The cover of TIME shows an 18-year-old woman with her nose cut off with the headline "What happens if we leave Afghanistan".
Aisha was the victim of Taliban brutality, her nose and ears barbarically hacked off by her own husband as punishment for attempting to flee her cruel in-laws, The Daily Mail reported.
She was held down by her brother-in-law while the man she married disfigured her face with a knife.
When she was caught last year attempting to flee her home, a local Taliban commander acting as judge ordered the medieval-style punishment.
The cover comes as the Netherlands became the first Western ally to end its mission in Afghanistan yesterday. The Dutch have lost 24 soldiers, with 140 injured. The Netherlands departure raised fears of a stampede towards the exit as the deployment enters its endgame.
A note from TIME managing editor Richard Stengel said Aisha had "posed for the picture and says she wants the world to see the effect a Taliban resurgence would have on the women of Afghanistan, many of whom have flourished in the past few years . . . she knows that she will become a symbol of the price Afghan women have had to pay for the repressive ideology of the Taliban".
Mr Stengel said Aisha was sentenced by a Taliban commander to have her nose and ears cut off for fleeing her abusive husband and in-laws. She is in a safe house for women in Kabul and will have reconstructive surgery in the US.
He apologised to readers who found the image too strong, but said he "would rather confront readers with the Taliban's treatment of women than ignore it. I would rather people know that reality as they make up their minds about what the US and its allies should do in Afghanistan".
Switzerland was the only country to have withdrawn its forces until now, bringing its two soldiers home from Afghanistan in March 2008, NATO said.
Canada is set to withdraw its 2800 personnel next year, Poland is likely to pull out its 2500 troops in 2012, while Britain and the US have signalled that some of their forces will also leave next year, leading to an end of combat operations in 2014.
"This is the start. It is a chain - the Dutch forces start to withdraw, followed by the Canadians, then the British by 2014," Haroon Mir from the Afghanistan Centre of Research and Policy Studies said.
"In the middle I think we will see a number of other NATO members setting a timetable to leave."
The governments of Germany and France, which have made the biggest force commitments after the US and Britain, are coming under huge public pressure to announce withdrawal timetables.
Australia currently has 1500 troops in Afghanistan.
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