by Jeff Raleigh
My friend Lt General Daud Daud was killed two weeks ago in his home province of Takar, Afghanistan. The General was in a meeting with members of ISAF and the District Governor when a suicide bomber, dressed as a policeman, detonated his explosive vest and killed six people, including two German NATO soldiers. He wounded the Governor and a German Army Major General in addition to murdering NATO soldiers and General Daud. Daud's death, as was his life, was a microcosm of life in Afghanistan.
Daud had served closely with the Ahmed Shah Massod, the famous and revered, among certain Afghan ethnic groups, mujahedeen leader who was assassinated by the Taliban on September 10, 2001. While serving with Massod, Daud was, by all accounts, a fearless and ruthless warrior against the Russians.
He was also charming, intelligent and hard working, qualities that were not all that common among Afghan officialdom. He was able and —to work across ethnic and tribal lines to build a nation in a society riven by ancient conflicts.
When Hamid Karzai, a Pashtun, was named president he appointed Daud a Tajik, as the head of Counternarcotics for the Ministry of Interior where he was responsible for the MOI's CN efforts, not to be confused, or in most instances, coordinated with the efforts of the Afghan Ministry of Counternarcotics (MCN) a separate entity that was responsible for... well none of us who worked with MCN were ever sure for what it was responsible
I worked with and got to know and like Daud when he was CN Chief at the MOI, a job many thought was the perfect position to protect his reputed family drug cartel. The UK, which had the lead on CN in Afghanistan, was especially adamant about Daud's ties to the flourishing Afghan drug trade. The US, especially those of us who were involved in the counter narcotics efforts on a day-to-day basis, suspected that he was at least peripherally involved but we also respected his dedication to his nation, his courage in waging the Afghan version of the War on Drugs and his relative incorruptibility.
While CN chief Daud could be counted upon to take action against drug dealers in certain provinces of Afghanistan, though as with much with went on, we westerners were sometimes unsure exactly what criteria were used in determining what drug lords and what areas were to be acted against.
A colleague of mine once told me that to understand Afghanistan one had to understand Daud. He was intelligent, though he was relatively uneducated. He was generally incorruptible, in the Afghan milieu, yet was able to support in style his Afghan wife and children as well as his other wife and family in the United States. (Apparently he had the uncanny ability, as did many Afghan officials, to make his government salary of about $3,000 per month stretch more than most people could.) He was an activist police official who did do much to stop certain elements of the drug trade while at the same time exhibiting a blind eye to certain other elements. He was among the warmest, most hospital officials I ever met. He once hosted a rather large dinner party to thank me and some colleagues for putting on a large CN conference. There were forty guests, a large dinner, speeches and gifts. As usual, we were told of the event at 4:00 PM one Saturday afternoon. The dinner started at 6:00 PM.
The one quality that no one who ever met him doubted was his courage. From standing next to Massod as the Northern Alliance fought first the Russians and then the Taliban, Daud never backed down. I saw his courage on a number of trips I took with him to Helmand, Patika and other volatile provinces when most Afghan officials who were supposed to come with us became conveniently "ill" and missed our flights.
His most recent job was as police commander for northern Afghanistan a region that has been, until recently, a relatively quiet section of Afghanistan with a much smaller Taliban influence than in the Pashtun dominated south and east. That he was killed in his home province despite heavy security is an indicator of increased Taliban activity in the north.
The last time I saw Daud was about 18 months ago on a trip back to Kabul. He had learned that I was back in town for a short visit and had his aide call me and ask if the General could come by to say hello. Since I was a private citizen in town just to say hello to some of my former colleagues I was honored that Daud took the time to call. I was even more honored when he showed up at the guesthouse where I was staying and spent an hour with me. When I had first met him in 2004 he spoke virtually no English. This day he was almost fluent, having dedicated himself to learning English and pursuing a university degree. I believe that his goal was to run for and be elected President of Afghanistan, a nation he truly loved. We discussed what he saw as Afghan's future and his role in it. He told me that he was confident that the country could survive and prosper if the men who believed in it and were dedicated to building its institutions stayed in the country and survived the violence.
Unfortunately for my friend and for Afghanistan, the same forces that killed Massod and many other Afghans killed him. With each loss, the odds of Afghanistan ever becoming a stable member of the family of nations become greater. Daud Daud was a good Afghan. His nation will miss him.
Jeff Raleigh was a senior US Diplomat in Kabul for a number of years. He is presently writing a book about a murder in Kabul.