Afghan Journal

from Photographers Blog:

38 days and 10 years in Afghanistan

By Erik de Castro

As I write this blog, I am on the 38th day of my current assignment to Afghanistan as an embedded journalist with U.S. military forces. I have been assigned here several times since 2001 to cover the war that is still going on 10 years after the al Qaeda attack on U.S. soil. Mullah Omar, popularly known as the one-eyed Taliban, was the first member of the Taliban I met back in 2001. He held press conferences almost daily at the Afghan embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan a few weeks before U.S. forces and its allies attacked Afghanistan to remove the Taliban government.

Ten years and several trips back to Afghanistan later, I still haven't seen a lot of Taliban fighters. My present assignment is the time I’ve experienced the most encounters between the combined U.S. and Afghan forces and the Taliban.

It is remarkable how the Afghan soldiers and Taliban fighters are more aggressive now. The insurgents, though they know their artillery is no match to that of the Americans, are daring enough to attack at every opportunity, be it with small arms, RPGs or, on occasions, IEDs and rockets. Most of the time, it is a “hit and run” kind of attack wherein they flee after firing some shots. Such eagerness, however, could cost lives.

from Photographers Blog:

Back in Afghanistan, ten years later

By Erik de Castro

Ten years ago I was part of the three-member Reuters multimedia team that went to Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. We covered the pursuit for Osama Bin Laden and his Taliban followers, who were believed to be holed up in the caves of the Tora Bora mountains, by US military special forces fighting alongside the Afghan Mujaheedin. Nobody from the press saw Osama. Instead about a dozen Taliban captured from the caves were presented to the media in Tora Bora.

As we passed the Afghan border on the road to Jalalabad following a long journey from Islamabad, Pakistan, I remember the precautions our security adviser told us: If ever we are stopped by armed men along the way, stay calm and just hand over our U.S. dollars. Weeks earlier, two Reuters colleagues (a TV cameraman and a photographer) and two other European journalists traveling with a convoy of media vehicles were killed by bandits on the same road.

Ten years after 9/11, I was back in Jalalabad as an embedded photojournalist with the U.S. military forces. I was attached to Task Force Bronco covering eastern Afghanistan. During the first week of my embed with different units, I joined the soldiers as they met with Afghan police officers and local government leaders, patrolling for hours, day and night searches for arms caches, and looking for members of the Taliban.

from Photographers Blog:

Poppy politics

It's not hard to find a field of poppies in the village of Jelawar, north of Kandahar. Some are hidden discreetly behind mud walls but others have been brazenly planted within sight of the main road. During a recent patrol, I accompanied Afghan National Army Captain Imran (he uses one name) and a group of U.S. civil affairs soldiers on a tour of Jelawar's back roads as they tried to assess the extent of this year's opium production.

The first field we came to was a couple of hundred meters across, filled with pink poppy flowers in full bloom. There were several men working the field and Imran asked them what they were doing. A farmer looked up from pulling weeds and said they were working on their onions. Indeed, in a poppy field the size of a football stadium there were a handful of green onion shoots pushing out of the soil. Not exactly the perfect cover, especially after the farmer admitted to planting the poppies in the first place.

As we walked from one poppy field to the next, Imran was not amused. Finally, he gathered a group of farmers together to give them some bad news. "President Karzai has said it is illegal to grow opium poppies and that they must be destroyed. I give you 48 hours to cut down your plants or I will return with Afghan police and Afghan soldiers and we will force you to destroy these fields."

The farmers protested. What about the money we have already spent to prepare the fields and irrigate the land? Why not let us harvest this year's crop and we will not plant next year? Imran was firm. "My hands are tied", he said. "If I let one farmer harvest his crop then I must let everyone harvest their crops. Everyone must be treated in the same manner."

from Photographers Blog:

Medevac! Medevac! Lifeline over Afghanistan

I had just reached the camp of the unit I would be embedded with at remote Forward Operating Base Ramrod in Afghanistan's Kandahar province.

As soon as I got off the military aircraft that took me there, I saw a helicopter with a red cross sign painted on it. I approached a crew doing a routine check on their aircraft and, after introducing myself, they explained the details of my embed and gave me some instructions. They pointed me to a section in the chopper where they said I should keep my body armor and helmet, which I have to put on when we flew.

Early morning on the second day of my embed with the “Dustoff” medical evacuation team of Task Force Shadow from 101st Airborne Division of the 101st Aviation Brigade, the sound of “Medevac! Medevac!” echoed on the two-way radio issued to me earlier.

Barely awake, I rushed out of the tent and saw everyone in a hurry. Remembering the briefing I had on the first day with the unit, I realized the urgency of the radio message. The Medevac team was rushing to the Black Hawk helicopter, including a female pilot who dashed from the container van shower room straight to the aircraft with water still dripping from her hair.

I was in a panic, worried that I wouldn’t make it, as I hurriedly put on socks and tied the strings of my boots while recalling instructions from my briefing. In five minutes, or a maximum of seven, we had to be flying. I ran inside the tent to grab my cameras and gear and then sprinted to the chopper. Sure enough, as soon as I was done putting on my flak jacket and helmet, we were up in the air.

from Photographers Blog:

Life and death on a medevac helicopter

Taking pictures of people who are suffering and in pain is never an easy experience. From the jump seat in the back of a Blackhawk medevac helicopter, a constant stream of injured, dead and dying men and women passed in front of me during a recent week-long embed. The wounds were as varied as the patients; an Afghan soldier with kidney stones to a Marine whose legs had been nearly severed by an IED blast.

The medevac helicopter crews were part of the 101st Airborne Division based at Camp Dwyer, a dusty Marine base in Afghanistan’s Helmand Province.  During my one week embed with Charlie Company, I would generally work from 6am until it got dark around 7:30pm. The busiest times of day seemed to be in the morning and then again in the afternoon, but calls were received 24 hours a day. About 50% of our patients were Afghan nationals, both military and civilians; with injuries ranging from amputated limbs blown off by IED’s to stab wounds from domestic disputes. The military medical facilities offer the same level of care to locals and soldiers alike, in no small part to gain a bit of good will in this hostile and volatile province.

One morning I was in my tent when the call went out over the radios, "Medevac Medevac Medevac” I joined the crew as we sprinted to the helicopter and within minutes we were airborne. The noise inside was deafening, and earplugs brought the level down to a dull roar. After about 15 minutes, the pilot increased our speed to around 175 mph (280 km/h) and we dropped to tree-top level for our final approach. The helicopter rotors kicked up a cloud of dust as we touched down and the flight medic jumped out to help board the wounded.

A group of Marines were already running towards the door carrying a litter with an injured comrade. The soldier was conscious as they placed him onto the floor and one Marine reached out to shake his hand before leaving. A moment later, a second litter arrived with a more serious casualty. The Marine had no vital signs and the flight medic immediately began CPR while the crew chief pumped air into his lungs.  They worked on the wounded man for the entire flight back to the hospital, about 20 minutes, and as soon as they arrived, a nurse jumped onto the gurney and continued to pump his chest.

from Photographers Blog:

Embedded in Taliban territory

One of the most challenging and exciting parts of my job is working with some of the toughest and best-trained men in the most dangerous and challenging spot in the world. Last January, Reuters photographers received a group email asking for volunteers for an embed in Afghanistan “during the two most dangerous months of the year, May and June”. I did not think much before responding. I was on my way back to my home base in Greece after a two-year assignment in Israel.

By mid-March I was back in the gym to be fit for the embed. After a series of emails with the U.S. military in Afghanistan and a bit of paperwork, I received the approval for a three-week embed with the 2-508 Infantry Parachute regiment, (the Red Devils) part of the 82nd airborne, based in Arghandab valley near Kandahar. I was very happy and relieved to get the go ahead. I arrived at Kandahar airfield (KAF) on April 30. After a two day wait at the airbase, and a few rocket attacks, I got the green light to fly on an Australian Chinook chopper to my base in the valley -- a region considered the most dangerous on earth at that time. To whoever is a fan of extreme games, I suggest a flight with that "bird."

We flew at a maximum of 300 feet over fields and small villages at high speed, zigzagging all the time with the gunners occasionally shooting their machine guns. The flight was supposed to be less than 20 minutes, but the “bird” stopped at several small bases to unload or pick-up soldiers. The flight ended up lasting for more than two and a half hours. At some point it had to go back to the KAF for refueling. Most of the soldiers were throwing up after the first 10 minutes of our long flight. Myself and two Canadian soldiers were the only ones not vomiting. We joked that our Australian crew had made a bet to see how many of us they could make sick.

After arriving at the base and getting a camping bed in a big tent with another 10 soldiers, I tried to find out who was who on the base and if I could start my work as soon as possible.

from Photographers Blog:

A shot in the dark

It’s 1:00am, I’m sitting in a small dirt hole. Not sure exactly where but somewhere in western Kandahar‘s Maiwand district. How did I get here? On a journey that has involved too much time spent waiting. Waiting at Forward Operating Bases, waiting for planes, waiting for people, waiting for helicopters, waiting for convoys, waiting for patrols.

The short version is it hasn’t been the most productive assignment. I am itching to get ‘out there’ and shoot. So I have jumped at the offer to join an observation post patrol on a moonless night in a flat and treeless landscape, looking for militants laying IEDs.

I’ve bumbled my way out the back of an armored Stryker, across rocky ground, closely tailing a few soldiers who unlike me are equipped with night vision gear. It’s inky black, no illumination permitted. I even have the small red indictor lights on my camera’s back covered with tape. So now I’m in this little dirt hole. It’s dark, really dark. No light at all…… Well, except the billion or so stars above.

f1.4 offers such a tiny depth of field I’d be wasting my time attempting to manual focus accurately in the pitch dark on anything close and even a soldier sitting behind a night scope wont stay still long enough to be sharp for such a long exposure. But those stars aren’t close and they aren‘t exactly whizzing past either. It takes about 10 exposures with some fine adjustment to get them sharp. My tripod for the evening is a convenient and infinitely adjustable model. A small pile of pebbles and sand between my feet.

It takes a while to get the combination of focus, exposure (including balancing the light from the night scope reflected in the soldier’s eye) and a subject that doesn’t move too much to make this picture but time is one thing I have plenty of.

For those of you who like all the details. Exposure - 20 seconds @ f1.4. ISO 2500. 24mm lens. Canon 5D MkII.

from Photographers Blog:

Bloodied streets of Bishkek

WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT

Kyrgyzstan-based photographer Vladimir Pirogov's images of Wednesday's violent clashes in Bishkek are examples of the power of photography in telling stories. Here are a selection of the best. Click here to view the slideshow of images.

Men lay dead during clashes between riot police and anti-government protesters near the presidential administration in Bishkek.

A protester carries a rocket propelled grenade and a riot shield during clashes with riot police in Bishkek.

A victim of clashes between riot police and anti-government protesters is seen in Bishkek.

Riot police are attacked by anti-government protesters in Bishkek.

Anti-government protesters clash with policeman during riots near the presidential administration in Bishkek.

from Photographers Blog:

Destination: Afghanistan

It all started out with a phone call from Reuters News Pictures Washington Editor In Charge Jim Bourg on Thursday night informing me there was a secret Presidential trip leaving on Saturday to an undisclosed destination which Reuters would like me to travel with the president on. I was told that this was very secretive and that I was not to mention it to anyone and that no details were available yet. I had been with President Obama on his secret trip to Baghdad last year, so it was pretty easy to figure out that the destination this time might be Afghanistan, a trip which had been highly anticipated since Obama became president 15 months ago. I was to expect to be contacted directly by the White House for a meeting to discuss the details. But I was to "open" the White House as the first Reuters photographer arriving there on Friday morning at 7am, my scheduled shift, and to go about my day as planned acting as if everything was normal. Nothing could be further from the truth.

That afternoon I was called in to meet with Press Secretary Robert Gibbs in his office at 4pm, along with some of the other members of the 14 person media travel pool who would be going on the secret trip aboard Air Force One.

We were given a schedule of events and were sworn to secrecy. I headed home to pack and test out the BGAN satellite phone I had been provided by Reuters for the trip.

On Saturday night, I met up with the 2 other wire service photographers who were in the travel pool at a gate at Andrews Air Force Base at 7pm, an hour before our call time. But after sitting in the cars for an hour outside the Air Force base gate, and when no one else showed up, we figured that we better make a protective phone call to the White House staff. It seemed we were a half-mile from the correct entry point to the base. Whoops! The details we had been given were a little too secretive even for us!

Our names were checked off a list at the gate and we drove into a parking lot. We unloaded all of our gear and it was all turned over to the U.S. Secret Service. All electronics, cameras, and blackberries were to be loaded on to the plane by them and we would get not them back until we were in flight.

The full media pool then waited on a bus for about an hour until we were driven inside the aircraft hanger where Air Force One was parked. Normally we board Air Force One in broad daylight in the middle of an open air force base tarmac and climb up the rear stairs of the aircraft. But in this case, we were asked to board the plane after dark, inside a hangar, entering the plane from the front where the president does, which we never do, and we got to see a lot of the plane that I had never seen before.

Reuters photographer and Marine meet again in Helmand

Almost two years ago, Reuters photographer Goran Tomasevic captured a dramatic shot of U.S. Marine Sergeant William Bee, from Wooster, Ohio, the moment a Taliban bullet hit a wall inches from this head.

In the photo Bee is just about holding on to his rifle as he is hit by a spray of rocks and dirt when the bullet hits a compound wall in front of him.

When the photo was published by Reuters, in May 2008, it was picked up by several newspapers, widely distributed over the internet and has become one of the defining images of the war in Afghanistan.

Last month, en route to Marjah to cover the U.S. Marine-led operation in the town, Goran bumped into Bee for the first time since he took that photo. Bee was on Camp Dwyer, a large base home to mainly Marines in southern Helmand province. Bee was also on his way to Marjah with Alpha Company of the First Battalion, Sixth Marines.

“I was doing change over, getting dressed, getting washed, stuff like that. We heard one gun shot by one of the posts, I went over there to check and make sure it was alright. I’ve seen this guy, I drew down on him and the world went black. Then I came to, I was on a stretcher, everybody thought I got shot. But I was fine. Had a couple of Tylenol. Goran came up to me with a big smile on his face and said ‘dude, you got to see what I got’. That was pretty much it,” Bee said. “I was hoping Goran was out here, I like him a lot. He’s probably the best embed I’ve ever worked with, plus he gave us a shit load of cigarettes when we didn’t have any.”