease up in the vehicle, but as the Sarge said we were still to cross “IED Wadi” the one we had traversed was simply a tributary of the one they all feared.

Before crossing two guys from Explosives Team swept by hand “IED Wadi” bed with metal detectors, an almost futile gesture now as the Taliban no longer use any metal parts in their homemade bombs to avoid detection. Once they gave the all clear the bulldozer again descended the bank and made a clear path.

Our destination was getting close but 4 more Wadi’s had to be cleared, 18 hours had passed and the lookouts were nervous, children carrying yellow plastic jugs were noted, shepherds with flocks of goats were potential Taliban lookouts. Anyone moving at more than a slow shuffle in the late morning heat haze was a suspect.

The final miles had become a struggle against exhaustion and nervous tension. Locked in a metal box the air conditioning battled the extremes of the approaching noonday sun. But at least we were moving closer by the hour.

We entered the safe confines of FOB Now Zad after twenty hours; given the delays at the start the mood of the Marines as we all climbed out was that of relief. For Greg and I we looked at each other and wondered just what planet we were on. Moon dust or “Afghan Snow” a fine powder was six inches deep and the temperature was in the 120’s degree Fahrenheit. We had beaten the competition up, and had a good story in the can as we say.

The other Press flew up that night; it took them 18 minutes in a helicopter to cover the same distance it had taken us twenty hours to travel.

When I next buy a lottery ticket, I am going to use the numbers of hours that were predicted, discussed and joked about how long it would take to cover the Desert of Death Convoy.

Return From Embed

2009-08-15T12:42:00.000+03:00

Operation Eastern Resolve 2
Now Zad / Dehanna – Helmand Afghanistan
August 2009

The media calls it “Bang Bang or Action”; the Marines call it “Kinetic”. What it means is that everyone wants War. It is not unusual to be sitting around on a FOB, (Forward Operating Base) and hear a 19-year-old Marine say casually as if talking football that he wants to “Kill someone today”. The officers sitting around do not politically correct him, more than likely they will nod their heads and smile, for that is what Marines on the frontline are trained to do. War is about killing and defeating an enemy.

Now that I am back in the relative safety of Camp Leatherneck in Helmand after nine days being embedded in the North of the Province, reflections become like a stone thrown into a pond the initial splash causes the ripples to extend out and memories are like that, there is no central point but just expanding thoughts on what I have experienced in the last days.

The first thing that strikes you here is the heat, you hear about it, read about it but to live it, is like taking your soul and slowly stripping it down to the point where you simply try to function. A cold bottle of water is something you actually start to dream of, the reality is that you simply accept that you are going to have yet another bottle of hot bath water. I eventually resorted to wetting my sock and putting the bottle in the wet sock and by the process of evaporation the bottle would cool down a few degrees, and that was as good as it would get. One day I drank 11 liters of water and yet only urinated less than half a teacup of dark treacle, drinking water here is not a trendy good for you fad as recommended by a health agency, but a fact of trying to stay alive. Talk with anyone on the frontline and the conversation inevitably turns to urine, colors and amounts are discussed with strangers, stand a piss tube (a plastic PVC pipe into the ground, serves as a urinal, with a piece of gauze over to stop the flies and wasps going down it) and you compare amounts discharged.

This entry will run over a few entries as the story is long and has like a book many chapters, but there is no end, for the war here has no end. More will die, more will be injured.

The “Read Board” of 2/3 Marines newsletter has a 10x8 photo of a colleague who lost both his legs in an IED (Improvised Explosive Device) explosion with two prosthetic limbs learning how to walk again, he looked no older than 20.

They have an expression at the frontline called “River City” whereby in the event of a fellow Marine being killed or injured then all communication with the outside world is severed for them, no phone calls, no Internet. The next of kin must first learn of the casualty from a knock on their front door from an officer and normally a chaplain. When you prepare for any event the first details you give in order are; Surname, Christian name, last four digits of your Social Security Blood type and Religious Preference. The later reflects who will knock on your next of kin’s door.

The War in Afghanistan has become the second longest in US history, after Vietnam. There is no end date, no timetable, just a circle of mistakes and bad policy decisions by leaders, both Political and Military. The average age of an Infantry Marine fighting is between 19 and 20, when 9/11 happened they were 11 or 12 years old not even in High School. Most of the Marines I talked too on this trip cannot remember or recollect where they were when the World Trade Center in New York was attacked.

As most of them say, “ I just want to get some “ action.

Boots and Bare Feet

2009-08-04T14:15:00.003+03:00

Boots and Bare Feet

En route Kandahar Afghanistan on US Air Force C130 Plane

August 3 2009

There is a strong push now to involve the Afghanistan National Army (ANA) in the frontline in the war against the Taliban, and yesterday we Correspondent Greg Palkot and I were flying down to Kandahar, where the ANA was to add to the forces down there.

I add that we were flying down there, because as we were in the air there was according to the loadmaster in the plane a “sustained rocket attack” on Kandahar Airport. In the back there was confusion as the flight dragged on, what was supposed to be an hour and change flight was getting up to two hours. Being strapped into the webbing seats with no window for reference the only sense that we were circling Kandahar was that every ten minutes the sun would beam through the port hole above us.

Finally the word was passed around that we were flying to Bagram Air Base. North of Kabul as the weather in Kabul had deteriorated to the extent that even a Air Force C130 could not land. Landing in Bagram presented another problem, as it is a secure US Military base and the Afghans are not permitted on the base without major security clearances.

An hour later we took off and headed back to Kabul as the winds had dropped. And the ANA who took off in the morning expecting to be deployed out of Kandahar in the South found themselves back in Kabul.

Our adventures were to take on another level.

The initial impression of the ANA deployment is more confusing than logical. Only a third of them had any sort of uniform, the rest dressed in traditional Sharwa kamisa’s and sandals. Looking down the plane it was the image of an army boot and bare feet, that will remain with me.

There were some classic moments in the hours that we spent together, like the fact that a few of the Afghans thought it would be good to get up and standing on the web seats try and look out of the portholes as we actually landed.

Then of course there is the issue of everyone sitting on the plane drinking water to avoid dehydration for a couple of hours. Human nature takes course and on a C130 the toilet facility can only be described as “primitive”. Standing on a platform, wearing body armor and trying to aim into a sucking sinkhole is not easy.

The first Afghan to come back was more shocked than anything else as the polite way here is to squat with modesty, not standing behind a screen with fifty plus people watching you.
By the time we had landed at Bagram, there were many crossed legs, and there was a polite but urgent trot to the edge of the flight line, where in accordance with modest tradition. Nature could be attended to, even strict security and guidelines can be transgressed the male to male knowledge that when a man has to go, he has to go.

In Afghanistan it is no different.

Update - we were meant to get a flight down South to Helmand this morning and billeted overnight in the Transit barracks. Kabul then experienced its first serious rocket/mortar attack in the lead up to the Elections, with 8 rockets landing in the city close to the airport. Result airport closes, after getting up at 5am, we were only to have our flight cancelled as we walked down the terminal stairs to the plane. Next plane 11:40pm, only a 14 hour wait, and given our penchance for attracting rockets in the last twenty four hours, lets see what the gremlins of the air have for us.

Cheese & Processed Meat

2009-08-02T16:08:00.001+03:00

Kabul
Sunday August 2nd 2009

With very hour passing we are getting closer to embed and the fears that it brings with it. You cannot hide from your own soul and the fear that perhaps something bad will happen, July has been the worst month for casualties of troops here, the scary statistics are the ones that do not make headlines the injuries and number of amputations. The Military Hospital at Camp Bastion in Helmand has had to call in extra Surgeons to deal with the sheer number of victims being bought in. The call for more doctors and surgeons seems to be ignored, as headlines continue to concentrate on the call for more troops.

I have written previously about nerves before going to the frontline, lucky omens and charms I carry. Am I nervous, the simple answer is yes. It is going to be tough and dangerous, each trip to Afghanistan seems to get that little bit more tense.

Packed cheese and canned processed meat for sandwiches for breakfast tomorrow, as they say its game time.

Pssst ... You wanna buy guns

2009-08-01T15:15:00.003+03:00

Saturday Afternoon Kabul

Not exactly Mall cruising, but picking up some last minute supplies for the embed. Correspondent Greg Palkot needed some knee guards, myself simply another T Shirt, hopefully without any death head logos embalazzened on the back (which is quite common surprisingly with any t shirt bought in a war ravaged nation, with tens of thousands of Foreign Troops deployed here).

Conor Powell, the Fox News based Correspondent here took us down to the "Bagram Store". Bagram is the enormous Air Base just North of Kabul, and in fact was also used by the Russians during their very succesful campaign here twenty years ago.

The Bagram Store effectively finds what drops off the back of trucks heading to the base, and or somehow buys the rejects and overflow from Army Surplus Stores globally.
Where else can you easily find a Security Pass Holder from an Air Base in Tashkent.
The guys in the store were nice and friendly and more than willing to show us anything we took fancy to, and given that nothing has a price tag, customer service tends to be very attentive.

One of the store salesman struck up a conversation, wherein he told me that he had worked as a translator for NHK TV (Japan) and other Western Media. This is actually quite common here, and like all young men he seemed to be sizing me up to see if there was any potential for work.
Retail therapy completed we left the store. I had just walked out the door when the translator came out and passed a note into my hand, casually as if you were tipping someone. I fully expected it to be a name and telephone number in case we wanted a translator.

I took a couple of steps opened the note and lets say it wasn't call me if you need me note.

"AK weapons, M16 weapons and pistols"

Afghanistan a nation were shopping is... well never dull

Mal
Kabul

Taliban Set to disrupt Elections in Afghanistan

2009-08-01T10:34:00.003+03:00

Have started writing for the Fox News Channel website - have done three stories so far including this one -

http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/07/31/taliban-vows-to-disrupt-elections/

More to come , currently in Kabul about to embed to Helmand for ten tough days

Mal
Kabul

Dubai

2009-07-28T16:57:00.002+03:00

Lay day in Dubai , arrived at around 2am last night, up at 3am tomorrow morning for the flight into Afghanistan . A day to compress and get ready for the weeks ahead , hope to be embedded with the US Marines in Helmand by the weekend. A yes nerves are tense

Catching Up

2009-07-17T15:23:00.002+03:00

Apologies for no posts for a long time, many things happening. Mainly working on Pirate Specials in last few months. Some stories to tell , so will try and write something soon.
Heading to Afghanistan in ten days , will be trying to update on the twitter system . More details to follow

Pirates of the Gulf

2009-04-10T17:56:00.000+03:00

Instant Expert

En route to Mombassa, Kenya.

Assignment – Somali Pirates take an American Vessel. April 8 2009.

Now the assumption is that all of us at all the time are instant experts on everything known to mankind (and or sisterhood kind, if you want to be PC). And often I find myself in a situation where to all honesty I know nothing about.

I have not cared about, worried about or even thought about Somali Pirate’s. In fact the last time I even remember thinking about Pirates was watching “Pirates of the Caribbean”. In which everything ends well and we are left with the glowing image of Captain Jack, being a scoundrel but a nice hero.

Flash-forward to reality, Somali Pirates seize yet another ship…. Oops this one is American flagged and the crew is all American. As opposed to being some foreign vessel crewed by Filipinos with a Greek Captain. Now we have breaking news.

The cold hard fact is as I fly in that when you commence an assignment we are so often totally devoid of knowledge of the story, that you could change names and places and nothing would really change.

However having read twenty articles on Somali Piracy written in the last year, including think tank reports the reality is that I have become an instant expert and will happily discuss any issue regarding piracy around Somali in the last decade.

It is not rocket science to become informed on a subject, but so often people have a preconceived opinion that they never bother to actually take the time to read up on an issue. It does not worry me that before I got on the plane this morning I knew nothing about the background to the assignment I am heading too, the reality is that now I am an instant expert.

For example –

The best method of repelling Pirates is not to throw tomatoes at them as they try to board as one crew did last year to no avail.

If you are taken hostage, relax the kidnappers are more likely to take you out to dinner at a new restaurant in town that has opened as a result of business improving due to piracy.

If you are a pirate and are captured in 99% of the cases the navy that captures you and takes you prisoner will simply take you back home and land you on a beach close by as they have no international law to prosecute you by and also the warships have no prison facilities so it is easier and quicker just to get rid of you.

When the Islamic Party took control of Somalia a year or so ago, it should be noted that piracy fell to 0%, they simply did not allow it. So lets forget the terrorists are controlling the pirates. When the Islamic Courts Union fell, piracy returned immediately.

The good news for Somali is that it is no longer considered a “Failed State”; the international consensus is that it is now a “Post Failed State”.

In the Northern area of Somalia, “Puntland” which accesses the Gulf of Aden, piracy has injected $35 million dollars into the local economy in the last year, not bad for a country whereby half the nation needs food aid.

The area involved with the Somali Pirates extends over 1.1 million square miles of sea; it takes fifteen minutes from a vessel seeing a pirate to being over run and captured. The most elaborate technical gizmos are useless against pirates, the best defense is to simply look out of the windows of the bridge and have eyes on the sea.

There have been no reports of rival pirate gangs (of which the estimate is ten gangs with 1000 members total) ever fighting each other; they just only care about money.

How do Somali Pirates get better? “Practice, practice, practice.”

Chasing Pirates with International Forces is as one serving Italian Officer notes is - “going after them in a 485ft long destroyer bristling with surface to air missiles and torpedoes, is like going after someone on a bicycle with a truck.

It will be interesting to see how the world and especially the US reacts to this issue and whether Islam phobia is bought up as an issue by the right wing commentators, because this is simply a matter of money, nothing else. Pure greed and bling with an AK47 attitude.

Winter of Discontent - Iceland

2009-02-03T20:09:00.003+02:00

The following is an actual quote from the in-flight magazine on Icelandair:
"If you have had enough of the Lamb Testicles (Can one ever get enough) "
Now I thought Reykjavik Iceland would be a destination of Vikings and Fisherman, not frustrated contestants of "Fear Factor"

Try as we might of the next few days to see if this delicacy existed it was to prove allusive, although the Whale burger was mighty fine and did not taste like chicken.

What is it about Iceland that a nation of 300,000 people in an area smaller than Kentucky, has the oldest democratic Parliament in the world, (apparently in 930 some Viking decided democracy would be a fun experiment, in lieu of plunder and war and choose this island in the middle of the North Atlantic and to this day the Althing as they call there parliament exists).

The trouble is that a few years ago, a few modern Vikings in Armani suits decided to continue their heritage and launched global raids on financial institutions, everyone thought this was good and money poured into Iceland as it never had before, then as we all know, someone just had to ask some questions and all of a sudden the world discovered that the foreign exposure of Icelandic Banks was 10x the countries GDP.

Now it does not take a Rocket Scientist, let alone an Economist to figure out that they were in deep trouble.

The Stock Market dropped 94%, every Bank was nationalised, and the value of the local currency halved and the 3 month unemployment safety net is due to expire in a month. Add to this that in the good times every Icelander took out large loans to buy a new SUV or Mercedes and book overseas holidays, of course all loans were taken in foreign currencies and now everyone is about to default. End result the normally placid Icelander's took to the streets the other week, banged saucepans and threw rocks at the Parliament. Police came along bit of violence and the Government collapsed. The first elected administration in the world falls to the Economic crisis.

So with Correspondent Greg Palkot and Producer Tadek Markowski we arrived in Reykjavik to look at what happened and could this become a domino effect, as the Winter of Discontent spreads across Europe.

Now the first thing we should of realised in the worlds most Northern Capital city is that it does not get light enough to film before 11am , we found this out sitting around at breakfast at 8:30.

So at this point we decided to adapt the Icelandic approach to values, as everyone here can, change a tire, strip an engine, ride a horse, sail a boat, dress a sheep, cure a salmon and maintain an open mind about elves. If they can do this then we can film in the dark. It should also be pointed out that here "elves have to be asked before a new road is built" who and how the authorities ask was never answered.

So we ventured out onto the streets as the snow started to fall, locals also explained that they do not have four seasons here, only two: Bright and Dark. Which seemed very apt given that 9:30 it was still pitch black?

The shoot went well and before dark returned we were back in the hotel, editing a package for Special Report.

Thursday had been planned for Live Shots for the News Channel and the Business Channel. We had booked a hotel balcony overlooking Parliament Square; Hi Speed Internet had been established so that we communicate to New York. The only problem was that when we came to stream live. Nothing happened, Transmission could not see us, and the curse of the firewall was upon us. Ok Plan B swings into action.

Take the portable satellite dish down into the main square and find the bird in the sky. Never a problem from Afghanistan to Iraq it is a fairly routine matter of locking onto the bird. BUT, I pointed here, I pointed there I even pointed down to the ground and nothing, absolute silence. Back to the hotel and check if there were any provider issues as to why the satellite might not be found. And there on the main page of the provider a map showing temporary blacked out areas in the worlds as they realigned their satellites. A small black band was revealed affecting 3 countries on the entire planet – Greenland, Ireland and you guessed it "Iceland".

Strike 2 this was looking like a bad day was going to get worse technically speaking. However Greg found a hotel around the corner near the square and after a fast test using the camera built into the camera we had a link with New York established.

Thus from a nation that has produced 3 Miss Worlds, 1 Nobel Laureate, countless Worlds Strongest men and list amongst their greatest sporting achievements a Silver Medal for Handball (no one remembers who won the Gold) , we spent the day transmitting from a very cold balcony.

Although we never got to find the lamb testicles, there was a business that never lacked for hungry diners. A small hot dog stall that has been in business for 72 years, that according to Norse legend has "The best hot dogs in the Universe" and for the record they just could be.

Red & Blue at 3 am

2008-11-05T05:04:00.000+02:00

The diehards remain, the celebs and want to be celebs down to the E list have left. Perhaps only the true believers will be able to claim that they witnessed history and yet everyone who has left will tell tales of how they were here and watched it. I doubt that half the people here know the difference between the donkey and the elephant and who is blue and who is red.
Speaking of colors Correspondent Greg Palkot and I almost had a heart attack when the embassy map showed the state of New York as red before they changed it to blue , apparently the computers colors everything red first , and then you have to change it.
In the next hour I hope to witness history , perhaps that is why working in the media is magic at times, then again anything is better than two weeks ago in Afghanistan

1am London , 8pm Eastern

2008-11-05T02:59:00.001+02:00

The hard thing about time differences is that over here it is already tomorrow and yet the time on the East Coast is 8pm. And watching various monitors around the embassy you are beseiged by the flashing of figures across screens, we cannot contribute much as there is no reaction to results because they are still to be counted. The mood of the party makes me wish that I had spent more time reading celebrity magazines like Hello as the guest list here grows and given that the locals have not figured out how to turn on the air conditioners correctly. Most of the guests sip white wine and try to network amongst themselves. The map on the wall has only two states colored and the cut outs have finally become somewhat irrelevant as almost everyone has had their photo taken with them. It appears that we will still be here at 3am at least providing those chads are a thing of the past.

Midnight at the Embassy

2008-11-05T01:57:00.001+02:00

London Update Midnight , 7pm Eastern
The official results are still not being called and thus the party continues here in the Embassy spilling over three floors, with Burger King and Subway doing a roaring trade in the basement where we cannot film. The Obama cut out is just about faded with the number of flash bulbs . It is hard to determine a mood as people seem more interested in socialising than watching history unfold and the large projected map on the wall has no figures yet the next hour will be fascinating

Polls Closing

2008-11-05T00:58:00.002+02:00

London 11pm
Party in full swing now , complete with Starbucks coffe man walking around and a lady who must of been paid a lot to dress up as the statue of Liberty. The Mc Cain cut out is a lone figure not suffering from the flashbulbs. Oh and as Iwas walking thru the crowd I thought I had pushed someone so I turned and said sorry, it was the Sarah Pallin cut out .

Countdown to History

2008-11-04T22:54:00.002+02:00

US Embassy
London

Local Time 9 pm , East Coast Time 4 pm

Sitting in the Via Reception room at the US Embassy here in London, is somewhat of a weird place to observe a moment in history , that is likely to happen in the coming hours, The local evening newspapers here in London have all agreed that Barack Obama is likely in the coming hours to become the next President and here in the Reception room there are four cardboard cutouts of the candidates where you can have your photo taken with your favorite so far no one has had a photo taken with Mc Cain or Joe Biden. Obama is the favorite thou Pallin is popular because she is shorter.

We all remember where we were in great moments of history, Man on the Moon, 911 attacks and perhaps tonight the next defining moment a black man becomes President of the USA.

Apart from that we wait till the early hours of the morning here, as we are five hours ahead of New York and it is most likely that we will be here till 4 in the morning.

Meanwhile the Obama cut out remains the most popular and if that is any indication of the cut out exit poll, perhaps the night will not be that long. And history may start a little bit earlier.

Reflections from 36,000ft

2008-10-21T11:10:00.004+02:00

Afghanistan – September & October 2008

It would be easy to say that the war in Afghanistan is simply that a war between good and evil or a matter of faith depending on how you worship. How does one define victory, there will be no peace accord signed or will we watch two sides will try and rebuild there nations as in previous wars.

The cold hard reality is that no one cares about Afghanistan and never will. Afghans did not directly blow up the twin towers on 911. So the question they ask all the time is why are there still foreign troops on their soil. The enemy is there but is not seen.

After nearly a month in Afghanistan, I look back and see nothing positive. The role of the American soldier cannot be questioned each and everyone I met was that of caring. But we did meet soldiers with the look of defeat who openly questioned the effectiveness of the current strategy. The look in his eyes was the best mirror to the current situation there. And that reflection is the look of pointlessness.

Hard cold facts are never pleasant and the reality in Afghanistan is that corruption is pandemic. It is in and at every level of society and this cancer feeds on itself and the more money that is poured into Afghanistan every day, lines the pockets of the corrupt, twenty families now effectively control Afghanistan according to a recent British fact finding mission to Afghanistan.

Fact, you want to become a Police Chief, with a profitable narcotics route through your district - going rate is $150,000 and you get the badge, keep paying those above and take without mercy from those below.

Fact, In Southern Afghanistan, being a farmer, from Lashkar Gar and taking your crop and trying to bring your crop to Kandahar, to sell has become pointless. Police and Bandits set up roadblocks on almost all roads and by paying all the bribes there is no money to be made. So why grow crops when if you grow Opium you will have the protection of the local Warlord who in turn controls the Authorities. The farmer can now feed his family and have safety.

Fact, Statistics were quoted ad nausem to us, complete with power point presentations, which at times are more boring than death by paper cuts. Close to 250 International soldiers have been killed this year, the most since the fall of the Taliban in 2001. Civilian casualties have tripled to more than 4,500. Highways that Generals point out of helicopters at 1000 ft and speak with pride of rebuilding a nation are void of traffic. No one dares to drive on them. Private companies supplying the ISAF forces in the South are reportedly now being known to be paying nearly $4000 for a tanker of water or fuel to get thru and onto the main base at Camp Bastion, of which a quarter of this amount goes to the Taliban.

Telephone companies operating cell networks in rural areas now turn them off in the evenings, at the request of the Taliban, according to an advisor to the Energy Minister four of the nineteen regional electricity companies are run by the Taliban.

It is not that the Afghan in the street wants the Taliban back, but the cause of the Taliban has been helped by the number of civilian deaths in the last year, killed in US air strikes. Operation Enduring Freedom can hardly claim success from the air. Nangahar, Farah and
Azizbad are not household words in the West but in Afghanistan mention these towns and everyone knows the death count of civilians and shares a sense of outrage.

Fact the Taliban will pay a soldier twice the pay he receives in the Afghan Army, fighting for the other side for $180 a month is often considered better than being shot at for $90 a month.

Fact the safest ring tone to have on your phone in Afghanistan is not a top 40 hit, but the Taliban favorite ringtone “Death to the Invader” a reference to foreign troops. Reality TV, forget Afghan Idol, that ran into trouble despite its popularity, a young woman just won a cash prize, a plastic sofa and a trip to Dubai for winning “Koran Idol” whereby contestants recite verses from the Koran in front of a judging panel of mullahs.

Fact The best business in Kabul is to run a security company and get a lucrative contract with a foreign company or aid agency. Thirty-six international security companies have established themselves in Kabul and eleven more are setting up. Cost for license $300,000, and that is the clean figure.

Add to this Afghanistan is facing a drought that has forced the price of wheat up fourfold, you will not see the hunger in Kabul but behind the mud walls in the countryside, women and children will pay the price.

Afghanistan is not a Military victory waiting to happen, the amounts of money flowing into Afghanistan are obscene. The obscenity is what happens when the money gets in country.

I started this trip expecting the dangers of any assignment in a war zone, we were shot at by RPG’s whilst in a helicopter, ran the gauntlet of driving on high profile roads and slept in some pretty average places. Yet after the month it comes down to two images that remain and best sum up the situation that we face in Afghanistan.

One the look on the face of a Marine who was heading home after a six month deployment in Helmand, we met him back in April on our last trip. They had expected the operation to last four to six days, six months later a dejected marine sat on the bench at Bagram Air Base and his eyes told the story of a unit that had been betrayed.

The second image a close up of a face of an Afghani Army Soldier and the way a shaft of light light up his hand on his weapon. His fear was that of probably his first helicopter ride and not of an enemy unseen.

I praise each and every person from the Military that is over in Afghanistan, for they believe in a cause that is directed by an Administration that was attacked back on that fateful day in 2001. Every soldier should be proud of what they have achieved, the issue is that very little has been achieved for the average Afghan and that is what needs to change.

OXYPHENBUTAZONE

2008-10-16T08:17:00.007+02:00

In 1985 Lieutenant Commander Waghorn and Lance Corporal Gill played Scrabble for 5 days when trapped in a crevasse in Antarctica. Which begs the obvious question, how do you manage to have a Scrabble board with you when you get trapped in a crevasse in Antarctica?
The same logic cannot apply to the team here in Afghanistan, not only do we have two sets of Travel Scrabble; we also have the Scrabble dictionary. There is an old Military saying that “God curses anyone who does not bring two of an essential piece pf equipment”.

Whilst we have cases of cables, batteries and various cameras (7 in fact, counting all available means of capturing video). We always carry a scrabble set with us, (and the dictionary).

There are times when we have a couple of hours between live shots or simply at the end of the day, when you are sitting around at the end of the world. Walking around kicking rocks gets boring after ten minutes or even worse when we sit around and see who can make the highest pile of rocks by balancing rocks within arm reach.

Thus we strive for the ultimate “QUARTZY” ((164 points) across a triple-word-score square with the Z on a double-letter-score square.) or dream of OXYPHENBUTAZONE, 1778 points formed across three triple-word-score squares, while simultaneously extending seven specific already-played words to form new words.

The actual reality of life on the (tile) road here in Afghanistan, is that between us more arguments are caused by the playing of brilliant words like “MALTY” (adj, resembling malt) onto a triple than “ZINGARA” (n.pl, a female gypsy).

Not that we are competitive but given that we have played by kerosene lantern at our hotel here in Kabul.

Or we sat on the tarmac next to the Afghan Air Forces helicopters freezing to death whilst bemused Afghan’s tried to figure out what the hell these people were doing.

Then there is the story of our Producer Maryam Sepehri, locking her door and closing the curtains, and reading the Scrabble dictionary before a game, whilst I simply try to remember the two letter words by rote.

With a few days on this assignment to go the stakes and tensions are rising, if only I get the letters KIJUZMS tonight and have first turn, then face it Maryam its game over. You may be winning at the moment four games to two and then you did beat me by over one hundred points in one of those games. Dana the official wordsmith of the team, correspondent and editorial expert claims that both Maryam and I cheat, and having consulted the dictionary CHEATY, is not a word unlike MALTY.

What 2 Euros can buy

2008-10-15T17:57:00.004+02:00

There was a choice of two types available under the glass knife counter in the Italian PX store here at the ISAF base at Kabul International Airport. The price difference was two Euros.

Unlike the US military bases in Afghanistan, here at the ISAF base, it is a different world. In so many respects and in attitude, it is like a little European Union and the US Military presence is minimal. We have spent a few days here working with the US Air Force who are training The Kite Flyers (Afghan Air Corps) as I called them the other day.

The commitment to the effort here in Afghanistan of International Forces to actually do anything beyond the wire and barriers is a source of annoyance and frustration. Publicly they cannot say anything critical of these nations. But in private their words are harsh. The base here at the International airport is small and the car park is full of brand new 4x4 SUV’s that have never left the base.

However in the face of adversity, here are some examples of how International troops have embraced their deployment and somehow forgotten what this war is about.

Luke and Orsy have arranged for Salsa lessons for beginner beginning December, twice a week.

There is the tabletop fussball competition beginning soon, and a tribute to Depeche Mode is upcoming. The Beauty Salon is doing a roaring trade and massages are available. Are you the smartest person on the base? well the Dutch have a Trivia Night coming up, then there is the Mini Soccer competition.

The Italian PX store has a range of coffee machines available, and the lack of dress sense they display in the Dining Facility can only make you laugh. Running trainers worn with a full Military uniform seems more than acceptable.

Is the stress too much for the Germans? have no fear in there PX store there are stress balls in the shape of a women’s breast available, to take the tension’s away.

Do you seek “Strength, Flexibility and Relaxation” then sign up for the COMBAT Yoga class, instead of a downward facing dog maybe the upward facing bayonet pose will appeal. Instead of the sound of relaxing Tibetan mantras over running waterfalls, the “Ride of the Valkeryie” will help soothe your spirit.

After all that there is of course the choice of which bar and restaurant you would prefer, Thai, Italian or maybe a cold beer in the “Air Force One Bar and Restaurant”. All troops with the exception of the US forces are free to drink alcohol. If an American is caught drinking then a dishonorable discharge is pending, whilst the Europeans sip chardonnay on the outside tables.

It is not unusual in the evening to see male and female soldiers walking hand in hand around the base, or sitting and looking at each other between a bunch of plastic flowers. Condoms are available readily, (but I should add that they are available in stores on US bases also) there though I think they are used more for keeping dust and dirt out of rifle barrels, well that’s what they say.

It beckons the question of how committed many of the foreign nation’s are to the cause. World leaders like to boast about a coalition and commitment to Afghanistan, the reality is that some countries commit a hand full of troops and then place such caveats on there deployment that the greatest danger they face is a parking ticket on a day to day basis.

Under the glass back at the Italian PX, was a pair of standard metal handcuffs. Plain sturdy and functional cost 7 Euros. Next to them was a pair of Pink Furry Love Handcuffs, a vital piece of Military Equipment in a war zone, cost 9 Euros.

The Kite Runner & Helicopters

2008-10-10T06:27:00.005+02:00

Flying back into Kabul, as the sunset, it was not the brilliant glow of fading golden light in the mountains that held my attention. But the sheer number of brightly colored kites that ducked and dived under the windows of the helicopter.

If you have seen the opening scene from the movie “The Kite Runner” where kites fill the frame from above and below, you will know what I mean. As we came into the city at about 500ft it seemed that the kite runners below were intent on attacking the MI 17 helicopter that we were in filming a story on the newly formed Afghan Air Force.

The MI 17 is no sleek looking Darth Vader designed weapon of death but ha been the stable workhorse of the eastern block for years, it has an elder brother which is a merchant of death the MI 35. But for Afghanistan’s newly formed Air Force the 17 is there workhorse, ideally suited for the altitude and terrain here.

It is bare bones, comfort and electronic sophistication not included. Our US pilot working as a mentor for the training team also mentioned that the rotors go the other way, just like water down a sink in the Southern Hemisphere. Thus if the rotors go the other way all the controls are the other way.

But in the cockpit along with our US mentor was the leading Afghan Pilot who managed to take flying at low levels to a complete new low. The other week in a US Blackhawk in the Eastern Mountains it felt like you could safely touch the ground. In the Afghan version we at one time were crossing mountain passes with five feet to spare. Watching out of the opened portholes yes opened portholes. I felt my date with destiny was rapidly approaching and over the intercom the US pilot was insisting we go higher whilst the Afghan said “No No all is OK”.

I have had enough of helicopters for a long time.

There is a post note to the day and it was when after the first leg we came back from lunch at the base we were visiting. There was a delay in taking off, the crew on inspection found kite string wrapped in the main engine and in the tail rotor and for ten minutes the crew was seen pulling lengths of string from the engines.

No doubt The Kite Runner had run away.

Passion & Sport in Afghanistan

2008-10-07T14:27:00.007+02:00

Karga Lake is as close to a “Lovers Point” as Afghans know, about seven miles outside of the capital Kabul. The now infamous “Vice & Virtue Police” of the Taliban may be a thing of the past, however puritan standards do still remain. Any young couples that wish to drive to the lake are stopped at one of the checkpoints manned by the Police and they are asked if they are married. Failure to verify often means that their parents are called and irate fathers mete out the consequences.

The other reason why the lake is so popular with young men is that there is a restaurant there that sells alcohol, and every young man is seen walking around with a coke can that has had added to it the evil and taboo alcohol. Whilst expensive random breath testing kits are way beyond the budget of the Police here. They have come up with their own version of testing for alcohol. Young men leaving the lake are randomly stopped by the Police on the checkpoints as they leave and have to breath on the Police. The elite nasal senses of these vanguards of virtue can immediately smell alcohol and for a few dollars the young men can excuse themselves from their lack of moral willpower.

We had been up at the lake for a shoot, talking to people about how they perceived life and issues and Kabul. A reputed warlord, who according to a diplomat here is best described as “a hard drinking human rights abuser”, owns the lake and area below the dam wall here lies one of the gems of Kabul.

The “Kabul Golf Course”, 9 holes (18 if you go around twice) opened in the late sixties closed twice for the minor matter of a Soviet Invasion and then during the years of the Taliban, who deemed golf not to be a decreed sport sanctioned by Sharia law.

We drove into the course and found the clubhouse, and the Golf Pro Mr. Afraid Abdul who has been the driving force of maintaining the tradition of golf in what can only be described as the most un golf course in the world. Jailed and beaten by the Russians, jailed and tortured by the Taliban Mr. Afzai Abdul is passionate about golf.

But before we even played a hole there are some facts about this golf course that make it unique in the world. There is not blade of grass anywhere, the greens are well not green in fact but compacted sand and oil mixed together. There is a water hazard somewhere, but there is no water, but if your ball lands in the water hazard you must take a drop shot. If you wish you may bring your own piece of Astroturf and use it for every shot. If you have any concerns about possible landmines on the course, rest assured it is safe, as it has been used for training of de mining teams over the years and completely swept.

There is one set of clubs available and a limited number of golf balls so caddies come in two’s, one to carry the set of clubs and one to run ahead and chase the ball.

Correspondent Dana Lewis confidently drove the first fairway, I was second to tee off and hit the best shot of my life with a wood straight down the fair”dirt”. Maryam Sepehri our Producer looked the epitome of golfing fashion with her Ugh boots,

But knows how to play this silly sport better than the rest of us. Tom our Security Advisor had never played a stroke of golf in his life and upon his first tee shot was dancing like a kid who had won the Willy Wonka Golden Ticket, whilst Akbar our local fixer was just glad to hit the ball.

Golf articles tend to enhance the beauty of any course, but few words are needed to relay the picturesque non-beauty of the Kabul Golf Course. It is an experience that few golfers in the world will ever get to play a round here. And bragging rights go far in a game where you chase a small white ball and ruin a pleasant walk in the late afternoon light of Kabul.

We all made it to the green, sand and oil swept with a rag and for anyone who wants an insight into the speed of the greens, be aggressive as the ball sinks and leaves a deep rut as it inches towards the cup.

Some day’s you do get to experience fun on the road in war zones, and for a couple of hours we lost ourselves in a pastime that no one associates with conflict.

For the record Dana, Maryam and myself double bogeyed, Tom forgot that you had to count and would not tell us his score and Akbar never knew about scoring.

"Thunder Road" Air Assault Mission

2008-10-06T10:44:00.006+02:00

Correspondent Dana Lewis & I have just returned from an embed, with the 101st, the Army Division, made famous by Band of Brothers. Where we did an air assault mission into the mountains of Logar Province in Eastern Afghanistan, known as one of the four doors into Kabul. Here is Dana's blog entry, which is a change from my writing, the view from a new perspective.

Dana's Entry :

I heard the bang.  

We had been on a dawn air assault by the 101st Airborne into Logar province watching soldiers hunt for Taliban militants. There were a few small exchanges of gunfire but for the most part it was quiet as U.S. soldiers backed up the Afghan National army carried out their random checks of homes for weapons and bad guys. It seemed almost to quiet and cameraman Mal James and I even walked down a road by ourselves transiting between American army units. But among the villagers there are always a few bad guys say Commanders.   

The ride into the villages had been exciting and a bit unnerving. Soldiers lined up in squads to board Chinook helos, their twin rotors kicking up huge amounts of gravel and dust.   In the prebrief assault plan I was told the insurgents often fire rocket-propelled grenades at the big birds full of soldiers.

 And in another war zone, Iraq I covered the downing of a Chinook by RPG fire which claimed the lives of more than two dozen soldiers.    When the word came to move we almost ran onto the waiting Chinooks and then as they landed next to the so called target village, Mal and I were one of the first off the back ramp so we could film the soldiers rushing out and taking up defensive positions. Not the safest thing to do, but that's where we need to be to get the best pictures.    And while we were on the ground-watching soldiers conduct search missions an Afghan interpreter said messages from the insurgents had been intercepted with one saying "we can't hit the helicopters" "they’re to high".   

But after three hours on the ground humping over hills and down trails at 8 thousand feet we were ready to go back to forward operating base Shank.

  A soldier tossed a smoke canister into a field and a plume of green smoke marked the LZ for the big Chinooks to come back and pick us up.   Womp womp womp - those heavy lift helos can be heard far away as their big blades slice the mountain air.

It’s a sand storm when they land. Even my ears were full of sand and I dropped to the ground on my knees as the air beat my body with sand and gravel. The engine exhaust makes you feel like someone has you over a searing hot grill as you rush up the open ramp at the back and get inside next to 31 soldiers in this case. Safe and sound as the helo lifted off?

  Well just as we were airborne I heard a bang. It sounded like an explosion but a muffled one given the noise of the engines.   

But when we landed back at Shank a Captain who had watched us lift off and followed us in asked me how the day went for Fox News.   I replied, "Well we didn't get shot at so I guess it was good”. And that’s when he said "oh yes you did".

  Apparently insurgents fired an RPG at our helo and that was the bang I heard. It exploded just next to us and slightly under us. But fortunately didn't damage the helicopter.   It was a better day than I realized. We we're luckier than I knew at the time as we rode for home on board the big Chinook.  

The bottom of the Ninth

2008-10-03T11:52:00.003+03:00

Kabul
Afghanistan
October 2nd 2008

Sometimes going out in Kabul, can have as many potential risks as an embed in the hinterland. Certainly this was the case with yesterday when we had arranged o meet the head of the Kabul CIB. This man in the last few years has had eleven attempts on his life including one suspected attempt at poisoning, the last attack was the week before last.

The following blog is what I recorded on my blackberry as the morning went along

07:45 depart hotel enroute to meet the man I have dubbed Sean Penn , from the movie, Dead Man Walking" . He is the head CID Police Chief targeted three times for assianation in the last few weeks . The plan is to ride along with him for a few hours . The reality is that this is as dangerous as an embed
08:00 at hq
08:05 phone call shooting on jalabad road heading out
08:30 ninth and bottom of the innings , we ask why the baseball bat in the car in the Chiefs car, he says his driver plays but we think he hits more than balls
08:50 chief is tense gripping his ak 47 as we drive to scene of shooting
09:15 jalabad bus station
Chief examines bus with bullet hole , blood on seats and floor
Bodyguards all have fingers on their triggers as the boss walks around
09:30 at the NATO base reporrts that the french isaf troops were involved and now chief has gone inside to investigate ,reports that one person is dead and more injured. French deny they were involved. We wait outside the base in the sun
10:16 sirens and singing driver speeding back into kabul , more police escorting us , appears to be eight pickups loaded with police and guns in convoy
10:46 back at the police hq interview with the boss , as he continues to fidget with three phones in front of him, whilst a policeman with an ak 47 stands behind me at attention. They have not forgotten how Massood was killed by a tv crew here , just before 9/11. No one in any place of power here trusts a tv crew.
11:10 one more scene asks Dana "can you show us your police cells"
11:12 not exactly the black hole of Calcutta but still the seven guys being held are not happy to see me with a camera pointed thru the bars , espicially the man from Pakistan being charged with terror as he stares down the lens
11:25 we take our leave , a frantic three hours and it feels good to take off the body armour

Thrills & Reality

2008-10-02T04:56:00.000+03:00

Afghanistan 
Wednesday October 1st 2008  

There is thrill and reality of covering the war in Afghanistan. It does not have to come from being in "kinetic action" as the new term for gunfights with insurgents is referred too. The thrill of being in a Blackhawk helicopter filming out of the window past the guns hanging out the side, with the wind rushing in and buffeting you at a 150 knots, as you fly twenty above the ground crossing mountain passes of 10,000 ft. You can feel your stomach lurch as the updrafts rise and drop, like a rollercoaster with no track.   

We headed to the Eastern Province of Khorst and Camp Solerno. Moving around a battlefield is sometimes like a game of chess and getting from A to B is often a matter of waiting at C. C being back to Bagram and then driving to Kabul. The distance from our original starting point at Camp Shank to Kabul is less than forty miles by road; two hours drive at the most. But conditions here make travel on unsecured roads to risky. So air transport is the only way and it will take nearly 36 hours to safely get back to Kabul.   

Our connecting flight on a C130 had a check in time of 11:30 pm, the logistics of moving troops, contractors, equipment and at times media like us, can only be compared to running a major airline. After we had checked in and loaded our camera kit and bags onto the pallet to be fork lifted onto the plane. The Army corporal in charge of check in, yelled out

  "Could everyone please make sure that clips are removed from your weapon and that there are no live rounds in the chamber"  

There are no metal detectors here and you do not have to take your boots off or empty your pockets before boarding.   

The bad news was that the flight was now not until 02:30. Even in the middle of a war zone, you wait in airports. Producer Maryam Sepeheri and I settled down to a game of scrabble, the only thing that opened was a chest of cold water in the corner and as we played on, soldiers slept in broken armchairs covered with the sweat and grime of previous passengers.

  Finally a Sgt announced that our flight was inbound and let's get ready.

  "Make sure you are all wearing your IBA"

  Individual body armor in plain English.

  Walking out of the terminal into the night, you are surrounded b y blackness, the base has a blackout policy due to recent attacks by Insurgents that included truck bombs and suicide bombers at the front gate.

You can make out the rough image of the person in front of you and nothing else and out of the darkness you hear the plane land. No lights on the runway all operations for the pilots here are infrared, it is a strange experience to hear a plane and not see it. Like children on a pre school outing you file out to the plane, there is no talking as the drone of the blades and the smell of jet fuel blasting on you as you wait.

Shuffling on, you find a seat on the webbing and take your helmet off, Bagram is only thirty minutes away and we finally get to our bunkhouse on the base at 4am.

The thrill of the morning chopper ride over the mountains will remain with me forever, but the reality of traveling here, even short distances is brutal.

Post script – FYI I beat Maryam by 10 points in scrabble, Qi on a triple letter

Freedom

2008-10-01T15:40:00.002+03:00

There is a freedom to write that exists in our society, just as there is freedom to read. Perhaps that is what distinguishes democracy from tyranny. Under tyranny any comment about the state is dealt with and those who make the comments are persecuted and suffer.
I allow comments on my blog as I believe in free speech and will defend it, unlike people who hide and think that posting as Anonymous, I am not afraid to write and tell the truth.
Truth can hurt, and people who truly think the world is a kind and good place will only be guided by fools and dictators.
I write what I see and experience, because trust me I have seen the evil side.
If you believe in truth then you have nothing to fear.
Mal
Kabul
Afghanistan

And yes I am a cameraman and proud of it.

The view from Bee House 5

2008-10-01T15:31:00.003+03:00

Camp Shank
Afghanistan
September 29th 2008

The view from Bee House 5 is a bunker; then again view is a wrong word to use, as there are no windows in barracks in Afghanistan. You live in a dark cocoon where day and night are realized by either opening the door to whether it is dark (thus night) or light (thus daytime), or you can look at your watch.

Most of the bases in the East of Afghanistan come under regular attacks from rockets of the Insurgents on a regular basis, there is no witching hour the rockets can come at any time and soldiers do get injured or killed again on a regular basis.

Whilst you can easily ignore a stewardess on a plane trip with disdain about what to do in the event of an emergency when the soldier introduced us to Bee house 5.

The first and foremost information parted was not where the closet latrine is or what hours the Dfac (Dining facility) opens for meals. But what to do in the event of a rocket attack.

Calmly it was explained that there is usually sixty to ninety seconds between the first strike and following rockets so if you are not hit in the initial attack make your way as fast as you can to the bunker.

The bunker outside our beehouse was about ten feet long made of two concrete U shaped bocks turned upside down and covered with sandbags. Inside there was a stretcher, two sandbags to sit on and 31 bottles of water. Blocked at each end apart for a squeeze entrance to get in and out off.

The next question, we faced was whether to sleep with your boots on or off. Whilst it may sound like a silly thing to consider before going to bed, the reality is that in the event of an attack, could I in the dark find my boots, tie the laces and get safely to the bunker. Then again I would also have to have my camera on and be filming at the same time using night vision scopes which are the hardest things to use whilst not in a panic and having your heart race at 150 beats a minute.

In situations like this the camera never leaves my side, if I go to the latrine the camera goes with me, brush your teeth or go for a meal the camera comes with you. Because at any stage an attack can happen and running across a rocky parade ground a couple of hundred meters to get the camera is not an option. If it's not with me then I do not get the pictures, bunker or camera – the bunker will win.

I finally went to sleep last night at around ten thirty, late by isolated Forward Operating Bases standard, fully clothed with my boots on. The local wisdom is that if you have not been rocketed by midnight then it is a good bet that the night will pass quietly. I had practiced counting my steps down the stairs to the bunker three times before lying down. Two normal steps then a small half step and a drop to the ground three steps to the right and into the bunker.

In the early hours in the dark I finally took my boots off in the dark, reached across and checked my camera with night vision was at arms reach before falling asleep.

Just another day (or night) on the frontline in Eastern Afghanistan, a clear night sky crystal clear with stars and luckily no rockets rained down.

At every level it exists

2008-09-27T16:39:00.000+03:00

Kabul
Saturday September 27, 2008

Last May I left Afghanistan with the words of the outgoing commander of International forces here assuring us that by 2011 all foreign troops will be out of here and a stable democracy would have been restored.

Driving around the capital of Kabul in the last two days reveals a city that is effectively underseige. New checkpoints dominate virtually every road that leads to any Govt building or embassy.

For the more than 5 million residents of this city, the greatest problem they face is corruption. It is a cancer that has pervaded every aspect of life here, and by all reports it goes to the almost top of Govt, and even the President has a close family member that are regularly linked to the drug trade and corruption.

The figures are beyond belief; according to the US Government Accountability Office recent report the US Govt has spent close to $16 Billion on Military and Police training since 2002. And yet out of 105 Army Units only 2 are capable of conducting their primary missions, as for the Police. The figure is zero not one unit is capable of conducting effective enforcement.

I spent some time this afternoon filming Kabul Police conducting searches of cars, and again it is a matter of what is not being done that is more damming that what is being achieved. They would not stop a car with more than one male in it, cars with more than one male regularly waved off the Police requests to pull over and continued with immunity, not one car with a woman was stopped at any stage.

I filmed for a while for a feature we are working on, then getting back into our car I asked our fixer could we go to the outskirts of Kabul and film the checkpoints as the forces checked trucks coming into the city. He said he would try but a problem would be that when we were filming the authorities would not be able to collect their bribes. I jokingly mentioned that we would pay them for the lost revenue and he thought for a moment and did not answer.

A reality check for everyone is that Afghanistan is now officially the fifth most corrupt country in the world according to the latest report issued by Transparency International. Only Haiti, Iraq, Myanmar and bottom of the list Somalia are more open to corruption.

During an interview yesterday with an ex member of the Cabinet he told us that there were reports of Govt Officials who had assets in excess of $20 million dollars and yet they were paid only a few hundred dollars a month for their services to the administration here.

You can feel the frustration of everyone in this city as they are powerless to stop this cancer as the International Community continues to pour money in here with the hope that things will get better. For a select few the benefits are astronomical and the disease of corruption filters down till there is nothing left.

Reflections from 36,000ft

2008-08-22T20:00:00.000+03:00

En route Tbilisi – London

You never leave a war zone, in my work I depart one conflict and prepare for another.

In fact between live shots the other day, I went down to the hotel gym to find Correspondent Steve Harrigan working out as well.

“Here we find ourselves in a war zone, training for the next one”

The next one being Afghanistan, in a few weeks time where I have a three to four week assignment coming up, to coincide with the US Elections.

The last two weeks in Georgia have been physically draining, long hours , little sleep and the constant threat of danger. It is the danger you do not see that worried me the most. Isolated roads and ethnic tensions, add to that alcohol and guns and a lethal cocktail is created.

Who started the war in Georgia will be debated, Why Russia invaded can be argued from many viewpoints. I have no doubts that they had been planning this invasion for a long time.

I have learnt that you should never take sides and you cannot hate one side or the other. The secret is to simply despise both sides equally and be nice to the man with the gun or tank you are standing next to at the time. It is somewhat hard to explain what it feels like to drive across frontlines, one minute you are with one army the next with the other side with guns and artillery pointed at where you have just been and where you will be going too.

War is often not a constant Rambo’esque blaze of gunfire from the hip, but a slow calculated chess game, where moves are often made when the pieces are in place. And then the secret is not to be in the no man’s land

The one thing I dread about going home is the fact that I know that in the next few days, I will go thru, what I call the “wakes in the night”. Where I will suddenly wake up and not know where I am in the dark, and it will take a few seconds to register where I am and the fact that I am not in a conflict zone. That is never pleasant and will take a week to get over.

The Afghanistan trip next month will be hard, and already not two hours out of Georgian War. My planning has begun already.

Finally after two weeks my beard is at the stage that the itching is beginning to drive me crazy, what is worse though is the amount of less than dark hairs that seem to populate my natural color.

Perhaps it is the Hours

2008-08-19T17:38:00.003+03:00

Tbilisi
Georgia

Perhaps one the hardest things to come to personal grips with on assignments of this length is the toll working hours in two time zones, and then having to work them twice or more in a day.
Time zones are probably my greatest enemy in many respects, here in Tbilisi we are eight hours ahead of Fox News Headquarters in New York. The affects of this after twelve days on assignment probably really hit home last night or afternoon depending on where you are reading this.
The day seems to begin the night before, as if we have to do a live shot for the Prime Time News Show"Fox Report" that means we are still working at 3 am , you do the shot, then have to break down. So as far as New York is aware we have finished just after 7pm, by the time you get to bed it can be 4:30 local and then to get up and gather the news for the day I have to be awake again no later than 9 am, to get the kit ready from Sat gear to Computers, power, cameras, first aid kit checks and the body armor.
Out of the hotel around 10 am (which remember is in fact according to New York 2 am, and the day has begun)
We head up the road to the frontline, film for a few hours, then head back to Tbilisi, I try to feed some of the material we have shot on the road so that the Channel has material for us to run during the day.

And this is before we start our rostered shift of live shots , our block of lives yesterday was from 3 pm to the 7pm shows, New York Time, which meant we were going locally from 10 pm to 3 am.
Then figure on getting up again and doing it again, sometimes the live shift good fall in your favor and we can wrap up by midnight. But you know that all things end, and at some stage life will be back to normal.
As far as what has happened here today, the reality is nothing, but my conspiracy theory for the future has no silver lining.
Tomorrow is another day, that is after we finish at 3 am.

What's the time Mr Wolf

2008-08-18T17:05:00.004+03:00

Outside Gori , Georgia

Well according to all The Russian troops were of supposed to be pulling out of positions at noon (that is when the big hand and the little hand on the watch, are together and pointing to the top) Now as they say try to stay fashionable and explain to me how come when we approached Gori, after the big hand little hand scenario whilst still in the sovereign nation of Georgia.
We approached and past thru a Russian Military checkpoint some ten km's outside Gori on the road to the capital Tbilisi.

Only to drive on and come to a complete stop to be turned around by guess who ?
There on the highway leading into Gori, in the country of Georgia was a Russian Officer who said that unless we had Russian Media Accreditation approved by the Kremlin or Russian Authorities we may not proceed along a Georgian road into a Georgian city that was supposed to of been clear of Russian troops at midday.
Then again the artillery still on the hills dug in, plus the APC's on the road, ohh and the camp of Russian soldiers.

Call me cynical, but I laugh when I got back to the hotel in Tbilisi an hour later and there on an opposition Cable Network was a running headline banner on the bottom of the screen "Russian Troops begin pullout". If they bothered to leave the Presidential Suite they occupy on the sixth floor and drive up the road rather than rely on wires from Agencies that have been so inaccurate and propaganda tools for both Governments in this conflict, then perhaps they could report the news.
So where does this leave us, the bottom line is I do not believe anything that I have not seen with my own eyes.
And from behind these hazel irises, the Russian troops remain in Georgia.
The next time someone comes up with a time, just double check which day, week, month and year they mean

It is too Quiet - Igoeti Georgia

2008-08-17T16:06:00.004+03:00

ASSOCIATED PRESS REPORT
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

IGOETI, Georgia (AP) - Russian soldiers dug foxholes Saturday on a hillside near the capital of war-battered Georgia as a cease-fire went into effect, setting the stage for a Russian troop withdrawal after more than a week of fighting.

The Russian seizure of territory, including the strategic city of Gori about 20 miles from Igoeti, raised fears that Russia was aiming for a permanent occupation of the country that once was part of its empire.

As both sides waited for the truce to come into effect, Russian troops' intentions were hard to read.

The shallow foxholes being gouged out of the earth at Igoeti by a small contingent of Russian soldiers on Saturday could indicate intentions to stay awhile. They could be intended as defensive positions for the Russians to guard their comrades as they withdraw

If you Google "IGOETI" thousands of hits will come up, all reflecting one thing, as the Associated Press Report above indicates the Russians have control of this vital city or town, every newspaper in the world will have a story almost indentical, and around the globe the world holds it breath fearing for the fate of "Igoetians".

Prior to the war, here. Googling "Igoeti" would of revealed a couple of hits relating to vineyards in the area.

We drove up to Igoeti yesterday, Saturday and filmed the Russian Tanks, APC's and Soldiers digging foxholes overlooking the road. At the frontline yesterday it was a matter of Georgian troops and Russian troops literally 50 yards apart, sometimes soldiers would walk back and forwards crossing the line. No one caring or really bothered. Fighting is no longer a real factor here. Everyone knows who has won and that at any stage the Russians can move where and when they want.

We drove up today towards Igoeti, which is about half way between Tbilisi and Gori. The highway i virtually closed to all traffic and for the first time in this conflict we pasted with tape on our car the word "TV" on the windscreen, bonnet and rear window.

So that when we approach checkpoints the risks are reduced of being an unidentified vehicle.

Our main concern today was not the threat of coming into contact, but the real danger of being robbed and having our vehicle stolen at gunpoint by roaming militants, or as Cher might say "Gypsies Tramps and Thieves". In a new 4X4 Toyota, TV on the windscreen driving on a road with no law and no order we were an ATM on wheels to anyone with an AK47, of which there are no shortage of here.

The Russian have pulled back a few km's from Igoeti, and there is always the professional desire to check facts as true. But leaving the last Georgian Army checkpoint and heading towards Gori the silence in the car reflected that knowledge that it was a risk not worth taking. Around a corner and a Georgian Police car with a few people milling around gave a sense of safety so we pulled in to talk with the police, the trouble as Rez our driver explained that the police themselves cannot be trusted they can just easily tell you that all is ok on the road ahead, watch you drive off and call their friends to steal your car and everything in it.

It was the first time in the week plus that we have been here that our driver Rez has expressed any concern in regard to this and Steve and him talked in Russian for a while. Basically it could be done but the risk was just to high. So without saying anything to the police we turned back towards Tbilisi . We had not gone more than half a mile when we passed a Red Cross Aid convoy heading towards Gori, being a convoy we turned and started to follow them past the police we had just left.

One minute past the Police we came upon another checkpoint manned by uniforms that made no sense and this was a major worry. It took two seconds for us to make a fast very fast U turn and head back.

We try everyday to cover the war and tell a story, the last thing we want to do is become the story ourselves.

It was a day as they say that everyone's sixth sense, became a little seventh. Sometimes the scariest sound is the sound of silence at a checkpoint.

Superstition and Lucky Charms

2008-08-16T08:56:00.000+03:00

We all have them , and for whatever reasons you try not to break them just in case it brings bad luck. Friends often are amazed as to what superstitions I have when in a war zone and I do have a few so in no particular order here are some of the things that I believe bring me luck.
I never shave when covering combat, I can trim my beard under my chin as it gets too itchy otherwise, and if it goes on for too long I may trim my beard but never shave it completely. The exception is in the event that I have to wear a gas mask against a chemical attack, as was the case in the Iraq War, a beard is more likely to kill me than save me as the gas mask will not fit.
I always return home with one piece of clothing that I have not worn, nothing in particular but one piece and on this trip it will be a black t shirt.
I always carry a red hankerchief, have done for years and tucked away somewhere the last thing someone gave me before I leave for assignment. This time it is a coin that the London Producer Tadek Markowski, picked up from the bureau floor and said
“Here you are mate a lucky penny”.
Well a 2p coin is close to a penny.
We head out in an hour or so back to Gori, 40 miles away and the frontline.
With my coin, hankerchief and a stubble of a beard.
And most importantly photos of my two daughters, Louise and Brittany in my wallet.

Running from the Law

2008-08-14T18:33:00.003+03:00

Gori
Georgia

Law today on the outskirts of Gori, involved a crazed Ossestian wielding a pistol firing a journalists, this directly in front of a Russian tank flanked by Armored Personal Carriers, the fact that the Russian soldiers did nothing is not surprising as reports of all sides in this conflict are committing atrocities. In the spirit of the Olympics car jacking and robbery are now national sports, and as journalists we are being targeted to new heights.

You can get that sense of calm and normality sitting around an army only to have it destroyed in seconds.

We managed to get through all the road blocks and arrived on the outskirts of Gori, to find the Russians taking up positions and for the first time a tank barrel was pointing down the road. The soldiers seemed calm enough and after thirty minutes of media mayhem most of us along with the Russian Soldiers were sitting under trees chatting as they asked us to make calls home for them, and let their families know that they are OK. Unlike the US and coalition forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, few have cell phones and the concept of Internet Cafes and AT&T phone centers, these guys have nothing. A young Kazach soldier lay on the ground playing with a puppy.

After the melee of the first half hour, we had let our guard down, doubting that any trouble could happen surrounded by the Army.

It was the crack of a single round that made me look up as Steve and I walked back up the road towards the tank and up ahead our car. Anya, our Producer was still getting beseiged by soldiers giving her numbers of families to call. I thought it was strange to hear a small arm sound. But the smell of cordite drifted down to us and I commented to Steve.

"Smells like cordite!"

Another ten steps and it was revealed, the entire media pack was running away back up the road, cars with tires squealing were bearing away, and between us and our car was "the law". A middle aged man with a pistol was screaming as he wrestled with a cameraman trying to get his camera. The pistol was swinging wildly and he was between us and our car.

More shots sounded, a gun swinging around in the air.

Steve and i were running to the side as he continued to wrestle with the cameraman yelling in Russian

"Give me your camera, you jerk or I will shoot you"

You do not stop or try to establish eye contact, you simply run, as fast as you can in a flak jacket. Each step seems to get slower. The distance to safety seems to become an eternity.

Now with fifty yards between us and the gunman I yelled for Steve to start talking, the drama and tension as I ran on with the camera pointing back at Steve, at this moment in time framing and lighting even exposure takes second place. It is a matter of capturing the impact.

With a few hundred yards between us and the crazed militiaman, we slowed to a walk and for the first time I stopped and turned back , wondering where our Producer Anya was in this mayhem. I could not see her so I started walking back towards the scene. It seemed to have cooled down.

Back fifty yards, and all of a sudden everyone is running back past me at full speed away. It was going to hell again.

Cars with doors open full of media hanging out screamed off, shouts were drowned out by the sound of engines reving and horns blaring.

And I could not find my car, I could not even see it. So I ran around cars as they took off wondering if I should just jump into a half open door. This was not one of the times when life flashes past your eyes or everything goes into slo motion.

This was full body contact effort, only my own effort was going to get me out and safe.

It seemed an eternity and the sound of cars became less as they were just about all gone, when I saw our car ahead. The mere sight of perceived safety gave me a boost. This is no armored car, but as we call them "soft skins" but it is "sanctuary".

I remember my arm finally touching the handle and opening the door to scramble in and I turned the camera still rolling to my face, my eyes shot with blood, my breathing and heart rate pulsing to the maximum.

Lifting the camera I turned to Steve and said go, rolling ...

"it's a good thing Mal James is a triathlete, he just had to run
about a mile in a vest. That's how quickly things
change here. One minute you are sitting down with
Russian forces, next minute - car loads of Georgian
forces drive up, they are furious, and they seem to
take out that fury and humiliation on the people they
can, which is the journalists. We saw one Georgian,
irregular force, pointing a gun and then another
fired.I don't know the result, but I saw a pistol fat
guy pointed our way and we just had to run by that
pistol and keep running. This is an irregular,
undisciplined, chaotic, angry, humiliated Georgian
force. They don't listen to orders, they fire on
civilians from what we've just seen."

It is called Law and Un Order

Get Out NOW

2008-08-13T20:03:00.003+03:00

Gori Georgia
Covering a war like this one is honestly to a degree like rolling dice, hoping that snake eyes does not come out. You assess every risk and decision rapidly and logically. Just how far do you push the envelope to get a picture or story. All intel amongst the Press Corp was that the town of Gori was a no go zone this morning, eve one of the major agencies was reported to have decided that since their armored car took an attack yesterday that they were nit going to risk it today.

But events change so quickly that the line in the sand shifts and your assessment and gut feel is that, yes go for it.

We arrived at the gas station overlooking Gori and saw smoke rising but it looked more like fires than military operations and every now and then a team would bundle into a car and head into the town. We have been into Gori everyday for the past four days and had the feel of the geography and lay of the land. Seeing a bus of people returning after fleeing we jumped in teh car and drove in following the bus. The bus stopped and people got out and we jumped into the bus to film faces and emotions plus a piece to camera, then having chosen a woman we decided to follow her home filming the return with all the heart ache and emotions associated. I only ever knew her as the woman in green, because of the shirt she was wearing.

She had to go to the hospital where she worked to say hello and check in on friends, by now there was probably twenty or so Press in the courtyard of the hospital. When all of a sudden a simple text came through from a fellow journalist somewhere else to a friend.

It simply said three words

GET OUT NOW

The adrenaline kicks in at such speed that decisions that could be workshopped on merit for hours and made in a millisecond.

The options of why are not discussed but with camera rolling we ran for the car, the greatest threat is of an air strike coming in and from that there is no escape. You do not form up into convoys or wait for stragglers the moment we were half in the car we were driving out fast,

Not a crazy speed but enough to make distance fast and back to relative safety, like the gas station we were bombed at yesterday seemed very safe.

The streets were empty as we sped out of town and then face to face we met them

As i sit in the front seat to film out the window, the first of the Russian Armored Personnel Carriers came into my viewfinder, then a second then for the forseeable future we had run into the Russian Army storming into Gori. If they had wanted to shoot us we were dead but speeding cars going the other way are given usually the right of fleeing.

You do not stop to think you film and prey that it will be alright, Steve gave the commentary and I filmed this was a defining moment in our coverage to date.

We rounded a bend and came to the Gas Station, to an enormous mass of Press who had missed the Russians entering because they had come down a road out of sight of the long lens.

You stop for a few minutes, and then the emotions of risk kick in.

That Close

2008-08-12T20:52:00.002+03:00

Apar from the fact that I did not hear the second explosion, I have looked back at my day trying to figure out what the hell the Russians were trying to bomb into oblivion and the Communications tower you can see behind Steve in this photo was the target the trouble is that they missed the tower and landed so darned near us.
I can sit back and review what went thru my mind at the time, but the worst statistic is that in the last five days up to seven journalists and cameramen have been killed covering this conflict. And in a haunting fashion we discuss amongst all of ourselves on the road , did you hear that so and so was killed and we can all place the the location having been there and it is just luck that we are alive at times, this is a bad area, a small war between two totally nations one a superpower, one a small nation that dreams it matters. No one has come to their aid, because the cold fact is that they started the fight.
And seven members of the Fourth estate have paid the ultimate price, not for being foolish or reckless they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Tomorrow we will have to go back to the front, just hope this peace deal has reached the troops on the ground

The Adrenaline of Fear

2008-08-12T13:34:00.003+03:00

Steve Harrigan yells we "Out of Here" , Gori Georgia

You can be filming artillery landing on a hillside five km away , and then suddenly the air cracks and 200 m away a Russian Artillery shell lands, in the adrenaline of fear , it is a matter of calm, panic will not help . What made me scared was that I never heard the second shell land in the same area until I got back to the hotel and edited the material.
5 members of the Press have died in the last few days
Today we were lucky

What lies around the next corner ?

2008-08-11T16:39:00.002+03:00

There is a Golden Rule, in covering war and that is "Believe a Sixth Sense" , you can be traveling down a road and a member of the team gets that gut feeling that "We should not be here!". Everyone else may feel fine and comfortable, prepared to a bit further down the road around the next corner.
The moment one member gets that feeling and voices that fear we turn around, no questions we turn.
Today Correspondent Steve Harrigan, Producer Anya Ardayeva, our driver Rez and I wanted to try and get as close as we can to the capital of South Ossestia "Tshkinvali" which is now in teh hands of the Russian Army after the Georgians tried to crush the separatists there. No crew has gotten in, some get close but it is an extremely dangerous area with one road in and who controls it can vary and checkpoints can spring up and be manned by Russians, Georgians or anyone who wants to set one up and there rule is law. And law is an AK47 at your head combined with Vodka at times.
The line between safety and danger is rather like drawing a line in the sand during on a very windy day, it shifts every minute and you are never sure where it lies. What was safe an hour ago could be deadly the next minute, it all depends on what lies around the corner.
Yesterday we went to the city of Gori, the birthplace of Stalin. Complete with the house he was born in and a statue in the town square dominates this city. Gori is about an hour from Tsibilsi the capital of Georgia. Yesterday it was quiet after a Russian jet had bombed the day before, and the pictures showed me in the ruins of an apartment block.
Today as we approached Gori, artillery guns were on the road overlooking the city, camouflaged with tree branches making them harder to spot from the air. In one of the few shops still open and running a bakery soldiers were carrying out trays of freshly baked bread and loading them into civilian cars to take to soldiers.
Our driver spoke with a few of them and they all assured us that the road we wanted to take was safe.

We left town to head to Tshkinvali, troops with artillery guns were hidden in the trees, then tanks under bridges and under the canopy of a grove. We stopped and hopped out of the car, walking over wanting to get some footage of the Georgian tanks, before I even lifted the camera up, the tankers indicated NO, we drove on out to the front

Six hours later ... Tabilisi nearly midnight

I wrote this much and basically .... the shit hit the fan

Russian troops are in georgia proper

Georgian troops are in disarray and have pulled back to defend the Capital Tabilisi where I am

A second front has opened in the West of the country Russian troops are in there

And i suppose my title stands , even without finishing the story

what lies around the next corner ?

Gore Georgia

2008-08-10T19:24:00.003+03:00

The Edge of the Abyss

2008-08-09T21:34:00.002+03:00

Tbilisi Georgia
Below the hotel balcony , young Georgian males parade around the city with car horns blaring and flags hanging off the cars , in attempt to stir up the patriot spirit whilst a few miles up the road the might of the Russian Army masses. It could get nasty here very nasty. All the signs are for a full blown war to erupt, and I find myself on the edge of the abyss again.
We arrived here late this afternoon to a functioning city on a half empty plane full of journalists, nervous yet at the same time excited that we made it in, before access is cut off from the outside world. My first flight here was cancelled as the airline flying direct from London cancelled late yesterday, probably due to the fact that their insurance company advised that flying into a conflict zone might add a premium, so my route here was last night to Frankfurt, five hours sleep in the airport hotel, up at five am for a flight to Istanbul then a connecting flight on Turkish airlines which obviously does not have the same Insurance company. What amazed me was that all my 11 cases arrived amongst all those connecting flights.
It is hard to predict what could happen and tomorrow we will don the flak jackets and go forward to try and make some sense of this conflict.
Keeping safe as I can Lou, and Bj we will swim with the turtles soon have no doubts.

The Sleeping Bag War

2008-05-24T16:46:00.002+03:00

I sat up, shrugged the sleeping bag down and picked up my night vision camera which was next to me on the ground, filmed the Cobra and Huey helicopters flying overhead hoping that they would launch another volley of Hellfire missiles, in the green eerie light that is night vision they circled like hawks seeking mice in a field, but they were in fact looking for remnants of the Taliban Insurgents that the Marines had been fighting for the last twenty four hours.

The choppers faded off into the distance and I put the camera down, and lay back down. Dawn was a few hours away and I was freezing cold, in a few hours time I would almost be passing out with heatstroke.

“ You know you are close to the frontline, Mal when you can sit up in your sleeping bag and film war, without getting out of bed” commented Dana in the darkness of the night.

This trip has been one of the most grueling and demanding physically that I have ever done, in probably the most inhospitable place in the world. The Helmand Desert, known as the Desert of Death, average temperature 47 degrees Celsius, 126 degrees Fahrenheit. In the afternoon heat being in the sun is like feeling yourself being cooked from the inside. Add Body Armor and Kevlar helmets, and after a few minutes simply walking became a Herculean task.

Reflections, Looking back at my notes from the trip, what seemed important at the time becomes inconsequential with time. This truly was an embed back into the heart of darkness, where young marines as part of the new Afghanistan “Surge” were to take on the Taliban and Insurgents. What struck me throughout this trip was that not one Military person ever mentioned “Al Qaida or Osama Bin laden”; the threat now comes from “Insurgents and the Taliban” and is of course across the border in the Tribal areas of Pakistan that no one can go into.

Not one person ever mention Osama Bin Laden, the Army and the Marines along with the other forty countries that form the coalition in Afghanistan have simply decided that Al Qaida and Osama fall into the to hard basket and by ignoring them they will go away and hopefully the media will forget them too.

One thing you get used to when traveling with US military is flying in helicopters, I have to admit that whilst the excitement has gone out of flying in choppers for the most part. Flying across war zones in the middle of the night when you have absolutely no idea where you are or where you are going, and hanging off the back platform is a 25 year old girl with her blond hair pulled back firing a 50 cal gun into the desert floor does provoke some male fantasies, When you land in a cloud of moon dust and have a hot zone when nothing is turned off and the blades are screaming to take off whilst we try to get 14 cases and bags off loaded can be fun.

Arriving at FOB (Forward Operating Base) Dwyer, we were pre warned that it would not be comfortable, so lets begin, it is in the middle of a desert the tallest natural object is a small rock, living quarters are Hesco Barriers filled with dirt and a roof layered with four deep sand bags against Mortar attack, there are no windows and no air movement within, toilets are the piss tubes made from 6” plumbing pipes and toilets made of wood with the sign on the back of the door that read “When Mr. Brown has left the building, please put the seat down” , in the morning the pans of shit are pulled out and set on fire. Which is better than having the flakes of burnt shit come down on you, which happened later on the frontline, when the wind changed direction and the burning shit pit came back to haunt everyone. The most valuable commodity when we arrived was coffee, there was no way to have boiling water and there were no cups so using the meal heaters from the Mire’s (Meals Ready to Eat”) you could get a small plastic bag of water half tepid then adding the coffee, whitener and sugar to an empty water bottle you had a bad tepid cup of chemical coffee which given where we were actually tasted ok.

Breakfast was a MRE, lunch was a MRE and dinner was a commercial brand MRE, which in the big picture means that you are so clogged up that body functions become limited. I could eat one MRE a day and that was it, they taste ok but after 7:30am it was simply too hot to eat. The recommendation of the Marines at the base was to try and consume 9 liters of water a day, the best I got too was 7 liters that is 14 small bottles of water over ten hours and I only pee’d twice. Camel pack are useless in this environment, you just carry a bottle and search for another bottle that is hopefully not hot. At one stage I made a coffee from a bottle of water that I let stand in the sun for ten minutes and it was the hottest coffee I had in a week.

In the cold harsh light of the day, there is nothing cold you begin to accept that nothing will ever be cold and get on with life. Perhaps that is what bonds us as a team we can live thru the worst and hardest of times together and throughout it all we know that it will end and we will laugh when we reflect back. But at the time it is “Brutal” as Maryam would say “Just brutal Dude”.

I rarely write or comment on people I work with, but our team for this trip was great. Dana Lewis a superb Correspondent with a funny wit that can annoy you but at the same time make you laugh. And no matter what he says “I do not sound like Darth Vader, when I sleep”. It is always a pleasure to work with a correspondent who can turn on the barking words and work with my pictures. Maryam is one of the best Producers in the Network and this was one tough assignment, both Dana and I would go with her anywhere, and we have agreed never to mention the fact that whilst Dana and I survived the Desert of Death trip in the back of a 7 ton truck, Maryam sat in the luxury of a humvee. But then again she never found out our secret purchase.

Then you meet people like “England” all people in the military are called by their surnames, England well he joined the Military because he was told that Dale Earnhardt, the NASCAR driver who died was actually killed by the Taliban and for him this was a personal reason.

Then there is Mr. Brown, who has left the departure lounge, and requests that you lower the seat lid, this is to avoid flies congregating in numbers that would become biblical around the latrines. On the back of the door of the home made wooden toilets was the sign that literally said “When Mr. Brown has left the departure lounge, please close the lid”. In the morning they drag the cans of crap out through the back flap, pour diesel on them and burn the shit. Be warned, what goes up does come down and one day we found ourselves with flakes coming down from the burn pit behind.

We eventually left FOB Dwyer to join Charlie Company at the front lines of the battle. You imagine that a frontline is like a line in the sand when in fact it can be just ten steps outside the compound you end up in. We arrived at dusk and two minutes after arriving Dana and I were running down the dirt track to the sound of gunfire as the Marines were pounding a Taliban position across a field.

I often get asked what goes through your mind as you literally run into the death zone, bullets are ripping overhead and the sound of incoming rounds smack around. The simple answer is that you are so pumped on adrenaline that everything slows down and each decision is calculated and planned. I work from shot to shot, each and every camera angle is calculated before I hit the record button and above all I must see the eyes of the Marine. Each close up reveals the horror and emotion of the moment. People like to see the bang bang of guns, but impact only comes with the full adrenaline of a close up of a nineteen year old kid eyes frantically trying to stay alive.

We filmed for ten minutes, raced back to the compound and in today’s world loaded the video into the computer, edited, compressed into Mpeg4, and transmitted to New York all this took less than fifteen minutes. That is the reality of covering war now, if not live then within twenty minutes of a gun battle in the remotest part of Afghanistan, the pictures are on air in America and the world.

In fact I was trying to edit and send, whilst racing back out to film in the dying light, before racing back and editing to send again, when the Apache helicopter (could have been a Cobra chopper cannot remember) came screaming overhead in the black of night now and I grabbed the night camera and took the best shot of the trip as it let a hellfire missile rip into a building that the Taliban were fighting from a hundred meters from us.

The shockwave almost sucks the air from your lungs and the explosion lit up the area like a July 4th Parade finale, then there is quiet. Dead quiet because if you were in this building you are plain simple dead.

Does this worry me, no not all. The only thing that mattered was to get this footage back to NY ASAP and with 10 minutes of this strike, people around the world were watching it.

It then questioned down and the sky was a complete blanket of stars and every now and then the helicopters would circle back and leave. All night this continued and after a while we simply lay our sleeping bags down in the dirt and tried to sleep.

Around 3am, the helicopters, returned and all I had to do was sit up in my sleeping bag reach out with my right hand and pick up the night camera resting on my boots and start filming the attack runs on the frontline.

By 5 am I was so cold that I forgot about trying to film any action and tried to crawl deeper into my sleeping bag, knowing that in two hours I would be literally suffering from heatstroke, I collapsed after filming the remains of the hellfire house and opium fields. I cannot remember what my pulse was but I was physically ill and could not stand after being in the sun for half an hour, the temp was pushing 45 degrees Celsius and in body armor and Kevlar helmets, you are simply being cooked alive.

Walking around the compound that was destroyed by the hellfire we found live grenades, Rocket Propelled Grenades, Italian Anti Tank Landmines this was not a home for nice boys.

Where is the satisfaction in covering war, well it comes when you race back across the desert to the base, running three hours late and with a deadline that is so close you have doubts. When as a team we look after one and another, I was so ill from lack of food I thought I was going to pass out, and yet Maryam found some rice and two pieces of meat for me, as Dana wrote and Maryam verbated interviews I stood in the dark trying to eat. Then it happens the sheer adrenaline rush of covering news in war zones, when you cut and edit a spot and everything works because of a simple word “team”. It was probably the best edit I have done, every shot matched every word and impact was there.

That is why I do my job for the sheer joy of the success of that night in the Helmand Desert; It was a damm good story.

Afghanistan Photo Essay

2008-05-08T08:41:00.010+03:00

Hellfire Missile Attack on the Frontline

Producer Maryam Sepheri and I

Birthday in Afghanistan

Rainbow over Bagram Airbase

After four hours of travelling accross the Desert of Death

The full kit for covering War , In the backpack I carried Computers , bgan uplink, telephones, sound, four cameras, food and water

Waiting for war

The aftermath of crossing the Desert of Death

After the Hellfire Missile Attack , filming the ruins, a live grenade is a few feet from my "feet"

From the top of a 7 ton truck, shooting Charlie Co about to deploy for a mission

Breakfast , coffee in a bottle , whilst Dana holds up the most important thing Listermint Mouthwash

Correspondent Dana Lewis and I in the Desert , filming Charlie Co

Stuck in a plane , that well

2008-05-07T14:48:00.000+03:00

Kabul Airport
Flight 401 Ariana Airlines , from Kabul to Dubai, via Kandahar
It could be worse but i doubt it, we have been stuck on the runway for two hours due to weather in Kandahar , the cockpit crew are screaming in Turkish at the local authorities , as it is a charter operated flight, and the plane is putrid and hot , the whole thing stinks like a bad drawer of unwashed socks in summer and there is no air con on the plane .
Not exactly a way to spend the day but hope above hope we get out of this god forsaken place .
Just announced , flight cancelled to kandahar , now they have to empty the plane
Maybe we will make Dubai

Between Embeds

2008-05-03T05:10:00.003+03:00

Kabul

You can always laugh when you reflect on what you have endured, but at the time all things move slowly and painfully. We are back out of Hellmend as I call it , after a week embed in conditions that make Iraq look like a summer camp for spoilt children. Without a doubt the hardest assignment I have done to date, I have six pages of notes thoughts and incidents to write up and will do so, no doubt on the plane next week when we leave. We leave on a second embed tomorrow out to the East with the Army who I hope have the sense to be more comfort orientated, than the Marines.

The thought I leave you with is that the recollection piece will be called the "The Sleeping Bag War" , because I could literally wake up in the night sit up in my sleeping bag and film the frontline of fighting between the Marines and the Taliban, put the night camera back down next to me and try to get back to sleep on the ground in my sleeping bag. We were that close.

Picture of me coming into Camp Bastion, after driving across the "Desert of Death"

Somewhere in the desert

2008-04-27T19:41:00.000+03:00

Hellmend Afghanistan

There could be no more apt name for where I am now than Hell, for geographical reasons they have added a "mend" an created a province in Southern Afghanistan, whose only claim to fame is that produces approx half of the worlds of Opium for Heroin and also it is home for the Taliban. Given the terrain and the weather here you can understand why these people are so mad.

I am taking notes and will write a full account of this embed, but for security reasons I am limited in what I can write and account for at this time.

But I will say that I have never been this hot or uncomfortable in years, the days are just brutal the heat is above100 by the early hours of the morning and you just feel yourself drain of life as the day goes by, even now as i write in the dark it is in the 90's and the heat is replaced by th bugs attracted to the screen light and I barely have the energy to stand. The only aircon is in the medics field hospital surgery and whilst it is nice to go in, the reality is that you have to come back outside.

Our sleeping quarter are inside a hut built of Hesco barriers with a tin roof covered in sandbags which has no air, but will withstand a mortar attack, there is no hot food apart from MRE's or a new alternative which seems to be cans of catfood with labels that indicate beef. Water is taken from pallets and the sun makes it like drinking warm bath water all the bottles are covered in dust and it has been three days now since I have washed or changed clothes>

Last night as we tried to get to sleep. Dana asked me "Mal how long are you going to keep doing this?" I answered not much longer, but in a few months the discomfort of today will be forgotten, but for the moment all I relate too is that in a few hours the sun will be back up and the only thing you look forward too is it going back down.

Hell does exist, it is called Hellmend Southern Afghanistan

The next few days will be interesting.

Doing my best to keep safe Lou and Bj w will again swim with the turtles.

Hope that Maryam never finds out

2008-04-23T16:48:00.002+03:00

Kabul

It was over a cup of Chamomile tea, yes we have been reduced to drinking herbal tea in the evening before we turn in. Not exactly the hard image of War Correspondents in the battlefield that seems to pervade every stereotype. That whilst discussing plans for the upcoming embed and the move down South to be embedded with the US Marines and in all probability come into contact with Taliban and Insurgents that our producer Maryam Sepheri laughed as Correspondent Dana Lewis i sipped our tea before turning in for the night.

That Dana turned to me and said, "This is bad enough, hopefully she will not find out what we bought in Dubai"

"What did you buy?" asked Maryam intrigued that could there be anything worse for two experienced war veterans, than being exposed as Chamomile tea drinkers.

"Nothing" I replied and "Remember Dana, no one is to know! it will remain a secret and we cannot start to use it (the unnamed product) till after our embed"

"Come on you guys, that is not fair!"

But somethings are better off left to imagination, lets face it what could be worse than admitting to drinking Chamomile tea.

The Name is Back

2008-04-23T06:08:00.002+03:00

Kabul
After leaving Israel after five years there, I thought that it was relevant to change the name of the blog to reflect the my new assignment, and tossed about many names but after some 300 entries I reflected back, realised that I could not come up with a better name that somehow even here in Afghanistan "Unholy" has more relevance than "Mind the Gap" .... lets be honest that title did not have the same irrelevance as Unholyland , so as I wrote in my last blog about "there back & the Taliban" thus Unholylandnews is back.
Mal

Are they Back ?

2008-04-22T16:55:00.002+03:00

Kabul

From filming stockpiles of drugs to local Tv stations being forced to pull from air soap operas, there can be no doubt that the Taliban are back and starting to exert influence in all spheres of life here again. New laws are on the table for Parliament that will enshrine in the constitution that
- Women will not be allowed to wear make up at work or in a school
- Men must not wear clothes that are not appropriate, like short sleeves
- Men will not be allowed to wear anything deemed not manly, ie chains or jewellery
- Restaurants will not be allowed to play loud music
- Women will be barred from dancing at concerts or in public if men are present
- Women will not be allowed to be in public with a male unless they are related
- Hotels will be by law forced to separate men and women
These are not decrees from a past regime that issued them and enforced them with beatings, but religious leaders are pushing these laws to become the law of the land. Whilst they debate about pieces of paper, and try to deny that the wordings the intentions are clear and the force behind these laws is undeniable.
People we have met and filmed over the past few days here in Kabul, try to downplay and diminish the Taliban but they control the drug trade which is set for another record crop which in turn funds there insurgency and there power.
The view from Kabul is seen thru rose tinted glasses, Kabul Ken, the spokesman for the International Forces here tried to spin via powerpoint the success of operations, Ministers of the Government all claim they are doing what they can from the sanctuary of the capital whilst the newspaper headlines reflect that the country is once again sliding down a path of turning the clocks back again, and this despite billions of dollars of foreign aid in all forms seems to have achieved very little since 2001.
We leave the capital in a day and I hope we get the chance to see the reality of the situation here, I made a vow after visiting here in may 2001, when the Taliban where in power that never again will I look thru those rose glasses again, I may have become more cynical but I will not be lead into false stories again.

Flying Ariana Airlines

2008-04-21T12:14:00.002+03:00

The post script to flying Ariana Airlines (the National Carrier of Afghanistan) is that losing one bag of 18 is not that big of deal, in fact in percentage terms you would expect 1 bag of 18 to go missing.

However we arrived to find that in fact not one bag arrived, in fact not one bag of the entire plane load of people made it to kabul, they just seemed to have neglected loading one single bag without informing anyone until we arrived, despite the fact that surely someone must of told the pilot that his hold was empty of luggage.

The bags did come on a later flight 7 hours later, no doubt that the plane was probably empty of passengers but full of bags.

Mal
Kabul

Aluminum Foil

2008-04-21T12:12:00.000+03:00

En route Dubai to Kabul @ 31,000ft

There may come the day when I feel the need to apply for an Ariana Airlines (the National Carrier of Afghanistan) frequent flyers card, but it will not be in the near future. I make no secret of the fact that I like airline food but then again breakfast on flight 406 was as tasteless as the cooks at Dubai airport could make dutifully served by a stewardess wearing jeans, somehow the uniform for both male and female flight attendants on Ariana is now jeans.

Dubai, was a stopover for us and a chance for all of us to get together. Dana Lewis (correspondent) flew in from Moscow. Maryam Sepheri (producer) from New York and Tom O’Neill (security) from the UK. Naturally in the first hour Dana managed to forget his camera in the hotel lobby and a bag was left on the bus and what was worse was that we did not realize that we had forgotten it till our final count at check in. Then again traveling with 18 pieces of check in is in itself a total logistics nightmare.

Now Dubai has managed to cultivate a global image of being glitz, glamour and the happening city of the Gulf Region where money is no option and anything and everything is available. Whilst that may be true, then travel writers should turn up at Terminal 2 at 4am on a Sunday morning, here are the options and destinations available this morning.

Kabul (two flights), Kandahar (cancelled) Baghdad International (as opposed to what? Baghdad Domestic) Islamabad (the excitement never ends there), Mosul (also a fun destination in Iraq and finally a place called “Kish”. Where in the hell is Kish! , Without looking up on Google does anyone know a place called “Kish”.

Yes Terminal 2 is the place that many International tourists will never see and Dubai planners have managed to figure out how to racially profile without offending rich tourists. The average suitcase that arrives at Terminal 2 is naturally wrapped in a blanket or mat and then tied up in ropes so elaborate that Bondage Masters should come and take lessons here. Women covered in black sit on the floor in front of their husbands who ignore them, not so much as their eyes showing thru a slit.

Dubai may be a modern metropolis but it can under the surface still treat women with a disdain and prejudice that is almost comical if it was not for the fact that it is true. Two examples jumped out at me, the first being at the airport yesterday morning on arrival at the main terminal, outside the doors there was a fenced in zone clearly marked “Women Greeters Area”. Here we are in the 21st century and one of the most modern airports in the world considers it necessary to separate sexes coming to meet you at the airport.

The other example was at a supermarket in mall so large that I never found another exit in 90 minutes. I needed to pick up some toiletries and there was the standard area with everything available in every size shape and brand, toothpaste to make up, shaving cream to condoms. I picked up what I needed (just fyi a roll on deodorant stick) . Then walking back thru the store I looked up and there was an aisle marked Female Hygiene and Aluminum Foil. Thus the average local Arabic male would never have to look at a tampon or napkin pad box, whilst he was shopping, he can go to the toiletries happy in the knowledge that he can look at condoms and lube creams, and never have to worry about being offended by female hygiene.

I think most Arabic men in Dubai, wake up in cold sweats worried that one day they may have to go to the supermarket and shop for Aluminum Foil.

Preparing for War , Again

2008-04-17T09:46:00.002+03:00

Heads up as they say , heading out to Afghanistan tomorrow, three weeks. All I know is that we are going to Kabul then onto Hell'land province as the papers call it here. To cover a war that most people have forgotten about, a war that should of been won many years ago given the amount of money and support that has been provided to date, and in reality a war in a country that has never lost a war on its home soil, and never fought a war on foreign soil.

Inside the Hermit Kingdom

2008-03-03T17:19:00.009+02:00

History is defined by events that change, and this week perhaps will go down in the books as such a moment, when the New York Philharmonic Orchestra played the Star Spangled Banner in a concert hall in Pyongyang. Two Nations still technically at war after 50 years. I had tears in my eyes listening to a national anthem that is not even mine as I knew in my heart, history was happening and I was there.

“Pop Quiz? Greg, What have you not seen here?”
“ I do not know? What?”

It would be easy to write a critical piece of oppression and a nation living in fear, because that is a simple fact of life in North Korea. The cult of fear pervades every level of society and life for anyone is so hard that we cannot comprehend the hunger and the degradations of life that are simply a matter of fact for the everyday North Korean citizen.

Greg Palkot and I spent 48 hours inside the Hermit Kingdom, a name the authorities there hate. And unlike previous trips to unknown countries like in May 2001 when we covered the Taliban in Afghanistan. I went into Pyongyang determined to look and try to see what I could not see from the buses that shuttled us around whilst a Government Minder stood a few steps away noting and observing every move, camera angle and word we spoke.

We flew into Pyongyang from Beijing with the orchestra, patrons and a media pack, landing in Pyongyang we were not sure what to expect, what would we be allowed to film, that was taken care of in a matter of minutes. We were hardly off the steps of the plane before Mr. Kim raced over to us and introduced himself. We had our minder and there was not a thing we would do in the next 48 hours when he was not standing in our shadow, listening observing and reporting back. It reminded Greg of the old days when he was in Iraq under Saddam Hussein.

The first thing that struck me at the airport was the North Korean airlines planes all but two of its entire fleet seemed mothballed, and in a fleet that numbers less than thirty planes in total that was the first indication that here was a nation teetering on the edge.

We boarded our bus along with Mr. Kim, and the drive in from the airport revealed one thing so clear and shocking that it defies reality, there are no cars on the roads in any number, sure you occasionally see a few but there are none. Leaving the country driving to the airport 40 minutes outside Pyongyang on at times a four lane highway I saw two cars coming in the opposite direction both military. It was like everyday was Yom Kippur in Israel, when there are no cars on the roads, here in the capital Pyongyang it is just another day of atonement, and tomorrow will be the same.

When George Orwell wrote 1984, he must have been thinking of North Korea 2008, workers in shapeless suits all with the Great Leaders badge on them shuffled on the pavements, the man in the street has nothing to smile about. Lines of 400m were not uncommon to see as people waited for antiquated buses to come along and transport them from misery to misery. Take this into consideration there are no mobile phones and even more shocking was that I did not see one person carrying any groceries, not one plastic bag. Next time you are on a main street stop for 10 seconds count the number of people on mobile phones and carrying plastic bags, in Pyongyang it does not happen.

Dinner the first night was with Mr. Kim in the hotel, which was a 40 storey monolith on a river island, the corridors are bare of any pictures or plants and every time the lift opened I expected the twins from the movie The Shining to step out and whisper praises to the dear leader Kim Jung Il.

Back to dinner, it is a matter of reading between lines. The restaurant was good the menu was traditional North Korean dishes as opposed to the banquet dining room I will write about later. Mr. Kim politely refused to order any hot food, and when our dishes came he still refused to sample the beef or chicken. But he looked and that is what changed me, he was without doubt under orders as to what he could do say and eat. He kept insisting that he liked only cold food and that we must try the “Cold Noodles”.

Thus imagine someone going into your shower and removing the hair that has congealed under the plug, putting it into cold water then add vinegar and mustard. Greg the complete bastard at this stage decided that he had to go and work on a script, but I would stay with Mr. Kim and try to pointlessly schmooze him.

We did the first live shots ever for Fox News from North Korea, an member of the “axis of evil”, Greg had to go outside in the snow and the next day in the wind when the temp dipped to minus 8, I meanwhile stayed inside and constantly whined into his ear that the draft coming in the door was cold. My revenge for having to eat the cold noodles was to watch him come back inside blue from the cold.

Waking the next morning after three hours sleep you could hear the sounds of patriotic music playing in the streets below and watching the people who looked like ants with heads down shuffling, whilst on the state run television happy singers and dancers extolled the virtues of life in the DPRK (Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea).

Again this is a matter of reading behind the words and images, the orchestra, organizers, patrons and media were the largest group of foreigners to have visited North Korea in 50 years, not since the Korean War had this many Americans been on their soil. I have no doubt whatsoever that the state run TV muted its coverage whilst we were there and instead of endless patriotic films of the Great and Dear Leaders we had MTV DPRK style.

We headed out for the morning tour, we had asked for certain things like shops and restaurants the night before, but it soon became clear that this was irrelevant we were pushed onto the bus and the tour would be what they wanted to show us and everything would be staged and timed for the cameras. And it was.
First stop the statue of Kim Song Il , the Great leader, originally covered in gold before being taken back to basic bronze after the Chinese complained that Communist leaders covered in gold is somewhat against the proletariat principles.

I had just framed up my first shot of the Great Leader, when Mr. Kim on cue came running up as if he was going to burst into tears, (Just as I had been told would happen by people who been to Pyongyang before) I must not in any way film anything but the whole statue, you must only show the Great leader complete, do not just film his face and arm extended in fascist salute for example, and then out of the blue 40 or so workers turn up whilst the cameras are there to lay flowers in praise of him. It was just the first of such propaganda that we were to encounter. Do not fight it, just film it. No one in that work party was smiling.

The next stop was the library where all tour groups go, it was so hollow that you could almost gag on the farce of what they showed, room after room of people wearing comfortable clothes and Kim suits quietly studying, poorly paid actors nothing less, it was complete with showing us internet which did not connect with one page outside the building, they filled the screens with basic Microsoft OS which fooled 90% of the media. Hit F2 when you boot up next time and enjoy what North Koreans can surf. The English class was just foolish with students and a charm teacher. All with the same message just like the girl on the Internet. The trouble is that we were so desperate to talk with any North Korean that we had to deal with the actors, Greg tracked it well in the script that night, enough respect but also enough doubt that we were being lead on a dog and pony show.

There were funny moments have no doubt, like Greg messing up the safe combination in his room with all of our money in it and then having to deal with getting the manager up to open it, or the time our bus almost rammed the only taxi we saw in Pyongyang. In 48 hours I saw one taxi, a city of nearly three million and one taxi.

Perhaps I look harder know, but in our time there I saw a maximum of five shops open because I was counting, one obviously had food as there was a small crowd outside the windows two deep, the other department type store you could see people moving around counters.

At no stage could we ask our bus to stop and just examine an area or store, it was the tour – point A to point B. I have never shot so much from a moving vehicle since the Iraq War. The funny thing is that apart from no traffic every intersection has a hot looking traffic chick, women only and good looking. They were like hip hop robots with there moves, it became a running joke on the bus as due to the complete lack of traffic we were never stopped and had the chance to get some good shots of the traffic chicks, but I did get one great sequence.

The Concert itself was attended by the political elite, but not the man having a bad hair day. One thing both Greg and I found out was just how normal the musicians of the orchestra were, I had always had this image of elitism, yet they were the funniest most normal people I have met in years whom you could strike up a conversation with in seconds.

After the concert I was talking with a leading musician and asked him how he felt playing the National Anthem in such a historic moment, and he told me that for the first time in eight year he was proud to play the Star Spangled Banner, had to laugh because he also told me that it had been a good gig and that they had played well tonight, I left him with the words “détente does not have to start with words”.

Earlier in the day I had what I call my Bourne Moment, we had asked to see the famous Pyongyang Metro (Subway). It is the deepest subway in the world, and has large steel doors, which just so happen to make it a handy nuclear shelter. There are only two lines and stations are named after great events in the revolution rather than suburbs. Previous journalists visiting have only ever gone between two stations and true to form we did exactly that. No one knows if the subway is just turned on for the visiting tourists and journalists or if more than two stations exist.

We were not given the chance, the only thing was that this was the only time I managed to slip away from the minders, by going thru a side door and straight onto the elevator I was a hundred meters ahead of the pack and if a train was about to pull out I was going to jump the tracks with my camera and try running loose in Pyongyang, but strange as it was the train waiting on the platform waited till all the rest of the media turned up before leaving and exposing the murals on the walls. By the time Mr. Kim caught up with me he was breathless, anxiety and western cameraman on the loose was not on his schedule.

In the 48 hours we spent inside the hermit kingdom, Greg and I did not get more than 5 hours sleep, and it was to get worse once we were out and could say more, After our second night and our final morning Mr. Kim bounds up to me in the corridor and asks

“Mr. Mal, what would you like to do this morning?”

My sense of humor had left me. This is what I wanted to say

“Ok Mr. Kim, I would like to film, A gulag work camp where people are starving and dropping dead in front of the lens, then an interview with the Dear Leader, followed by a tour of your Nuclear Reactor program, oh and if there is time came we go to an orphanage and see children dying of hunger and disease.”

The reality was I said this

“ Mr. Kim, does it matter what I say or ask for, just tell me what time I have to get on the bus and go where you are taking us to “

“ I am going to breakfast first”

Very rarely am I disgusted with my fellow travelers, but on this occasion I was. We had been told that a complimentary breakfast was available for the traveling party, the previous morning Greg and I had just gone into the coffee shop and ordered a simple basic affair that included single serves of butter and jam that were out of date, the coffee was good (in fact better than Starbucks any day)

I walked into this breakfast buffet and almost walked out in the disgust at how could members of the traveling party accept this. Here was every dish from Smoked Salmon to Mutton Curry being served for breakfast, and outside the door were locals who were not permitted by the regime to even taste hot food. I was beyond words and actually took out a small camera to secretly film this opulence of decadence. I walked over took two pieces of cold toast and some cold chicken made a sandwich and felt like choking on every mouthful. Around me people had omelets, fresh fruits and whatever they fancied along with espresso coffees.

We drove out to what we termed Potenkim Village, a showcase of modern high rise buildings and apartments, not one shop or store open, not one car, a six lane highway through the middle of it.

We were taken to the hall of the Children for a performance, the auditorium held maybe a thousand people and all seats by coincidence were full with locals, the women in the front dressed in elaborate national dress, we were not permitted up the back. What followed was almost as obscene as the breakfast scene.

Greg and I dubbed it “Camp Evil” children smiling as if they would be whipped for doing any less performing acts that are not natural, hours, hundreds if not thousands of hours of robotic regime training, so that they can extol eternal happiness to there Dear Leader, when his image came on at the end the scene on stage was one of adulation beyond words and what was worse was that all the audience went even wilder with their clapping upon his image being shown.

In years to come, his regime will fall like they all do, and people will say do you remember that kooky regime.

But as we took off and I looked out the window and saw my reflection, I shed a tear in my heart for all the normal average people of North Korea, I had seen a snapshot of the model capital city, just how bad could it be in the countryside. No one may ever know.

To answer my pop quiz, I turned to Greg ...

In 48 hours, we did not see one gas station.

North Korea

2008-02-29T06:35:00.002+02:00

I have been thinking a great deal about what we saw and did in North Korea , and will write the entry on the plane when I have twelve hours to fill, the thing is that I want to write about the silly and the small things we saw, yet the hardest thing is to realise just how bad things are and to make fun at a regime is one thing, but to convey the suffering is even harder
Mal
Seoul

50 minutes 50 Years

2008-02-27T16:50:00.002+02:00

Seoul

It took 50 minutes to fly from Pyongyang to Seoul and it felt like you had time warped back to the future, all is well and the blog will come in next day or two.
We are running on fumes after six hours sleep in nearly 60 hours

Mal

Going Black

2008-02-25T02:38:00.002+02:00

Beijing

Just a quick entry , going into North Korea this morning . Handing in Phones all four of them , Blackberry every communication device is banned.

So when you hear, read or see anything about the New York Philamonic Orchestra's ground breaking tour of North Korea, i will be there in the background filming , taking photos and of course those little side stories about the Unholy world of mal.

Hope to try and do some entries from inside the Hermit Kingdom, if not then next entry will be from the Land of Kim Chi (South Korea)

Wish me luck, as they say clocks may go forward one hour but in fact you are going back 50 years in history, should be fascinating

Mal
Beijing

The Hermit Kingdom beckons

2008-02-25T00:29:00.001+02:00

Americans in Pyongyang

The following letter welcoming the New York Philharmonic Orchestra to Pyongyang on the eve of its historic concert there tomorrow has been published by the North Korean League of Girl Accordionists, apparently with the approval of President Kim Jong Il and the help of a Korean-English dictionary of musical terms. We have chosen to reprint it verbatim. (The Times Online Edition)

“Greetings to New York Musiclovers' Orchestra and listeners of the world in unison! Our Dear Lieder welcomes you to the shores quiet-flowing old man Taedong River, where great East Pongyang Theatre is majestically fulfilled with chairs, music stands and electric lighting for your whole foreign concert. It will be a clashing cymbal of détente.

“Our nation's father is world-most-known musicologist, composing perfect symphonies for our accordions and also decomposing decadent lackey pop for Korean youth safety. In counterpoint, he loftily supports classics and sees no bass designs in your chosen Gershwin and Dvorak programme, respectfully An American in Paris' and New World Symphony. A dittier man would cry, “by Jingo!”, but not our chief magnanimous conductor. His achievements all self-trumpet.

“Not since spy ship USS Pueblo's arrest 40 years ago has our nation given foreign visas on this major scale. We hide nothing in our guitar cases. Foreign discourse on our so-called Gulag Arpeggio are a pure crotchety note of misinform, and we trust that your second violins are not disguised fifth column, or diminished seventh.

“We are not hungry. We have great tubas. So enjoy Communist Korea from C to shining C.”

Originally appeared in the Times Online

The Forbidden City Marathon

2008-02-24T13:39:00.004+02:00

Beijing

You could hint that by the title that I had somehow stumbled across another race whilst traveling and that for a few hours I took time off and ran the "Forbidden City Marathon" here in Beijing.

One of the great joys of my job is visiting places that are some of the greatest attractions in the world, people save for years to be able to travel and have holidays in exotic locations. I somehow usually find myself flying in, working insane hours and then try to squeeze in a bit of sight seeing and retail therapy, as we refer to shopping. And as part of my therapy I went out and bought 4 shirts, all fake all great names, all wrapped up to look identical to the real things. Thus four brand name shirts, Armani, Zegna, Polo etc. Trusting that the size neck would ensure a correct fit only to get back to hotel and find that they do not fit my arms, so in a fit of RT frenzy I went back and bought another three this time trying them on. Hey Armani at $6 is a bargain in anyones book.

Anyway back to the marathon, just after dawn yesterday I got up and ran from the hotel down to Tiananmen Square past the famous Mao portrait on the Gate of Heavenly piece and back to the hotel in sub zero temperatures wearing running shorts. Lets say that the locals could not make out if i was mad or that my legs were normally blue.

Later the correspondent on my trip Greg Palkot, on his first trip to China really wanted to see the Square and tour the Forbidden City. The Forbidden City is in its own right and incredible place where courtyards the size of small airfields lead onto more temples and more courtyards. On a good day I have walked thru the city in a couple of hours.

Greg I am sure just wanted to get it done and ticked off on his bucket list "Yes I have seen "The Forbidden City". i think he looked at two temples for about a minute and we just bolted thru the city in I am convinced a world record time of 48 minutes. Even when the Secretary of State or the President comes they with no crowds or distractions take an hour complete with posing for Photo calls.

There is a couple of funny points to note though , half the Forbidden City is covered in scaffolding as it gets a face lift for the Summer Olympics and we went thru more "gateways of Heavenly Scaffolding" than real historic gates

and I also noted that the dreaded Sky Antenna was in fact invented by the Chinese back in the 13th Century and looks just as bad back then as it does now on the side of every English house .

And thus Greg can now claim to hold the unofficial world record for the Forbidden City Marathon.

Minimum 8 Teeth

2008-02-22T13:11:00.002+02:00

Beijing

Forget the surly image of the Chinese, everyone in Beijing is getting prepared for the Olympics. So far 1 million local Beijing residents have been given the day off work to attend "learning how to cheer" classes so that come those two weeks in summer the noise of hands clapping and thunder sticks being beaten will cheer on their fellow countrymen and ladies to perform to their best and beat the imperial powers through motivation to honor the country.

The girls who will be centre stage bringing out the medals to drape around the winners, are all hand picked beautiful airline attendants from the airlines here and have been attending beauty school and learning how to smile by hours of practice. How do you practice smiling, well you clench two chopsticks in your mouth and that creates the perfect smile.

When you arrive in Beijing Customs and Police are being taught how to smile and say hello, and there has been a minimum standard set for smiling. The correct smile upon greeting should reveal a minimum of 8 teeth and thus my photo proves that I am ready and happy to greet you in Beijing

Onto Asia

2008-02-21T12:00:00.002+02:00

Well now that democracy in Pakistan is established and the internal politics that will take the months to reach any conclusion, peace is on the streets, and in the news business, peace is not a story. A sad but true fact of life, before you tut tut me, nobody watches TV if nothing is happening.

Peshawar was once one of my favorite cities in the world for its charm, history and sense of vibrancy, however with the rise and hopefully the fall of Islamic power in the state there, it has become too dangerous to be on the streets. I just hope that one day it will be ok to walk around the streets again without fear of being attacked or kidnapped for the sole reason of being a foreigner, let alone working as a cameraman for an American Network. We generally have no displays or stickers on our equipment and when asked I often say Swiss TV, lets face it no one has ever had a grudge against the Swiss.

Later on today it is off to Beijing and the next leg of the trip, before we go to the Hermit Kingdom and that should be a months worth of blogs in a matter of 48 hours.

Mal
Islamabad

"What would you like?"

2008-02-20T22:31:00.002+02:00

There are things about Pakistan that can drive you to drink, well if there was a hotel or bar in Peshawar where you could get a drink then you would drink.
There used to be one bar, in fact the worst bar in the entire world which was a sealed off room in the Pearl Continental Hotel , which had the atmosphere of of a funeral parlor on Christmas day. However the management took the wise decision that given the rise of the islamist movement in the area there was a very high risk off either one being bombed or two being torched by a mad mob of mullahs.
Thus Peshawar is a dry city, and all sense of humor seems lost on hotel restaurant staff. Greg and I figured that since we had not heard from New York about any live shot requests and we were still waiting on DC for script approval that we would chance going down for dinner.
Option 1 was the Chinese, however on entering it seemed that family night was in full swing. leaving the small people running rampant we went to the lobby to see if the buffet was available, worse than small children they had a man on an electric organ croning for the benefit of the staff as the place seemed deserted. We decided that small children were the lesser of two evils and went Chinese.

Waiter "What would you like to drink, coke , seven up , pepsi ..."
Greg "Can we see your wine list? sir"
Waiter "Coke, seven up, pepsi..."
Me "What about a bottle of Scotch?"
Waiter "Coke, seven up, pepsi..."
Greg "We will have sparkling water...."

One minute later, New York called, 30 seconds after we had ordered our meal, we had a live shot coming up. The meal arrived and we had two minutes to try and get some of it down , before Greg left and I ordered the bill and asked for the meal to be put in a takeaway box, it is still sitting in my safe early in the morning.

If I had a Scotch or vodka or gin (all locally made in Pakistan but not available in Peshawar) then I might be tempted to eat cold chinese and enjoy a fine but rough bathroom tumbler of Scotch.

Peshawar
Pakistan

All the king's men, Gone!

2008-02-20T21:53:00.001+02:00

The headline on the front page of one the national newspapers today, along with "Democracy takes revenge" describing the elections for the Parliament here in Pakistan yesterday. In a nutshell President Musharraf's party was walloped in the first free and fair elections in years here, almost all the senior cabinet members in his administration lost there seats in Parliament and the party of Benazir Bhutto (now dead) is set to form a coalition government.

By Pakistan standards it was considered a complete success as only 25 people were killed nationwide in election related violence and a only a couple of hundred were treated for polling related violent scuffles.

It is strange covering an election were in many respects the outcome means very little to one personally, sure there is the greater global picture and of course the vote here has a direct influence on the "War on Terror". But for me personally the election yesterday was not easy.

The reason being that back many years ago in the late Eighties I came the closest to being killed whilst working.

Sure I have been bombed and shot at in war zones, but the incident in the Philippines Election was the closest I have ever come to being shot at point blank range by a gunman I could see.

And arriving at a polling station in Rawapindi, just outside Islamabad yesterday bought back some hard and bad memories of could this be a deja vu, perhaps it was not the threat of a gunman but the risk of a suicide bomber yesterday, needless to say that we did not muck around on the streets as this polling station was a potentially prime target.

Manila 1986

President Ferdinand Marcos, had called an election naturally he was expecting to win, as all Dictators do. However having killed the Opposition Leader Aquino on his arrival back at Manila airport (they shot him as he walked down the steps to the tarmac) his wife Cory Aquino took the rains and a peoples power revolution was underway.

For the first time in the first and only time in my life I went to a rally that was a true 1 million people rally. And believe me 1 million is a large mass of people , it took nearly an hour to try and squeeze into the middle near the stage.

From nun's to housewives the city and nation was awash in yellow, the symbol of Peoples Power leading up to election day, and the President was nervous, the ballot would be rigged but this time it would require corruption on a massive scale to try and fix the numbers.

Vote buying by Marco's was so endemic that locals took it as a way to earn easy money, and a classic expression was born in "Vote early, vote often". Playing cards with the picture of Jesus were handed out by Marco's cronies and locals would place them under the ballot and when they marked the ballot it left a mark on the card, they would then go around the corner show the crony the marked Jesus card and collect their money, then assuming another false name go to another polling station and repeat the process.

Only the vast and overwhelming majority had figured out that they could reposition the Jesus card, so that the mark would be the same as if they had voted for the Marco's candidate when in fact they had voted for the Peoples Power candidate. So in essence there was a need to simply steal the ballot boxes after the polls had closed and replace the ballot boxes with fake votes.

At the time I was working for the Seven Network in Australia and we had done our story for the day by mid afternoon before the polls closed due to time zones and the US network asked if we could help them out by covering some polling stations in the suburb of Muntilupa, south of Manila. They arranged for me to have a sound man to help, a mercedes car with driver and even a policeman for security on a motorbike.

We headed out and went around a few of the polling stations before it became evident to us all of us on the team, Correspondent Paul Lyneham, Local Soundman Sarni Ocampo and myself that we in fact were not covering news but in fact were being used by the locals to try and show the Marco's Cronies watching the Polling stations that an American TV Network was there filming polling stations.

Finally we said enough and having been directed to a polling station just before the close of polls we stopped, I filmed the last votes being cast and the start of counting. After ten minutes or so of this I had shot enough and we were simply sitting outside in the courtyard relaxing behind a low wall of the school were the polling station was. The only noise came from the main road , as the school was up an narrow street and our mercedes with driver and policeman was waiting for us to come back.

Then the first noise and the first screams started up as the pistol shots were being randomly fired in the air, grabbing the camera I dropped behind the wall and filmed half a dozen men running into the schoolyard still firing, the gun is mighter than the ballot in this case, and they wanted the ballot boxes now!, American TV Network be dammed.

In those few seconds I had dropped behind the low wall and had started filming the gunmen on the other side of the school yard, you descend into another world in moments like this, it is about capturing the image, and for twenty or so seconds my mind was occupied with the the technical aspects of framing, exposure and above trying to get your breath and heart rate under control as the adrenaline courses thru your body like a fire hydrant being suddenly opened.

After about twenty seconds or so of filming the mayhem of gunmen running from classroom to classroom, weithout saying anything dramatic from a Hollywood script, the words went something like this

Me " lets get the fuck out of here now"
Sarni (my soundman carrying the BVW 50 Recorder and tethered to me by a cable between us" Go Go Go
Lyneham "Fuck me this does not look good"

I started of first with Sarni close behind me the cable bonding us, Lyneham a few steps back, round the low wall and across maybe ten yards of open space to the gate to the street and another wall. I kept going through the gate with Sarni, oblivious to where Lyneham was.

The sound of gunfire behind us had not let up, the goons had control of the school and the ballots.

Crouching to stay low I ran out into the lane , and coming up from the running crouch I came face to face with a man brandishing a pistol , he coldly calmly pulled the trigger and a bullet passed over my head by inches as i was still in a run.

Time stopped, In that absolute second of terror everything stopped, the barrel was pointed directly at my eyes, all I coulod focus on was his hand gripping the trigger, and I thought I was dead.

Sarni behind me dropped and I followed as we now lay on the ground face first in the dirt, it was as if I had not taken my eyes off the trigger and the barrel still pointed directly at my head. Sarni was tucked in behind me and the video recorder lay there in the dirt and my camera was in my hand still recording , what I would never know.

Screaming at me, he said

"Camera Camera"

I remember the weight of the camera as i lifted it up , my eyes never leaving the barrel, I cannot remember his face only the gun pointed at my head ,

" Camera Camera" he screamed and i let go of it

Two well placed kicks to my body and I turned my face back onto the ground and looked to the side.

With this I watched him drag it down the lane the recorder bouncing along with cables and microphones trailing.

Sarni remained tucked in and then two more young guys came over and started kicking us again, except now they were yelling at the top of there voices

"Go Go"

Sarni and I slowly stood to our feet and put our arms in the air, at this moment we saw Lyneham come out of the school his arms slowly rising too.

He had been just going around the corner when he saw me being shot, ducking back a second or two later all he had seen was the back of Sarni tucked into me and us lying in the dirt, he thought we had been shot dead in cold blood.

The three of us slowly walked down the lane arms in the air towards our mercedes and waiting policeman, I went into shock as i slipped in the seat of the car and we sped off with the policeman now using his siren, he had seen it all and was powerless.

NBC complained to the President and the next day the camera and recorder was returned to the hotel in pieces minus the tape. To this day I wonder where that tape is, not that it matters.

The Marcos regime claimed victory in the election and later fell in a peoples power revolution which was a sweet moment for me and another story as I was there and entered the Palace the night he fled the country.

................

Perhaps that is why yesterday I was nervous, another election and perhaps, just perhaps it could of happened again .

A head for Heights

2008-02-17T15:38:00.003+02:00

Islamabad

Election eve and a nation on the brink of either democracy or potential riots. According to latest reports there are at least 19 ways to rig the ballot tomorrow, and filming in Rawapindi this afternoon it took less than ten minutes to find false voter registrations being waved in our faces. The politics is far to inside baseball to try and explain the differences between PPP, PML and PMLQ, to be honest I have trouble figuring out who is who and what symbol they are using on the ballot, all I know is that the Bicycle party should beat the Arrow party, but they are not the main vote riggers so the Tigers may end up winning.

One of those days when it seems that things are not going to end, we flew overnight here from london, touching down around six am, a couple of down hours the out getting yet another 2 dog tags to wear, with the obligatory passport photo on them that make Hannibal Lector look good even with his mask on. Then a press conference from the Electoral Commission that is about as exciting as watching paint dry, before over to Rawapindi more filming back to the hotel, edit and feed, and this is all before New York is awake and we have to start out shift on New York time.

Now usually hotels have nice views and given what we are paying here I would of expected a view of the rolling hills, well I look out onto a building site that seems to be going 24/7.

Check out the workmen on the scaffolding, they are about six stories up with not so much as a piece of dental floss to secure them. Greg Palkot and I decided that if one fell we would not watch, six stories onto concrete

Having trouble uploading Pix , so will post sans graphic

XV111: WHY YOU FART

2008-02-08T21:33:00.000+02:00

Tourism magazines are at best a collection of advertisements for bars and restaurants, however the December edition of “Vilnius Now” has a fascinating final article from the acclaimed series by the Executive Chef of the Vilnius restaurant “Le Passage”. Titled “Why You Fart”, which concludes with the final line of

“So, happy farting!”
Wouter

Thanks Wouter in a thousand or so words, you managed to explain that you need to avoid fruit after a meal, but eat fruit two hours before a meal on an empty stomach. And have no doubt that when I have the urge to fart I will be sure to do so.

Vilnius is a great city, you can dine entirely on potatoes and sour cream and as was the case with Greg today three plates half covered with sour cream was not enough, to the point that he ordered an extra bowl of sour cream to supplement the “festival of the spud”.

Kim Miller our Producer has had to endure a solid forty-eight hours of continuous “Beaver” jokes following dinner on the first night, but walking into the potato restaurant she noticed a rooster in the entrance and promptly turned to us and said, “Well at least I know what I am having for lunch”.

A classic moment today was walking around the old city; we entered the Cathedral Basilica in which twenty-foot statues are dwarfed by columns and paintings. Organ music filled the space and made you feel very humble walking around, turning a corner I noticed a woman bent over on a pew, naturally I assumed that she was deep in prayer seeking solace, continuing my walk around I glanced back and realized that instead of seeking penance she was in fact texting on her phone. As she left she threw herself down on the ground hoping that her savior would forgive her for texting instead of praying.

Eating Beaver

2008-02-07T13:02:00.000+02:00

Correspondent Greg Palkot and I have travelled the world together on assignments from the mountains of Tora Bora in Afghanistan to Sudan, where the closest power pole was 600 miles away. This time however we have returned to the ancestral home of the Palkot family.

Now I must admit that when I was told that I was coming to Lithuania, I had to go and find an atlas, yes one of those old fashioned things that lies around with lots of pictures in it. I actually wanted to see where in the hell I was going without Google maps.

So what do we know about Lithuania apart from the fact that famous Lithuanians include Charles Bronson & Monica Lewinsky. 90% of the worlds Amber comes from here, according to the French geographic society , the actual centre of Europe is 15 miles North of Vilnius, the capital. Public Holidays of note include : 8th September "Nation Day" - Grand Duke Vytautas was due to be crowned in 1430. He died the day before.

We arrived last night along with Producer Kim Miller, both she and I asked Greg for some everyday phrases like hello and thank you, since being a proud Lithuanian would naturally have a grasp of the language and be our interpretor. Actually he was waiting for his dad in New York to email him the essential twenty phrases

Now driving in from the airport in the dark it seemed like we were going in circles around a train yard in the rain. The old city of Vilnius is very beautiful, in that classic European sense of history and culture.

So what does one eat in Vilnius on a Wednesday night in Winter , what is a classic Baltic dish that defines the gastronomic taste buds of a true Lithuanian. There are not many places in the world where you can say to the waitress in the restaurant. How is your Beaver tonight? and I would like your best beaver please.

Now having eaten beaver, I can say beaver stew is a different taste and no it does not taste like chicken

Mal
Vilnius
Lithuania

The Secret to crossing the road in Roma.

2008-02-04T22:13:00.000+02:00

So what gives, a month in Europe and not a word about life? Well there seems little to write when everything in life is so good and you start feeling like you are alive again. I have discovered in myself, a happiness that I have not had for a long time.

I have been in London, just five weeks and so far have spent two weeks in Pakistan, the next week was Holland, week after that Berlin and now I am on a plane coming back from Rome, then in between all that I have found somewhere to live moving into my flat overlooking the canals in the morning.

Been to Emirates stadium or as I will refer to it from now on as the Cathedral of Arsene, (after The Arsenal Football Manager, Arsene Wenger) were my football team Arsenal won, trust me getting tickets is harder than anything else in the UK. Been on the London Eye, spent an afternoon looking at Da Vinci and Van Gogh paintings, celebrated Australia Day laughing in a Pub off Covent Garden, walked along the South bank of River Thames watching street art. Spend each Saturday morning in Richmond Park where you see your cold breath running past deer’s and that is my England.

In Berlin ran thru the famous Brandenburg gate,

stayed at Adlon hotel where Hitler held functions but is now more famous as being remembered as the hotel where Michael Jackson dangled his kid out of the window. Seem the Berlin Wall;

they build bigger ones in Israel I might add. Ate French fries with mustard from a paper cone in The Hague, in Holland. Filmed a mad Dutch Politician who is a dead man walking if you think Muslim’s hate George Bush wait till you see what happens to this guy, he needs six body guards to move around inside (yes inside) his own Parliament building and that is in the area where the public are not allowed

This month is going to be even busier and better and there will be blogs from some even more stranger countries, where? Well take the one of the most orchestras in the world; add communism and a mad hermit through in Mal and you have some potentially funny incidents about to happen.

Oh and yes the secret to crossing the road in Rome (or as they like to say in Europe romA) is to not look, this is essential as eye contact with the driver means that you have seen him and will avoid him, whilst if you have no eye contact with any car then the driver must assume that you have not seen him and thus he is not allowed by the laws of “The Safe Drivers Code of Italy” to hit a pedestrian who has not seen you. And as Mario lead me across a busy road coming back from Lunch yesterday we did not look and it works

Anyway must get back to the Tabloids and see how Amy Winehouse is going in Rehab, whether Cheryl will leave the love rat Ashley who vomited on a girl he had picked up in a drunken love romp, and did you know that the Spice Girls cry at the end of each concert because it is one day less that they will be together.

Mal
Enroute ex RomA

THE EMERGENCY ARCHITECT

2008-01-17T18:08:00.001+02:00

In times of crisis, there are plumbers available 24 hours a day even if they charge more than Ernst & Young Accountant an hour. If you are hurt or injured hospitals claim to have highly trained medical teams open 24 hours a day, even if you might have to wait 8 hours to see someone other than a cleaner. Your can breakdown in the middle of the night in the worst rainstorm of the century and according to the commercials on TV their smiling roadside mechanic will get you home in time to give your missing two front teeth daughter her birthday present. These are all noble professions that in an emergency we use.

There is a crisis that we in the West have ignored for far to long. Perhaps the Liberal and Conservative Press into a catatonic state of ignorance as to the plight of the housing and commercial building market, in the largest Nuclear Armed Islamic nation in this world, have blinded us.

Whilst we worry about global terrorism and jihads’ mountain camps where terrorists train in children’s playgrounds. If you think I joke? please next time you see a Al Qaida training film the odds are that in some scene there will be masked men with AK 47’s strapped to themselves swinging across a set of Monkey bars to rousing music.

On the streets of Pakistan a small but dedicated few are there for the many, preventing a blueprint from falling into the clutches of a Fundamental Architect.

They need our support, they might not have the flashing lights and sirens we associate with an emergency but as they say “Who are you going to call?”

I still thou ponder what the hell does an Emergency Architect do and who in the hell would need one. But then again that is why I like Pakistan. Simple things in a complicated world.

A City So Vast

2008-01-03T19:37:00.000+02:00

There is a line in the movie, "A Mighty Heart". which portrays the tragic murder by terrorists of Daniel Pearl "Karachi a city so vast that you cannot count the people".

It is one of the strange things whereby I can sit in my hotel room here in Karachi and watch this movie and at the same time have the door open and listen to the traffic and sounds of life of the place a movie is set in at the same time.

We have been here five days and have seen the city come back to life, the first day it was so quiet and yet so dangerous we tried to enter a part of the city and managed to get 100m up the road before we had to turn back for safety reasons. It is hard to explain how 100m up a road and the mood can change from safety to danger on a scale of ten. It was as each meter on the road we were descending into hell.

New Years Eve was spent with just Greg Palkot (Correspondent) and Tadek Markowski (Producer) on the roof of the hotel, actually featured in the movie. We listened to gunfire and decided what goes up must come down and left the roof asap.

Tomorrow we head to Islamabad and wrap up coverage from the capital, hoping to be out and back home to London early next week, by early that means we have seats confirmed for Wednesday.

Two Pictures Karachi from our roof view during the unrest and normal.

Trust me the pollution you can see

Somewhere Bad But Safe

2007-12-29T14:19:00.000+02:00

Now ths should of been the first of the blogs from England, whereby i would be starting to take the riotous preverbial out of the Pom's however in my quest to visit every hotel rooftop on the planet I am sitting here watching the sunset and burning tyres in the distance over Karachi in Pakistan.

The not so gentle drone of the hotels air conditioner plant mingles with the effusive smells coming up from the kitchen vents.

I arrived in the bureau in London two days ago and within twenty minutes, Benazir Bhutto was dead, Pakistan launched itself into riots and I was packing equipment I had never seen or used before.

Luckily my trusty Pakistan Airlines Frequent Flyer card was in my Passport holder and hours later we were on PK 788 direct from London to Karachi flying overnight. Now Business lounges around the world can be graded according to which other airlines share the same lounge, and you know you are in for a treat when waking to the door of the PIA lounge we noted that two other great airlines also shared the lounge facilities those being Turmenistan and Uzbekistan Airlines.

Arriving in Karachi a city of 15 million people, twice the amount of New York City it was as they say in the movies like a ghost town or as Greg Palkot put into prose "An unerry quiet" . The streets are deserted, all shops are closed, buses are burnt and shops banks in some parts of the city are trashed.

Karachi is not a city for the feint hearted and trying to film rioting is to be honest bloody dangerous and driving to the edge of the suburbs with smoke on the horizon, the nerves were tingling, we made it about half a mile into the city before he crowds were drawing in and the mood of the mob ensured that we did a rapid U turn and got the hell out of dodge.

So Somewhere bad we managed to get too , somewhere safe NOT

And thus

2007-12-26T06:56:00.000+02:00

I have wondered in recent times how i would write this entry as I wait the final hour before leaving Israel for the final time as a resident. No longer when asked where I live will the answer be the "Unholyland"

Five years have passed since what started out as a simple newsletter to friends has developed into this rather bizarre rambling of what happens in my rather strange world.

Much has happened and much more will continue to happen.

Will I keep the title "Unholyland" ? that is still for debate.

I leave behind friends who have shaped and defined my life into what it is today. Each and everyone of you will be missed more than you realise.

I have made it a point than rather say "Goodbye" i prefer only see you later.

And thus

"See you later"

Mal
Ben Gurion Airport
Tel Aviv
Israel

How Uganda has won the War in Iraq

2007-12-26T05:44:00.000+02:00

Jambo

Thanks to Kerrie, for a correction , the term is "Jambo"

The odds are that most US servicemen serving in Iraq will come home with a better grasp of Swahilli than Arabic. Despite the fact that Arabic is the language of Iraq, very few soldiers will actually meet an Iraqi in the big picture. Whilst they will meet Ugandans a minimum of three times a day, upon which they will utter "Jambo"

The simple fact is that a private security company has won the contract for all bases in Iraq for guards. When you arrive at any base the first person you will meet is odds on to be Ugandan, want to eat today, well guess who checks your credentials to get into the DFAC (thats army slang for food hall) need anything from the PX (again me showing off my vast knowledge of military terminology - the PX is the shop on the bases where you can buy anything from chewing gum to tampons to televisions and of course pouches for your ammunition clips)

Want to shop? well the Ugandans are there to check you. And man do they check always with a smile. If you do not have the right card then it is easier to argue with a brick wall.

To give you an example of the power they can wield, we were coming back from a Special Forces mission flying thru the streets of Baghdad at four in the morning wielding more guns than most small countries have, when we came to the entrance of the Green Zone in downtown Baghdad, we planned to drive thru to return to base. Well the convoy stopped at the gate and because the Ugandan on the gate had not been told we were coming he was not going to let us in. Let me say that the Special Forces did not take to this kindly and it took ten minutes of artful negotiations before they let us pass.

Thus Uganda can claim to be the most powerful nation in Iraq , you cannot enter or leave without them approving, want to eat or shop for toothpaste and washing powder the keepers of the gate determine who may pass.

and "JAMBO" well that is swahilli for Hello

4 went in 4 came out Iraq 2007

2007-12-23T16:07:00.000+02:00

Definition of success, in a war-zone: Four go out on a mission, four come home safely.

Perhaps the only thing that matters when it comes to looking back at the last three weeks is that we all went in and came out safely. As the 5th Anniversary of the war approaches early in the New Year, you can ask nothing else than to come back from a war zone safe and intact. You constantly see signs around all the bases that “Complancy Kills”.

True words, then again you also see signs that say “Deadly Force Authorised” , and my favorite “you are not allowed to drive your tank on this road” and in case you cannot read it does not matter because it is one of those picture signs with a tank and a cross thru it.

So what makes life on the road fun in Iraq, how do I stay sane and enjoy company. Perhaps snippets in no order taken from my diary can show you a side to life on the road in a war zone.

Riding in choppers is fun unless it is nearly three in the morning, the temperature is below zero and the crew decides that they want range practice at night. So off into the desert they fly and each gun is fired just to clean the cobwebs and then the pilot takes us up to nearly 8000ft for the rest of the ride before an ear splitting descent into Baghdad to be dumped in the cold by the side of a helicopter landing strip with no one to meet you and our 12 bags.

Now Humvees, they look enormous, they should be able to sleep a complete Bedouin tribe plus goats in comfort however the Military have managed to some how make the seats and leg room the equivalent of sitting in a pre school on those small chairs and desks. You can literally be screaming in pain and unable to walk after a few hours cramped up and remember the door weighs 400lbs due to the armor against roadside bombs. And by the way if you get out in a gunfight make sure you close the door the gunner in the turret does not want his legs blown away, a serious request.

Road side bombs are no longer six sticks of dynamite with a fuse, the one we were shown off the record was an incredibly highly sophisticated bomb complete with infra red sensors, timing devices and electronic circuitry all shrink wrapped and believe it or not it even came with its own little carry bag that any person could walk around with. The armor on the humvee would stand no chance at all.

What was unique about this trip to Iraq was that we spent ten days with the US Special Ops’s Teams from Seals to Delta we met and talked with them, became friends laughed joked and got a great insight into what makes the ultimate warriors tick.

The bottom line is that these guys are good, really good at what they do. They do not take risks everything is a calculation of perfection, sure shit can happen but the odds are that they have planned for it . Then again some plans are very simple; like when we were being given our briefing for a night operation to bag a bad guy in a very bad part of Baghdad.

Asking what the E & E plan was (Emergency & Evacuation) was for the operation, hey we have all seen Blackhawk Down and here I was actually preparing to go and take down a bad boy in the close to the worst area of the city.

The Master Sergeant giving us the briefing looked at Ollie North and me and asked if we had a compass and could we run if required. ‘Well yes in fact we both have wrist compasses on our watches and if needed we could run’ “Well good … Head south till you get to the Euphrates River swim across it and look for a good guy” I shit you not that was the it all gone wrong plan and you are on your own.

The comforting fact was that we had air cover with the flying death star 130 above us, F18’s circling and Apache helicopters were poised for instant support. These guys can summon up what they need when they need it . Truly elite soldiers.

The Medics are something to marvel at they carry close to 110 lbs with their body armor and weapons, if you ever find yourself in a war zone stick with the medics, these are the most protected and respected men in the unit. Before we even went out the gate on anything the medics at all the bases wanted our blood types and to know if we were allergic to anything. The way they ask it is how you would say hello in the morning and would you like a cup of coffee. As a rule I normally have my blood type written on three different parts of my body and kit, it is not something you do to be a hero in photos back home, but a critical piece of information that will save your life.

My medic first aid kit is in fact the largest pouch I have on my flak jacket, two tornaques , one large battlefield dressing for chest wound, a smaller battle field dressing for leg or arm , and the medic on this trip gave me a drip starter kit , needle tape pipe the whole nine yards, as he said one day you may need this hopefully not today.

Now what would you think talking to three young guys in their twenties standing around , not looking like Sgt Rock Jaw, but to all intensive purposes almost college nerd looking who upon asking why they joined Spec Op’s answer

“I like to blow shit up” and my other favorite:

“Why go in the front door it may be booby trapped, when you can go in thru the wall” and proceed to show you what looks like a Childs electric slot racing set from the seventies in a figure eight which is made of high explosives and will in fact take down a wall.

Every office and most family kitchens have a white board with things to do or buy at the shops, well at one base we spent time at I looked up on their white board and here is the quote …Ammo in stock 1,000,000,000 5;56 bullets, ok a joke but made me laugh. Or the classic on the door of a barrack room, no explanations needed

One change in attitude now is that I was asked daily “If I carried a weapon?”

“No, but I now know how to use them”

Both Producer Andy Stenner and I spent time on the range learning from the best how to use a multitude of weapons, and then asked “If needed would I use it?”

“Yes, trust me I am not going to end up on an Islamic web site with a knife to my throat” is by far the

Do I carry a gun?

No, but the day when come I believe I will have to, and it nothing to do with Iraq.

Perhaps what you need more than anything is a perverse sense of fun, because for three weeks you are locked together with other people and there is no out. You are in Iraq. The secret then is go in with friends and learn to laugh at yourself. Because there are so many times when laughter is the only thing that keeps you honestly sane. We have so many in jokes that to try and explain “The Mexican Police Chief Belt” or “Padawan the Turp” is so unimportant and for the record the “Man Sandwich” and “Budgie Smugglers” go no further.

What counts is that as a team we had highs and lows, far more highs than lows, The lows being dying of food poisoning from the

”Half cooked freshly killed still raw in the middle do not offend the sheik by not eating his provincial wide famous goat kebabs”

The only positive was that the kebabs felt more processed and cooked on the rapid way out.

Now having highly trained Medical staff around is a total bonus as if they are not busy they are generally bored stiff like everyone else and the chance to deal with normal human functions enables me to get on our trips free medical consults. This time I had my right ear cleaned and boy this was like something from the movie Alien being removed, followed up by a Spec Forces Medic armed with a lengthy book sticking needles into my feet which by the way hurt like bloody hell, but I was tough.

Then there is the ridiculous events that make you realize that the war in Iraq is being controlled not by the US or Iraqis but by and wait for this …..

Uganda is the most powerful country in Iraq today, forget Uncle Sam forget Osama Bin Laden. Ugandans control Iraq.

And as they say that is the tease for the next entry

Out Safe

2007-12-21T23:19:00.000+02:00

Kuwait Airport
The simple words are out safe another assignment done in Iraq. Perhaps the hardest thing is the incident that I cannot write about for many reasons. But every once in a while you do shoot tape that is so explosive that releasing it would send tremors on a global stage of outrage.
I have been keeping a diary of the trip and will start to put insights down , hopefully on the plane overnight but most likely will fall asleep and wake up in Frankfurt.
Again let me say one thing it is not always hot in Iraq in fact the temp has dipped to below zero over the last couple of days and add the cold rain in Kuwait tonight , glad to be heading to warmer weather for a few days before London.
Mal
Kuwait City

Moments of Definition

2007-12-20T15:28:00.000+02:00

A question that faces many of us in conflict and war zones is at what point do you put down the camera and start to help. It is important that you never forget what you are there to film and record not only for the story you are working on but also as a document of history. Bad things can and do happen in conflict zones, and the rule of thumb that I apply is that I switch off emotions and switch on the camera record for twenty seconds to capture what I am witnessing then just as quickly turn off the camera and assist.

It is not a matter of being a ghoul by these actions but a cold hard fact of doing a good job in a bad position. It does not always have to be death or injury to allow these events to happen. They can and do occur when you least expect them too and when they happen it can reduce you to tears in seconds and rip the soul out of you.

It happened a couple of days ago on this assignment in Ramadi Iraq. Not a major event in terms of world news but an image that will haunt my dreams for the rest of my life. We were at a medical clinic that members of the US Special Operations were running on a football field at the back of a Sheiks house for the poor. Since the war commenced nearly five years ago all semblance of medical care has disintegrated, doctors have fled the country for fear of religious backlash from Al Qaida Terrorists trying to intimidate all authority to the age-old Sunni Shia issue that vexes Iraq.

The end result is that for the poor there is no hope of basic treatment, children stand in line with their parents hoping for a cure for blindness, two policemen stood there with one eye between them, a medic treats a man whose foot is bloated with gangrene and when an old woman is asked whether she would like medicine or blankets for her children, she replied “blankets”.

It was not these scenes of despair and tragedy that drew my breath, but the sight of a man whose son lay on the ground crippled by Cerebral Palsy. Inside the tortured body of this young man was human being, whose thoughts and ideas will never be known due to a disease that has been part of his family fight for help. His father cradled his rolling head slowly moving his hand across his face to keep the flies away.

I did not think much about at the time took a couple of shots and moved on with covering the story of the medics treating the people waiting on the lawn.

About an hour later I looked across the lawn and saw the young man lying exposed alone on a mat, his father was away and he lay on the mat his body contorted with the disease and his face exposed to the sun. That was enough to make me walk over and there he lay his face covered with flies.

At this point the question is, what to do?

I took a breath, framed a close up and let the camera roll. Showing the flies crawling around his eyes and his mouth and I counted to twenty. That was it. I turned the camera off and walked over and knelt down beside him with my body casting some shade over him and I started to brush the flies off his face.

Tears of sorrow rolled down my face as I looked into his and tried to understand what was behind the face and eyes that looked up. Producer Andy Stenner and Ollie North came over and asked to do something. I looked up and glared nothing they saw what I was doing and walked away, understanding that I was doing what I needed to do.

For ten minutes I sat there, brushing away the flies wondering where his father was, I stroked the side of his face. Feeling the texture of his face under my hand hoping that he could realise I understood that he was a human.

I would have sat there all day if I had too; there is no way I could leave him. I had taken an image that will haunt me and now I was prepared to pay the price of capturing his plight, everything has a price. But it was not that I had too, it was because wanted too.

I looked up and saw his father walking to me; he looked and said the most heart-warming words anyone can hear. It was simply “Thank you”.

I walked away and went back to Andy and Ollie and continued working.

Looking back half an hour later the ground was empty, Father and Son had left.

Tragedy in a War Zone sometimes comes when you are least prepared.

Sandstorms in Winter

2007-12-15T00:34:00.001+02:00

Sandstorms Suck at the best of times , add a freezing cold wind and clear sky above and the added fun of watching the Iraqi Commandos driving around in highly non technical vehicles whilst my camera is being filled with talc fine sand and well thats the type of morning we had . Not to mention that they would not let us play with the guns on the ranges

Fallujah
Iraq

Commuting Iraq Style

2007-12-15T00:24:00.000+02:00

It is like the ultimate muscle car, the roar of the engine and the wind ripping in thru the windows. Except the US Army Blackhawk is capable of doing all of that and flying at 150 knots an hour and at 5o ft above the ground. By the time the bad guy has seen you, you have passed which is a comforting thought.

Flying over Baghdad and across the desert to visit Army Bases and walk thru Iraqi villages is an experience that so few people will ever have happen to them, yet in many ways for me it is the means to get to a location. You cannot help but feel like a king of the universe as the adrenaline kicks in along with the fear. Perhaps it is the fear that drives the excitement. For fear is ever present here.

You will hear on the radio, see on the TV News and read in the paper that another helicopter has been shot down or mysteriously crashed in Iraq and that X number of soldiers have been killed, and that is when the fear factor comes into play.

As I type this entry I am waiting for a night flight from Baghdad to Fallujah. Just a short 20-minute flight. But try doing it at night with a hot landing and off loading, in the pitch black the choppers will land twenty yards away and without shutting down we have a minute to load the ten cases including our personal bags into the chopper. There are no porters or smiling check in counter girls you pick up what you can and ducking trying to avoid the rotor wash approach the bird drop the gear in the doorway and run back for another load. Whilst wearing 30 lbs of body armor and Kevlar helmets. Earplugs and clear glasses. The moment we load we take off and lift into the black. The only noise above the wind and rotors are the loadmasters cocking and priming the guns that are pointing out and down. Fingers never leave the triggers as they peer thru night vision lens and we sit back and say our silent prayers that we will not be hit.

You see nothing but blackness, you only feel your own adrenaline in the darkness and hopefully we will land and scramble to unload as fast as possible, then turning our backs the Blackhawk’s take off and thirty seconds later it is silent and the night remains jet black.

Thinking that again in twenty-four hours we will move once again and the process of fear and adrenaline replays itself.

One heck of a way to commute to work.

Mal
Baghdad

Great Hotel Rooms of Iraq

2007-12-14T23:54:00.000+02:00

Now life in a warzone is not all five star hotels and room service , but you eat for free and where you lay your head at night or in the morning depending on what time you are up partying too [NOT] . Thus a selection of my rooms of recent

Baghdad
At least this one had a window which is a very rare treat, you could watch the lake being refilled with blackwater [ a tem used to descibe water that is well removed from certain locations } had a nice kitchenbut you need to buy your own coffee maker , tea and coffee provided , in fact we had five industrial size Maxwell house cans and no coffee maker but a quick thirty minute drive to thePX store solved that issue. No check in required and the door code is 4 5 32 . Water in showers runs orange

Fallujah

Comfortable rustic approach with pull chain lights, toilet and showers accross the gravel , No coffee making facilty , but a complimentary can of mountain dew upon check in . gym facilty nearby , restaurant is a ten minute walk . Warning thou no softener is used on blankets

Ramadi

Again the rustic natural pine is all the range in Al Anbar Province these days , centrally located to a food hall that resembles a supermarket where taking anything you want is totally acceptable without paying. Good selection of salt and pepper sachets available. toilets are portaloos centrally located ten feet from the door . Hospital blankets make a nice change , rooms are small and check in involves a ten minute death by powerpoin orientation whilst still wearing body armor.

The Unhealthy Bathroom

2007-12-12T15:24:00.000+02:00

Now cleanliness is next to ... well for the lack of a better description "The Piss Tubes" , bathrooms are a luxury when in an outpost and the the humble tube allows you to do what nature intend , but just in afunnel and since you wash your hands might as well do the teeth at the same time

Mal
Army Outpost Camp Murray
South of Baghdad

Going Dark

2007-12-10T20:23:00.001+02:00

An expression that we use when there are things and places where you cannot report or discuss , hence the expression " Going Dark" , best explained in the current context that I am in a city the same size as Baltimore or Boston surrounded on all sides and the only thing that is between me and half a million people are 48 men , thats it total.
Have been keeping a detailed diary and when this is over a long piece that I hope will make up a chapter of my never to released book will cover the next ten days.
At times in the last few days I have honestly felt that I am living a Hollywood movie script, doing things that are so extreme (and I add at this stage yet to be shot at) yet you can stand in the staging area in the morning and listen to a never ending barrage of automatic weapons and around you people just hope that is not an omen
Mal
Dark Deep and in Iraq

Snapshot of Life inIraq

2007-12-07T04:03:00.001+02:00

Have no tshowered in three days
Have not hd a hot meal for 36 hours >
Wkoken at 4.40am
5.40Live shot
Endureda a famous Iraqi sandstorm
have not slept inthe same bed more than 1 night
Have not been shot at ... That is good
Flown in Blackhawks that s fun
Still wearing the same clothes as three days ago
Cannotremember the last time I showerd three days ago i think
Coffee is bad
Life e is good wish you were here
Mal
10 mles south of Baghdad

The School Safety Belt

2007-12-07T04:00:00.000+02:00

Lucky for a Pillow

When we checked into housing tonight at the Army Base South of Baghdad, two things struck me. One was that instead of on the back the room door a fire escape map, there was at reception a “Warning Sirens explanation Chart” so that you could tell the differnce between “Incoming, all clear and this siren is ok because it us firing out”. The other was that somehow when Producer Andy Stenner and Chuck Holton, a fellow cameraman/correspondent traveling with us, rushed into our room I somehow managed to pick the only bunk bed that did not have a pillow.

The pillow issue being resolved I find myself at 11:30pm writing this entry lying in bed in my sleeping bag with a headlamp on trying to figure out where the last 48 hours have gone.

The best part of the trip so far has been flying around Baghdad in the Army Blackhawks below 1000ft over the roofs hoping that the movie Blackhawk Down had been a box office failure in Iraq. These machines are like being buckled into a muscle car and bullying your way thru the skies. With the cold winter air rushing past the machine guns and buffeting me as I tried to film the classic gun turrets over rooftops. The adrenalin rush is always tempered by the thoughts of how many times I heard of helicopters beng shot down over the course of this war, whilst at the same time the incredible sense of awe and excitement is a complete rush. For those used to hearing radio reports of traffic on the I 95 I can tell you that traffic was moving well on Route Irish today but expect delays at checkpoints near the bridges.

The question is of course is the war being won, if so how is victory assessed. From what I have seen so far “ The Surge “ has been effective for it has provided Iraqis to have what is being called “ The Awakening”. Local’s have started to organize themselves into teams of Concerned Local Citizens or CLC’S and armed with nothing more than a yellow safety reflective belt, they are cooperating and assisting the local police and the US forces to give them intelligence and help with patrols.

What can a man do with a yellow plastic safety reflective belt, by himself not much but when groups of locals all start wearing the belt, it becomes a symbol of hope and provides the people of the villages and towns a new beginning of hope and of a future for their children. No mother ever wants their child to grow up in an environment where hatreds and frustrations lead her son or daughter to become a suicide bomber for the cause of desperation.

What is evident is that US troop morale is very high, for the first time in a couple of years they sense that there is an end to this war. It will not be tomorrow or in the next couple of months, but the pride of the people we met yesterday armed with a plastic safety belt, has become their new symbol of pride and hope. Small steps and snapshots of life here, now if they could only use this power of for once in long time, the “Yellow Revolution” may be the start of the winter of hope.

Waiting for the Colonel

2007-12-07T03:58:00.000+02:00

Many days have passed , since i wrote this but it is a start 4.30 am Frday , south of Baghdad lets go back .....

This entry will be written over the next few hours from the lounge in Frankfurt to Kuwait. Perhaps one of the truly bizarre things about traveling in this business is that you just accept it as travel. I honestly worry more about bus timetables down to the rail station when on holidays in Australia than I do about flying.

Somehow you always believe that it has been taken care of and somehow computer magic will ensure that all flows smoothly without a blemish. So imagine my surprise this morning arriving in Frankfurt to be told that yes I had a seat on the plane to Kuwait but I did not have a ticket and that if I wanted my seat it would cost $3500, the full cost of a return ticket Frankfurt – Kuwait.

I did not bother calling the travel agent who made the bookings back in the states as no one there makes much sense at two am on a Monday morning.

So as I sit and wait for “the Colonel” aka Ollie I think and reflect on how bizarre it is that we can simply say see you in the lounge on Monday and have no idea whatsoever as to the travel plans or flight details of the other members of the team. Keeping it simple like see you in the lounge sounds good just hope they turn up in the next hour before I figure out am I going to get on a plane to Kuwait if no one else from the team is on the plane . Then again all my gear is theoretically on the plane so at least I know I will be getting on the plane if for no other reason than … my gear is in the hold

Hang on … Hello Ollie are you there ?

12:07 pm

Ollie walks in the lounge , off to our ritual photo shop visit .

Rituals and routines are something that I do not like to break on every one of the trips I have done to Iraq with Ollie we have always gone down to the photo shop in the airport in Frankfurt. And we have comeback from every trip safe and sound . Some people have lucky rabbits foots , well Ollie and I go and look around the photo shop at Frankfurt airport. I used to have a lucky red war neck hankerchief but it faded to white and thus became not so lucky

Back soon