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An alliance airstrip is under construction near the town of Gulbahar, not far from the front, and should be open this month. Until it can operate, military hardware and ammunition from Iran and Russia must follow one of two treacherous supply routes. The first is a limited airlift: a handful of Mi-17 transport helicopters that load up at supply dumps in Tajikistan and northern Afghanistan, then fly across the towering Hindu Kush range to the Panjshir Valley and Shomali Plain. But last week bad weather and low visibility grounded those choppers. The other supply line is a rock-strewn mountain track that winds for more than 150 miles from Afghanistan's northern border through the heart of the Hindu Kush, crossing the 13,000-ft. Anjuman Pass into the Panjshir Valley. It's a grueling three-or four-day journey--for those vehicles that make it. "This road wasn't built for human beings," says Mohammed Zikria, 25, a Panjshiri driver who nearly died last week when his jeep stalled and almost slid backward over a precipice into a foaming mountain river. "It's a road from hell."
--By Anthony Davis/Jabal-us-Seraj