![Atop Empire State- in construction; Chrysler Bldg & [Daily] News in middle foreground. (1931)](http://www.retronaut.co/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Atop-Empire-State-in-construction-Chrysler-Bldg-Daily-News-in-middle-foreground.-1931--199x123.jpg "Balancing on the Empire State, 1920s")
‘Given the images people see on TV, many conclude Afghanistan never made it out of the Middle Ages. But that is not the Afghanistan I remember. I grew up in Kabul in the 1950s and ’60s. Stirred by the fact that news portrayals of the country’s history didn’t mesh with my own memories, I wanted to discover the truth.
‘Remembering Afghanistan’s hopeful past only makes its present misery seem more tragic. But it is important to know that disorder, terrorism, and violence against schools that educate girls are not inevitable. I want to show Afghanistan’s youth of today how their parents and grandparents really lived.’
- Mohammad Qayoumi
"A laboratory at the Vaccine Research Center."
"A villager welcomes visiting nurses to his compound."
"Biology class, Kabul University."
"Cabinet in session."
"Central control panel at Radio Kabul transmitter. Transmitter can be heard as far distant as South Africa and Indonesia."
"Fresh fruit bazaar."
"Furniture display room."
"Gulbahar Textile Plant is one of the most modern in Asia."
"Hundreds of Afghan youngsters take active part in Scout programs."
"In the absence of dependable international peace, national defense plays an important role in the affairs of the nation."
"Infant ward at feeding time."
"Kabul is served by an up-to-date transportation system."
"Kabul University students changing classes. Enrollment has doubled in last four years."
"Most hospitals give extensive post-natal care to young mothers."
"Mothers and children at a city playground."
"Park Cinema, like many others, provides the needed entertainment."
"Recording room pre-records many interviews, special service programs for delayed broadcast."
"Sarobi hydro-power plant on Kabul River is one of the country's foremost power stations."
"Skilled workers like these press operators are building new standards for themselves and their country."
"Student nurses at Maternity Hospital, Kabul."
"Textile store window display."
…
Thank you to Eric Stephan and Mohammad Rahim
Fascinating blog…http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/afghanistan/
I wonder, and this will sound racist but it’s because I don’t know the history of Afghanistan during this period represented, who was in control of the nation at the time? Also really radical Islamic “fundementalism” as it’s known today is credited to have come out of Egypt in the mid 50′s. That looks to be about the period these photos were taken. It is very sad because we in the west prefer our luxury. It is also sad because no country or area should abuse any gender and recind rights out of misguided efforts at purity. Again, not intended to offend, just some thoughts and questions.
To my knowledge, Afghanistan was, at that time, a sovereign nation having defeated the British and gained independence. It’s worth noting that these are quite definitely pictures of urban Afghanistan – the wild north and rural regions were far less developed.
Things didn’t start to go downhill until 1970, when the US started funding the proto-Taliban insurgents along the Russian border. Like most cold war ‘interventions’ the US hoped to put pressure on Russia through a proxy war – both sides did that routinely as a means of military engagement that lacked the risk of a full-blown war between superpowers. On this occasion it was disastrous, both for Afghanistan and Russia. The proto-taliban (the Mujhadeen) forces set about putting the country on its path to medieval-dom, using their new resources to transform the country into the state it is today. Then the Russians reacted (disproportionately) to the US bait and mounted a full invasion of Afghanistan.
10 years later the Mujhadeen had defeated the Russians by bleeding them for resources until the war became too great an economic drain – much like their response to US/NATO more recently. By that stage, the Mujhadeen were highly armed (as the US started ramping up arms supplies to them as soon as the Russians launched their invasion), and had become strongly fundamentalist in the same manner as regional Pakistan did during that same period. They then morphed into the Taliban, swept south and defeated the ‘urban Afganistan’ depicted in the above photos, hung the president and took control of the country.
I’d be very surprised if history doesn’t repeat itself when the US leaves – whether that’s in 3 years or 30 years.
Most of the fundamentalism that we associate with the middle east today only came around in the last few decades, as a consequence of military ‘interventions’ by both the US and Russia during the cold war. What the author says above could be applied equally to Pakistan. Even Iran only turned fundamentalist in response to the Western nations crushing their early attempt at democracy and installing a ruthless and barbaric dictatorship (the Shah).
Remember that when you look around the middle east and ask why doesn’t democracy seem to work there. I’m not blaming the US alone – Russia was doing the exact same thing throughout that period. But the current state of the middle east was never an inevitable feature of their history or culture – it was the product of being treated as toy soldiers in the cold war between the US and Russia.
Oh boy has that country been screwed up. I can’t believe the Afghanis did it on their own so who should we blame? The US, the USSR, UK, oil companies? You can bet that those responsible aren’t going to come forward
How about blaming Islamic Fundamentalism and the Taliban. Those are the monsters that believe in genetial multilation of women.
Surely you are both right? Since, and indeed before, those times the country has been a pawn in many games.
Afganistan certainly seemed to be on the right path in the 1950s. So sad what’s become of them since.
Like Iran, Egypt, Syria, & Turkey, these countries all made a very deliberate effort to Westernise and thus become “modern” – but I’d put money on nearly all the people in these phots coming from the tiny middle or upper classes – they simply didn’t carry the peasants with them.
@Catherine Jones, answer; All of the above…
Odd coincidence, Iraq and Iran also had the earliest democratic/parliamentary systems in the region. Again, “all of the above” got involved and… ok, maybe it’s not such a coincidence.
Hard to make it “out of the middle ages” if you keep getting carpet bombed back into it.
Even the commenters are afraid of being labelled racist!
Why fear the truth? The problem IS the interpretation of the Quran, seems that each ‘mad mullah’ has his own version.
If none followed these teachings there would be no problem.
The solution would be in rewriting the misunderstood words to emphasise the EXACT meaning
@Buzz
Sorry to say this, but your attitude is a text book example of the mindset that allows groups like the Taliban to prosper. The West is now far more concerned with appearing tolerant, accepting, and non-racist than it is about women’s rights. We walk on egg shells and accept all cultural practices as being valid when they clearly aren’t. Here’s two as an example: genital mutilation and the banning of women from education. When we as a society begin to entertain these practices as in any way defensible because they are “part of the culture” or “part of the religion” then we might as well curl up and die.
These pics could be any western country…what happend? In 50 years, it appears as though, the country digressed back 1500 years. It would seem as though the Taliban types have set this country in a counter clockwise, rotation
Yeah blame the fact that girls there are not allowed to go to school on “carpet bombing” blame the opium producing warlords there on “carpet bombing”. No, it’s the Taliban that has set this country back 1500 years!
The country…or the city? There are lots of countries in the world whose capitals look very modern and progressive…but where time steps back centuries once you drive out past the reach of city lights. I’d be interested in seeing 60-year-old pictures of the Afgan countryside to see how modern and enlightened it appeared to be…
So, what happened?
if you guys really wanna know what happened just go ahead and search for america’s cold war against Soviet union & Afghan communists in Afghanistan and you all will know what the fuck the most powerful countries in the world did to us!
Actually, Farhad, Afghanistan went down the drain when the Soviets came in. The Taliban came to power fighting the Soviets. America helped fund the war against USSR by giving Afghanistan weapons to fight back so I am not sure how we’re at fault for the downfall of a civilized nation.
Be a little more honest, Sharon. The US funded the Taliban and a whole bunch of other militarised groups,.. anyone who could fight their proxy war against The Reds. And then there is also the Pakistani Intelligence Services, who continue to bankroll and provide intelligence and guidance to the Taliban, as it keep the US in the region, paying war dollars and providing kit in the fear that if the Taliban rolled into Karachi they’d have a fully working nuclear arsenal to use.
Same outcome just a different cartel with bigger bombs and more weapons that the local chiefs. Money and power, it’s the same the world over people.
@ Token – I agree the countryside has probably always been unaffected by attempts at modernization, although quite possibly vaccinations went beyond the cities when things were looking up for Afghanistan, at least you’d hope so.
@ Oh Whatever
The mess Afghanistan is in is definately in part caused by the Taliban, but their ascendency came after the nation was torn asunder by the Soviets, and unfortunately international support did not come to Afghanistan after the Soviets had left.
A war mentality brings out the worst in people and quite possibly religion and radical beliefs have an ‘in’ from the chaos and desperation caused by war.
How surprising! I’m having trouble wrapping my mind around the kind of philosophy that would make someone look at all this and be dissatisfied with the progress of their own country to the point of wrestling it back to the stone age.
These pictures should fill us all with hope for their future, but I wonder how long it will take to settle all the wars and issues that fractured this country from a modern future.
I lived in Afghanistan in the early 70s. There was obvious CIA presence on the streets (crew cuts, fake Hawaiian shirts, bermuda shorts, white socks, black shoes, Ray-bans, hello ?) There were Russian missile silos disguised as grain silos north of Mazar-i-Sharif, guarded by Russian soldiers with guns. There was excellent medical care at the central hospital in Kabul, with training and an outreach program run by Medecins Sans Frontiers. A foreign woman, I walked freely through the streets of Kabul. I sometimes wore a chappai, but was not molested or even especially noticed if I didn’t. I loved it there, although I certainly didn’t approve of the casual abuse of the Hazara people. Pakistan, on the other hand, was a nightmare and I often went dressed as a man in the streets. Even then, I had stones thrown at me, and experienced rioting on the streets due in part to my presence. There seemed to be a large “intelligence community” presence at Tarbella Dam, and fundamentalist mullahs were already fomenting unrest.
During the Soviet invasion, a friend photographed the illegal use of Stinger missiles in Chitral as well as instruction manuals on the use of nerve gas written in Russian as well as photographs of captured nerve gas canisters. He also shot documentary footage of the war, including footage of moujahiddin armed with obsolete rifles fighting Russian tanks. We took this information to the major media outlets in New York and attempted to address the U.N. about it. NO ONE cared. Someone broke into our room at the San Moritz hotel on Central Park, rifled through the documents and stole my friend’s Italian passport. That same night, my wallet was lifted when we ate at a fancy Pakistani restaurant uptown. It was found days later in the light shaft of the elevator in the highrise housing the restaurant. Nothing was missing. My friend got travel documents from his embassy and left the country immediately. He was later killed, filming in the mountains of Afghanistan.
Later during the Soviet war, refugees…mostly women and children, mostly “peasants”….were housed in camps in Peshawar under the most arduous of conditions. Aid was not forthcoming from the United States. It was easy to radicalize the Afghani under these circumstances, since all they had to cling to was the Qu’uan. How can America possibly be surprised that the Taliban made such headway ? The Afghani were some of the finest people I have ever met. And in my opinion, Pakistan was and is one of the most dangerous places on Earth because of its irrationality and religious fanaticism. Young men are unemployed, urban, and cannot afford the bride-price to marry…a dangerous and easily swayed group. Many of the problems found there can be traced back to partition by the British and a displaced population. The same defensiveness, for many of the same reasons, exists in Israel, in my opinion.
Last month I stumbled upon some CIA-linked documents on the Internet. They detailed minerals, gemstones and other assets found in Afghanistan. The most interesting was the statistic documenting the fairly recent discovery of large deposits of uranium. I bookmarked these documents, but when I went back to review them a week later, they had been removed and in their place was a link requiring CIA clearance to access. There is so much more going on over there, such a different agenda, than what we are allowed to see in the popular press. I mourn the destruction of this wonderful place and the sorrow rained down upon its people.
Sharon, most young people don’t believe me when I tell them how modern Afghanistan used to be before the Soviets invaded and the Taliban became the answer to fighting back. The people had no idea what they were opening themselves up to until it was too late. I impress upon young people that these women enjoyed the same freedoms we enjoyed at the time and had it all ripped away in a few short years. What a waste of a great culture.
Afganistan has some of the most sort after minerals in the world including vast deposits of uranium. This info was published not too long ago as I remember.
Before the USSR invasion, Afganistan was a happening place, home of the finest horsemen in the world. I purchased many handmade items via a friend there years ago and treasure them.
Thank you Sharon, for your wonderful info.
Old tasty pics, without other value than show the people how to create ilusion, and raise national spirit. Just establishment propaganda. There’s not heaven in earth.
How strange it is that their past seems futuristic when compared to their present…
This is interesting, indeed. Even the movie, The Kite Runner, didn’t have a modern look to Kabul, but in fact, the pictures showed that at least some parts of Kabul was very modern. Even women were learning in universities with men, and in the same laboratories.
This is the Afghanistan, that my mother talked about, assuming that these photos were taken during the rein of The Shah…i feel sad to see the pictures of Afganistan.. they really are wonderful people…
The mullahs and Taliban would rather rule over a country in ruins than participate in rebuilding their country with somebody else in charge. Very much like our Republican/Democrat thinking in the US. But now no Afghani under 30 has ever known their country at peace. At least we Americans are lucky enough to have our wars on somebody else’s soil.
Under the Romans, even people living in the country had central heating, running water and toilets. They had paved roads, written laws and a justice system.
Then Christianity took over and insisted that occult rituals were more important than real learning so even the kings didn’t have indoor plumbing for over 1,000 years.
All religion is mental illness and should be treated as such.
2 Angry Voter: roflmao
central heating even in the country under the romans.
biggest LOL of the day.
another one is Peter Farrell with this phrase: “At least we Americans are lucky enough to have our wars on somebody else’s soil.” all hail AMERICA! which country you’ll destroy next? Iran or Syria?
@jin -
the central heating system was even found in the ruins of harappa/mohenja daro! . It doesn’t mean they needed a PG&E utility connection…the rooms had heating ducts all connected to a central fireplace!! interestingly , harappans also seemed to use a wet clay to line these ducts and they were coated with cow/buffalo dung periodically..it was difficult to say how often except for the fact that in the ruins , these ducts had layers of dung lining the wet clay walls of the duct..the houses closer to the community pool had more elaborate heating ducts implying people higher in the social order had ‘heating’ for the entire house rather than just a few rooms!! I know..I know..ancient people were stupid and our white race is the smartest…LOL for sure
What made it go backward?
RELIGION.
Taking that awful hateful Islam too seriously. And it’s amazing so many commenters are to scared to say it. The only women with face veils are the nurses with the newborns.
Now we have a whole lot of people in the western world saying “it’s okay to force women to wear burka’s because that’s their culture, we need to be culturally sensitive.”
Solution? There is no quick solution. But we need to stop giving a free pass to any idea merely because it’s a religion and “needs to be respected”.
tbird.
what makes people go backward?
thinking like yours.
you think an ideology that promoted learning, understanding and beauty would have caused this? you have no clue. the islamic civilisation lasted longer than any other and the knowledge that it had aquired it what makes part of your life so comfortable and rich.
lets just ignore soviet rule, US influence because a religion all on its own has the power to regress a whole culture and people. its thinking like yours that stumps progress and reflesiveness. you have a similar mentality to those of the taliban, the only crucial difference is that you were not forced through poverty and violence to think this way. you are naturally backward.
Really, you think that poster is like the Taliban? And Islam is understanding? Please get lost with your complete BS.
What wonderful pictures, we should have more like those, to remind us that there are real people out there in the other Countries, who once lived good lifes.
Not too long ago I watched a video of the countryside of todays Afghanistan, and man it was beautiful, at least in those areas where there were no bomb craters.
The pitures are amazing,GOGbless whoever saved these pictures and posted the pictures for the world to see it. This time we will build Afghanistan even better, greener, sustainable and broughter, Afghanistan never failed, the fundimintalits and super powers did that to Afghanistan, Afghanistan was the first ground zero, and new york was the second.
RN
http://www.facebook.com/reyaznadi
as an artist/architect and activist I have many architectural plans for rebuilding Afghanistan.
It’s up to a people/country to decide their own fate. If they can’t stand up for what is right on their own, why should anyone else be risking their lives for them?
It’s a shame that radical religious groups can bring down a whole country like that.
Not a bad thing to remember if you live in the U.S. and head to the polls this fall.
Thank you for posting these, the people deserve remembering.
I travel frequently to Afghanistan and some friends tell me of what it was like. Over 30 years of war has done so much damage. Thank you for these photos. They show what is possible.
For those who wish to see a progressive and liberal (in the classical sense of the word) Afghanistan, please visit http://www.aelso.org, the Afghanistan Economic and Legal Studies Organization.
This is by far the most “comment posted” posting on Retronaut that I’ve seen to date! Obviously a concern for many people today on how we (western society in particular) look upon other countries and cultures and what is perceived as a “closed” society and our desire to manipulate or change these cultures to a more western based society, a struggle that no doubt will exist as long as the human species will exist on this planet…..
Fundamentalism filled the void and instability created by years of war and destruction.
If the infrastructure of the urban areas of Afghanistan had not been so destroyed and daily life made chaotic and hard…I doubt Afghanistan would be anything like it is today.
I can see religion gaining a bit over modernity, like countries around it…but women not allowed to be alone, being attacked if they try to be educated, being covered from head to toe with even eyes covered? Seems unlikely.Z
I don’t know the solution. Even if the super powers that helped level this country tried to make repairs…the fundamentalists would just bomb them, thus wasting money.
No mentioned so far is that the West was admired and immitated during the heydey of the West, especially America after WWII. This has been lost for various reasons. Also, wasn’t there a Afghan King back then in league with the West? I also remember the SOVIET propaganda justifying the invasion: the evils of Islamic Fundamentalism as compared to Communism.