The Lone Leopard. Sharifullah Dorani. Bedford, England: S&M Publishing House, 2022.

In his novel The Lone Leopard, Sharifullah Dorani provides a sweeping view of the struggle that Afghans endured under the burden of foreign influence, ethnic and religious seams, and the clash between traditional conservative cultural norms versus more modern liberal western ideals. The book does an excellent job of bringing the reader into the complicated societal mosaic that makes Afghanistan so unique. Dorani provides enough historical context through his narrative and characters, without excruciating detail, that even those unfamiliar with the region can follow the plot through its twists and turns. Ultimately, The Lone Leopard captivates and brings to life the determination and humanity of the Afghan people as they face obstacles in their struggle to survive and maintain their dignity.   

The book’s lengthy 400 pages are divided into two parts covering separate time periods. The story begins in Part 1 with its main protagonist, Ahmad Azizi, a 15-year-old seeing his normal life in 1992 Kabul rapidly destabilizing as competing rebel Mujahideen factions fight for control of Afghanistan. In Part 2, the saga fast-forwards to 2013, as Ahmad has just graduated from medical school and returned to Afghanistan to find a wife after a 20-year exile in England. 

Dorani describes Kabul, and Afghanistan more broadly, as a melting pot of different ethnicities and religious factions that exist in the region. The Soviet Invasion and 10-year period of control dumped a new secular set of values and institutions into the bubbling ethnic cauldron. It is after the Soviet withdrawal, and near the end of the Soviet-backed government of Mohammad Najibullah, that Part 1 describes the ethnic and religious friction affecting Ahmad’s friends and family, fueling the instability that tears his world apart. Dorani details several instances where Ahmad’s conservative Sunni Pashtun neighbors ostracize Shia and non-Pashtun Afghans. Ahmad is a proud Pashtun who embraces his Sunni roots, yet embraces the ethnic diversity of his friends, school, and neighborhood. When asked, Ahmad defines Pashtunwali, the code-of-conduct for the Pashtun populations of Afghanistan, as standing for “independence, bravery, loyalty, justice, revenge, self-respect, righteousness, pride, honour, chastity, hospitality, love, forgiveness, tolerance, faith and respect of elders.”[1] The hardline mujahadeen in Part I, and the Taliban from the latter time-period, are more focused on the first 10 attributes from the code, and less on the last five. Those vying for control of Kabul in the book’s first half hold their highest level of disdain and seek the severest “justice” and “revenge” against the Afghans that cooperated with the Soviets and the Najibullah regime. Throughout the book, Dorani effectively reveals this resentment against non-Muslim foreign powers in Afghanistan, most specifically the Soviet Union and the United States.

Makroryan may have been an ideal neighborhood for elites living there, it showcased unfair advantages, drawing envy and bitterness from those living elsewhere in Kabul, and fueling the growing insurgency against the soon-to-be-deposed government. 

Following the Soviet withdrawal, Dorani reveals the tension between the secularized Afghan government and Afghan society and highlights how Afghans that cooperated were granted favors. Makroryan, the nice area of town where government bureaucrats and their families lived, including Ahmad, symbolized the new decadence that many conservative Afghans believed soiled their country. Early in the book, Ahmad describes his neighborhood.

The Central Heating kept our apartments warm as a sauna. The Mirror Show on television broadcast Kabulis queuing up with their coupons and complaining that their Soviet-subsidized cooperatives had run out of this or that. Supplies were never exhausted in Makroryan.[2]

Dorani shows us that while Makroryan may have been an ideal neighborhood for elites living there, it showcased unfair advantages, drawing envy and bitterness from those living elsewhere in Kabul, and fueling the growing insurgency against the soon-to-be-deposed government. 

Ahmad’s return to Kabul in 2013 in Part 2 witnesses the attitude of Afghans towards American involvement, and the resentment from the population. Many in Kabul appreciate the American presence and protection and enjoy the more Western way-of-life, while others, particularly the more conservative Pashtuns, resent the United States for their promotion of un-Islamic values and rampant corruption and incompetence of the leaders backed by American diplomats and soldiers. One of the book’s positive examples of Afghanistan’s pro-American faction rests in one of its main characters, Dorani’s heroic Frishta, “the lone leopard.” Frishta becomes Ahmad’s love interest, and is fervently pro-women’s rights. She perseveres through persecution and imprisonment by the Taliban only to flourish after the Americans arrive, ultimately becoming a powerful Member of Parliament (MP) by the time Ahmad returns to Kabul. As a teen, Frishta tells Ahmad, “If I lock you up and deprive you of an education, you’d equally become ‘stupid, frail, and a sex object.’”[3] She adds, “Educate us, and we’d be neither stupid nor a sex object.”[4] Later MP Frishta tells her American mentors, “Afghanistan’s women today aren’t the women of ten years ago. Our rights are now enshrined in the Constitution. We enter education and the workplace. We freely express our views.”[5] Frishta’s character is a prime example and composite of those in Afghanistan who supported America’s presence and the changes that followed, but there were many who opposed it.

In contrast to Frishta, Dorani vividly portrays the bitterness and anger against United States involvement, not just through the eyes of the Taliban, but also ordinary Afghans as well. Near the end of the book, a Taliban leader angrily sums up the general feeling, stating that the Americans and the British have “Oppressed our brothers and sisters. Insulted our religion. Stained our honour. Snatched our independence. Undermined our dignity.”[6] Ahmad’s own mother praises the Taliban for “bringing back Pashtunwali,” and believed the Americans had “ulterior motives.”[7] Even Ahmad himself, having spent virtually all of his adult life in England, and who shared many Western beliefs on the place of women in society, believes that “Americans were culturally insensitive by inspecting private areas on people” and agreed with his mother that war against Western occupation was “as much about ‘protecting Pashtunwali’ as it was about Islam.”[8] 

Sharifullah Dorani provides an interesting, suspenseful, and impactful story that should especially appeal to those who want to learn more about Afghanistan’s complex culture and recent tumultuous history.

The Lone Leopard is Dorani’s second book and first novel, and it follows the release of his historical analysis, America in Afghanistan.[9] In this novel, Dorani does a decent job providing an interesting storyline that gradually rises in intensity and drama, holding the reader’s interest through the slightly too-long 400 pages. Yet this reviewer was mildly disappointed in two areas. First, both Ahmad and Frishta develop a deep love for each other during the chaotic collapse in 1992, sharing very intimate details of family backgrounds and tragedy with each other.  Yet, as Ahmad’s family flees Kabul, they part without either verbalizing their feelings for the other. This avoidant behavior continues after they reunite in Part 2, and lasts all the way through to the last chapter, where the reader suddenly finds the whole situation resolved without getting to share in its climax. 

Secondly, through its depiction of several major violent attacks occurring in short order, the book makes 2013 Kabul seem far less safe than it really was, reinforcing the stereotype of the Afghan capital as an extremely dangerous city during this timeframe. This false narrative, fueled by the “if it bleeds, it leads” nature of western news stories, belies the truth. The Kabul of 2013 was the 5th fastest growing city in the world, with the causes of its growth “the toppling of the Taliban…the hope of increased security and economic possibilities…people displaced by fighting in the countryside, refugees returning from Pakistan and Iran, and hordes of labourers simply looking for a better life.”[10]  This rapid rise in population did lead to “criminality and economic malaise.”[11] However, Dorani’s 2013 Kabul is a place civilians seemingly cannot walk down the street without risking their lives, which was not the case.[12] While he should be allowed artistic license to add to the excitement of the storyline, the unfortunate side effect is that readers not familiar with Afghanistan may be unintentionally misled as to the extent the Taliban insurgency negatively affected the Afghan capital.

With his novel, The Lone Leopard, Sharifullah Dorani provides an interesting, suspenseful, and impactful story that should especially appeal to those who want to learn more about Afghanistan’s complex culture and recent tumultuous history. Although the ending was abrupt, the work offers a unique understanding of the complex cultural web that defined Afghanistan in general and Kabul in particular. Those only familiar with Afghanistan’s tumultuous 20 year period following the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001 will be particularly enlightened by the look at Kabul and its residents as they were caught in the middle of the turbulent 10-year transition between Moscow’s control and the eventual takeover by the Taliban in 1996. Readers of this book will no doubt reflect on the fact that Afghanistan has cycled back to Taliban control. Further, one cannot help being saddened by the fact that there are real-world “Frishtas” suffering under this new regime. Hopefully, Afghanistan’s history will continue to repeat itself, and the Taliban will be thrown off at some point in the not-so-distant future, and “lone leopards” can once again roam freely in this proud graveyard of empires.

Matthew C. Brand, is currently the Course Director for three Airpower courses at Air University’s Global College of PME. He previously served as the Director, Air University’s Spaatz Academic Centers, and a faculty member of Air War College where he taught Strategy and International Security Studies. He is the author of Resourcing General McChrystal’s Counterinsurgency Campaign; The 2009 “Troop-to-Task” Planning Effort to Determine the Right Force Package Necessary to Defeat the Insurgency in Afghanistan and General McChrystal’s Strategic Assessment; Evaluating the Operating Environment in Afghanistan in the Summer of 2009, both published by Air University Press. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Air Force, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

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Header Image: View of Bibi Mahru, Kabul, Afghanistan, 2017 (Tyrell Mayfield).

Notes:

[1] Sharifullah Dorani, The Lone Leopard (Bedford, England, The UK: S&M Publishing House, 2022), 68.

[2] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 4.

[3] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 69.

[4] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 69.

[5] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 298.

[6] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 259.

[7] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 247.

[8] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 360.

[9] Sharifullah Dorani, America in Afghanistan: Foreign Policy and Decision Making from Bush to Obama to Trump. (London, England, The UK: I.B. Tauris, 2019).

[10] Sune Engel Rasmussen, “Kabul - The Fifth Fastest Growing City in the World - is Bursting at the Seams,” The Guardian, December 11, 2014, Guardian News & Media Limited, US Edition New York, NY, https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/dec/11/kabul-afghanistan-fifth-fastest-growning-city-world-rapid-urbanization.

[11] Rasmussen, “Kabul - The Fifth Fastest Growing City in the World - is Bursting at the Seams.”

[12] Dr. Antonio Giustozzi testimony and United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan report as part of testimony and evidence for the Immigration and Asylum Chamber, United Kingdom, 14, 15 March 2012, Background Evidence, Sections 15 and 51-55, Levels of Violence: Targeting of civilians; Levels of Violence: Targeted categories of civilians, bailii.org/uk/cases/UKUT/IAC/2012/163.html .