Afghan Diary: On the once most dangerous road in Afghanistan - a symbol of failure

Created: 12/16/2021, 10:00 AM

Highway 1 should stand for the modernization of Afghanistan.

Instead, the Ring Road became the most dangerous road in the country.

The international correspondent Natalie Amiri dares the trip.

Kandahar / Kabul - Did I mention that I've hardly slept a night since I landed in Afghanistan? Because I am always startled by the volleys of gunfire on the street. That was already the case in Kabul, now I hear gunshots every night in Kandahar. The city, a stronghold of the Taliban, is 500 kilometers south of Kabul. In the morning I ask my co-worker whether he has not heard her. The shots. No. He thinks it is much quieter at night than it was before the Taliban came to power in August. On the one hand, it is probably true, as many have confirmed to me - and on the other hand, he has probably got used to these inner unrest-causing noises over the years.

It is still pitch dark when we leave. I took a thermos from the hotel, full of tea. There is green and black tea in Afghanistan. More green than black, I can't really get used to the intensity of black here, it's much too weak compared to tea in Iran or Turkey. We pack everything in the car and drive off.

We plan to drive back to Kabul on what was once the most dangerous road in Afghanistan.

Hence the tea, I don't know if we can stop.

We are told that this road can be used again.

The Ring Road.

A ring-shaped network of highways that connects many, and above all the largest, Afghan cities.

2200 kilometers long.

Our route is shown as 491 kilometers and calculated by Google Maps as 9 hours and 43 minutes.

In the end it will be 15 hours with stopovers.

The once most dangerous road in Afghanistan: Natalie Amiri on the Kandahar-Kabul route

This section of almost 500 kilometers is called Highway 1. When then President Karzai inaugurated the street in 2003, he said in an interview that it was one of the best days of his life. He knew how important this connection road to Kabul was. He comes from Kandahar after all. The highway stood as a symbol for the rapid development in Afghanistan, the modernization, the construction. For a short time - after that, Highway 1 became a symbol of failure in Afghanistan. Basically, it was already recognizable back then. The Afghanistan project was unsuccessful. And the road is not passable. Til today.

I still hardly see anything, there is almost no street lighting. No oncoming traffic either. Not yet. We drive really fast in the pitch black, I think, fortunately the driver has to brake again and again to avoid huge potholes. He knows the route because as a former police officer he had to patrol here. A dangerous job that many of his colleagues had to pay with their lives.

Dawn is slowly setting in, I recognize the outlines, the catastrophic condition of the road, more and more clearly. Blasted bridges, a road on which you can hardly cover a distance of 30 meters without having to drive around the next crater, crack, damage. On this street, the driver tells me, there was only the Taliban or armored military vehicles. Afghan, German, American. Or armored government vehicles. The Taliban * targeted the last two groups.

They hid on the side of the road and then set off IEDs.

Improvised explosives.

Improvised Explosive Devices.

They were detonated as soon as a vehicle was over the self-made bombs.

USBV is the German abbreviation.

That stands for unconventional explosive or incendiary device.

In 2003, 81 attacks with such explosives were registered in Afghanistan, and in 2009 there were 7228. 

Afghanistan under Taliban rule: perpetrators of terrorism are celebrated for being safe now

Lieutenant Colonel Heck, responsible for the Counter IED information center, said at the opening of the center in Bonn in 2010: "The Taliban naturally have the great advantage that they can force us in many areas when and where they actually want to attack us with an IED, so that in principle we have to expect an IED attack always and everywhere, but ultimately the insurgents determine when, where and how it happens. "

And as schizophrenic as it is, those who caused this terror on the streets are now being celebrated to make sure it is safe.

Not actually a work of art, because the perpetrators of terror are now in power in Kabul.  

Natalie Amiri, Afghan Diary

I ask an ex-Bundeswehr soldier who was on duty in Afghanistan for a long time what he felt when he had to drive on this most dangerous road in Afghanistan. He writes to me that he hated it. They were in armored vehicles, but each time they were soaking wet within minutes from the heat and tension. Even today, long after his time in Afghanistan and living safely in Germany, he still pays attention to every garbage bag on the street. And even with pressure cookers, he would immediately have the assembly instructions for IEDs in front of his eyes. He would have developed a real aversion to bags and pressure cookers, because both remind him of the booby-traps: “If you look, you will find. Who steps on it disappears ”he writes. Perhaps that was a common slogan among Bundeswehr soldiers in Afghanistan.

more on the subject

Afghan Diary: Afghanistan's defeated ghost army - "They wanted revenge, but there was no other plan"

Afghan Diary: In the stronghold of Talibanism - "They destroyed the police officers' gravestones themselves"

Afghan Diary: “What do you want to do?

Kill us all? ”Afghanistan's women under Taliban rule

The Taliban were very popular, especially among the Pashtun population, when they first came into power.

On the one hand because the Taliban are Pashtuns themselves and on the other hand because they ensured security and order.

From the point of view of the local population, it was a success.

Then came 20 years in which there was uncertainty and terror, while the international community of states and their soldiers tried to ensure security without any chance or result.

And as schizophrenic as it is, those who caused this terror on the streets are now being celebrated to make sure it is safe.

Not actually a work of art, because the perpetrators of terror are now in power in Kabul.

Solar panels in the middle of the Afghan province: power generation through renewable energy

Meanwhile the sun is shining. I see more and more solar panels on the roadsides, I would almost say, clearly more than in Germany. I would not have thought that. I want to talk to the people who set it up, generate their electricity from it. We hold. Three farmers are currently working in the field, in the middle of which are solar panels, I count one, two, three of them. What are you doing with these solar panels? I ask them.

“We use it to generate electricity for our water pumps.

They are right behind the panels.

They pump groundwater that we use to irrigate our grapes.

We have been doing this for almost 20 years. ”I am amazed.

The farmers in the middle of the provinces in Afghanistan seem to be further ahead than we are here in Germany.

It seems at least very well-rehearsed, the generation of electricity through renewable energies.

They bought them in Kandahar.

“Since we have had these panels, our lives have become so much easier, there was absolutely no water here, there was absolute drought.

Since we got water with the electricity, we always have water, ”they say, beaming at me.

In the fifth part of her Afghan Diary, the international correspondent Natalie Amiri travels down what was once the most dangerous road in Afghanistan.

© N. Amiri / N.Bruckmann / M.

Litzka / afp

You really tried hard with your small solar park.

The panels all come from different manufacturers.

Colorfully mixed up module types.

They were probably already used when you bought them.

But that doesn't matter at first, together they generate electricity that is important for the farmers.

I show the pictures of the panels to a friend, it's his specialty.

He says to me that the panels have not been cleaned; if they were, they could get ten percent more power.

I have to tell the farmers that is my first thought.

Next time I come down this street

Otherwise, says my friend, the modules would be in very good condition and will certainly supply the farmers with electricity for the next 20 or 30 years.

Encounter with ex-Talib on Afghanistan's most dangerous street: "Taliban are always needed"

The farmers do not care who guarantees them security, the main thing is that they have it: “We have no good memories of the time when many fights took place here in our fields, we hid every day and could not work in our fields. Now we have no war or even fire and we will come here safely and continue our work. Life is so safe and we are so happy with our life, we have had so many problems before. We are happy because nobody starts a war. We can work or travel without any problems, which we couldn't do before. "

We keep going. When it was still really dark, we already had our first records. I remind the driver that we no longer have a spare tire and that given the road quality, getting one might not be a bad thing. We stop at the nearest garage. Auto repair is a bit euphemistic. There is a tire on the ground in the dust and a jack - five men, two boys, standing by and shooting non-existent birds in the air with an air rifle. I ask whoever is shooting what it is like to live here now, since the Taliban came to power.

“Before there was a war here, I was a Talib, and now it's only my brothers in the Taliban and not me. My brothers are in town and my life is very quiet now, ”he tells me. I want to know why he's not with the people in power now. The former Talib replies, “Now my brothers are here and I am running my shop and business. I am happy to be a Talib, but the financial situation of the house is not good and we do not have enough money. "

If everyone were rich, I would like to know from him that we would not have a Taliban.

He replies, “The Taliban are needed because the previous regime did a lot of bad things and there were thieves, but the Taliban eliminated thieves, thugs and illegal sex.

Before that, the police stations were so bad that we couldn't even get to our shops.

They took money from vehicles on this freeway.

The Taliban are always needed to maintain security.

Security in Afghanistan: Many do not see the Taliban as an enemy - they see other countries

Security, a cornerstone in life. No matter whether in Afghanistan * or in Germany. Only we in Germany don't know what it feels like to have no security. Many in the Afghan population do not see the Taliban as an enemy unless they are a woman or belong to the marginal middle class of Kabul that we focused on in the West, with whom we communicated. For many, the enemy was foreign countries, which drove through their country in armored military vehicles and which the Taliban fought. The result was: no security.

At the end of my trip, I chat with a colleague who is planning to take this very street from Kabul to Herat.

I'm a little jealous, I write to him, I'd also like to take the even longer route to the west.

He writes back: No envy, reports my back to your back.

He is right.

7 days in Afghanistan: Afghan Diary by Natalie Amiri 

We are all still aware of the tragic images of the days around August 30, 2021 that accompanied the withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan. Thousands of people desperately tried to get on one of the planes at Kabul airport to travel west. They did not want to live in an Afghanistan ruled by the Taliban again. Few of them were lucky enough to get a seat on board. 

Since then, the Taliban have ruled the torn and impoverished country, which many observers are predicting a humanitarian catastrophe this winter.

Natalie Amiri, international correspondent, kept an impressive diary during her most recent research stay for her new book (to be published on March 14, 2022) in Afghanistan.

IPPEN.MEDIA publishes the diary of their trip in seven parts both online and in print in some titles such as Münchner Merkur or Frankfurter Rundschau.