The Kabul List

‘Whoever saves one life saves the world entire’

Pic - Reuters

If anyone of you has seen the movie ‘Schindler’s List’, you will remember this quote. The movie is about World War II. The Nazis in Krakow, force local Jews into a ghetto. Oskar Schindler, a member of Nazi party arrives in the city to acquire a factory. He hires Jews from this ghetto and convinces the Nazis using bribes that Jewish workforce is essential and instead of sending them to concentration camps, allow them to work at his factory. However as soon as the concentration camps were ready, thousands of Jews were either killed or transported to concentration camps. This 1993 movie in B & W shows only one scene in colour, a girl in a red coat who hides from the Nazis and Oskar later finds her body in a wagonload of corpses. This was the turning point for Oskar Schindler.

Paying a huge bribe Oskar Schindler and his factory in charge Stern makes a list of 850 people to be transferred to Brünnlitz instead of the camp in Auschwitz on the pretext of building a huge ammunition factory there. Over the next 7-8 months till the war is over, Oskar Schindler spends all his money to ensure that Nazis forces are kept away and these lives are saved. He also ensures that Jews celebrate their faith and festivals! When the Nazi SS guards are ordered to kill the Jewish workforce at Schindler’s factory, he persuades them to ‘return to their families as men, instead of murderers’

This movie about the bravery of a man who within the corrupt system did his best to save lives inspired me a lot, so much that I even named my son Oskar after him.

Circa 2021, while the world is fighting a deadly pandemic, the geo political dynamics, and naked ambitions of people in power and corruption continues. On August 15th, when we in India celebrated our independence, Afghanistan was taken over by the Taliban again after 20 years.

While a lot is still happening there, what got my attention is the picture of an Afghan child sleeping on the cargo floor a US air force C -17, kept warm by the camouflage coat uniform during an evacuation flight. Unlike the red coat girl in the movie this child was saved. In another video, a woman was seen clambering on to the wall and handing over a small girl to British and US troops in an attempt to get her on a flight out of Afghanistan, who now is united with her family inside the airport. The 17-year-old Afghan Soccer player Zaki Anwari falling to his death from a US evacuation plane defined desperation cruelly.

Almost the entire media focussed on Chinook helicopters lifting personnel from US embassy in Kabul, reminiscent of Vietnam, while a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III safely evacuated some 640 Afghans from Kabul. The aircraft designed to seat 130-150 soldiers with their equipment, lifted near 5 times its weight in one heroic effort of evacuation. The flight was one of several that were able to take off with hundreds of people on-board and some may have had a load larger than 640.

The shocking collapse of the Afghan military and government has set panic. Thousands of Afghans with their families who have worked alongside international forces have poured into the airport fearing revenge by the Taliban forces. Countries around the world have committed to resettle 88,000 under Special Immigrant Visa for their roles in assisting the international forces. Only 2,000 of them have been evacuated so far.

With 7,000 more international troops being added to safe guard the evacuations, let’s hope the airport remains safe from an imminent attack and the people are evacuated.

But the larger question is, what happens to the people in Afghanistan who don’t have this Special Privilege Visa and the ones concerned about the return of Taliban and their harsh restrictions on basic lifestyle. Ethnic minorities are being targeted; many fear atrocities like in the past. Nationals who had backed the US are being hunted down. Journalists reporting from ground are living in fear. Interpreters who were supporting allied forces are being hung on trees and their families killed. Women anchors on television channels are being replaced, with strict Sharia laws, many are asking the details about woman's rights.

I hope there are hundreds of Oskar Schindlers in Afghanistan, who will take risks to protect basic human rights and humanity. I hope they make their own small list of people that they will protect. And as a global community I hope we think beyond saving the ones stuck at airport and work on the larger goal of bringing back peace and prosperity back to the nation that has suffered a lot over the last few years. For one, FB has added safety features to help people control their accounts because with all the personal information available on its network, they could be at risk about their location and information.

The crew of the aircraft that took an on the move call to air lift 5 times the weight suggested for the aircraft and saved 640 people and then refuel the aircraft mid-air and many other aircrafts followed suit. The mother who clambered the wall to hand over the girl to international forces, the crew of U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III, and the 7000 troops who have entered Afghanistan again not for war, but for safe evacuations, all are setting examples for more heroic stories that we will hear from this country.

Let’s hope that people on this ‘Kabul List ’waiting to be evacuated are protected and rescued now so that eventually these ‘refugees’ will return to a country where human rights triumphed!