The Taliban Shuffle_ Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan - Kim Barker [51]
“Everyone throws rocks at us,” the copilot answered. We all laughed.
Our helicopters landed outside a tiny base in the middle of the desert, kicking up sand into a swirling cloud of beige as we jolted to the ground. Quickly we climbed out the back, where the sand soon clogged every orifice, my eyes, my nostrils, my ears, my mouth, choking me and erasing the bulk of my senses. I pushed through the beige, following the dark outlines of the translator and other U.S. soldiers, wearing one backpack, carrying another with my right hand, my helmet slipping sideways on my head. I saw shapes of people waiting to board the helicopters back to Kandahar. One shape grabbed me by the flak vest.
“Are you a journalist?” he shouted over the roar of the helicopter.
“Yeah. You’re a photographer?” I shouted back, noting his camera.
“I’m a German photographer,” he corrected. “This place is hell. Get out while you can.”
The shape then turned and ran for the helicopter. I stared after him for a few seconds, wishing I could follow, then, resigned to my fate, pushed through the hot dust fog toward a truck, where I dumped my bags gratefully. We then trudged inside the base. I saw the Uzbek head off with some men with beards. I never saw him again.
“Hell” was a compliment. The temperature here soared higher than 120 degrees. The new base was modest, a few big tents that each slept fifty or so people and kept getting blown down by the winds, which whipped through the camp like a thief, leaving behind a fine dust the consistency of talcum powder. Barbed wire and a ring of HESCOs, large bags filled with sand, protected the camp. Sentries stood on a hill above the camp and in guard towers. In the desert that stretched forever, seeing anyone approach was easy. It was not that obvious what the soldiers were doing out here. Their goal was supposedly to clear the territory of bad guys, hold the territory, and build stuff for Afghans. Yet barely enough soldiers were here to fill a movie theater, let alone clear anything or hold it. And the closest town, again, was three miles away.
The media handler, an affable soldier with thick Mr. Magoo glasses, introduced himself and explained the camp and its rules. He pointed out two large guns on the side of the base, 105-mm howitzers, and told me not to be afraid if I heard loud blasts in the middle of the night—the Americans were firing the howitzers into the desert, letting the Taliban know that they were there. He told me women could use the showers only at certain times, which I promptly forgot. Showering here would be like trying to beat back the Taliban with Karzai pamphlets, as pointless as a pedicure in Kabul. Mr. Magoo showed me the tactical operations center (known as the TOC, pronounced like “talk”), the only place with air-conditioning on the base. Outside, other air conditioners sat unused and dusty, with no generator to power them. The Taliban had just destroyed the base’s new large refrigerator unit as it was being driven through Musa Qala, along with containers of Red Bull and Gatorade and many soldiers’ personal belongings.
I was told to find a cot. One tent had two rows of green cots, with only a few women takers, and I dropped my bags on an empty one, sending up clouds of dust. I walked outside the tent and looked for water—different bins set up across the base held thousands of bottles of water, all instant-coffee hot from the sun. I carried a bottle back to my cot. An embed was essentially a test of patience. Too eager, and a reporter risked alienating soldiers. Too passive, and a reporter risked sitting around reading leftover thrillers. As I had just arrived, I waited for the soldiers to come to me. It did not take long. They called me “ma’am,” and asked where I was from. They showed me how to cool down my bottled water—take a sock, wet it with a splash of the hot water, drop the bottle inside the wet sock, and tie it to a bed frame or tent post near the wind, which was everywhere.