Four years ago, we made a film called Inside Afghanistan with veteran war reporter Ben Anderson. Since then, we’ve enjoyed a harmonious, fruitful relationship that mostly involves Ben hanging out in war zones and sending us amazing stories from the front line. The latest feature Ben put together is the film This Is What Winning Looks Like (below), which documents his time embedded in the Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police as they prepare to take over policing of the country when allied forces withdraw in 2014.
What Ben found was a police force riddled with corruption—openly admitting to kidnapping and sexually molesting young boys, selling their weapons, pulling down the sides of their bases to sell for scrap metal, and smoking hash and heroin while on patrol—and an army still misunderstanding the rules of engagement after all these years of combat. None of those exactly being ideal when you’re in charge of making sure an entire country stays on track.
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At 11 AM today, Ben’s going to be doing a Reddit AMA, where you can ask him about anything from his new film—which is currently sitting at the top of Reddit’s documentary section, BTW—and the five years he spent embedded with British and American troops in Afghanistan, his hanging out with deportees and pimps in Cambodia, covering gang wars in El Salvador, and spending time with third generation Agent Orange victims in Vietnam. And a bunch of other insane/interesting/dangerous stuff he’s done throughout his career.
