Phil Halton - Blood Washing Blood

A curious fact about the Afghan war is that many soldiers we sent to fight the Taliban a movement whose name translates as students themselves became students, educating themselves about the history and peoples of South Asia. Some of these warrior-scholars read deeply and could hold their own in any room of grey-bearded tribal leaders. Phil Halton is an exemplary part of that tradition, a careful historian who knows the facts about Afghanistan but also knows the limits of any foreigners understanding. His sweeping narrative is foundational reading for any student of the war or anyone curious about why our armies fared no better than their predecessors.

Graeme Smith, Emmy-winning journalist, bestselling author of The Dogs Are Eating Them Now: Our War in Afghanistan

Rather than focusing on the more recent decades of war in Afghanistan, Halton offers an astute analysis of the deeply rooted political issues driving conflict in Afghanistan over the last century. Blood Washing Blood is an engaging and well-written text that will open eyes for scholars, policy-makers, and general readers interested in one of the most enduring conflicts of our time.

James Tharin Bradford, author of Poppies, Politics, and Power

Through this sweeping and grand political history of Afghanistan, Halton proves himself to be one of Canadas leading warrior-scholars. Blood Washing Blood combines meticulous scholarly research and ground-level field experience in a compelling story about Afghanistans enduring war.

Dr. Aisha Ahmad, University of Toronto, author of Jihad & Co.: Black Markets and Islamist Power

Phil Halton has done an impressive job of objectively chronicling and making unique sense of the devilishly complicated subject of contemporary political and social upheaval from an Afghan perspective. The conflicts between Afghanistans strategic partners and adversaries, the international community, and the coalition and governments of the day is a backdrop to the Afghan way of personal, tribal, and ethnic influences and loyalties that have shaped domestic power struggles something that is exceedingly difficult for outsiders to grasp. It is one thing to see the continuing saga as an outcome of the Great Game, but Halton nuances this by additionally portraying how Afghan leaders have consistently levered the Great Powers to their particular purposes. This is a very credible and readable work that resets the narrative around 100 years of upheaval, progress, and setback.

Michael J. Ward, Major General (Retired), Deputy Commander NATO Training Mission Afghanistan 20092010

I wish Blood Washing Blood had been available to read before my first deployment to Kandahar, Afghanistan, in 2007 or even my second tour to Kabul in 2012. I would have made it compulsory reading for my whole combat team or task force. It provides a detailed but easily understood analysis of the complicated, convoluted intricacies of Afghan history, politics, tribal relations, and power struggles.

Colonel (Retired) Alex Ruff, the Royal Canadian Regiment

Halton has an easy style, which he uses to effect in this well-researched and highly readable history, while endeavouring to untangle a highly complex subject. The author wisely goes back more than a century in order to establish that the current animosities had their roots long before the Soviets or the West found themselves fighting in Afghanistan. This book is at once both a warning and required reading for any who would insert expeditionary military forces into parts of the world that they do not fully comprehend.

Colonel (Retired) Charles S. Oliviero, CD, PhD

Blood Washing Blood is an extremely readable account of a century of unending Afghan warfare. It provides valuable context and understanding of the human dimensions of a conflict in which the West has been mired for the last two decades.

Dr. Howard G. Coombs, Associate Chair War Studies, Royal Military College of Canada

Understanding Afghanistan and its evolution necessitates a grounding in its political history. In this volume, Phil Halton has taken a complex topic and woven a detailed, highly readable narrative that makes the topic easily accessible to anyone interested in the region and how it became what it is today. The events of 9/11 created a resurgence in our interest in Afghanistan. In Blood Washing Blood, author Phil Halton has shown that the path to 9/11, and beyond, actually began much earlier. Tracing the last century of twists and tumult in Afghan history, he has created a narrative that makes a very complicated history readily accessible to the contemporary student of the region.

Colonel Tod Strickland, CD, Commandant, Canadian Army Command and Staff College

Afghanistans history and evolution is often as mysterious as it is complex to many outsiders, but Halton has expertly unpacked it for the reader in this richly detailed and easily readable overview of its past hundred years. Combining extensive research and sources with first-hand experience on the ground, he has given us an invaluable primer for unlocking the reasons behind much of the recent conflict taking place there.

Lieutenant Colonel Andrew B. Godefroy, CD, PhD, Canadian Army Command and Staff College

In Blood Washing Blood, Phil Halton has brilliantly captured the essence of the roots, goals, and nature of the Taliban insurgents who fought Canadian soldiers in the dusty groves and sun-baked plains of southern Afghanistan. Its a compelling, nuanced, and unflinching window into the heart and soul of the movement behind the insurgency. Blood Washing Blood is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the rivalries, hopes, hatreds, and complex motivations behind the Taliban and the men who fill its ranks.

Chris Wattie, author of Contact Charlie: The Canadian Army, the Taliban, and the Battle for Afghanistan

Afghanistans Hundred-Year War

PHIL HALTON

Copyright Phil Halton, 2021

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purpose of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.

Publisher and acquiring editor: Scott Fraser | Editor: Cy Strom

Cover and interior designer: Laura Boyle

Cover image: istockphoto.com/RobinOlimb

Printer: Marquis Book Printing Inc.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: Blood washing blood : Afghanistans hundred-year war / Phil Halton.

Names: Halton, Phil, author.

Description: Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20200272683 | Canadiana (ebook) 20200272802 | ISBN 9781459746640 (softcover) | ISBN 9781459746657 (PDF) | ISBN 9781459746664 (EPUB)

Subjects: LCSH: Afghan Wars.

Classification: LCC DS363 .H35 2020 | DDC 958.1/03dc23

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Ontario, through the Ontario Book Publishing Tax Credit and Ontario Creates, and the Government of Canada.