I got myself to Afghanistan in 2010 with frequent flier miles, a few hundred dollars cash from my day job, and permission, the only one ever granted, to embed with the contingent of Drug and Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents in the war zone. The DEA had quietly surged from six to about 100 personnel on a mission from the White House to reduce the flow of Afghan heroin dollars to the Taliban.
The American people deserved to know all this, but no publisher was eager for a narrative with so little forward motion. I yearned to write a story with a beginning, middle, and kickass endgame. In Afghanistan, one or two investigations were coming along slowly. Meantime, I decided to look elsewhere for a chocolate-covered cherry.
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