Author: Peter Maass

I was born and raised in Los Angeles. In 1983, after graduating from the University of California at Berkeley, I went to Brussels as a copy editor for The Wall Street Journal/Europe. I left the Journal in 1985 to write for The New York Times and The International Herald Tribune, covering NATO and the European Union. In 1987 I moved to Seoul, South Korea, where I wrote primarily for The Washington Post. After three years in Asia I moved to Budapest to cover Eastern Europe and the Balkans. I spent most of 1992 and 1993 covering the war in Bosnia for the Post.

Gul Agha Gets His Province Back. In Kandahar, the Warlord Has Returned.

The New York Times Magazine
January 6, 2002

Gul Agha Shirzai was the governor of Kandahar Province in the early 1990’s, an infamous period filled with anarchy that was shocking even by Afghan standards. Gul Agha was personally acquainted with the ethos of those times. ... (Read more)

Paying for the Powell Doctrine: The Delusions behind 200,000 Deaths in Bosnia

Dissent
January 2002

In the early days of the Bosnian War, Colin Powell, who at the time chaired the Joint Chiefs of Staff, came to the conclusion that stopping the fighting would require the use of 250,000 troops. Then-President George Bush took his advice to heart and, fearing ... (Read more)

Special Operations: How to Change a Tire in Kandahar

The New Republic
December 15, 2001

The United States Special Forces have had many fine days in Afghanistan of late, but yesterday was not one of their best, at least not in Kandahar.

The Taliban surrendered their spiritual capital a week ago, and now the city’s dusty ... (Read more)

Camp Taliban: The Strange Last Days of the Mullahs

Slate
November 20, 2001

It was, I suppose, just a matter of time until the Taliban imported a media circus.

About nine days ago the Afghan ambassador in Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, who was his regime’s principal spokesman to the outside world, was instructed by Islamabad ... (Read more)

How a Camp Becomes a City

The New York Times Magazine
November 18, 2001

Nusrat motions for me to follow him through the crowd. The situation is hectic, and I hesitate, even though Nusrat was a guerrilla commander in Afghanistan who fought the Red Army for a decade, facing far worse than the assemblage ... (Read more)

Emroz Khan Is Having a Bad Day: Why Peshawar’s Youth Are Tinder for Extremism

The New York Times Magazine
October 21, 2001

Emroz Khan destroys for a living. He dismantles car engines, slicing them open with a sledgehammer and a crooked chisel, prying apart the cylinders, tearing out pistons, dislodging screws and bolts and throwing the metal entrails ... (Read more)

The Volunteer: Finding Love on the Battlefield

The New York Times Magazine
October 7, 2001

A commander in the Hezbul Mujahadeen, a band of Islamic militants, Kiramat Ullah loves to fight, loves to watch videos of fighting, loves to listen to songs about fighting and would be honored to die in battle against American soldiers. ... (Read more)

Do You Know the Way to Paradise?

Slate
October 4, 2001

Nawaf Alhazmi, one of the suspected Sept. 11 hijackers, left behind a letter that outlined last-minute things he should do and think about, such as not forgetting his passport and ensuring he was not being followed. The letter, according to the FBI, also ... (Read more)

The Zealot: Getting Ready for the Jihad

The New York Times Magazine
September 30, 2001

If you happen to need ball bearings in Peshawar, Abdul Sattar Shah is your man. He runs a shop in the Khyber Bazaar that, as his business card states, “deals in all kind of Ball Bearings, Roller Bearings, Needle Roller Bearings, ... (Read more)

Pakistan’s Everyday Dangers

Slate
September 28, 2001

America sounds like a dangerous place. I don’t know for sure, because I was in Macedonia when the World Trade Center was attacked, and I have been in Pakistan since then. But friends in New York, where I live, have e-mailed me about gas masks ... (Read more)