“It’s [“Into Thin Air”] there in print forever. It’s part of history. People should be above taking someone else down. And for what? For money and egos people are willing to destroy other people to further their careers.”

— David Breashears, (“Improper Bostonian”, Sept 24, 1997)
. . .

On April 17, 2011 CBS’s “60 Minutes” aired their expose of Greg Mortenson (best-selling author of “Three Cups of Tea”). Jon Krakauer (best-selling author of “Into Thin Air”) said that Mortenson tells a “beautiful story, and it’s a lie” and “uses Central Asia Institute (CAI) as his private ATM machine.”

This expose resulted in a dramatic drop in Mortenson’s book sales and donations to CAI. So, it’s rather ironic that after his break with Mortenson in 2004, Krakauer had written: “I still believe in CAI’s mission … I don’t want to make any public statements that would have a negative impact on Greg’s work….”

So then, seven years later, what prompted Jon Krakauer to speak out on “60 Minutes” and write his e-book “Three Cups of Deceit”? Well, Krakauer was not just a “jilted crank” or “crusading do-gooder” outraged by literary deceit and lax accounting practices. It appears that Krakauer’s e-book was also a publicity stunt whose publication was timed with the “60 Minutes” broadcast (that was largely based on research spoon-fed to them by Krakauer) to create the “buzz” to raise the investment capital needed to launch his old friend Mark Bryant’s start-up of Byliner.com.

Once Mortenson comes out of seclusion, he certainly needs to answer questions about his literary and financial practices. However, I believe Krakauer also needs to answer questions about how he “got onto the Mortenson story” (but, like Mortenson, Krakauer isn’t talking to the press).

And, while it certainly appears that Greg Mortenson confabulated parts of his ”inspirational story,” Jon Krakauer has also had “credibility problems” with his own books. Krakauer displayed hypocrisy by “throwing stones” when his own hands are not clean of deceit.

Overall, I believe Daniel Glick (at danielglick.net) has offered the most balanced commentary on this affair: “[‘60 Minutes’ and Jon Krakauer’s assault was overkill] lacking in basic elements of fairness, balance, perspective, insight and context. … Mortenson is neither a saint nor a charlatan; Krakauer is not either a jilted crank or a crusading do-gooder. There are nuances, debatable “facts” and conflicting motivations in almost every situation, messy and at times seemingly irreconcilable. This is no exception.”
. . .
Note: An un-abridged version of this post (with hyperlinks, more detailed quotes, and complete references can be found in the chapter, “With Three Cups of Luck?,” in the post, “Jon Krakauer’s Credibility Problem” at http://www.feralfirefighter.blogspot.com

P.S. How come Alex Heard didn’t address Jon Krakauer’s Byliner publicity stunt in his 2-20-12 “Outside Magazine” article “The Trials of Greg Mortenson”?

“It’s [“Into Thin Air”] there in print forever. It’s part of history. People should be above taking someone else down. And for what? For money and egos people are willing to destroy other people to further their careers.”
— David Breashears, (“Improper Bostonian”, Sept 24, 1997)

. . .
On April 17, 2011 CBS’s “60 Minutes” aired their expose of Greg Mortenson (best-selling author of “Three Cups of Tea”). Jon Krakauer (best-selling author of “Into Thin Air”) said that Mortenson tells a “beautiful story, and it’s a lie” and “uses Central Asia Institute (CAI) as his private ATM machine.”

This expose resulted in a dramatic drop in Mortenson’s book sales and donations to CAI. So, it’s rather ironic that after his break with Mortenson in 2004, Krakauer had written: “I still believe in CAI’s mission … I don’t want to make any public statements that would have a negative impact on Greg’s work….”

So then, seven years later, what prompted Jon Krakauer to speak out on “60 Minutes” and write his e-book “Three Cups of Deceit”? Well, Krakauer was not just a “jilted crank” or “crusading do-gooder” outraged by literary deceit and lax accounting practices. It appears that Krakauer’s e-book was also a publicity stunt whose publication was timed with the “60 Minutes” broadcast (that was largely based on research spoon-fed to them by Krakauer) to create the “buzz” to raise the investment capital needed to launch his old friend Mark Bryant’s start-up of Byliner.com.

Once Mortenson comes out of seclusion, he certainly needs to answer questions about his literary and financial practices. However, I believe Krakauer also needs to answer questions about how he “got onto the Mortenson story” (but, like Mortenson, Krakauer isn’t talking to the press).

And, while it certainly appears that Greg Mortenson confabulated parts of his ”inspirational story,” Jon Krakauer has also had “credibility problems” with his own books. Krakauer displayed hypocrisy by “throwing stones” when his own hands are not clean of deceit.

Overall, I believe Daniel Glick (at danielglick.net) has offered the most balanced commentary on this affair: “[‘60 Minutes’ and Jon Krakauer’s assault was overkill] lacking in basic elements of fairness, balance, perspective, insight and context. … Mortenson is neither a saint nor a charlatan; Krakauer is not either a jilted crank or a crusading do-gooder. There are nuances, debatable “facts” and conflicting motivations in almost every situation, messy and at times seemingly irreconcilable. This is no exception.”
. . .
Note: An un-abridged version of this post (with hyperlinks, more detailed quotes, and complete references can be found in the chapter, “With Three Cups of Luck?,” in the post, “Jon Krakauer’s Credibility Problem” at http://www.feralfirefighter.blogspot.com

(Last updated 9-24-11: How come Alex Heard didn’t address Jon Krakauer’s Byliner publicity stunt in his 2-20-12 “Outside Magazine” article “The Trials of Greg Mortenson”?)

“It’s [“Into Thin Air”] there in print forever. It’s part of history. People should be above taking someone else down. And for what? For money and egos people are willing to destroy other people to further their careers.”
— David Breashears, (“Improper Bostonian”, Sept 24, 1997)
. . .

On April 17, 2011 CBS’s “60 Minutes” aired their expose of Greg Mortenson (best-selling author of “Three Cups of Tea”). Jon Krakauer (best-selling author of “Into Thin Air”) said that Mortenson tells a “beautiful story, and it’s a lie” and “uses Central Asia Institute (CAI) as his private ATM machine.”

This expose resulted in a dramatic drop in Mortenson’s book sales and donations to CAI. So, it’s rather ironic that after his break with Mortenson in 2004, Krakauer had written: “I still believe in CAI’s mission … I don’t want to make any public statements that would have a negative impact on Greg’s work….”

So then, seven years later, what prompted Jon Krakauer to speak out on “60 Minutes” and write his e-book “Three Cups of Deceit”? Well, Krakauer was not just a “jilted crank” or “crusading do-gooder” outraged by literary deceit and lax accounting practices. It appears that Krakauer’s e-book was largely a publicity stunt whose publication was timed with the “60 Minutes” broadcast (that was largely based on research spoon-fed to them by Krakauer) to create the “buzz” to raise the investment capital needed to launch his old friend Mark Bryant’s start-up of Byliner.com.

Once Mortenson comes out of seclusion, he certainly needs to answer questions about his literary and financial practices. However, I believe Krakauer also needs to answer questions about how he “got onto the Mortenson story” (but, like Mortenson, Krakauer isn’t talking to the press).

And, while it certainly appears that Greg Mortenson confabulated parts of his ”inspirational story,” Jon Krakauer has also had “credibility problems” with his own books. Krakauer displayed hypocrisy by “throwing stones” when his own hands are not clean of deceit.

Overall, I believe Daniel Glick (at danielglick.net) has offered the most balanced commentary on this affair: “[‘60 Minutes’ and Jon Krakauer’s assault was overkill] lacking in basic elements of fairness, balance, perspective, insight and context. … Mortenson is neither a saint nor a charlatan; Krakauer is not either a jilted crank or a crusading do-gooder. There are nuances, debatable “facts” and conflicting motivations in almost every situation, messy and at times seemingly irreconcilable. This is no exception.”

. . .
Note: An un-abridged version of this post (with hyperlinks, more detailed quotes, and complete references can be found in the chapter, “With Three Cups of Luck,” in the post, “Jon Krakauer’s Credibility Problem” at http://www.feralfirefighter.blogspot.com

(Last updated 9-26-11)

Three Cups Of Tea

Correction
Some days back I scanned through the book Three Cups of Tea. It shocked me when I found Greg Mortenson giving such a negative impression of the inhabitants of South Waziristan. He writes that they smelled as if hashish oil was seeping from their pores, and they ate lamb like barbarians with the sharp points of their knives. What elaborate lies Greg tells! I, Naimat Gul Mahsud, am the man who brought Greg Mortenson to Tehsil Ladha in South Waziristan [a tehsil is a Pakistani administrative division, larger than a municipality but generally smaller than an American county]. We were together for 15 days, mostly in the village of Kot Langer Khel. He had not been abducted, and was never threatened.

I have photos of Greg, as well as hand-written post cards he gave me. I think Greg must remember me well. I asked him what his name meant. He explained that he is easily astonished, which is why his father had chosen this name for him. He told me that Greg means “watchman.”

In its history of Ladha, the Pakistan army wrote that Greg Mortenson intended to visit Ladha but had to postpone his visit. This history is untrue. I drove Greg to Ladha and introduced him to many people there. I am not afraid to unmask Greg’s lies. The story he has narrated in the book Three Cups of Tea pretends to be complete and comprehensive, but it is fiction written for commercial purposes.

Three Cups Of Tea

Greg Mortenson knows how to get into the minds of readers by playing psychological tricks. He starts the chapter about his visit to Ladha, on page 154 of his book, by introducing the Wazir tribe with a quote from the 1911 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica:

The Waziris are the largest tribe on the frontier, but their state of civilization is very low. They are a race of robbers and murderers, and the Waziri name is execrated even by the neighboring Mahommedan tribes. They have been described as being free-born and murderous, hot headed and light-hearted, self-respecting but vain. Mohammedans from a settled district often regard them as utter barbarians.

We met in July 1996 at the Rawalpindi Sudder Bazaar, in the hotel Habib. It was just after dawn. There were light rain showers, and a cool breeze was blowing. I am in the habit of getting up early in the morning to enjoy the pleasant weather. On this morning I got up early as usual, and stepped out of my room in the hotel to enjoy the merciful day. I saw a person making videos, and he suddenly turned his face towards me and waved his hand. I went near to him, shook his hand, and asked, “Where do you come from?” He said his name was Greg Mortenson. He had been working for the Central Asia Institute in the Northern Areas of Pakistan to build schools. I responded with passion and told him that I was from Tehsil Ladha in the South Waziristan Tribal Agency. I further told him that we tribals are deprived of our basic needs; the Mahsud tribe in particular has been ignored by the government. His face filled with curiousness, and he said he was anxious to visit the Tribal Areas. He asked me if this was possible. I said yes, why not? You may go with me if you are seriously intended. He again shook my hand. He seemed enthusiastic. I briefed him that he would be bound not to tell to any Government official. If he did, he would be forbidden to go to the Tribal Areas because of security measures.

After two or three days we started our journey from Rawalpindi to Peshawar. We had to stay overnight in Peshawar to buy him Shalwar Qamiz and a topi [the traditional Chitrali prayer cap]. We arrived at dusk in Peshawar and rented a room in the hotel, situated in Sudder Peshawar.

Once again, in Three Cups of Tea, he tells the lie that

from his second story hotel room in the decrepit haveli, Mortenson watched the progress of a legless boy, dragging himself trough the chaos of the Khyber on a wooden skid. He looked no older then ten, and the scar tissue on his stumps led him to believe, he had been the victim of a land mine. The boy made grueling progress past customers at a cart where an old turbaned man stirred a cauldron of cardamom tea, his head level with the exhaust pipes of passing taxis. Above the boy’s field of vision, Mortenson saw a driver climb into a Datsun pickup truck loaded with artificial limbs and start the engine.

Nothing of this sort happened. We went to the market to go shopping for the aforementioned Pashtun clothing. But only for what could be needed during the visit to South Waziristan. From the places I took him in Peshawar, it would have been impossible for him to see what he described:

Exhausted refugees, fleeing the fighting, were flowing east in equal numbers, and straining the capacity of muddy camps on the margin of Peshawar.

We did not go to visit the outskirts and muddy camps on the margin of Peshawar. The reason for buying him Pashtun clothing was to hide his identity. Foreigners were strictly prohibited from visiting the outskirts of Peshawar. We spent our night together in the hotel.

To win the trust of his readers, Greg tells another lie:

From inside his room Mortenson heard a knock and answered the door. Badam Gul slipped past him with cigarette dangling from his lip, a bundle under his arm, and a pot of tea on a tray. Mortenson had met the man, a fellow hotel guest, the evening before, by a radio in the lobby, where they had both been listening to a BBC account of Taliban rebels rocketing Kabul. Gul told him he was from South Waziristan and had a lucrative career collecting rare butterflies all over central Asia and supplying them to European museums.

The truth, as I mentioned, is that Greg and I came together from Rawalpindi to Peshawar. No persons were allowed to meet him. I had warned him about the sensitivity of the volatile situation in the Northwest Frontier Province. Badam Gul actually exists and he is my actual brother, but Greg did not meet him in Peshawar. In the month of July Mahsud families migrate to the mountains of South Waziristan to relax and enjoy the cool weather instead of living in the hot settled areas. Badam Gul had also gone to South Waziristan that month, and I introduced him to Greg when we arrived in Ladha. Presently Badam Gul is still performing his duties as assistant entomologist in the city of Dera Ismail Khan. Badam Gul did not drive Greg to South Waziristan or anywhere else. I, Naimat Gul Mahsud was Greg’s driver. What Greg wrote is a clever lie, a dramatic fiction intended make his book a bestseller.

Once again, Greg dreams fictitious things to write in his book:

The gray Toyota Sedan was waiting when Mortenson came carefully down the stairs at dawn, afraid of splitting the seams on his clothes…. Gul, smiling reassuringly, told him he had been called suddenly to Afghanistan on business. The good news, however, was that the driver, a Mr. Khan, was a native of a small village near Ladha and had agreed to take him there.

As I mentioned that Badam Gul had already gone to Ladha. Nobody else accompanied Greg, except me. I had rented a Toyota car model 1986. The following morning we headed to South Waziristan via Dara Adam Khel,
Bannu, and Miranshah, on our way to Ladha subdivision. Greg writes in Three Cups of Tea that one hundred kilometers south of the city they pass into South Waziristan, the most untamed of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Provinces. The Wazir were a people apart, no tribe captured Greg’s imagination more. The Wazir were also underdogs. He soon saw the region for what it was: bands of tribal powers, shunted into states created arbitrarily by European nations that took little account of each tribes primal alliance to its own people. No tribe captured his imagination like the Wazir. Loyal to neither Pakistan nor Afghanistan, they were Pushthuns.

The Toyota passed through six Militia checkpoints before entering Waziristan proper. Greg felt sure he would be stopped and turned back. At each post, sentries pulled aside the sedan curtains and studied the large, sweating foreigner in the ridiculous ill-fitting outfit, and each time Khan reached into the pocket of the leather aviator jacket he wore despite the heat and counted out enough rupees to keep the car moving South.

Greg says that he had been abducted. If this was true, why then did he not attract the attention of sentries to tell them that he was kidnapped?

Before starting our journey I had taught Greg a few words of traditional greeting. That was, when you shake hands with someone on the way, he has to be asked, “May you not be tired,” and “How is your family?” The car was driven by me: No imaginary “Khan” was there, as he wrote. I did not pay any money at any checkpost. I was tribal and knew tribal customs and tradition, how to behave with sentries at checkposts. It is considered awkward to bribe someone when traveling in the tribal lands.

Greg writes, “They passed squat gun factories, where Wazir craftsmen made skillful copies of many of the world’s automatic weapons.” There are not any factories in North and South Waziristan where skillful copies of automatic weapons are made. Before arriving in Waziristan we stopped in the city of Dara Adam Khel and went into the arms shops there. Skillful copies of automatic weapons have been made at Dara Adam Khel since the British era. Greg should have known the geographical details about Waziristan before narrating such vile lies. Dara Adam Khel is situated at a distance of only 40 kilometers from Peshawar. The factories we visited are 120 kilometers far from Waziristan. Dara Adam Khel is a part of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province. It has never been a part of Waziristan. Any slightly learned man can understand the map of Peshawar, if he chooses to look. The only place in Waziristan where broken 303 rifles could be repaired was Kaniguram, situated at six kilometers distance from Ladha. Nowhere in Waziristan do weapons copying factories exist.

Mortenson wrote that

we stopped for launch in Bannu, Waziristan’s biggest settlement, where they wove through dense traffic of donkey carts and double-cab pickups. At a tea shop, Mortenson stretched as much as his shalwar would allow, and tried to strike up a conversation with a table of men, type of elders Haji Ali had advised him to seek out, while the driver went looking for a shop selling his brand of cigarettes. Mortenson’s Urdu produced blank stares, and he promised himself he would devote some of his time back in Bozeman to studying Pashto.

As I mentioned, Dara Adam Khel has never been a part of Waziristan. It is a part of the Khyber Pass, which is situated near Peshawar at 40 km distance. Dara Adam Khel is considered FR [Frontier Region] and is administrated by the assistant Political Agent of Khyber. Khyber and Waziristan are far away from each other. Both of the agencies Khyber and Waziristan have their own Political Agents. In both agencies Pashtuns are the inhabitants, but
Khyber and Waziristan Pashtuns have each inherited a distinct culture and Pashto accent. From Dara Adam Khel up to Bannu, the Wazir do not own one square foot of land. In Bannu, members of the Bannuchi caste inherited the land from their ancestors, while around the fringe of the main city of Bannu, the Wazir have bought land, and in addition the Wazir have fought against the Bannuchi and occupied their land by force. Some of the Wazir have inherited land in Domil on the east side of Bannu. These properties are still owned by Wazirs.

Bannu is not the biggest settlement of Waziristan, as Greg has written. Bannu is in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The people of Bannu live their lives under the shelter of Pakistani law, Police agencies, and courts. In contrast, Waziristan is a part of FATA [the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, which are administrative entities beyond the jurisdiction of many Pakistani laws, roughly analogous to American Indian reservations]. Greg is in error when he writes that Bannu is Waziristan’s biggest settlement.

Greg unmasked himself when he writes that I went looking for a shop selling my brand of cigarettes, while he tried to “strike up a conversation with a table of men, the type of elders Haji Ali had advised him to seek out, but his Urdu produced blank stares.” It is commonly understood and recognized that no criminal would leave a kidnapped person alone. Kidnappers never like to expose themselves to law enforcement agencies. Upon entering Waziristan one must visit a Police station and a frontier constabulary checkpoint.

We arrived in Bannu having pleasant moods. I never thought that one day Greg would portray me as the fictitious “Khan,” the driver. We stopped in Bannu at a tea hotel adjacent to the Police station, took tea, and headed to Waziristan. The only true thing Greg wrote in this passage is that we wove through dense traffic of donkey carts and double-cab pickup. Nothing has changed: donkey carts and double-cab pickups are still seen on the roads here.

Sometime I become astonished that the minds of those who live in a highly developed superpower nation such as America are not so advanced and learned as we in underdeveloped countries imagine them to be. I feel proud to be who I am, being a tribal, whom 99% are illiterate. A little more I can judge the phenomena of Greg’s writings. Greg is ignorant about the geographical situation and realities of the area. It is shocking, what Greg tries to tell to the world, specifically what he tells Americans who are unaware of the his geographical lies. Greg writes,

Across the dusty street, behind high walls was the Saudi-built Madrassa-I-Arabia, where two years later, John Walker Lindh, the “American Taliban,” would come to study a fundamentalist brand of Islam called “Wahhabism.” Lindh, fresh from the crisp climate of Marin County, would reportedly wilt under the anvil of Waziristan’s sun, and cross the passes into Afghanistan, to continue his education at a madrassa in the mountains with a more temperate climate, a madrassa financed by another Saudi, Osama Bin Ladin.

The way the road from Peshawar to Bannu is constructed, as soon as one enters Bannu city, the road turns from Bannu to Miranshah. There was no madrassa of the sort Greg describes on either side of road when we started driving from Bannu towards Waziristan.

At Baka Khel we were halted by the customs and Police checkpoint. Just beyond this place called Baka Khel is where the land of the Wazir begins. Baka Khel is in the Frontier Region like Bannu, and is administrated by the assistant political agent, who is accountable for his duties to the commissioner in Bannu. Beyond Baka Khel, the land of the Wazir is considered a Federally Administered Tribal Area [FATA]. At the Baka Khel checkpoint, a Police officer came and looked into the car. He inquired after the foreigner (Greg Mortenson). I simply replied to him that foreigner (Greg) was a friend of mine. He further asked me some questions and demanded my national identity card, noted down my whereabouts and other details mentioned in ID card. Then he allowed me to drive ahead.

There are four checkpoints on the way to the tehsil of Mir Ali: (1) Baka Khel, (2) Dhree Ghundari, (3) Isha, (4) Kajuri Kuch. We were dealt with in the same way at all checkpoints.

Kajuri Kuch is the entrance checkpoint to Mir Ali. This road straightaway leads to Tehsil Ladha, the Mahsud homeland, after passing through Wazir land. From the Kjuri Kuch checkpoint, a Madrassa has been built at about 4 kilometers away. When we arrived at this Madrassa, I pulled up the car on the left side of the road opposite the Madrassa’s main gate. I told Greg that I needed to wash my hands and face with cool water. As I got out of the car he opened the door and asked me if he could come with me. I told him, Why not? You are my guest; according to custom and tradition you can go everywhere freely; I am responsible to provide you safety and comfort.

We entered into the Madrassa, went to the place specifically built for the faithful to perform their ablutions. We sat down on concrete seats to wash our hands and faces. I suggested that if he was keen, he was welcome to walk about the Madrassa. He said that he would indeed like to roam about the Islami Madrassa. In those days Osama Bin Ladin was not so popular among the tribal men; he didn’t at that time finance Madrassas to train Talibs. People of Waziristan from both of the Mahsud and Wazir tribes were impressed by the Haqqani and Mullah Omar groups.

Greg did not talk to any of the Madrassa students or the Mullah. All that he wrote about the Madrassa in Bannu is plainly false. Greg might have later studied about Lindh and his visit to study Wahhabism and added it to his book to make it more commercial. During that era there was no concept to differentiate Wahhabism from other Islamic views and creeds.

We walked about the Madrassa, inspected it thoroughly, and then came out to drive to Ladha. There were some five more checkpoints to be passed. These checkpoints are manned by the Khasadar Force; the Khasadar Force is a paramilitary militia comprised of local tribesmen under the command of the FATA Political Agent. The men in the Khasadar Force who perform such duties are all from a lower caste. They are traditionally obligated to behave with deference toward the tribal men passing through the checkpoints. If ever they behave violently, they can be impeached by the tribal men, so they oftentimes take care not to trouble or enmity for themselves. Therefore we were treated politely at every checkpoint. They never asked for bribes or anything like that. Throughout the long drive I remained calm, fresh, relaxed. I had nothing on my mind, not any burden, because I had nothing to give me a guilty conscience. I was just going to my home with a foreigner guest.

All the checkpoints are linked and to each other with communication equipment. The Khasadars inform the Political Agent about all the events they experience during their duties. Because of this, criminals do not usually travel on any route where they must pass through checkpoints. Criminals and miscreants prefer to travel on the substitute routes, which are built in hilly areas where they will not be stopped, and can travel unchecked on their own accord. If ever the Khasadars at a checkpoint see someone who seems to be suspicious or doubtful, first they are obligated to immediately inform the Political Agent, and then suspicious person would be stopped at further checkpoints. If a suspicious traveler resists in any way, he would be arrested on the spot with the help of the Frontier Constabulary. The Frontier Constabulary Force is unrelenting. They would not hesitate to open fire and shoot dead the suspicious person. Anyone would understand that it would be insane for a kidnapper to attempt to pass through 10 or 12 checkpoints with the person he has kidnapped.

Greg writes in Three Cups of Tea:

All afternoon, they drove deeper into Waziristan, while Mortenson practiced a few polite Pashto greetings the driver taught him…. [Mortenson says,] “We were really getting to the heartland of the tribal areas and i was excited to have made it so far.” Just south of Ladha, as the sun dropped into Afghanistan, they arrived at Kot Langerkhel, Khan’s ancestral home. The village was just two general stores flanking a sandstone mosque and had the flyblown feel of end places the world over. A dusty goat relaxed across the center of the road, its legs splayed so flat it looked like roadkill. Khan called out a greeting to men in a warehouse behind the bigger of the two shops and then told the driver to pull the car inside, where it would be safe overnight.
The scene inside the warehouse set Mortenson immediately on edge. Six Wazir men with bandoliers criss-crossed on their chests slumped on packing crates smoking hashish from a multinecked hookah. Piled against the walls, Mortenson saw stacks bazookas, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, and crates of oily new AK-47s….
The scruffiest of the smugglers, who smelled as if hashish oil was seeping from his pores, offered Mortenson a mouthpiece of the hookah, which he declined as politely as possible.

This warehouse Mortenson tells about in Three Cups Of Tea is situated in Zai village, which is a 45-minute walk from Kot Langer Khel. We arrived at this warehouse on July 15, 1996. There was no road to Khot Langer Khel. So we pulled the car inside the warehouse where it would be safe overnight. This warehouse is owned by a person whose name is Rahim Jan. He is still alive and has been living at Dera Ismail Khan since the residents of Ladha got displaced from their houses by terrible violence in 2009.

We tribal people are bound by the strong traditions of Pashtunwali to offer our guests protection and hospitality; there is nothing more important to us except our religion. In tribal society it would be shameful to offer hashish to a guest, whether that guest was a foreigner like Greg or a local. Smoking hashish in public, in our culture, would be like appearing naked in public. I have never heard or seen such a disgraceful thing during my life. Hashish is considered by the people of Mahsud tribe to be an unlawful (haram) drug, as our religion Islam describes it, too. The warehouse is a traditional house, built of mud and stone; warehouses of this sort are seen all over South Waziristan along the roadsides, built close enough to houses on the hillsides above so people can walk to their homes carrying their luggage.

Rahim Jan is humble, gentle, typical tribal man. He is not ever seen smoking cigarettes, let alone hashish. Greg’s claim that he smoked hashish with a hookah in his warehouse is an unforgivable smear of Rahim Jan’s honor.

The region of South Waziristan that is the Mahsud homeland is surrounded by North Waziristan to the north and Tehsil Wana to the south (both inhabited by the Wazir tribe). To the east is the territory of the Bhittani tribe; to the west, beyond the Koh-e-Hindu Kush hills, lies Afghanistan. The Mahsud tribe do not own even one piece of land where hashish and opium could be cultivated to smuggle abroad. We have built small fields where barley and wheat are commonly cultivated. Anyone who has visited to the Mahsud territory, or simply looked at a map of the globe, should be able to understand that the routes used by smugglers and drug traffickers do not go through this part of Waziristan. The majority of the Mahsuds work in the UAE [United Arab Emirates], or work as domestic help in Karachi. So it shocked me when Greg wrote that I introduced him to the scruffiest of smugglers, and offered him a mouthpiece of the hookah. It is not a part of the Mahsuds’ tradition to smoke the hookah even seldom; Greg’s account of smoking a hookah with the Mahsud tribe is a dramatic fiction. We place tobacco (Naswar) inside our lips inside, but not to be chewed.

“Only a day’s drive from the modern world, I really felt we had arrived in the middle ages,” Mortenson says. “There was no moat to cross, but I felt that way when I walked inside.” The walls were massive, and the cavernous rooms were ineffectually lit by flickering lanterns. A gun tower rose fifty feet above the courtyard so snipers could pick off anyone approaching uninvited.

As I explained, Kot Langer Khel, where we stayed, is a forty-five-minute walk from the warehouse in Nai village where I parked my rented Toyota. We took his luggage on our shoulders and walked to Kot Langer Khel. Greg and I spent the days described in Three Cups of Tea in the house of the Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of the Police, who is a close cousin of mine. He seldom comes to Waziristan. His house was under my supervision when he was away, and I often used it to offer clean lodging to respectable guests. The rooms and latrines were built in the modern Western style. Greg was given warm hospitality, and was served breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Contrary to what Greg has written in Three Cups of Tea, no Mahsud would ever watch a person using the toilet. This would be forbidden by tradition and custom, even for prisoners held in jail. To do this to an honored guest like Greg would be unthinkable.

In 1972, the late Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto [president of Pakistan at the time] visited Ladha, South Waziristan, and after his visit a regular electric supply was brought to South and North Waziristan. Greg visited Tehsil Ladha in July 1996, many years after the “flickering lanterns” he described in Three Cups of Tea had been replaced by electric lights. One can imagine that a residence built for the DIG of the Police would be very nice. Attached are photos of Greg that I took in the bedroom of this house where we stayed during his visit to South Waziristan, where he can be seen writing.

“Mahnam do die,” Hajji Mirza announced, “Dinner.” The savory smell of lamb lured Khan out from under his coat. Urbanized as he appeared, the driver still drew a dagger at the site of roasted meat with the dozen other Wazir at the feast. Hajji Mirza’s servant placed a steaming tray of Kabuli Pilau, rice with carrots, cloves, and raisins, on the floor next to the lamb, but the men only had eyes for the animals. They attacked it with their long daggers, stripping tender meat from the bone and cramming it into their mouths with the blades of their knives. “I thought the Balti ate with gusto,” Mortenson said, “but this was the most primal, barbaric meal I have ever been a part of. After ten minutes of tearing and grunting, the lamb was nothing but bones, and the men were burping and wiping the grease off their beards.”

In our religion, and especially in our tribal society, using daggers or any other eating utensils is religiously forbidden. The Mullah says that for Muslims, using or eating with fork, knives, and spoons is a sin and impious. Cutlery is used by atheists and infidels. Muslims are taught since childhood that when eating a meal, the right hand should be used to handle food; the left hand is Evil’s hand. In the current modern era, it has become widely known that the tribal people of Pakistan are extremely religious. They have faith in one God. Since 1980 they have been resisting and performing Jihad against the invaders of Afghanistan, under the shelter of one God.

All this has been confirmed by Sir Olaf Caroe, the respected international scholar who thoroughly researched the Pashtun culture in his book, The Patans.

Mez is also respected research, written by Alvin Hall.

Nobody on this planet who is knowledgeable about the Pashtuns would write that members of the Mahsud tribe are ever seen eating with the sharp points of daggers—this is the sort of ridiculous fiction that one expects in a Hollywood movie, not a book that claims to be truthful. All of what Greg has written goes against our basic teaching of Islam. I invite intelligent persons from all over the world to provide evidence that the Mahsud tribe are barbarians as Greg has described us. It cannot be proven because it is not true, and has not been true throughout history. It would be a disgrace to the creed of Islam to eat food in this fashion. It is forbidden in Islam even to eat big morsels, to say nothing of eating with daggers. We do not even eat with five fingers; only four fingers are used when eating.

Three Cups of Tea is a work of complete invention, meant to be an inviting commercial success. We visited some prominent persons in South Waziristan who can refute Greg’s lies. We had had lunch at Chalwishti Buder with General Alam Jan’s brother Malik Anayatullah. The same day on our way back to Kot Langer Khel, we visited and had three cups of tea with Sangi Marjan, the commissioner of education, who was living there in those days. Greg admired that Sangi Marjan expressed himself fluently in English.

We came back to Kot Langer Khel. But during Greg’s visit the Political Agent was informed that a foreigner was seen stationed at Kot Langer Khel, and the political authorities demanded that I produce him to appear before the Political Agent. I replied to the concerned authorities that Greg would be immediately returning to Islamabad and would never be produced before the PA court. According to the customs and traditions of Pashtunwali, I was morally obligated to make sure Greg had a safe return to Islamabad. After some days we departed for Peshawar in my car. When I checked my bag some amount of Rp 10,000 was missing. I kept silent and gave Greg a hug, saw him off for Islamabad.

Years later, when I scanned through the book, Three Cups Of Tea, and read that Greg had been abducted and threatened with guns, I was shocked. Instead of telling the world about our frustration, deprivation, illiteracy, and tradition of hospitality, he invented a false story about being abducted by savages. I do not understand why he did this.

I, Naimat Gul Mahsud, am the man who brought Greg Mortenson to Tehsil Ladha, South Waziristan, an area inhabited by the Mahsud tribe. We never traveled into the areas of Waziristan inhabited by the Wazir tribe. He spent approximately 15 days with me in Kot Langer Khel, Tehsil Ladha. He was never abducted or held against his wishes. As my honored guest, he was treated with hospitality and kindness.

Greg Mortenson’s lies have brought dishonor to me and the Mahsud tribe. I would like to invite intellectuals and journalists from all over the world to investigate this matter and bring Greg Mortenson to justice.

If approved, Wyoming natural gas, liquified, would flow through the Ruby pipeline from the Upper Green River Valley to Oregon and cross the Pacific to a growing Asian jones.

Pushers in the natural gas industry would make about four times more in the foreign market than they can get in Wyoming. It’s not really clear what benefit this will have for U.S. consumers, who already pay dearly for natural gas development by breathing dirty air, suffering groundwater contamination and dwindling wildlife.

If we import tar sludge and export natural gas, killing both us and the planet, doesn’t that qualify us as certifiably crazy?

I am from GB-Gilgit Baltistan, the part of the world from where Dr.Grage starts his three cup of tea story. He is our hero then anyone else on the planet, way because he is the one how had highlighted the educational crisis of this part to the world, he is the man who teach the world that how you have to make a relation ship with the poor communities of the world, he tough us the humbleness and understanding need to understand the view point of other.
Dears mortenson was in WAR in area where its easy to say but difficult to do, and in a ware you can not keep records and all. Greg mortenson was not selling his book (three cup of tea) he was selling an IDIA, the marketing of the book actually marketing of an idea and for cause. please try to understand it. Although like everyone had an opinion I also agree that Grag had done some mistakes in their management level but it doesn’t mean that he did every thing wrong.
The criticism on Greag mortenson is a serious harm for education in the world.
Mubeen675@hotmail.com