Students at the Walter Cronkite School learned just how exciting and dangerous covering the Taliban could be at the Must See Monday lecture.
Nicholas Schmidle, staff writer at The New Yorker and Cronkite Fellow at the New America Foundation, studied Persian at the University of Tehran. He then had the opportunity to explore Iran as a citizen journalist and later received a writing fellowship to report in Pakistan.
“You just write about what you see — it’s a dream gig for an aspiring foreign correspondent,” he said. “I showed up in Pakistan, first time that I’d been there … I had this financial lifeline to dig around and see what I could find.”
Because he was writing for an American audience, Schmidle needed a source that was able to connect the information back to his story in a way that American’s unfamiliar with Pakistan could understand — a concept that he deemed one of the biggest challenges foreign correspondents face.
“Writing about stories like the Taliban is often fraught with this difficulty that you can see it, and you know it’s everywhere, but you can’t find the character to tell that story for you,” Schmidle said.
He eventually found his source, an English-speaking man named Abdul Rashid Ghazi, the head of the Red Mosque, which was a pro-Taliban and al-Qaida mosque in the center of the capital. Schmidle said that Ghazi had two sides: the humorous man with a degree in international affairs and the man who supported the Taliban and went to meet with Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan.
“Ghazi and I developed this really unique relationship,” Schmidle said. “I would go and sit with him for hours … he became my window into this world.”
From that point on, Ghazi remained an invaluable source for Schmidle, gaining him access to other people and places that he wouldn’t have had without help. But in July 2007, Pakistani forces surrounded the Red Mosque and raided it, killing Ghazi.
Schmidle had lost his source and his most valuable connection to the country, leading him to write an article for Slate titled “Farewell My Jihadi Friend.” Schmidle then decided to do a bigger piece on the Pakistani Taliban.
On his way to meet with a source, Schmidle had to disguise himself with a mediocre beard and dyed brown hair in order to bypass Taliban roadblocks armed with rocket launchers looking to kill foreign spies.
After the meeting, Schmidle headed to a compound and encountered a gruesome scene of Taliban power. Schmidle used a zip-line to land in the center of the compound, where he witnessed the lashing of prisoners and shouts of Taliban morale.
“My first thought is, ‘I’m not supposed to be seeing this,’” Schmidle said. “That’s a great feeling when you’re a journalist. It’s a little scary, but when you’re some place where you know you’re not supposed to be … that’s what you want to keep coming back for.”
After the piece came out, police and intelligence officials showed up at Schmidle’s home in Pakistan and issued a deportation letter.
Although he never attended journalism school, Schmidle received the 2008 Kurt Schork Award for freelance journalism for his work in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“I thought it was really inspiring that he didn’t even go to journalism school but he was willing to put himself in those situations to get the story,” said journalism senior Kendra Rutledge.
After writing a prominent piece for The New Yorker about Bin Laden, Schmidle wanted to come up with another story of equal caliber. He decided to investigate Viktor Bout, the world’s preeminent arms dealer at the time.
After Bout was arrested in Thailand, he was extradited to the United States. Schmidle was left with the task of covering his trial and investigating it past the sentencing.
“It’s hard to know when a story has germinated enough to feel full,” Schmidle said. “It’s all about trying to find that balance. I needed to get to Viktor.”
Schmidle said he was able to find a way to speak with Bout as a source after a “journalistic parting of the seas” — he got the contact information for Bout’s business associate and friend, Peter Mirchev. Schmidle arranged to meet up with Mirchev in Bulgaria.
“I was a little nervous,” Schmidle said. “I mean, this was the guy after all that was providing weapons to the merchant of death.”
Through this source, Schmidle eventually gained access to Bout.
After writing his story, Schmidle said that there was trouble because Bout was so difficult to get a hold of for fact checking. He had to go back to the jail where Bout was being held and attempt to speak with him again.
“At this point, this became this bizarre, unforeseen love triangle between me and these two weapons dealers that emerged,” Schmidle said. “Viktor said ‘Well why don’t you just write a story about Peter Mirchev,’ and Peter Mirchev would later call me and say, ‘Is Viktor mad at me for talking to you?’”
All that came out of the second visit was resentment from Bout. Despite the negativity, Schmidle said he learned more about the truth surrounding Bout and who he really was. Since that day, Bout has not been in contact with Schmidle.
“This is the best Must See Monday that I’ve been to so far,” journalism sophomore Jackie Cotton said. “The kind of stories he was telling reminded me that I’m in the right major.”
Contact the reporter at rebecca.brisley@asu.edu
