Ghosts Of Afghanistan : The Haunted Battleground

There are dozens of books on the afghan wars. Most centre on firefights and heroics. This is the first to take the events of the war bush and blair started in october 2001, put them in the context of the soviet war and even the british imperial wars that preceded them, and draw the lessons out. no war against the afghans is ever won. garrisoning the country is not an answer. the only way out is to forge a peace settlement. here steele explains how the russians fared; how gorbachev ended a wasteful war; how the us blocked the road to peace in the 1990s; and how obama is still repeating his forerunners’ mistake. ghosts of afghanistan stands out for its fair and honest reporting, vivid writing, clarity of view and firmness of argument. steele was part of the guardian team which got first access to the wikileaks cache on afghanistan, and he makes riveting use of the behind the scenes attitudes and secret planning of ministers, diplomats and generals which the documents reveal. steele’s stature as an analyst of the region of 30 years’ standing, his record as one of britain’s finest foreign correspondents and his interpretation of what he found in the wikileaks cables give his book a unique perspective. if you read one book to understand where things went wrong in afghanistan and how the country can return to peace , this should be it.