Post Reports

This week, Americans watched in disbelief as Afghanistan fell to the Taliban in a matter of days — and we wondered what Craig Whitlock was thinking. Two years ago he and a team at The Post published a prescient and ground-breaking project called “The Afghanistan Papers,” revealing hundreds of secret interviews with U.S. officials candidly discussing the failures of the war.
The interviews with some 400 people were part of a project called “Lessons Learned,” undertaken by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR, and The Post obtained them after a three-year legal battle. These Afghanistan papers are a secret history of the war, Whitlock tells Martine Powers, and “they contain these frank admissions of how the war was screwed up and that what the American people were being told about the war wasn’t true.” 
“They really do bring to mind the Pentagon Papers, which were the Defense Department’s top-secret history of the Vietnam War,” Whitlock says. 
These recordings have new resonance this week. 
Read excerpts from Craig Whitlock’s new book, ‟The Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War”.Deceptions and lies: What really happened in Afghanistan
The grand illusion: Hiding the truth about the Afghanistan war’s ‘conclusion’

Haitians face devastation after two natural disasters hit the island. And what the tragedies have exposed about the country’s preparedness.
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Last weekend, a 7.2-magnitude earthquake caused widespread destruction and death in Haiti. Then, torrential rain from Tropical Storm Grace hit the island. Now, Haitians are recovering from two back-to-back natural disasters while reeling from political turmoil caused by the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse last month. Caribbean bureau chief Anthony Faiola reports on how public officials and citizens living close to the epicenter of the earthquake are grappling with the compounded loss and tragedy.
When an earthquake hits, it’s not the quake itself that kills people — it’s often the rattled buildings that collapse with people inside, or on top of them. And in Haiti, earthquakes are more dangerous than in other countries, because buildings there aren’t designed to withstand them. Reginald Desroches is a Haitian American engineer and provost of Rice University. After Haiti’s 2010 earthquake, he traveled there about a dozen times to investigate why the damage was so severe and to figure out how to reinforce the structures that remained standing. 
Listen to our episode on the assassination of Haiti’s president and how years of U.S. intervention in the Carribean country contributed to the chaos we’re seeing now.

Today, Post Reports answers your questions about kids, schools and covid-19 with physician and columnist Leana Wen and education reporter Hannah Natanson. Plus, the latest news on booster shots. 
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Subscribe to The Checkup With Dr. Wen to get guidance in your inbox on how to navigate the pandemic and other public health challenges.

Almost as soon as Kabul fell, the political blame game began in Washington. But why weren’t we more prepared? Plus, an interview with Afghanistan’s first female ambassador to the United States on her fears for women and girls in her country.
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As quickly as Kabul fell, the finger-pointing commenced. Reporter Shane Harris on the political fallout of a disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan — and how it could have gone better. 
Roya Rahmani was Afghanistan’s first female ambassador to the United States, serving from 2018 until just a few weeks ago. She spoke with producer Arjun Singh of the podcast “Can He Do That?” about what it’s like to watch her country fall to the Taliban, and what her fears are for women and girls who are still there.

As the United States left Afghanistan after nearly 20 years of war, the Taliban seized control of the country in a matter of weeks. President Biden defended the withdrawal Monday afternoon while Americans and vulnerable allies remained in limbo in Kabul.
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The Taliban seized the Afghan capital Kabul Sunday morning, restoring the insurgent group’s grip over Afghanistan after they were removed from power by U.S.-led forces in 2001, and kept at bay for about two decades during America’s longest war. 
Kabul bureau chief Susannah George explains what it’s like to be in the city in such a dramatic  moment of transition. “Once the Taliban took over Kabul, the security forces in the entire city melted away overnight,” she says.
Meanwhile in Washington, Pentagon reporter Dan Lamothe on the military calculus for withdrawing from Afghanistan, and the efforts to safely resume evacuations.  
With the Taliban's return to power in Afghanistan, we want to hear from veterans or anyone who was involved in the war effort — whether you’re American, Afghan or served in the coalition. If you had friends or family members serve, we’d also like to hear your perspective on how the war affected you. Tell us your stories.

Today on Post Reports, an interview with Dave Jorgenson, The Washington Post’s “TikTok Guy.” Throughout the pandemic, he’s been uploading two newsy, funny TikToks a day for The Post’s nearly 1 million TikTok followers.  
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Dave also has a book: “Make a TikTok Every Day: 365 Prompts for Attention-Grabbing TikToks.” You can check out all of his TikToks here.
A few of Martine’s favorite Tiktoks from Dave:
During the primary for the 2020 election, Dave made TikToks with a bunch of presidential candidates, including Cory Booker and Julián Castro. 
You can also check out the sea shanty here.
All of Dave’s delightful quarantine TikToks are in a Twitter thread here.

How some states are trying to make students and staffers feel safe in school. Why more moms may leave the workforce as the delta variant spreads. And what it’s like to lose your town to a wildfire and to have to start again. 
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California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) announced Wednesday that the state will require all teachers and school staffers to be vaccinated against the coronavirus or to submit to weekly testing. It’s the first state to impose such a rule. The governor is citing the surge of the delta variant as the reason –– and the fact that more and more children are being hospitalized by infection. 
As the pace of coronavirus cases rises nationwide and children’s camps and day cares shut back down, working mothers’ lives and livelihoods are taking another massive hit. Heather Long reports on the panic setting in among America’s millions of mothers with children under the age of 12 and the potential economic cost of a second mass resignation of moms.
The Dixie Fire in California has been burning since mid-July. It now covers more than 500,000 acres in four counties and has forced thousands of people to evacuate their homes. Marisa Iati reports on the state’s containment efforts, the emotional toll of evacuation and why rebuilding may not be an option in Greenville, Calif.

What’s behind Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and other Republicans embracing a big Biden agenda item? Infrastructure. Plus, a delightful story about a man, his hobby and his dog. 
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The big bipartisan infrastructure bill that passed the Senate this week is being hailed as a moment of unity, with politicians from both sides of the aisle finding common ground in building roads, repairing bridges and expanding broadband technology. But the reality is a bit more complicated. Mike DeBonis reports on Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s thinking behind his support of President Biden’s agenda item.
Along with being The Post’s art and architecture critic, Philip Kennicott is also an avid piano player. The thing is, his dog hates it when he plays piano, particularly Bach’s Goldberg Variations. He tries to solve the mystery of why.

The resignation of Gov. Andrew Cuomo. And, as American troops withdraw, the U.S. response to a surge of Taliban control in Afghanistan. 
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Today, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced his resignation after a state investigation found he sexually harassed 11 women and oversaw an unlawful attempt to exact retribution against one of his accusers. Reporter Michael Scherer on what this means for New York politics and the women at the center of the accusations. 
The Taliban is gaining more ground in Afghanistan, as U.S. troops withdraw from the country after two decades. Missy Ryan and Susannah George report on the regional capitals that have fallen to Taliban control and America’s role in Afghanistan’s uncertain future. 
As the school year approaches, we want to try to tackle your concerns about how covid affects kids and how to safely go back to in-person learning. If you’re sending your child back to school or going back to school yourself and have a question, send us a voice memo at [email protected]. We would love to hear from kids and teenagers as well as parents.  

A landmark United Nations report finds that humans have pushed the climate into ‘unprecedented’ territory. Plus, what we can learn from the Tokyo Olympics with the Winter Games in Beijing just around the corner.
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On Monday, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its latest and most dire report about the state of the planet. U.N. Secretary General António Guterres said that  results are “a code red for humanity” and is calling on countries to embrace the drastic transformation needed to slow the warming of the planet. Reporter Brady Dennise has more.
The 2020 Tokyo Olympics have officially ended. Tokyo bureau chief Michelle Ye Hee Lee explains that the events have offered a brief respite from the latest pandemic surge but also a complex legacy. With the Winter Olympics set to begin in just six months, what lessons have the International Olympic Committee learned — and will they stick?