Afghanistan- Behind Enemy Lines

On Monday night the Channel Four Dispatches TV program showed a film by Afghan reporter/cameraman Najibullah Quraishi, Afghanistan-Behind Enemy Lines. Quraishi is granted access to a unit of what Channel 4 described as an army of extreme Islamic combatants, but who are in fact a group of fighters from Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hizb-e-Islami group, along with a sprinkling of Talaban. In the two weeks he spent amongst them they come across as little different to any solders on active service, the only difference being they appear a little more relaxed and quarrelsome than their western counterparts.

It really is a fine film; and makes a nonsenses of US government claims that the 'Taliban' insurgents are fire breathing fanatical terrorists who willingly throw away their lives. They quibble with each other, mislead their commander about the success of they're fighting prowess and play around like all solders do when they take a bit of R@R. Their commander, like all military chiefs when they spot a camera talks up their military successes both real and imagined.

A week or so after Quraishi leaves the Hizb-e-Islami group, he returns to the spot on the road where they had attempted a week earlier to attack an Afghan police convoy; and finds senior Afghan government police officers in the same petrol station as he and the Hizb-e-Islami fighters had holed up the night before their attack on the highway. Like the Hizb-e-Islami commander they to talk up their military prowess, claiming they had driven the Talaban away from the highway. Telling Quraishi the Talaban have not been in the area for well over a month, which must have brought a rye smile to his face.

The full video can be seen here.