Fred was there at the beginning in Uruzgan Province and returned at the end working on the chaotic evacuation from Kabul International Airport.
His epitaph for the mission is "it was what it was", and we are left with an understanding of the experience of Australia's soldiers and diplomats in our longest war, and of the courage and tenacity of thousands of Afghans who braved the human logjams outside the Airport gates in a last ditch dash for freedom.