The Foreign Service Journal, January 2004

ver, lined as it was with various diplomatic and government mis- sions full of flowering plants and trees. As we drove in awed silence there was not a shade of green any- where: only mounds of rubble and shattered compounds. We passed the completely gutted Soviet embassy, whose size at one time must have matched the State Department’s Truman Building. The KBG compound next to it was extensive as well, but little remained except for a few skeletal structures barely standing. Further on we passed more adobe ruins with white trucks parked outside. The driver told us this was the new UNICEF mission headquarters, a glimmer of hope amidst total devastation. At the end of the two-mile long road of death, the Darulaman Palace (home of King Zahir Shah before his exile to Italy) rises majes- tically atop a knoll, its gorgeous architectural detail still visible between pockmarked shell holes. Circling its base is a barren domain of crumbling walkways. Our driver described this belt as once contain- ing the most beautiful gardens in all Afghanistan, with the citizens of Kabul thronging here on weekends to picnic amidst the luscious palace foliage. Today there is nothing but rubble and desiccated earth. The famous Kabul Museum is just across the street, directly beneath the palace, its priceless Buddhist collec- tion destroyed by the Taliban just like the towering Buddha figures carved in the cliffs at Bamiyan. Behind the Darulaman Palace rises the hulk of another great struc- ture, the Ministry of Defense, anoth- er heavily shelled exterior whose win- dows show nothing but sky. From the hill of the Darulaman Palace looking back through the wasteland we had driven through, it was as if a nuclear explosion had leveled the western part of the city. The craggy, lifeless hills separating the devastated part of the city from downtown to the east, only added to the bleak vista. The massive, snow-covered Hindu Kush, rising majestically to the northeast, still seem to wall the tragedy of Kabul off from the world. To counter the depressing nature of our surroundings, our motor pool driver, who was himself incarcerat- ed by the Taliban for several months, took us though more rub- ble to the Loya Jirga tent, where the tribal chiefs met and voted to form the Karzai presidency. The trans- parent bigtop, a tent-like structure made of some sort of plastic, in which King Zahir Shah convened the meeting is a hopeful sign that a healthy democratic government can be established. But with Hek- matyar’s troops staging hit-and-run operations on U.S. special forces in the Spinghar region and elsewhere, and a resurgent Taliban challenging ISAF troops ahead of the coming elections, success is far from certain. Stark Contrasts Taking another route back into town, we stopped atop a pass over the craggy hills at the Inter- Continental Hotel for its tremen- dous views over downtown Kabul and the airport. The quiet civility of the hotel was in direct contrast to the reality of what surrounded it. Just below the hotel, in fact, is a deserted swimming pool resort, called Bag-e-Bala. According to our driver it once housed Al-Qaida troops and was visited often by Osama bin Laden. We drove in and toured the decrepit ruins once encircled by a vineyard. Most of the grapes are gone now, the roots and branches used for firewood by al- Qaida. Driving back into Kabul’s center, things do appear normal, mainly because there is so little overt destruction. We went to ramshackle “Chicken Street” to check out the carpets and jewelry, but found the selections limited and overpriced. ISAF forces patrol the streets of downtown, so we did feel safe on the sidewalks. The most intriguing sight in all of Kabul, however, is the overwhelming number of Massoud posters. They’re affixed every- where! The Northern Alliance leader, assassinated two days before 9/11 by either Taliban or al-Qaida operatives masquerading as journal- ists, seems to rule Kabul through the ubiquitous photograph of him peering out from under his floppy (pakol) woolen cap. In contrast, there is not a sign of President Karzai anywhere. Despite the relative safety of downtown, it was comforting to return to the security of the embassy compound at dusk. The random hateful stares on the streets, coupled with the devastation we’d witnessed, made a night in a clean, modern container seem downright elegant. The following morning dawned icy and cloudless. Our quick trans- fer to the airport graveyard with post’s classified outbound proved uneventful. We were escorted 68 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / J A N U A R Y 2 0 0 4 There were few signs of reconstruction, but that didn’t stop a throng of humanity from conducting business along the cratered dirt road and setting up shop in the adobe ruins.