Sometimes, you have to listen to the mountains.” This was quoted to us journalists in Kabul by Brigadier-General Walter Givehan of the US Forces in Afghanistan, with pride. He uses it as part of his mission statement: a reminder, he said, always to be alert to one’s environment and ready to hear the lessons it may teach.

So, as you shake your head in sorrow at the British soldiers killed there, read a story from the mountains: the jagged brown ridges of Oruzgan, a province adjoining Helmand where I’ve been spending time in a Dutch-Australian military base, Camp Holland. My Australian colleague Brendan Nicholson, of the Melbourne Age, and I heard about the story, and did some digging.

Bear with my tale. Its very intricacy is important. This is the story of three men: Jan Mohamed Khan, Rozi Khan and Mohamed Daoud. The two Khans are not related.

Zoom in then from the big map of Afghanistan to the smaller, Netherlands-sized province of Oruzgan. Zoom in further, through wastes of mountains to Chora, a small, green settlement between the parched flanks of a narrow valley at whose base sits Camp Holland.

Jan Mohamed Khan — let’s call him JMK — was the local governor of Chora about 30 years ago. He headed a tribal sub-group called the Popolzi. He was a corrupt, brutal leader. The Taleban removed him. So he made a pact with seven fellow Mujahidin commanders to fight the Taleban together.

But JMK reneged. He didn’t fight; instead he collaborated. Later he fled to Pakistan, where he was arrested and jailed. JMK’s former seven Mujahidin allies did fight the Taleban: with Hamid Karzai they helped to liberate Oruzgan.

JMK had backed the losing side. Tainted by his former co-operation with the Taleban, he devised a comeback strategy. First he set out to destroy his seven old allies. Enlisting the support of US Special Forces, he told them he had information that these seven were Taleban. The Americans believed him. He had six of these seven (with their followers) disarmed, their wealth confiscated and their reputations destroyed. They fled and sought sanctuary — finding it, paradoxically, with the Taleban.

The one Mujahid who kept his power and resources, and stayed in Chora, was Rozi Khan.

JMK, meanwhile, attached himself to President Karzai. He wanted presidential patronage. Mr Karzai wanted his allegiance and money, because JMK’s Popolzi people are rich, numerous and influential, and Mr Karzai needed to tie up their support.

So, now, some of those who by outsiders are loosely described as Taleban in Oruzgan are the survivors of the Mujahidin group who had actually been fighting the Taleban until they were betrayed and ruined by JMK. Because he became an ally of Hamid Karzai, they are now estranged from the Government in Kabul. But their links with hardcore Taleban are disputable.

JMK prospered. The biggest poppy-grower in the province, he was in 2001 reappointed Governor of Oruzgan — by President Karzai. In 2005 the Dutch, disgusted by what they had heard of his corruption, told Mr Karzai they would not accept responsibility for security in Oruzgan unless JMK were removed.

Mr Karzai removed him, but, anxious to keep him onside, appointed him his chief tribal adviser on the following day.

Rozi Khan — and his son, Mohamed Daoud — belonged to a different sub-tribe: the Barazki. In 2007 a force of about 150 Dutch troops was surrounded by Taleban in the Chora valley, and in imminent danger of massacre. Rozi Khan, a firm ally of the coalition forces (plus another local leader, Malem Sadiq) rode to the rescue with a great crowd of local tribesmen, and they and the Dutch together defeated the Taleban onslaught. Rozi became something of a folk hero as a result — not least in the Netherlands.

One night, about a year later, Rozi Khan received a phone call: a plea from a friend not far away whose house was surrounded and who feared the Taleban had come to kill him. Rozi and some of his bodyguards ran to the rescue through the darkness.

But there were other armed groups out that night, including an Australian SAS patrol, who, with the advantage of night-vision equipment, saw armed men running towards them. Misunderstanding who they were, they shot them. Their loyal ally, Rozi Khan, was killed.

The horrified Australians were quick to apologise at every level; their Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, telephoned Mr Karzai; and an army general flew in to calm the situation. Rozi Khan’s (then) 23-year-old son took his father’s mantle as local chief, but is at present only provisionally governor, as he must first learn to read and write.

I met Mohamed Daoud last week in Oruzgan. He has the air of the young prince: a calm and nobility, but a vulnerability too. He assured us of his protection if ever we visited Chora. He told us he has forgiven the Australians their tragic mistake. Now he works with them, and the Dutch, to whom he remains an ally as his father was.

But he told us that if the Dutch leave, then he and his local area might have to seek protection from the Taleban. He fears and distrusts Hamid Karzai, his Government, and the President’s dastardly crony JMK, whom he suspects Mr Karzai may try to reinstall.

So many stories intertwined. So many layers. So many shifting allegiances. So much memory. Such a sinuous entanglement of loyalty and treachery. I’ve almost certainly got details of this story wrong. But the Dutch have worked to understand, and build a relationship with, young Daoud. After a struggle they have managed to extend their sway to Chora — an “inkspot” of security on their map — but not the places in between.

Now zoom out again. Chora is one small area in a huge valley system. The valley system is only part of the Oruzgan province. The enormous province is one minor part of Afghanistan. My excellent 750-page Afghanistan: A Companion and Guide does not even mention it. And there’s a force approaching 2,000 Western personnel stewing in Camp Holland, tangled up in just a handful of stories like this. Departing, as my plane rose into a hot sky, and Camp Holland, and Chora, dwindled into pinpricks on an immense landscape pinpricked by countless other settlements, I too zoomed out to the bigger picture.

And, friends, we can’t do it. This isn’t do-able. Sometimes you have to listen to the mountains.

Times Recommends

• A dose of defeat is just the medicine
• Protecting ourselves from Eurocreep
• After the summer of LUV, it'll still hurt