Cowper-Coles was the British Ambassador to Afghanistan from 2007-2009 and then the UK Foreign Secretary's Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Using his diary, Foreign Office cables, etc., he pulls together his memories of being in Afghanistan as the Western countries efforts to bring stability to that country seem to unravel. Cowper-Coles felt from the moment of his appointment that the method being promoted by the USA was flawed. He believed that no peace and stability could be achieved by military means alone. He tried to get other countries to look at inviting the Taliban to the political mix rather than just trying to exterminate them, an impossible target to achieve. As we know, the quagmire is still tying up resources with no real solution evident. ( )

This is a book about the limits of diplomacy. It's not so much the inside story of the west's campaign as the inside story of the inside of an embassy somewhere on the fringes of the west's (i.e. America's) campaign. And the inside story of an embassy tends to boil down to one thing: parties. There are parties, conferences, dinners, and social gatherings galore here, all underpinned with the constant refrain 'But why is nothing getting done?' At the outset, Coles admits the possibility that keeping the whole social whirl going may indeed be end in itself and one suspects that he might well be having his cake and eating it here - both indulging in the merry-go-round and complaining about its ineffectiveness in actually changing much. Being a good diplomat, Coles tends not to go too far in any direction opinion-wise, and so the whole narrative tends to drag with boredom. It is only in the final chapter that he redeems things somewhat, engaging in a relatively convincing polemic about the need for proper political control in Afghanistan. ( )

Sherard Cowper-Coles gives an interesting account of his three years dealing with Afghanistan, but never reaches the depth of Ahmed Rashid s formidable trilogy on Afghanistan and the region. ( )