Some 5,000 Afghans rescued, plus Italians and citizens of allied countries: a spectacular achievement by Italy during the evacuation from Hamid Karzai International Airport. To handle the extraordinarily complex and dangerous task, Rome had dispatched some of its very best soldiers and Carabinieri.

Other countries can learn from Italy’s green-and-blue Carabinieri—a hybrid police-and-military force—because the world will see plenty more of these highly complex and dangerous situations short of war. “We were in Afghanistan from Day 1,” Brig. Gen. Stefano Iasson told me. “And when it was decided the allied forces would leave, it was clear that we’d help with the evacuation as well.”