Afghan Air Force

There is an article in the New York Times called Facing Language Gaps and ‘Flying Trucks,’ U.S. Trains Afghan Pilots by Elisabeth Bumiller. It is about how American soldiers are trying to establsh an Air Force in Afghanistan. This is estimated to take until 2016 and cost $5 billion. A set back is that the American pilots are having trouble teaching the Afghan pilots because some of them do not speak English.

Bumiller writes an excellent lede: "Col. James A. Brandon flew Black Hawks when Moscow was considered a mortal foe of the United States and spent years in the Army studying enemy aircraft. So he now finds it a little bizarre to be piloting an old MI-17 Russian helicopter, a legacy of the Soviet invaders here, in the Hindu Kush of Afghanistan." She not only tells who and what but she also hooks the reader into finding out why Brandon is flying an MI-17.