Inside the fall of Afghanistan: A journalist’s diary
Los Angeles Times foreign correspondent and photographer Marcus Yam entered Afghanistan on the verge of the American withdrawal. He stayed for the next two months to document the Taliban’s swift takeover. Here are his reflections.
Aug. 14: I arrived in Afghanistan as the Taliban was advancing on the capital at an incredible pace.
A hired driver named Massoud picked me up at the Kabul airport on Aug. 14. We dropped my bags at a guesthouse and headed out to parks to interview Afghans who had fled fighting between government forces and the Taliban in the provinces. Men and women tugged at my shirt, grabbed my arm, held my hands. They wanted somebody to help them. As night fell over a makeshift camp, scared voices whispered over sleeping children.
Although I had landed only hours earlier, I realized I would be telling the story of a nation’s swift fall. It seems predictable in retrospect — the Taliban was tougher and more resolute than the American-backed Afghan forces. It controlled swaths of the country; it capitalized on fear. But it was still a startling reversal of fortune. The wisdom in early August was that it would take months for the Taliban to win. It took days. These are moments I witnessed from the inside as America’s longest war came to an end.
Aug. 15: Confusion swept Kabul. Massoud quit on me. He was frightened and needed to stay with his family. Town after town had already succumbed. And now the Taliban was entering
