Kara Kush Read online

  BY THE SAME AUTHOR

  The Sufis

  The Way of the Sufi

  Tales of the Dervishes

  The Book of the Book

  The Commanding Self

  Neglected Aspects of Sufi Study

  Reflections

  Seeker After Truth

  A Veiled Gazelle

  Special Illumination

  Learning How to Learn

  The Elephant in the Dark

  Thinkers of the East

  Hundred Tales of Wisdom

  Widsom of the Idiots

  A Perfumed Scorpion

  Caravan of Dreams

  The Magic Monastery

  The Dermis Probe

  Destination Mecca

  The Exploits of the Incomparable Mulla Nasrudin

  The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mulla Nasrudin

  The Subtleties of the Inimitable Mulla Nasrudin

  The World of Nasrudin

  The Secret Lore of Magic

  Oriental Magic

  World Tales

  Darkest England

  The Natives are Restless

  The Englishman’s Handbook

  The Farmer’s Wife

  The Lion Who Saw Himself in the Water

  The Magic Horse

  Neem the Half Boy

  The Silly Chicken

  The Boy Without a Name

  The Clever Boy and the Terrible, Dangerous Animal

  Copyright

  This edition first published in the United States in 2002 by

  The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc.

  www.overlookpress.com

  NEW YORK:

  141 Wooster Street

  New York, NY 10012

  Copyright © 1986 by Idries Shah

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

  ISBN 978-1-46830-781-8

  TO THE PEOPLE OF AFGHANISTAN

  and

  in homage to

  The Leader of our Caravan:

  All perfect he, and therefore won

  His lofty place; and, like a sun

  His beauty lighted up the night.

  Fair are his virtues all, and bright.

  Let peace and benediction be

  On him and his posterity!

  Saadi of Shiraz

  From The Rose Garden

  CONTENTS

  By the Same Author

  Copyright

  Book One: Nikolai is Here

  Tiger’s Fort South of the Soviet Border, in

  Afghan Turkestan

  SUMMER

  Book Two: The Gold of Ahmad Shah

  1 Ura Pobeyda – Hail Victory!

  Kalantut Village North-West of Kabul, Afghanistan

  APRIL 23

  2 ‘I thank the court for its clemency …’

  Guerrilla Headquarters The Eagle’s Nest,

  Paghman Mountains North of Kabul

  APRIL 29

  3 Karima: ‘If you push me too far …’

  Kabul City and Jalalabad, South Afghanistan

  JUNE 7–8

  4 Business on the Frontier

  Manchester, England and Istanbul, Turkey

  MAY 25–26

  5 A Caravan for David Callil

  Inside Afghanistan, on the road west of Chitral, Pakistan

  MAY 31–JUNE 8

  6 Bright Wolf

  The Eagle’s Nest, Paghman Mountains, North of Kabul

  JUNE 8

  7 Noor Sharifi, Hostage

  Pul-i-Charkhi Prison, Kabul

  MAY2

  8 A Formal Case has been Initiated

  The Great Castle at the mouth of the Paghman valley

  MAY 4

  9 Captain Azambai, Soviet Red Army

  South of Khaja Rawash Airbase, Kabul Road

  MAY 2

  10 The Treasure

  Kajakai, Kandahar Province, South-West Afghanistan

  APRIL 30–MAY 10

  Book Three: Halzun, the Snail

  1 Nurhan Aliyev, Uzbek Librarian

  Tashkent, Uzbek SSR, Soviet Central Asia

  MAY 24

  2 The Artefacts Department

  Moscow, Union Capital, USSR

  MAY 26–30

  3 A Passport for Tezbin, Carpenter

  Moscow/Kabul

  JUNE 2–11

  Book Four: Hail Jamal, Son of Zaid!

  1 ‘This is your mission Jamal …’

  The Airport, Hadiqa City, Narabia, Arabian Gulf

  JUNE 12

  2 Highness, I am Samir, servant of Akbar

  Peshawar City, North-West Frontier, Pakistan

  JUNE 13–17

  3 Send for Yunanian, the Chemist

  The Palace/The British Embassy, Hadiqa City, Narabia

  JUNE 18

  4 Thank you, Dr Anddrews

  Oxford, England

  JUNE 20

  Book Five: A Mirza in a Mulberry Tree

  1 Hang the Bandit Scum!

  Kabul and Panjsher Valley, Afghanistan JUNE 9

  2 Compassionate leave for Mr Khan

  New Delhi, India

  JUNE 8–14

  3 Account paid

  Kabul, Afghanistan

  JULY 14–16

  Book Six: Daughter of Daniyel

  1 Prem Lal, KGB Rezident

  Kabul, Afghanistan

  JUNE 8

  2 Fazli Rabbi, Innkeeper

  Jalalabad, Afghanistan

  JUNE 8

  3 To the Castle of the Yusuf-Born

  The Path of Flight, Smugglers’ Route, Jalalabad to Pakistan

  JUNE 9–19

  Book Seven: Ataka! Ataka! Ataka!

  1 Nanpaz the Baker

  The Castle, Paghman Valley

  JUNE 5

  2 The Whirlwind to see Colonel Slavsky

  Below the Castle, Paghman

  JUNE 19

  Book Eight: Nest of the Eagle

  1 One hundred and fifty-eight – and volunteering

  Eagle’s Nest, The Buddhist Monastery, Paghman Mountains

  JUNE 19

  2 Silahdar Haidar, Weapon-Bearer, reporting, Komondon

  Eagle’s Nest

  JUNE 20

  3 Time to move on, Big One …

  Eagle’s Nest/Kalan’s Farm, Near Kabul

  JUNE 20

  4 The Fourth Battle

  Valley Entrance, Paghman

  JUNE 24

  Book Nine: Across the Hindu Kush

  1 An Izba in Nuristan

  The Koh-i-Daman Foothills

  JULY 3

  2 The Wild Ones of Murad Shah

  The Lower Paghman Range

  JULY 5

  3 Land of the Living Prince

  Beyond High Serai

  JULY 11

  4 We must cross Black Mountain …

  Qala Kavi, Central Mountains

  JULY 12

  5 Kara Dagh is Icebound …

  The Great Pass

  JULY 14

  Book Ten: The Wolves of Turkestan

  1 Like lice on a dinner plate …

  The North Slope of Kara Dagh Mountain, Afghan Turkestan

  JULY 16

  2 Guerrilla City

  Kurt Burj, ‘Wolf Redoubt’, Reed Forest, Afghan Turkestan

  JULY 17

  3 The Gunboat Jihun

  Qizil Qala, Oxus River Port, Afghan-Soviet Border

  JULY 21

  4 Leninised

  On the
Oxus River

  JULY 21

  5 March South …

  Wolf Redoubt

  JULY 21

  Book Eleven: Southwards to Kandahar

  1 Ride and Die!

  High Hazara Land, Central Afghanistan

  LATE AUGUST

  2 The Mulla and the Water of Life

  Baghran Town, Descending towards Kandahar, South-Central Afghanistan

  LATE AUGUST

  Book Twelve: Ekranoplan, the Sea Monsters

  1 Wild Horses

  Southern Hazarajat

  AUGUST-SEPTEMBER

  2 Kandahar in disguise

  The Oasis of Panjtan, Kandahar Province

  MID-SEPTEMBER

  3 Council of War

  The Oasis

  MID-SEPTEMBER

  Book Thirteen: Into the Abode of War

  1 Target: Kandahar Airport

  Pendergood’s Army, In the Free Land, Pakistan-Afghan Border; and Moscow

  SEPTEMBER 15, Late Afternoon

  2 The Russians are coming

  The Eagle’s force, North of Kandahar City

  2100 hours

  3 Pendergood’s Army, approaching the Airport, 18 kms from Kandahar

  2140 hours

  4 The Eagle’s force, north of Kandahar City 527

  2151 hours

  5 Pendergood’s Army, Kandahar Airport

  SEPTEMBER 16,0100 hours

  6 The Eagle’s force, Herat Road boundary, Kandahar City

  0230 hours

  7 Pendergood’s Army, Kandahar Airport

  0800 hours

  Book Fourteen: The Secret Weapon

  1 Stand to Arms!

  North of Kandahar Airport

  SEPTEMBER 16, 1000 hours

  2 Kandahar Airport

  1200’1300 hours

  3 The Tanks must not get through

  1436 hours

  Book Fifteen: Zoo-Bear

  The Super-Redeyes

  Almas Fort, the heights near Kandahar Airport

  1600 hours

  BOOK 1

  Nikolai is Here

  Tiger’s Fort

  South of the Soviet Border

  Afghan Turkestan

  SUMMER

  Juma lay, waiting for death, by the parapet on the roof of his ancestral home.

  Until five weeks ago, he had been a captain of the Seventh Infantry Division of the Afghan Army, stationed at Kabul. Then had followed a week under arrest, for slandering the Soviet people.

  As the Russian grip on his country had tightened and the National Army crumbled, broken by purges and desertions, Juma had answered a more ancient, more pressing, call to duty. He was the twenty-fifth hereditary Battle-Lord of Sher-Qala, Tiger’s Fort, a mile south of the Soviet–Afghan border, the Oxus River, and he had come home to lead his people, and to fight for freedom.

  It seemed an age since the Russians had invaded Afghanistan, one of the few free countries left on their borders. It was three and a half years ago. The war was still on. Ten miles up the road from there, the Afghan port of Qizil Qala was crammed with tanks, landing-craft, Soviet equipment of all kinds. The only halfway decent ship on the mile-wide river was the ancient Afghan gunboat Jihun, busily ferrying the country’s gold reserves, precious stones which were mined there – lapis lazuli, emeralds and rubies – and priceless ancient Greek, Buddhist and Islamic artefacts from the collection in the Kabul Museum, to help pay for the ‘fraternal assistance’ of the Soviet Limited Military Contingent, the new masters.

  The Russians had, at last, broken through the barrier which had denied them warm-water ports of their own. To the south, Pakistan was wide open, all the way to the Arabian Sea. After that, the Gulf, the riches of Arabian oil, and the outflanking of Iran, were the next targets. Unless the Afghans, still fighting, could stop them. Twelve to sixteen million mountaineers, with only the world’s vague sympathy, and their own determination, on their side.

  But there was something that might enable the Afghans to evict the invader, reclaim their homeland, win their war. This lay in the secret which Captain Juma had entrusted to the village mayor.

  What chance was there that the message would get back to a man who might do something, might just turn the tide in time, the man they called The Eagle? Not much.

  The Russian helicopter gunships had been flying low these last few days. God willing, the summer clouds of north Afghanistan would keep them low, so that someone could, now and then, manage to shoot off a tiny rear rotor: the only way to get them down, if all you had was a World War I British Lee-Enfield .303, with second-hand cartridges filled with homemade black powder.

  Captain Juma, of the former Royal Afghan, now People’s Democratic, Army, screwed up his eyes to make out the distant profile of the light, scouting whirler, and guessed that it must be the forerunner of two or three more: the big ones they called the village-killers. They would have been called up by radio, because this community had harboured badmashes, ‘villains’, the communist word for the Muhjahidin, ‘the strugglers’ – the Resistance. And Juma had his own, special reason, for wanting them to come.

  Last night near Sher-Qala, the village folk, the yokels, with utter foolishness, had lit a huge bonfire to celebrate the ambush of three Soviet tanks, just four kilometres down the road towards the provincial capital of Turkestan. They had knocked them out in broad daylight, too. Using only soft-drink bottles filled with petrol, plus a little shredded rubber – Molotov cocktails – they had burned out all three tanks, though with the loss of eight men and five women of the farming folk.

  Usually the assault helicopters flew high past here, on their way to deal with the people of the more turbulent far west, along the plains of the boundary with the Soviet Union. Their targets were the ordinary people of the country: starvelings who tended the fields as best they could during the day, and crept out to attack at night. Just after dawn, the raiding parties, each of ten to thirty fighters, would return, carrying their wounded, from the raid. They would show Russian army pay-books, an officer’s gaudy epaulette, boxes of almost unstrikable Estonian matches, buttons, cap-badges. Yesterday’s day-raid had been too successful, and far too venturesome, for the Russians to ignore.

  The best times were when the fighters brought back arms, grenades and ammunition. Often, too, there were things like canned food and candies: boiled sweets from Hungary which the Nikolais really loved. And metal mirrors. These were, oddly, engraved with the words, in Russian, ‘to be used only for shaving’. Sometimes the village women, although most of them had been in action against the Nikolais, would weep when they saw these. Each could see, in her imagination, another mother, somewhere far to the north, saving up to buy one, and giving it to her conscript son. ‘Nikolai, carry it in your left breast pocket. Do it for my sake: you never know …’ There were letters, too, unposted, to Moldavia, Georgia, the Ukraine or Byelorussia. Trophies, certainly: but this detritus of death, this rubbish from soldiers’ pockets, was the same the world over: sad and irrelevant.

  Not irrelevant were the loading and defence instructions for the huge secret cargo of the treasure-ship; foolishly carried by an over-confident Russian officer, on an observation mission in one of yesterday’s tanks. That was the sort of information that would change the course of the war. Taken from the Russian’s body and carried to Juma, sick and useless, by his men.

  The local Muhjahidin were still a travesty of a resistance force. Ragged, ill-equipped, careless and lacking cunning. They needed to be trained. Descendants of warriors, perhaps; but at this rate, how far were they from complete extermination? They were not afraid: Juma accepted that, but they were far from being the kind of soldiers that Afghanistan needed now. Giving themselves away with public displays of exultation at any success, firing shots wastefully and idiotically into the air, they regularly forgot that the cover of darkness was their great asset. Instead of letting the night cloak them, all too often they allowed themselves to be caught in the open in the mornings, and hunted by thos
e satanic flying machines. Mind you, there were other fighters, like the seasoned warriors of the southland, who had had the Soviets on the run more than once; but Juma belonged to Turkestan.

  A spasm of pain brought his thoughts back to the present. The villagers would not come back, he hoped: not for some time, anyway. He lay back on the straw which the blind cobbler, Haji Alim, had brought for him, near the upper turret of the baked clay building. By moving slightly, he tried to ease the pain, but it only increased: he felt the throbbing move higher, up now to his thigh. The wound was massively infected, the leg swollen and going blue. He hadn’t been able to get it treated since the guard had slashed him with a bayonet as he jumped the barbed wire that night at Islahgah, the ideological-correction camp for politically unreliable soldiers, more than a fortnight ago. He had covered over a hundred and fifty kilometres in five days, most of it on foot, but sometimes helped by a friendly peasant with a donkey. Twice it was a man with a truck.

  He had been planning his escape since he had discovered that his wife, held hostage for his good behaviour, had died of ill-treatment in the Pul-i-Charkhi prison. They had no children; now that Peri was gone, his duty was clear.

  Juma had got home, had come back here to Tiger’s Fort, still in his own uniform, to help train these people, to give them the knowledge he had gained at battle school. Without that they would be wiped out by those skills that he had learnt, but of which they had only dimly heard. His father had been their Bashkan, their chief. His family, alone in the village, had maintained the ancient fighting tradition, for seven hundred years. They were hereditary noyons, battle-lords, descended from the commanders of the Horde of Genghiz Khan. And the peasants, surely, could be trained. They would listen to him. It was really a matter of time, as Major Zaman had said. The Major had been trying to prepare him for this day.

  Instructor-Major Zaman was an ancient veteran of the war with Britain in 1919, the year the Afghans had last regained their independence. He had lectured, speaking truly, that day ten years ago in the stifling classroom, a hero with the Star of Afghanistan on his tunic. ‘Now hear and understand!’ Cadet Juma had jumped to full alertness, awakened by the raised voice from his daydream of the fair maidens, peghlas they called them thereabouts in the soft southern Pashtu, tripping to the brook which he could see through the window from his desk, the meadow bright with buttercups and daisies; and filling their clay jars with the family’s daily drinking-water.