What did the Americans leave to the Taliban? The Wall Street Journal tells it. The Americans destroyed or disabled 100 combat vehicles and dozens of planes before leaving Kabul airport. However, Oryx, a blog that verifies military equipment using photos and videos, has identified 38 aircraft, 13 helicopters and 7 unmanned aircraft that the Taliban now have in good condition.
"The total arsenal is probably much larger. The Taliban have inherited thousands of US-supplied assault weapons and military vehicles along with other technologies and equipment including artillery pieces and night vision goggles”.
The embarrassment is such that the Biden administration has just ordered US federal sites to delete references to the Afghan military arsenal.
The American Waterloo reveals itself in the details. Like the one that US officials provided the Taliban with a list of names of those trying to evacuate from Afghanistan, the Washington Post reveals, prompting critics of Biden to accuse the administration of endangering those people.
In one fell swoop, the Pentagon has deposited in the hands of the Taliban about 80 percent of all military aid ever given to Israel since the founding of the Jewish state.
The New York Times on Sunday reported a list of names and information of hundreds of students and family members of the American University of Kabul who were eventually turned away from the airport gates because evacuations were ending. The Taliban had already targeted them, including a terrorist attack in 2016 that killed 15 people. Two weeks ago, the Taliban released a photo describing the school as a den of "disloyal wolves".
The National Review takes stock in human terms. At least 100-200 American citizens have fallen behind under the Taliban. Thousands of other legal permanent residents of the United States have been left at the mercy of the jihadists. And what about the Afghans who were the closest Western allies and therefore now face the greatest risk of being massacred by the Taliban? It is difficult to establish an exact figure, but the New York Times claims that America has abandoned "at least 100,000 Afghans eligible for resettlement to the United States for their work." And for them, Sky correspondent Dominic Waghorn reveals, door-to-door executions have already begun. Fox News reporter Lara Logan has posted videos of Afghan collaborators filming the gunfire around her. The Washington Post speaks of "moral disaster".
The Hill gives some examples of those left behind: “The New York-based Women for Afghan Women was unable to guarantee evacuation for 500 of its most vulnerable employees. This group qualified for evacuation for its association with a United States government-funded organization. "No people were evacuated," Sunita Viswanath, co-founder of the group, wrote in an email to The Hill.
There are also 150 journalists left in Afghanistan working for Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, media funded by the US government. That group has 500 people including their families, according to a congressional aide ”.
The United States, the Wall Street Journal reveals, has left most Afghan interpreters behind. Thirteen years ago, Afghan interpreter "Mohammed" (real name) helped rescue then-Senator Joe Biden and two other senators stranded in a remote valley of Afghanistan after their helicopter was forced to land for a snow storm. Biden, says the Wall Street Journal, "forgot" to take it away. "Hello Mr. President: Save me and my family," Mohammed, who asked not to use his full name while he was in hiding, told the Journal as the last of the Americans flew out of Kabul. "Don't forget me here." Mohammed and his four sons are hiding from the Taliban after his years-long attempt to get out of Afghanistan got trapped in bureaucracy.
The great military historian Victor Davis Hanson instead helps us to understand the effect of this abandoned arsenal: "Of particular concern are the loss of night vision equipment, 20,000 grenades, 1,400 grenade launchers and 7,000 machine guns, the perfect equipment for jihadist terror operations and asymmetrical street fighting."
We can look at this disaster in many ways. “One would be to compare this gift to military aid given to Israel over the past 70 years, which roughly amounts to about $ 100 billion. In other words, in one fell swoop, the Pentagon has deposited in the hands of the Taliban about 80 percent of all military aid we have ever given to Israel since the founding of the Jewish state. In terms of tactical and operational capabilities, the Taliban could now be the best equipped terrorist force in Asia and the Middle East ”. The Taliban filmed the Black Hawks taken from the Americans as they flew over the sky of Kandahar, their spiritual capital.
Take the US Embassy in Kabul and it cost $ 1 billion, “comparable to America's most expensive embassy in London. It will now become a stronghold of the Taliban. Bagram Air Base, originally built with US help and money during the Eisenhower administration, has been upgraded with hundreds of millions of dollars of US investment over the past 20 years, in buildings, a new runway, housing for personnel, detention facilities and infrastructure ”. The Americans fled Bagram during the night of July 1 without even informing their Afghan allies.
Donald Trump's former adviser Sebastian Gorka explained that when you look at the long-term strategic ramifications, it could be traced back to Pearl Harbor. “Let's be very clear about what happened. A group of individuals who want to kill all Christians, all Jews, all apostates and non-Muslims, have now taken control of a country where al-Qaeda has established the basis from which 9/11 was planned and executed. Afghanistan is now the center of the universe for a revitalized and revived jihadist movement. The jihadist movement is more powerful than ever and has a new sanctuary of national dimensions ".
Maulawi Hafiz Mohibullah Muktaz, a religious leader and fighter from Kandahar, meanwhile declared to The Times from the Bagram base: "Never, even in our wildest dreams, could we have believed that we could beat a superpower like America only with our Kalashnikovs and our faith. We now hope that Bagram can be a basis for Jihad for all Muslims ”.
And while Amin-Ul-Haq, Osama bin Laden's right-hand man and security chief, rejoined Afghanistan and Al Qaeda celebrated the American defeat, at the departure of the Americans the Taliban staged the coalition funeral with coffins and American, English, French and NATO flags. How to blame them? British Foreign Minister, Dominic Raab, revealed that they were unable to rescue even the Afghans who protected the British embassy in Kabul ...