30 Days Through Afghanistan

30 Days Through Afghanistan episodes:

• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan Promo

  Promo about a show that depicts the lives of the work of the counterinsurgency in Afghanistan.

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 1

  Camp Julien is no more than a bunch of little buildings set row upon row. There are no stores, and the dining facility is only open when there are students here, and even when that’s the case, the hot food...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 2

  Today I found answers and I can’t wait to share them with you. Ken and I had an incredible opportunity to talk, one-on-one, with U.S. Army Colonel John F. Agoglia the director of the counter insurgency training center here.

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 3

  My family probably thinks I’m crazy for what Ken and I did yesterday. We walked through the streets of a Kabul suburb in civilian clothes and no body armor.

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 4

  I’m all about eyeballs. There’s something truly beautiful about them. If you give me a good eyeball, I’ll stare at it for hours like it’s a sneak peek at the next big movie.

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 5

  The best thing about flying somewhere is sitting in the terminal. I’m not a very shy person and I have the ability to walk up to complete strangers and start talking to them. While I do enjoy being a hermit, when...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 6

  Fobbit or poge, either way is a term for those who never leave the wire. There are a great many here in Kandahar. It’s actually quite painful for me to write those terms, because I know how many are grimacing right...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 7

  When I face a challenge, I have no choice but to stand up, face it, acknowledge it and talk about it. There’s no denying the fact there is a lot of politics surrounding Afghanistan. At the ground level, we are not...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 8

  Right now, I’m listening to my Top 100 Billboard Hits of 2008 playlist while typing and occasionally looking around at all of the smiling faces surrounding me. People are relaxed and enjoying some downtime. But I can’t, it just doesn’t seem...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 9

  A Marine, I highly respect, told me before 30 Days started, a massive operation in the South would limit our project and in some regards overshadow it. I told her our project wouldn’t be affected because we weren’t trying to tell...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 10

  We finally made it out of Kandahar yesterday and took a 20-minute Canadian Chinook flight here to Camp Hasum Ghar. This camp is nestled into the side of a mountain in the middle of the desert. I can tell security...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 11

  We’re in Taliban country. It took us eleven days, but we can now say we’re less than 150 yards from where the Taliban have heavy influence.I always assumed the closer you got to them, the more "war like" the environment...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 12

  I would love to say I found the IED today, but I’ll have to wait until I’m an 80-year-old grandpa. For now I have to tell the truth, the Afghan National Army Soldiers we were with found it. It wasn’t much...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 13

  This morning I got up bright and early, jumped in an armored vehicle, and headed down the street with my new Canadian friends to explore the world of Afghan governance. We entered the district center and it was the biggest one...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 14

  It was another travel day for Ken and I and as we were flying over southern Afghanistan in a Canadian Chinook, I realized that now would be a good time to talk about my bosses. I’ve been intimately familiar with close...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 15

  Today was our second travel day, which basically means Ken and I were stuck in air terminals all day. It did give us a chance to catch up on the Olympics though. Traveling Afghanistan is extremely difficult. I think the...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 16

  We’ve had such an interesting day with the Swedish and Finnish provincial reconstruction team, I’m not even sure where to begin. We were picked up by the team at 9 a.m. today and were taken to Camp Northern Lights, which is...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 17

  It was a little bit of a quiet day today, since Ken and I headed back to the airport. Yes, I admit it, I called Camp Marmal, Mazer-e Sharif in my Day 15 blog. I could have just changed it,...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 18

  It felt like we were on a safari today and Afghanistan is gorgeous. We rode with the Germans to a place named Tanji Marmor. A German commander went there to talk with the Afghan National Police chief about a bridge that...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 19

  I worry sometimes that the world looks and sees only four nations involved in operations here, the United States, Great Britain, Germany and Afghanistan itself. This is one of the major reasons that Ken and I started this trip. The...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 20

  Stuck again! We tried to catch a flight out of northern Afghanistan this morning and it was cancelled. The Germans who are helping us did everything they could but we couldn’t get out. It’s life here and the real challenge...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 21

  We keep running into these extremely interesting civilians who can never talk to us officially, but teach us so much about counter insurgency and what’s happening in Afghanistan. It sucks for Ken because video cameras scare them away but I...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 22

  We’re still in Kabul, fighting to escape, calling all sources and pulling all strings to try and get out to the next regional command. Today we watched a bunch of helicopters come and go and we waved bye-bye as they left....

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 23

  There is a magical place full of wonders and excitement filled with international soldiers and rich cultures… it’s known as eastern Afghanistan and I really hope to take you there someday. I’ve been there before, and in all honesty, it’s the...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 24

  Kabul | Day 24 — Societies are riddled with bad people; it just so happens Afghanistan has a lot more of them. We were discussing who the bad people were and how they were harming society here. Since my memory is...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 25

  PRT Herat | Day 25 — The weather here astounds me. Tuesday it was beautiful blue skies and the helicopter left us standing on the helipad. Wednesday it was dark grey skies and pelting down rain preventing any helicopters from...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 26

  PRT Herat | Day 26 — Thank you Chris. Your comment and questions to my "Hallelujah in Herat" blog led me on a very interesting journey. To catch everyone up, he basically asked "Why is Herat so nice," and I...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 27

  PRT Herat | Day 27 — We’re back! We had some problems with internet, which prevented us from uploading on time. I’m really hoping Day 26 doesn’t get lost in the stack, because I’m hoping it spurs some interesting conversation....

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 28

  PRT Herat | Day 28 — I love my father and the embroiled conversations that erupt between us sometimes. I cherish the moments where we disagree and we go back and forth on various facts and ideals. I haven’t always...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 29

  PRT Herat | Day 29 - Afghanistan is such a huge topic across the world, it's easy to forget the individual stories here. So many people are grouped together and called Romanians, Croatians, Dutch or Americans, I tend to forget...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 30

  Bagram Air Field | Day 30 — In honor of our project saviors I’m dedicating, what was supposed to be my last blog, to the aircrew of the U.S. Air Force C-130 who picked us up today. I didn’t have...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 31

  FOB Shank | Day 31 — We’re in overtime! Due to the travel delays, we weren’t able to get to all of the regions in 30 days, so we’ve extended our trip until Sunday. We are now in Regional Command...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 32

  Padkhvab-e Shanah | Day 32 — It was a little strange being out in the province again after we’ve spent so much time in the major cities of Afghanistan. It was actually quite nice. I’m more of a country guy...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 33

  FOB Shank | Day 33 -- When times are slow, and missions fall through, I always have our 30 Day visitors to fall back on. In many ways I prefer taking your questions and directly answering them because I know...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 34

  FOB Shank | Day 34 -- There's a very important portion of the Afghanistan story that I feel we haven't told successfully. It's the story of the troops living in holes next to the Afghan National Security Forces while fighting...

  
• 04.23.2023

  30 Days Through Afghanistan: Day 35

  FOB Shank | Day 35 -- This is it, the final blog and the end to the greatest military experience of my life. Looking back I hope this project has not only opened civilian eyes to what life is like...