Everything You Wanted To Know About Porn, Weed, And Toilets In Afghanistan, Courtesy A Platoon Leader

That photo of an anonymous U.S. soldier standing in front of a whole shitload of weed was taken by a platoon leader in Afghanistan with the Gawker handle Lono. He emailed me recently to clarify a number of things about fighting overseas, namely the quality of local porn, the abundance of local weed, and why American soldiers and Afghan soldiers aren't allowed to use the same toilets. Take it away, sir.

I am recently returned from a year as an Infantry Platoon Leader in South Afghanistan, and feel qualified to address a few things:

PORN. Obviously I don't know if (Osama bin Laden) had porn, but a lot of the Taliban guys we captured and the Afghan Army guys we worked with had porn on their phones. Keep in mind, these are people who mostly live with no power, who shit in the ground (see following), and bathe once a month at most. Yet somehow they have cell phones with video capability, and have porn on these phones. A lot of this porn is filmed in Pakistan, and is INCREDIBLY low video quality. Most of the time it's a woman, still in pretty conservative dress, getting railroaded by a couple of bearded Pashtuns. A good amount of it, unfortunately, is child porn. Which is always horrible and difficult to see. Unfortunately, child sex is a huge part of the culture there, and really, deserves a longer and more in depth explanation than I can muster in this email.

MARIJUANA FIELDS. I'm sure N/W Pakistan is just like South Afghanistan. The fields are crazy. A few times we set fields on fire with Artillery, and I am glad we did not get drug tested over there, because I have no doubt I would have failed. See the attached photo for an example.

PORT-A-JOHNS. I figured I would show you what we were dealing with over there. The below photo is taken from a Combat Outpost (like Restrepo) in the middle of nowhere. We got some portajohns, and a local national water truck to empty them out. We quickly had to have separate facilities for American Soldiers and Afghan National Army Soldiers, because Afghans like to squat over a toilet and take a shit like they were back in the US... which results in the attached photo.

But why is the toilet paper pink? Was it breast cancer awareness month? Anyway, now you know a bit more: child porn, burning giant supplies of perfectly good weed, and segregated toilets. If you have a friend coming back from that part of the world, by all means treat them to many drinks and a box of Triple Double Oreos.