Between 2021 and 2023, Adnan worked in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, gaining unprecedented access during the most critical period of modern Afghan history. He documented Taliban governance structures and shifts in the population while producing Emmy-winning documentary work for HBO and BBC on the chaotic fall of Kabul in August 2021. His reporting for the Financial Times provided analysis of the Taliban's rapid military success, the collapse of Afghan government forces, and the humanitarian crisis of the US withdrawal—grounded in direct observation of how the Taliban operated in the territories they controlled. This sustained field presence provided rare insight into Taliban decision-making and the realities of governance under an Islamist insurgency-turned-government that few Western analysts could access. The experience revealed the profound gap between Western assumptions about Afghanistan and the lived reality on the ground, informing his subsequent work on intervention failures, counterinsurgency strategy, and the complexities of state-building in conflict zones. He worked across the country including Herat, Mazar-e-Sharif, Kabul, Kandahar, Gayan, Jalalabad, close to the borders with Iran and Pakistan. He saw the aftermath of suicide bombings, was close to the strike which killed Ayman al-Zawahiri and experienced tremors and flash floods in Gayan after the devastating earthquakes. His service as a soldier in the Iraq War—both during the 2003 invasion and the 2006-7 Basra insurgency—brought a unique perspective to understanding Afghanistan's collapse: the view from both sides of intervention, as participant and observer, executor and analyst. This dual lens illuminated the recurring patterns of the limits of regime change imposed by external powers, and why counterinsurgency doctrine repeatedly fails to account for local political dynamics, social structures, and the resilience of indigenous resistance movements. This Afghanistan experience combined with systematic academic training in politics and history at Oxford informs ongoing analytical work on intervention failures, Taliban governance, and regional security dynamics.

Selected media

2024, ItalyPost, Link Festival, Guest speaker on war journalism in Afghanistan and Migration, Treiste

2022, HBO/BBC, Escape from Kabul, Emmy award-winning (Outstanding Investigative Documentary) and BAFTA nominated, Additional Cinematography and Field Support

2022, Financial Times, We may not agree with the Taliban but we should help Afghanistan, dispatch from the earthquakes in Gayan

2022, Channel 4, Marine A, War and Justice, on a Royal Marine shooting an unarmed Taliban fighter, nominated for Best Documentaries at BAFTA Scotland Awards 2023, Afghanistan Producer

2021,  Vice, Apple TV, Amazon Prime, Point Blank: Afghanistan, on Afghanistan’s gun culture, Presenter

2021, Financial Times, Among the Taliban: a soldier-turned-writer’s journey through Afghanistan