You may recall the news reports that President Joe Biden and former Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani spoke by phone July 23, just a few weeks before the country’s American-installed government collapsed, and the Taliban Islamist Supremacists took over.
In the transcript of the call reported by Reuters Biden noted the perception was the war with the Taliban was not going well.
BIDEN: You know, I am a moment late. But I mean it sincerely. Hey look, I want to make it clear that I am not a military man any more than you are, but I have been meeting with our Pentagon folks, and our national security people, as you have with ours and yours, and as you know and I need not tell you the perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan, I believe, is that things aren’t going well in terms of the fight against the Taliban.
And there’s a need, whether it is true or not, there is a need to project a different picture.
Biden went on to say: …we will continue to provide close air support, if we know what the plan is and what we are doing. And all the way through the end of August, and who knows what after that.
We are also going to continue to make sure your air force is capable of continuing to fly and provide air support.
That was another typical Biden lie, because the U.S. pulled both the close air support when it abandoned Bagram air base and the contractors who were providing services to keep the Afghan Air Force flying, well before the collapse.
Not long after Biden spoke with Ghani, White House spokesperson Jen Psaki said, “The president made a decision, which is consistent with his view that this was not a winnable war, to bring the U.S. troops home.”
But they didn’t stop shipping and stockpiling arms, ammunition, and equipment, including advanced attack helicopters.
Pat Droney, writing for Law Enforcement Today, reminded us of what seems, in light of Biden’s comments to former Afghan President Ghani, to almost be a planned arming of the Taliban.
Just about one month before the Afghan collapse, noted Mr. Droney, the Afghan Ministry of Defense posted pictures on social media of seven brand new military helicopters arriving in Kabul courtesy of the United States.
“They’ll continue to see a steady drumbeat of that kind of support going forward,” said feckless U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin a few days later in a news briefing.
About a month later, those helicopters…along with fighter jets, drones, Humvees, armored personnel carriers and a whole bunch of weapons are now in the hands of the Taliban. The equipment was abandoned as the former Afghan Army and Air Force fled after the Taliban began to run roughshod over the country.
Why would the administration ship firearms, drones, communication gear, etc., to a country they planned on abandoning within months, asked Mr. Droney?
And what was left and how much did it cost?
Good questions, which the Biden administration has refused to answer, and which Democrats in Congress have refused to investigate.
While the Biden the administration downplayed the Taliban getting the technologically advanced equipment due to their inexperience in utilizing it and suggested they wouldn’t have the capability to, for example, fly the Blackhawks and attack helicopters, they apparently had enough capability to fly one of the Blackhawks over Kandahar with an Afghan ally of ours hanging from it.
MSN.com reports open-source analysts Stijn Mitzer and Joost Oliemans have tracked videos and images released by forces loyal to the insurgents and recorded over 30 pieces of equipment that now belong to what they dubbed the “Taliban Air Force,” ranging from at least one A-29 Super Tucano to seven ScanEagle unmanned aerial vehicles — drones — made by Boeing.
And Taliban fighters have been shown operating aircraft they had commandeered. At Herat airport, footage posted online appeared to show fighters operating a Russian-made Mi-17 helicopter.
Mitzer said that video evidence showed that a number of aircraft, including three Blackhawk helicopters, had been taken to Panjshir Valley north of Kabul, where anti-Taliban forces have gathered under the leadership of Vice President Amrullah Saleh and Ahmad Massoud, the son of late Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Massoud.
What’s more, according to the Russian outlet Sputnik's Persian language service, Iran allegedly bought armored US-supplied ground vehicles, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), and helicopters belonging to the Afghan army.
The Russian news outlet cited unnamed "news sources", and added that the equipment was purchased for a quarter of the amount they are worth and that Tehran was probably moving the equipment to research centers for reverse engineering.
And the Chinese and Russians can be counted upon to be doing the same thing.
The toll-free Capitol Switchboard (1-866-220-0044), call your Senators and Representatives and demand that Congress investigate exactly what equipment was left behind in Afghanistan, how much it cost and what it will cost to replace it and what steps are being taken to harden similar equipment left in the US inventory against the inevitable Chinese, Russian and Iranian attacks.
Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani
Afghanistan withdrawal
Taliban
Bagram air base
Arming the Taliban
attack helicopters
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin
drones
Humvees
armored personnel carriers
Blackhawk helicopters
Iran purchases weapons