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interviewOn Sale Now Buy the Book: Hardcover | Paperback | eBook The bestselling novelist of ancient warfare returns with a riveting historical novel that re-creates Alexander the Great’s invasion of the Afghan kingdoms in 330 B.C., a campaign that eerily foreshadows the tactics, terrors and frustrations of contemporary conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Here the foe does not meet us in pitched battle, as other armies we have dueled in the past..…Even when we defeat him, he will not accept our dominion. He comes back again and again. He hates us with a passion whose depth is exceeded only by his patience and his capacity for suffering.In words that might have been ripped from today’s combat dispatches, Steven Pressfield brings to life the confrontation between an invading Western army and fierce Eastern warriors determined at all costs to defend their homeland. Narrated by Matthias, an infantryman in Alexander’s army, The Afghan Campaign explores the challenges, both military and moral, that Alexander and his soldiers face as they embark on a new type of war and are forced to adapt to the methods of a ruthless foe that employs terror and insurgent tactics, conceals itself among the civilian populace, and recruits women and boys as combatants. As Matthias relates the brutal day-to-day encounters between the two sides, he exposes the human cost borne by a company of men whose code is humanist and secular when they seek to impose their will on a people of deep religiosity, insularity, unbending pride, and a passionate readiness to die for their cause. In The Afghan Campaign, Pressfield offers an edge-of-your-seat adventure and once again demonstrates his profound understanding of the hopes and desperation of men in battle and of the historical realities that continue to influence our world. Contact Steve with questions or comments about The Afghan Campaign NOTE: Mr. Pressfield reads all e-mails and tries to respond personally to as many as he can. He hopes his correspondents will understand, however, if time-constraints of work, travel, research, and family prevent him from answering every one. "No one writes better historical fiction than Steven Pressfield. The Afghan War that was waged by Alexander the Great 2000 years ago is eerily similar to the one that's being fought today. This book should be required reading for anyone who wants to better understand what American and Coalition forces are up against in one of history's most tribal and troubled regions." Excerpt The following excerpt is the opening of the book -- the quote at the very start and then the first chapter. We hope to add a few more chapters from the body of the book as the publishing date approaches.  EPIGRAPH
"Do you believe that so many nations accustomed to the name and rule of another, united with us neither by religion, nor customs, nor community of language, have been subdued in the same battle in which they were overcome? It is by your arms alone that they are restrained, not by their dispositions, and those who fear us when we are present, in our absence will be enemies. We are dealing with savage beasts, which lapse of time only can tame, when they are caught and caged, because their own nature cannot tame them ... Accordingly, we must either give up what we have taken, or we must seize what we do not yet hold." PROLOGUE
A Wedding in Asia
The war is over. Or it will be by sundown tonight, when our lord Alexander takes to wife the Afghan princess Roxane. Across the Plain of Sorrows, so named for the multitude of its burial grounds, the camps of the Macedonians sprawl flank-by-flank alongside those of the enemy. There must be half a thousand of the latter, those bivouacs the Afghans call tafiran ("circles"), each housing between fifty and five hundred men. Every tribe and clan from Artacoana to the Jaxartes has trekked in for the celebration, along with vendors and whores in thousands, tailors, seamstresses, acrobats, musicians, fortune tellers. The whole Mack expeditionary force is here, including foreign units, horse and foot. Every captain and corporal parades in his finery, eager for the festivities. Except me and my mates Flag, Boxer, and Little Red. We've still got work to do. Give Alexander credit. By taking to wife the Afghan princess, he turns his most formidable foe, the warlord Oxyartes, into his father-in-law. No other stunt could have produced victory in this war--or that state of affairs that can plausibly be passed off as victory. So we shall have peace. I doubt that any cessation of hostilities has been longed for more ardently than this. A campaign that was supposed to take three months has dragged on with unbroken terror and brutality for almost three years. Those of us who came out from home as boys have become first men and then something closer to beasts or devils. The Afghans have suffered worse. Two hundred thousand dead, that's the figure you hear. I believe it. Hardly a village remains in this country that our troops haven't leveled, or a city that we haven't taken apart stone by stone. So this wedding is much looked forward to. The deal between Alexander and Oxyartes is this: the warlord gives away his daughter and accepts our king as his sovereign. In return Alexander appoints him governor, to rule the country in Alexander's name. This makes Oxyartes the biggest mackerel in Asia, second only to our lord himself. Then we Macks pack up and leave. I don't know who's happier--us to get out or the Afghans to see us go. I'm getting married tonight myself. Fourteen hundred Macks will be linking with Afghan girls in one collective ceremony. My bride's name is Shinar. It's a long story; I'll tell it as we go along. My mate Flag dismounts now outside the tent, as I finish arming. He's about forty and the hardest knot I know. He has taught me everything. I would march into hell at his side. He enters dressed in formal military kit, for the wedding. I indicate his cloak. "You'll be roasting in that thing." Flag tugs back one wing. Beneath his left arm, a xiphos sword is strapped to his ribs. He's got an Afghan long-knife lashed along one thigh and throwing-daggers inside both boots. He carries two more weapons in plain view, a ceremonial sword on a baldric and a nine-foot half-pike. These are for show. To give Baz (the name Macks employ for all Afghans) something to fix his eyes on. Boxer and Little Red have reined outside. In a few moments we'll make our way across the plain to the camp of the Aletai Pactyans. There, I will meet the brother of my bride and pay him off, an indemnity of honor, so he won't murder me and his sister. The price is four years' wages and my best horse. Such is Afghanistan. Only out here do you have to bribe a brother not to slaughter his own sister. Her crime: being with me. Of course I suspect treachery. That's what the weapons are for. In a way I'm hoping for it. Otherwise, our own Mack code of philoxenia ("love for the stranger") forbids me to take the life of one of the family I marry into. I'm an idiot for still buying it, but there it is. Atop the citadel, the crier calls. Two hours past noon. The Persian day starts at sundown. That's when the wedding will take place. Lesser ceremonies have been going on all day. Late afternoon will be the military tattoo. The whole Mack army and all the Afghan clans and tribes will pass in review before Alexander, Roxane and the dignitaries. The big wedding, the royal one, will take place in Chorienes' palace atop the fortress of Bal Teghrib, "Stone Mountain." The mass ceremony, the one where Shinar and I will get tied, takes place outdoors in the new stadium at the foot of the hill. When the weddings are over, the celebrations begin. "All right," says Flag. "Let's go over this one more time." Flag is by far our senior. His rank is Flag Sergeant. He has a personal name but I've never heard anyone use it. We just call him by his rank. He rehearses us in blocking moves. What's critical is that Shinar's brother and his two cousins not escape. They can't be allowed to break away or survive with wounds. Our blows must be fatal. These three are Shinar's last male kin. No others stand under the obligation of nangwali, the Afghan code of honor, to see that "justice" is done. Brother and cousins slain, we can buy our way out of the crime. Money will patch it up. But these three must go down. I am grateful to my comrades. This is serious peril that they undergo for my sake. I'd do the same for them, and they know it. They'll be embarrassed if I express gratitude overtly. When it's over, if we're all alive, I'll get each of them a woman or a horse. "All I can say," says Little Red as we finish our preparations, "is this is a hell of a way to warm up for a wedding." As my mates and I cinch up, my bride appears in the portal. She will bathe now and, assisted by her bridesmaids, perform the karahal, the Pactyan purification rite. No male may witness this. She meets my eye. "When will you go, Matthias?" "Now." A groom brings my horse. My mates have already mounted. The Afghan farewell is tel badir, "With God's care." Shinar signs this to me. I sign back. Flag's heels tap his pony. "Now or never." We're off. To perform, if we must, one final murder; then get the hell out of this country. |
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