Kandahar Dispatches

For the media at Kandahar Airfield, it was a bizarre weekend to say the least.

One event in particular reminded us that we are definitely not in Canada. Our phones started buzzing, practically simultaneously, early Saturday afternoon. Text messages, phone calls, e-mails were coming in from our "fixers."

They are the local journalists we hire to keep an eye on things outside the wire, videotape "breaking news" we can't get to quickly and help us conduct and translate interviews in Pashto and Dari.

They had important news, they told us.

Afghan Security Intelligence Officials were having a news conference in the late afternoon.

Brief mentions of the arrests of several "Pakistani Taliban" were followed by promises of updates when possible.

Are Afghan women better off now than they were five years ago? The CBC's Carolyn Dunn reports from Kabul.

At first glance, Kandahar Airfield is exactly the same as it was when I was here a year ago. It is still dusty; clean hair is a luxury I know I won’t enjoy again for weeks. It is still so dry most of us are constantly guzzling water and complaining that our skin feels as taut as a drum skin.

Our working space is exactly the same, though the military is repositioning us in the coming days. If you hear no news from KAF, you’ll know we’re still trying to figure out which wire goes where.

They’ve changed sleeping tents since I was here last, but a cot in a tent is a cot in a tent no matter where it is. Even most of the journalists and technicians know each other pretty well. It gave my cameraman, Richard Devey, pause. “It’s surreal. I’ve got a real sense of déjà vu,” he told our table at lunch yesterday. He’s right. It is the same, only different.

By David Common

My post yesterday on how much information should be made public on wounded Canadian soldiers has elicited a great many responses. There are obviously many of you out there who feel passionately about this.

I’ve also heard from the military, which says it puts out all the information possible. [The DND response is included in the continuation of this post.]

By David Common

I’ve just spent a few days on a thrilling and depressing story. My camera operator and I were embedded with an American medevac helicopter crew. They’re a good, friendly, capable bunch of guys who welcomed us instantly.

By far, the majority of the injured who are loaded into the back of their heaving Blackhawks are Canadians.

That tells a tale now rarely talked about: a great many Canadian soldiers are being injured in Afghanistan. And we’re not hearing about it.

By David Common

Kandahar City

Cameraman Marc Robichaud and I dashed in to Kandahar City the other day. I say dashed because that's exactly what you have to do. The city is a very dangerous place for westerners so when we go, it's a short visit. No time to visit the dry cleaners, if you catch my drift.

We dress in the traditional shalwar kameez (many people call it a pajama top) which is very comfortable and airy in southern Afghanistan's often overpowering heat. We know full well that we aren't fooling anyone who can see us up close, especially with my blondish hair. But the idea is to keep as low profile as possible, including on the drive there.

By David Common

It was a vicious two weeks. During September 2006, in the place the movement was born, Taliban fighters gathered en masse in the Panjwaii Valley, presumably to prepare for an all-out assault on the nearby strategic city of Kandahar.

Almost all of Canada's battle group was sent out and day after day, there were hours and hours of shooting. Canadian soldiers died. Taliban fighters died (though it's never been clear how many). When it was over, NATO claimed victory and suggested insurgent forces were destroyed. Operation Medusa, as it was known, became legendary.

The problem is, while the Canadians could fight, they couldn't stay. The troops were needed elsewhere.

The peal of laughter could be heard from clear across the parking lot at the Kaldup Askari military field.

It was a blistering hot summer day in an Afghan capital where laughter used to be in chronically short supply, especially for women who were relegated to invisible second-class status behind men.

But temperature wasn’t a factor for the girls on this field, sporting baseball caps instead of the traditional headscarves. This was tournament day for the girls of Kabul, a girls’ soccer event featuring eight teams of young women with some 50 young players in all.

When the call comes to India company — at the Canadian forward operating base in Ma'sum Ghar — on Sunday afternoon, it's unclear what has happened.

All that company commander Maj. Dave Quick knows is that the Afghan National Police (ANP) have been attacked at a checkpoint several kilometres away from Patrol Base Wilson.

A Canadian soldier drives a Gator at Forward Operations Base Martello in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar.(Sgt. Dennis Power/DND)

When word first started to spread on Wednesday that the three soldiers who were killed by an IED were riding in a Gator — an open unprotected all-terrain vehicle — it was hard to believe.

Hard to believe that Canadian soldiers were travelling anywhere in this land-mine laden country in unarmoured vehicles.