Told through the eyes of witnesses to the fall of Kabul Walkley award-winning journalist
Andrew Quilty's debut book offers a remarkable record of this historic moment. As night fell on
15 August 2021 the Taliban entered Kabul capital of Afghanistan. After a 20-year conflict
with the United States its Western allies and a proxy Afghan government the Islamic militant
group once aligned with al Qaeda was about to bury yet another foreign foe in the graveyard of
empires. And for the US world superpower this was yet another foreign disaster. As cities and
towns fell to the Taliban in rapid succession Western troops and embassy staff scrambled to
flee a country of which its government had lost control. August in Kabul is the story of how
America's longest mission came to an abrupt and humiliating end told through the eyes of
Afghans whose lives have been turned upside down: a young woman who harbours dreams of a
university education a presidential staffer who works desperately to hold things together as
the government collapses around him a prisoner in the notorious Bagram Prison who suddenly
finds himself free when prison guards abandon their post. Andrew Quilty was one of only a
handful of Western journalists who stayed in Kabul as the city fell. This is his first-hand
account of those dramatic final days.
