Situated at the junction that separates India and China to the East from Persia and the Mediterranean world to the West, Afghanistan has been a focal point for migration and invasion, seat of expanding empires, a trading center and pilgrimage route for more than four thousand years.

The monuments, artistic works and archaeological material left behind by the cultures and tribes that inhabited this region provide the Afghan people with a remarkable cultural legacy, which remains under threat after decades of war and civil unrest, large-scale looting and high-profile acts of destruction ordered by the Taliban regime.

Given CENTCOM's continuing efforts to enforce General Order 1A and DOD's continuing efforts to adhere to the regulations of The 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, the Undersecretary of Defense Legacy Resource Management Program offers this Cultural Property Training Resource to CENTCOM personnel serving in Afghanistan.

You can play a role in CENTCOM's effort to respect and protect historic sites and cultural property in Afghanistan by taking a moment to review:

• major focus areas ("The Top Ten Dos and Dont's");

• the doctrine, theory and application of cultural property protection;

• the timeline of Afghanistan's history and culture; and
        
• the laws, treaties and enforcement measures that apply within CENTCOM AOR.