Under wraps

At its 6.5-year milestone, the war in Afghanistan stalls on corruption, drug trade, and Islamic radicalism. And going incognito has no guarantees | Jill Nelson

Hamed Zalmy/AFP/Getty Images

The last time Sonali Kolhatkar was in Afghanistan, she was in a race to reach Kabul. With only 24 hours to catch her international flight, she threw on a burqa and jumped into a taxi with an escort and her colleague—who had grown a beard prior to the trip. "Whatever you do, don't appear non-Afghan and be prepared to make up a story about why you are here," they were told.

Armed groups halted their trek twice but they arrived safely in Kabul. That was in 2005. Today that same road, the Kabul-Kandahar highway, is even more risky, Kolhatkar said: "Taxi drivers will charge a thousand dollars cash to take you across it because it has become way too dangerous."

As the war in Iraq has snatched center stage, the war in Afghanistan is all but forgotten. A recent rise in violence has called attention to NATO's mission in the war-torn country—and to stepped-up U.S. regional initiatives to bring sucessful closure. During an unannounced visit to Afghanistan in February, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice attempted to counter growing concerns: "If you look at the Afghanistan of 2001 and the Afghanistan of now, there is a remarkable difference for the better."