In the fall of 2002 --- little more than a year after the Al Qaeda attacks on the United States set off a chain of events that soon toppled the brutal, misogynistic Taliban regime in Kabul, and well before the fateful and misguided decision to invade and occupy Iraq -- I went to Afghanistan to begin shooting a documentary about the plight of women there.
Before departing, I contacted each of the major American television news networks. I explained that I would be in Kabul for weeks with a film crew, and could inexpensively shoot and deliver reports on Afghan women " or indeed any other topic of interest to them about a country that still harbored the man responsible for the 9/11 attacks, Osama Bin Laden.
No one was interested.
Instead
the networks were focused on the next invasion " one every news executive
seemed sure was coming, and one they all appeared to be supporting " in Iraq.
They were puzzled as to why I was pitching stories about Afghanistan, when the
story there was "over and they, at least, had moved on. It was as if everyone
-- but me -- had received a news memo from on high. When I persisted, they
rolled their eyes and indicated I was naà ve at best " even after, bowing to
reality, I suggested a report called "Afghanistan " the Last Iraq.
"Didn't you hear what I just told you? one insider asked. "We're not doing Afghanistan " we're only doing Iraq!
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