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New Story: “War for Afghanistan — 1998-2018. Twenty Years of Forty Years” by Daniel Schwartz

October 8, 2019

A man waits for a thunderstorm to pass on the “Betonka.” He fills the potholes with mud and gravel, a service for which he receives small donations from drivers. Farah Province, Afghanistan. 2 April 2001. Built by the Soviets in the 1950s and suitable for tanks, the north-western part of the Afghan ring-road—called the “Betonka”—connects Herat and Kandahar. The band of concrete slabs weathered three decades of war much better than the American tarmac in the south.

In December 2019 it will be forty years since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The country has been torn apart by foreign political and military meddling as well as internal strife ever since. The challenges of sustainable peace in Afghanistan cannot be overestimated.
What follows is a story not about troops in battle, but of a country and its people, locked in history.

Click here to view the full story by Daniel Schwartz.