Not that the Americans themselves are the problem. They are ensconced in their own “city” behind concrete walls, and almost no one has even seen them. The problem is the virtual reign of terror that the Uzbek security services have unleashed on the inhabitants of Khanabad and neighboring villages: whole villages sealed off by police, visits by outsiders forbidden, regular house-to-house searches and police at checkpoints taking taxi license-plate numbers, interrogating those drivers unlucky enough to have transported a foreign journalist and confiscating their cars.
Intense secrecy, repression and the complete information blackout by Uzbekistan’s state-controlled media have left locals anxious about Taliban or terrorist attacks on the nearby base. They even fear the possibility of a biological-weapons attack since American troops were recently seen carrying gas masks. And now there are rumors that villagers living near the base may be forcibly evicted in order to further enhance security for the Americans.
Still, the U.S. military isn’t doing much in terms of damage control. Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. Craig Quigley says there are no plans to station U.S. public-affairs officers in Khanabad to handle their neighbors’ questions on the nature or extent of the U.S. presence, or anything else. The U.S. military seems willing to go along with the host’s philosophy: if you grab people tightly enough by the neck, their hearts and minds will follow.
