Where is qala i jangi

But, with every month that passes, there are also signs on the ground that the mighty US Army is finally packing up. In Bagram, a bustling hive of a town which mushroomed over the years alongside the US's biggest military base, there's a constant clatter of helicopters and hulking military transport planes as US hardware is ferried out. The fate of this vast compound is still uncertain but a shifting perimeter fence has already retreated by a distance of several football pitches. And the lifeblood in this town is now draining too.

Some of the shops which made handsome profits selling army surplus, from nearly-new boots to computers and treadmills, are now shuttered. We were approached on the streets by Malik who, like tens of thousands of other Bagram residents, used to work at the base.

In Afghanistan now there's a profound sense of uncertainty over the future, including the outcome of the looming US elections. Whether a Trump or a Biden presidency emerges, bringing different approaches to this decisive drawdown, it seems certain this mission's days are numbered. Washington's main red lines will be drawn by assessments over the threats to America's own security - even if Afghan peace talks drag on, as they're likely to do.

But as the clock ticks down, its top soldier on the ground has a legacy on his mind that is at the top of the Afghans' list too. US peace envoy on release of 'dangerous' Taliban.

Taliban prisoners set free paving way for talks. Who are the Taliban? Afghan forces face losing crucial US firepower in the air. The monument to Mike Spann recalls someone who sacrificed his life, as many others have done. This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Caught in crossfire on Helmand front line Afghan-Taliban peace talks: What's next?

Taliban prisoners set free paving way for talks Who are the Taliban? US troops 'home by Christmas'? Image source, Reuters. Talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government have made little progress since the two sides met last month. The Afghan war: The short and long story Women in the crosshairs as Afghanistan eyes peace The Afghan women determined not to lose out 'They tried to kill my mother in front of me, twice'.

Image source, EPA. Tens of thousands have fled their homes after fighting erupted in Helmand province this month. Civil war 'very likely'. Bagram shopkeeper Sahel worries he won't be able to buy food for his children. His fear was palpable.

Related Topics. Asia Afghanistan Taliban. Published 14 September Published 14 August The leaders of the Taliban forces had previously feigned surrender and then ambushed Spann and Afghan forces who belonged to the U.

A three-day siege followed. The scene was a mix of the medieval and the modern: the first battle of the 21st century. Even after 14 years of war in Afghanistan, the U. Now, at the request of the new Afghan government, the United States has delayed the completion of its troop withdrawal from the country until at the earliest.

In retrospect, that battle at Qala-i-Jangi offered Americans an early glimpse of the complexity, contradictions, and shifting allegiances of Afghanistan.

Last year was the worst on record for Afghanistan in terms of civilian and military deaths, and the killing is continuing apace this year. During my time in the country, Taliban gunmen dressed in the uniforms of Afghan security forces stormed a Mazar courthouse in broad daylight, killing 10 people, including the provincial police chief. In May , in another vexing development, the United States released from Guantanamo Bay the Taliban commander Mullah Mohammad Fazl, who was present for the negotiated surrender that led to the battle in which Mike Spann was killed.

Fazl was freed along with four other Taliban leaders in exchange for U. Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, who had been held by the Taliban for five years after allegedly deserting his platoon in Afghanistan. Fazl was released to Qatar with an assurance that he would not leave the country for a year.

That year is almost over. As for me, the trip to Qala-i-Jangi was a return journey. I had been there on November 25, , reporting for The Boston Globe , during the uprising by some fighters—some of them remnants of the Taliban and some affiliated with al-Qaeda—who were being held prisoner inside the fortress. At that point, America was desperately seeking to assess its new enemy, hunt down Osama bin Laden, and crush the Taliban leadership that had allowed al-Qaeda to set up bases and plan the September 11 attack.

Coming back all these years later, I wanted to find Afghans who were present when the battle unfolded and to see what lessons they felt the fight offered now. At Camp Spann, a compound built by the U.

In the fall of , Moheb had been a field sergeant with the Northern Alliance, fighting against the Taliban alongside U. On November 25, , he was at the fortress as Mike Spann interrogated the Taliban prisoners. We walked through the fortress to the courtyard where much of the battle had taken place. He was not surrendering, and he was just shot here.

White doves had nested in the eaves of a gazebo protecting the monument. Moheb and his men said that the fortress had become a haunting reminder of the devastation their country has seen. The cappuccino-colored ramparts are pocked by machine-gun fire, punched by mortar rounds, and, in a few places, gutted by an errant U.

Gere is now 40 years old, with a thick gray beard and strong, calloused hands from working in the fields as a day laborer. When I met him, he was dressed in a long, green overcoat of the kind worn by tribal Afghans. He looked fearful and defeated, like a man on the wrong side of history. We had arranged through contacts to meet in the back of a kebab restaurant in Balkh, about 10 miles west of the fortress.

Gere said he had been present when the Taliban fighters—including Pakistanis, Uzbeks, Chechens, Arabs, and, famously, an American named John Walker Lindh—were handed over to the Northern Alliance after Fazl brokered their surrender. Some Americans and Afghans who were at Qala-i-Jangi during those fateful days in November believe Fazl and these fighters planned all along to stage an uprising inside the fortress, with the goal of capturing the cache of weapons—including machine guns, ammunition boxes, rocket-propelled-grenade rounds, mortar rounds and launchers, and hand grenades—stored in shipping containers and stables at one end of the compound.