Simon Norfolk

Afghan Police being trained by US Marines, Camp Leatherneck.

2011

© Simon Norfolk

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In Tate Britain

Prints and Drawings Room

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Artist: Simon Norfolk born 1963
Part of: Burke + Norfolk: Photographs from the war in Afghanistan
Medium: Photograph, digital C-print on paper
Dimensions: Image: 366 × 488 mm
support: 381 × 507 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by Simon Norfolk 2016
Reference: P20568

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Simon Norfolk Afghan police trainees being taken to the firing ranges by US Marines, Camp Leatherneck, Helmand.

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Simon Norfolk The swimming pool that crowns Tepe Wazir Akhbar Khan, built by the Soviets in the 1970s and restored in recent times at great expense by USAID. It is uncertain if it will ever be used.

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Simon Norfolk There are 16,000 US Marines aboard Camp Leatherneck spread over 1,600 acres. Empty shipping containers are used as storage, wind breaks or blast walls. In May 2010 a mysterious fire, that may have been sabotage, destroyed 9 acres of containers. It burned so furiously that fire fighters even lost two of their fire engines.

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Simon Norfolk Pakistani ‘Jingle Trucks’ end their long journey up from Karachi at the gates of Kandahar Air Field where they wait to be scanned, x-rayed and searched. Only people, ammunition and emergency requirements come by aircraft. Warlord-owned security companies protecting convoys can charge $15,000 per truck, but a large part of the fee is paid to Taliban protection rackets.

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Simon Norfolk Wasteland at the back of shops used as stabling for draught horses. In the distance is the Bala Hissar citadel, now home to an Afghan army base and mooring for one of the American blimps that carry electronic surveillance gear and cameras.

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Simon Norfolk Young women in the indoor skatepark of the NGO ‘Skateistan’, set up by American volunteers to help young Afghans improve their skateboarding and indoor rock-climbing skills.

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Simon Norfolk The seemingly endless number of helicopter pads and hangars at Camp Bastion.

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Simon Norfolk A shaded rest area built by helicoptor re-fuelling crews at Camp Bastion.

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Simon Norfolk Security lights and communications antennae at Camp Leatherneck.

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Simon Norfolk The Afghan Women’s National Basketball squad.

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Simon Norfolk One of the huge logistics compounds at Camp Leatherneck. A modern, technological army needs hundreds of thousands of different kinds of objects in order to keep it working. A $100m warplane can be grounded for the want of a $1 part. Supplying these things is a huge drain on the army’s resources and its greatest vulnerability.

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Simon Norfolk ‘Radio TV Mountain’ in the centre of Kabul seen from where the Kabul River cuts through the mountains creating the Deh Mazang gorge. In the first Anglo-Afghan War it was the site of a crucial skirmish and hasty retreat by badly outnumbered British cavalry who had blundered into the midst of a massive Afghan army.

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Simon Norfolk Jawad, who like many Afghans uses just the one name, out playing with an old tyre in the Mikrorayan district of Kabul.

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Simon Norfolk The former home of Jangalak Industries, a metalworking factory that once had a workforce of 1,800 but was wrecked during the civil war in the 1990s. It is now used as a massive storage yard for scrap metal. This area is all discarded hospital beds and school desks.

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Simon Norfolk The future home of the Afghan Cash and Carry Superstore on the road between the foreign embassies and Kabul airport.

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