Brian Williams
Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor
The awful Ft. Hood shooting incident has saddened everyone -- and we're feeling it acutely perhaps because we just spent a week with the U.S. military in Afghanistan. I've often said that one of the great blessings of my job (as someone who didn't serve) is the exposure it has given me to our superb all-volunteer force. I have been to Ft. Hood, and cannot imagine the shattering effect this will have on that post and community. Our hearts and prayers go out to the families of the dead and wounded -- and we hope you can join us tonight as we attempt to further de-construct what happened there.
Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor
We are covering an awful breaking story at Ft. Hood in Texas. Not only is it the single largest military installation in the country, this makes for the single largest loss of life in a single day domestically in some time. It’s an awful story, and there's a lot we don't know at this hour. We'll try to compile the very best reporting for tonight's broadcast, and we hope you can join us.
Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor
I'm simply writing today to say thank you -- and to express my ongoing appreciation at the amazing generosity of our viewers. Last night we did a follow-up on the orphanage in Afghanistan. I was only home from work for a few hours when we learned they had already received 500 e-mails from Nightly News viewers -- many of them offering donations and pledges to sponsor a child. It is immensely gratifying, and I'm beyond words in expressing my thanks and appreciation on behalf of the lovely children we met over there. Thank you.
We hope you can join us tonight.
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How to help:
Afghan Child Education and Care Organization (AFCECO) is an Afghan non-profit organization based in Kabul, founded by a group of volunteers in 2001. They are working with international partners in the United States, Italy, and Australia on projects that benefit Afghan children.
If you would like to sponsor an Afghan child or make a donation online, please visit: www.charityhelp.org/afceco
AFCECO
P.O. Box 5820
Kabul, Afghanistan
info@afceco.org
www.afceco.org
Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor
I'd like to make a special plea for your attention: tonight we are doing a follow-up Making a Difference report. It's actually a report on the generosity of our viewers. Last Friday from Afghanistan, we first aired the story of an orphanage on Nightly News. It is the home to 67 girls and several boys -- and it is an infectiously happy place. We aired the story, along with information on how our viewers could contribute. In the time it took us to fly home to New York, our viewers had donated more than $50,000 -- and since we've been back, we sent a camera crew back to the orphanage to measure how this segment has assisted them.
So please watch tonight's follow-up along with us -- and most importantly: thank you for your generosity, thank you for not letting me down...and thank you for what you have done for those wonderful children. I'm told that adoption from Afghanistan is virtually impossible... and yes, I wanted to take them all home. I hope you can join us for the entire broadcast this evening.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
How to help:
Afghan Child Education and Care Organization (AFCECO) is an Afghan non-profit organization based in Kabul, founded by a group of volunteers in 2001. They are working with international partners in the United States, Italy, and Australia on projects that benefit Afghan children.
If you would like to sponsor an Afghan child or make a donation online, please visit: www.charityhelp.org/afceco
AFCECO
P.O. Box 5820
Kabul, Afghanistan
info@afceco.org
www.afceco.org
Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor
Our last moments in Kabul left an indelible impression, and I'm afraid not a good one. While we were at the airport, waiting in the parking lot to be "processed," two SUV's full of American contractors arrived: all wearing visible body armor, many with thigh-mounted ankle holsters for their 9mm handguns, and still others with conspicuous automatic weapons held across their chests. They are not alone -- this kind of thing is now ubiquitous there.
There is a dynamic developing in Kabul which is reminiscent of Baghdad: Highly visible American security contractors, operating aggressively in Afghanistan. They are aggressive in traffic, they are threatening-looking in public (which they will admittedly tell you is by design, to protect their charge). Many of these firms are the same ones we all came to know in Iraq -- the security structure in Afghanistan has become a massive industry. It also works hand in glove with the deep corruption in that country: I watched as two gatekeepers at the airport were handed cash to allow admittance to the parking lots, and I watched as two passport workers were handed cash to facilitate a departure. Corruption is pervasive -- and it all can make for a rather toxic backdrop against which we now consider Afghanistan's future, and America's role in that. We were handed a whole new set of circumstances with the de facto dissolution of the election this morning, and we'll have to wait and see how (and if) that affects the security environment there.
One more thing: I transited home through Dubai. I opened a copy of GQ magazine on the plane, only to find many of the pages stuck together. After pulling several pages apart, I found that someone (I later learned it was the Government) had gone through every magazine with a heavy black liquid magic marker and blotted out any sensitive or provocative body parts. To be more blunt: if there was a nipple visible through a t-shirt, if too much of a derriere was visible, it was hidden behind a huge splotch of black ink.
I've now travelled through Dubai many times, and have spent a fair amount of time there. It's a confusing place: they advertise good times, while a conservative government and culture place limits on popular culture and discourse. As a friend who lives there points out constantly, "It is not a free society." As long as you know that going in.
As long as you don't mind knowing your magazine's been read before you opened it
--and portions of it have been turned black.
As always, it's good to be home.
We hope you can join us tonight from New York.
By Brian Williams, Anchor and managing editor
While we didn't fly halfway around the world just to interview generals or ambassadors, its nonetheless notable that we've been in the region a week and we will depart for home having not been granted an interview with a single senior U.S. official.
It's not for lack of asking... and it's not as if there's a shortage of them here in Kabul, either. Tonight I was invited to a dinner at the official residence of U.S. Ambassador Eikenberry, where Generals Patreus and McCrystal were present (among others) but the talk was gently but quickly steered away from the elephant in the room: the pending decision by the president regarding the future direction of the military effort here in Afghanistan.
Some of those in the room tonight will no doubt join today's White House military session by secure teleconference. While there have been leaks, they've been classic trial balloons to guage early reaction to a policy idea that may or may not be what the president ultimately announces. It is abundantly clear the word has gone out that no one is to say anything during this period. Today I spoke (on background) with two Army Generals and assorted Army and Marine Colonels -- they all said they will adjust, carry on and carry out the order when the new plan is announced. I guess I'd be surprised if they'd said anything else.
This will be my last post from Afghanistan on this trip, so please allow me one more note: while I get to have my name on the broadcast and on this blog -- and while the slideshows and on-air coverage show only me in Afghanistan, I'm the least of this effort. Right now, technicians are standing in the cold on the roof of this building preparing for the broadcast. An adjacent room is filled with producers who are enduring another sleepless night. A videotape edit room in New York is churning out the coverage you'll see tonight. So far on this trip, we've had explosions, gunfire, an earthquake -- and among the staff we've had a non life-threatening electric shock, one debilitating migrane, one Cipro-worthy illness (and countless minor ones) and that's actually a shockingly low number of ailments and injuries in a dangerous place. And then there are the local drivers, there are the men who protect us with machine guns, there are the Afghans on our staff without whom we could not do our work.
Just some of the NBC staff in Afghanistan, photographed with soldiers in uniform. Left- John Kooistra, cameraman; Bob Lapp, audio technician; producers Subrata De and Madeleine Haeringer; and Brian Williams (far right).
Long after we are gone, many of our people stay on, continuing to cover this changing story, continuing to cover the tireless work of those stationed here in uniform. None of them ever get the credit they deserve -- and while this isn't enough, it's something. My thanks to our incredible team all around the globe.
I hope you can join us tonight for the broadcast they put together. Have a good weekend, and we'll see you from New York on Monday.
by Subrata De, Nightly News senior producer traveling in Afghanistan with Brian Williams
"Please come inside, please tell them it is not safe for them to be out there."
I'd just walked inside the high walls of the orphanage compound run by AFCECO (Afghan Child Education and Care Organization). Andeisha Farid, the NGO's Executive Director was waiting and worried.
Before most shoots like this, Brian Williams and the crews prepare outside, getting him "wired up" with a mic so that we can record his audio while he walks into a place where he'll be followed by a camera. We didn't want to make a big fuss inside around the kids, so we were preparing just outside the gates.
But Andeisha advised we enter the compound immediately. NGO's -- especially those that have worked to provide education and safe havens for girls and young women -- are often targets in this country. Thankfully, this place hasn't suffered any retaliation, but the threat is still there.
Guards are posted at the door all night and the girls are only allowed outside for school each day.
And yet, once you step inside this place, the fears and threats that have begun to encroach on Kabul melt away. A huge flower garden added a burst of color to this cheerful and warm home for 67 girls and 15 boys. Children spilled out of the doors to greet our group.
CONTINUED >>
By Brian Williams, Anchor and managing editor
This has been an eventful day: the ride (under heavy guard) from Bagram into downtown Kabul, our tour of the courtyard of the guest compound where so many died yesterday -- and then to top it all off, while we were working in our rented building in Kabul late tonight, an earthquake. It was a long, slow roller -- like surfing -- though somewhat weaker in intensity than some of the quakes I’ve experienced in California. We went through the usual "delay" before realizing just what was happening (considering where we are, every time something shakes, its also possible there's been an explosion), and then watched as fixtures started to swing. Obediently, I stood in the doorway of my room as Senior Producer Subrata De did the first thing she thought of: she got her Flip camera and we started making a video toward the end of the quake. Several of our staff members were jolted out of bed by it and we've had one small roller since then. We hopped on an earthquake-monitoring site on the web and discovered that today's quake had been a 6.0 centered near the Hindu Kush -- the scene of the last big one -- and we had felt one of the outer bands. Just another day in Afghanistan. We sure hope you can join us tonight.
By Brian Williams, Anchor and managing editor
I am living inside a containerized shipping box. It’s a base housing unit here at Bagram, and it’s actually perfect. Small? You betcha. It’s tiny, taken up mostly by bunk beds. But it’s got all the comforts of (a very tiny) home, and we feel fortunate to have a place to rest our heads and take a shower at an Air Base where they have other things to worry about... aside from where to put the folks visiting from NBC.
During a few hours of down time this afternoon, I quickly fell into a deep, exhaustion-fueled sleep. I was awakened by an explosion. Luckily, I've heard my share (like one every 30 seconds on the third night of the invasion in Bagdhad) and wasn't overly alarmed. I could tell it was some distance away. Only when I got to our workspace tonight was I told it was a "Controlled Det" in military parlance: a detonation conducted by the Army. I apparently slept through the announcement on the P. A. system warning that it was about to happen. Considering the violence in Kabul today, an explosion made perfect sense to me.
It was also a reminder that we are in a war zone.
Then there are the people you meet here in uniform. CONTINUED >>
Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor
In just the space of one long day (actually the equivalent of two at home, since we're just pretending to have slept), we've seen such an extraordinary mix of images: the regional Afghan commercial aircraft we flew this morning that still bore some of the interior markings of its apparent previous owner, American Airlines...the various nationalities among the soldiers at the air base in Kabul...the Army Major whom I first met (back when he was a Captain) when I visited David Bloom on the Iraq/Kuwait border just prior to the invasion (in the other war)...and the palpable sadness tonight in the dining hall (at the Army Special Forces camp where we're spending the night) when the assembled soldiers heard the news that 8 more Americans had been killed in action here today.
We've tried to send back (despite some very dicey satellite communications, made more difficult tonight by the first downpour of the coming rainy season) a full package of coverage of our travels so far -- including still photos, web videos and of course what we were able to assemble for the broadcast tonight.
VIDEO: Winning over hearts and minds
For now, we press on...and we hope you can join us for the broadcast tonight. My thanks in advance to Ann Curry for splitting the duty with us.
