Steve Kohn's Reviews > To Lose a War: The Fall and Rise of the Taliban

The author seems to have had open doors to Afghan leaders, some with blood on their hands, for more than two decades. He embedded with US units at their remote outposts. A fine writer, too, he's the epitome of what a journalist should be.

It may be unfair to fault a book for what it doesn't have, but what keeps this book from excellence in this old soldier's eyes is the absence of reporting on our departure.

We left Bagram Air Base without ceremony, almost in the middle of the night. We seem to have failed, except by individuals, in evacuating interpreters who had worked with us over the years. And the fiasco at the Kabul airport cannot be allowed to be forgotten.

The book's last chapter was on the new Taliban regime enforcing sharia law, especially on its women. I wish the chapter had instead been on America's final months, where we got so much wrong. And probably a lot right. But none of it is in the book.

Other than that, I recommend it completely.