The Foreign Service Journal, September 2004

Want ’em.” The Marines were pre- scient. On Sept. 11, 2001, the chargé d’af- faires was out of the country for the day on official business, leaving Eileen as acting chargé. We both had a busy but routine day and were happy when the workday drew to a close. It was after 6 o’clock in the evening, Ashgabat time, when we returned to our home on the American compound. I came in ahead of Eileen and turned on CNN as usual, just in time to see the first tower of the World Trade Center burning from a crash by a passenger plane. I could hear her in the doorway outside saying to a col- league, “Thank God nothing happened today.” Within minutes of my calling Eileen to the television, a second plane flashed across the screen like a black crow and disappeared behind the second tower. Plumes of flaming jet fuel erupted out the other side of the building. By evening’s end, most of the families on compound had gathered in our living room watching CNN. It seemed unreal to witness the disintegration of the Twin Towers, especially from the other side of the globe. Turkmenistan state TV took the unprecedented step of breaking from its highly predictable pattern of news sto- ries devoted to the country’s president, Saparamurat Niyazov (self-declared as Turkmenbashi, “leader of all Turkmen”), showing the attacks as the lead story and devoting about 10 minutes of coverage to it. Although its coverage soon reverted to the president’s achievements, the cotton harvest, and preparations for the country’s 10th anniversary, private citizens left hundreds of bouquets of flowers as offerings of condolence along the front fence of the embassy. They created a colorful stripe down the sidewalk. On the Front Lines Once our chargé returned the next day, we began the difficult task of preparing for the uncertain days ahead. In light of the Taliban’s threat to attack any country that provided assistance to the U.S., we took seri- ously the rumors that Taliban follow- ers were already on the streets of Ashgabat. As a front-line state in what the U.S. media called the “first war of the 21st century,” we attracted a great deal of newfound atten- tion. Network news anchors displayed giant “war room” maps of Afghanistan and its neighbors, including Turkmenistan (though FOX News labeled it “Uzbekistan” for the first two days of its coverage). Friends and rela- tives sent us e-mails saying they had never realized exact- ly where we were. In the weeks following 9/11, the Department of State issued a travel warning advising Americans not to travel to Turkmenistan and evacuated all Peace Corps Volunteers back to the States. The embassy began a process of autho- rized departure of employees that included my wife and 3-year-old daughter. On Oct. 5, our new ambassador, Laura Kennedy, arrived. A few days later, U.S. Air Force and Navy planes began bombing targets over the horizon in Afghanistan. Despite the war next door, most activity in Ashgabat continued to focus on Turkmenistan's 10th-anniversary celebration in October 2001. In preparation for the Independence Day parade, rectangular blocks of soldiers with AK-47s practiced their formations around the presi- dential square and the Olympic-sized stadium across the street from USAID’s office. Construction on a 10th- anniversary monument — a fountain with 10 larger-than- life Ahal-Tekke horses — continued around the clock. Meanwhile, international media and relief workers were desperately trying to enter the country so they could use it as an alternate route into the Afghan war zone. But foreign journalists, including the BBC, were routinely denied entry visas, reflecting Turkmenistan’s historic sus- picion of foreigners. As a practical matter, there was lit- tle the embassy could do to change the minds of Ministry T-shirts sold by Embassy Ashgabat’s Marines showed a map of the region with the slogan: “Surrounded by Danger — We Got ’em Right Where We Want ’em.” F O C U S S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 4 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 59 A Civil Service employee, John Kropf has been an attorney in the State Department’s Office of the Legal Adviser since 1992. From 2000 to 2002 he was part of a tandem couple with his wife, a Foreign Service offi- cer, in Ashgabat. He has published articles on Turkmenistan in the Baltimore Sun , The Washington Times and Marco Polo Magazine , and is currently writing a book on the country. The views contained in this story are his and not necessarily those of the State Department or the U.S. government.