A Man of Proud Valour Martyred

"He's a hero; he saved many lives. All seven of those policemen are heroes but especially him."
"Just think if that suicide attacker got past the gate, what would have happened -- you cannot even imagine."
Basir Mujahed, Afghan Police spokesman

"My son sacrificed himself to save other people."
"He had two bachelor degrees, one in political science and another one at the police academy. He studied five years in Turkey. He came back from Turkey a year and a half ago. He was 25 years old and he was single. He has three brothers and one sister. He and I are the only police in our family. He was a very sporty guy."
"I lost my bodyguard in this incident as well. He was my bodyguard for the last 15 years, he was like my son. His name was Noor Agha, he left three children behind."
General Sayed Nizam Agha, Afghan Police commander

Afghan security officials inspect the explosion site after a suicide attack in front of a wedding hall in Kabul, Afghanistan on November 16, 2017 (Picture: Getty)

Afghanistan has been mired in conflict for the last several hundred years. In the 19th Century Russia and Britain contested one another to achieve conquest, trade and access to India through Afghanistan. More recently Russia occupied Afghanistan in an effort to ensure that its own choice of leader sympathetic to Russian interests was ensconced. That was followed by a U.S.-led invasion of the country when the-then ruling Taliban, majority Pashtun fundamentalist Islamist tribesmen, led the country under Sharia law and played host to al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden in the wake of 9/11.

The UN-NATO-US coalition has long since left Afghanistan. NATO member countries left behind military trainers to aid in ensuring that the Afghan police and military would be coached in the best strategic military and police practices. That both the police and military, like the government and society at large are inherently corrupt and that warlords continue to influence the government is well known. Also well known is that police and military conscripts are notoriously unreliable, going AWOL without a second thought.

And though the foreign troops stationed in the country for years fought against the Taliban, they would re-surge every spring, coming down from the mountains separating Afghanistan and Pakistan to mount fresh attacks. Infamously Pakistan gave the Taliban cover, training and armed them hoping to continue destabilizing Afghanistan ... and then their own Pakistani Taliban arose with the warlords plaguing the government of Pakistan just as they had Afghanistan; the killing of Benazir Bhutto signalling a temporary change.

General Sayed, proud of his son, and heartbroken by his death, along with that of his long-time bodyguard, was no doubt aware that his son, as a police commander, was involved in an anti-corruption campaign. Perhaps he wasn't aware  until the moment he lost his son that Police Lt.Sayed Basam Pacha was also courageous beyond belief. Through religious fervor, a Taliban attacker with a suicide vest was prepared to sacrifice his life to achieve mass murder. Through patriotism and valour, Police Lt.Sayed was prepared to sacrifice his life to save others.

On Thursday in Kabul Afghan Police Lt. Sayed and other officers from the police company he commanded were guarding dignitaries and civilians when a man approached the guarded gate and his demeanor immediately led the police to suspect he was a suicide bomber. Ordered by Sayed Pacha to stop, the man began running and so did the officer who stopped him by throwing his broad, muscled arms around the man in a deep bear hug. But nothing would stop the man from detonating his explosive vest.

In total fourteen people died, among them Police Lt. Sayed, six civilians and seven other police officers. Another 18 were wounded. Also among the dead was his father's trusted, reliable, and highly regarded bodyguard, dispatched by his father to assist his son at an event where high-profile political personnel were in attendance. In a country that remains mired deep in vicious, violent Islamist dysfunction. Where the Taliban, al-Qaeda and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant fester, threaten, and attack.

Policeman, Lieutenant Sayed Basam Pacha, 25, whose bear hug stopped a suicide bomber from killing more people outside a restaurant in Kabul