Intelligence Reveals US-Made Weapons In Control Of The Taliban, 2,000 Armored Vehicles To Black Hawk Helicopters

Illustration of a US-made military vehicle in Afghanistan. (Wikimedia Commons/MSgt Benjamin Bloker)

JAKARTA - About a month ago, the Afghan Ministry of Defense posted photos of seven new helicopters arriving in Kabul on social media. The helicopter was sent by the United States.

"They're going to continue to see a big bang from that kind of support going forward", US Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, told reporters a few days later at the Pentagon.

However, weeks later, the Taliban had seized most of the country, as well as all the weapons and equipment left behind by the fleeing Afghan forces.

Video shows the Taliban, who took control of Kabul on Sunday, August 15, inspecting a long line of vehicles and opening crates of new firearms, communications equipment, and even military drones.

"Everything that hasn't been destroyed belongs to the Taliban now", a US official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said.

Illustration of the Afghan military in a US-made Humvee vehicle. (Wikimedia Commons/US Department of Defense Current Photos)

Current and former US officials say there are fears the weapons could be used to kill civilians, seized by other militant groups such as ISIS, to attack US interests in the region, or potentially even be handed over to US adversaries, including China and Russia.

President Joe Biden's administration is very concerned about the 'fall' of these weapons into the hands of the Taliban and is considering several options to address the issue.

Officials said launching airstrikes against larger equipment, such as helicopters, had not been ruled out, but there were concerns this would lead to the Taliban being hostile to the United States at the same time.

Another official said, while there are no exact figures, current intelligence assessments believe the Taliban are in control of more than 2,000 armored vehicles, including the US Humvee, and up to 40 aircraft potentially including the UH-60 Black Hawk, reconnaissance attack helicopter, and ScanEagle military drone.

"We have seen Taliban fighters armed with US-made weapons that they confiscated from Afghan forces. This poses a significant threat to the United States and our allies", Republican politician Michael McCaul, who sits on the US House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in an email.

Illustration of the Afghan Air Force. (Wikimedia Commons/Master Sgt. Shane A. Cuomo/1st Combat Camera Sq)

The speed of the Taliban's attacks in Afghanistan is reminiscent of the ISIS militants taking US-made weapons from the hands of the almost unrelenting Iraqi army in 2014.

Between 2002 and 2017, the United States provided the Afghan military with an estimated $28 billion worth of weaponry, including guns, rockets, night-vision goggles, and small drones for intelligence gathering.

But the Blackhawk helicopters have been the most visible sign of US military aid and should be the Afghan military's biggest advantage over the Taliban.

Meanwhile, between 2003 and 2016, the United States provided Afghan forces with 208 aircraft, according to the US Government Accountability Office (GAO). Last week, many of those planes were most useful to Afghan pilots escaping from the Taliban.

One US official said between 40 and 50 planes had been flown to Uzbekistan by Afghan pilots seeking cover. Because, before taking power in Kabul over the weekend, the Taliban had started a campaign of killing pilots.

Some of the aircraft are in the United States for maintenance and will stay. Those en route to Afghan forces will instead be used by the US military to assist with the evacuation from Kabul.

Current and former officials say that while they are concerned about the Taliban having access to helicopters, the planes require frequent maintenance and many are complicated to fly without extensive training.

"Ironically, the fact that our equipment breaks down frequently is a lifesaver here", said a third official.

US-educated and armed Afghan special forces. (Wikimedia Commons/Sgt. Audiffred Laboy Cruz)

Retired US Army General Joseph Votel, who oversaw US military operations in Afghanistan as head of US Central Command from 2016 to 2019, said most of the high-end hardware captured by the Taliban, including aircraft, were not equipped with sensitive US technology.

"In some cases, some of it will be more like trophies", Votel said.

There are more pressing concerns about some of the easier-to-use weapons and equipment, such as night-vision goggles.

Since 2003 the United States has provided Afghan forces with at least 600,000 infantry weapons, including M16 assault rifles, 162,000 pieces of communications equipment, and 16,000 night-vision goggles.

"The ability to operate at night is a real game-changer", a congressional aide told Reuters.

Votel and others say small arms seized by insurgents such as machine guns, mortars, and artillery including howitzers, could give the Taliban an advantage against any resistance that could emerge in historic anti-Taliban strongholds such as the Panjshir Valley northeast of Kabul.

Separately, US officials hope most of the weapons will be used by the Taliban themselves, but it is too soon to say what they plan to do, including the possibility of sharing equipment with rival countries such as China.

Andrew Small, China's foreign policy expert at the US-German Marshall Fund, said the Taliban would likely give Beijing access to whatever US weapons they may now control.

One US official said it was unlikely China would get much, as Beijing likely already had access to weapons and equipment. The situation, experts say, suggests that the United States needs better ways to monitor the equipment it provides to allies.

It could do more to ensure that supplies to Afghan forces are closely monitored and inventoried, said Justine Fleischner of the UK-based Conflict Arms Research. "But time has passed for these efforts to have an impact in Afghanistan", said Fleischner.