Afghan collapse pinned on years of US chaos, talk of withdrawal

Inspector general office says more than $US7bn in military equipment was left under Taliban control.

A Taliban fighter sits in the cockpit of a US-supplied aircraft at Kabul airport following the withdrawal of US forces. Picture: AFP.

A government watchdog has said an abrupt, uncoordinated withdrawal from Afghanistan and years of problems with planning and oversight of US assistance contributed to the collapse of the Western-backed government in Kabul and the Taliban takeover of the country soon after American forces departed, according to a forthcoming report.

Poor accountability on weapons and equipment provided to Afghanistan and a lack of systemic planning were also important factors in the military collapse there, according to the report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction.

The report, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, also calls out the Department of Defence for delaying answering official inquiries, missing deadlines and providing incomplete answers to questions.

The Defence Department said in a written response included in the report that it co-operated with the investigation, and disputed the characterisation, saying it provided written responses to the inspector general’s questions.

The Pentagon also disagreed with some of the report’s key findings, including that US forces abruptly quit the country and cut off assistance to Afghan allies. In its response, included in the report, it said US officials were in touch with Afghan leadership during the period before the withdrawal, assuring them it would continue to provide security assistance.

The Pentagon is aware of the report and provided its input, said Rob Lodewick, a spokesman for the Pentagon. “However, it would be premature to comment on the report before it’s been published and released.”

The congressionally mandated report comes 18 months after the rapid collapse of the Western-backed government in Kabul, which led to bipartisan criticism of how the Biden administration handled the withdrawal. It will also arrive on Capitol Hill amid a debate over how to conduct oversight of the tens of billions of dollars of assistance now flowing into Ukraine.

Government watchdogs responsible for aid to Ukraine recently said they would like to have auditors on the ground in the country. And John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, who has spent the past decade documenting wasted US funds, has also called for more oversight of the money now flowing into Ukraine.

In this latest report, Mr Sopko’s office said current military assistance to Ukraine required more oversight to avoid the mistakes made over the course of two decades in Afghanistan.

“There is an understandable desire amid a crisis to focus on getting money out the door and to worry about oversight later, but too often that creates more problems than it solves,” the report says. “Given the ongoing conflict and the unprecedented volume of weapons being transferred to Ukraine, the risk that some equipment ends up on the black market or in the wrong hands is likely unavoidable.”

Weeks after the fall of Kabul and the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in 2021, congress directed the inspector general to find the causes of the quick collapse of Afghan armed forces.

The inspector general said that from the onset of the investigative process, government agencies didn’t help in the effort. In addition to its criticism of the Pentagon, the report also addresses the role of the US Agency for International Development and the State Department.

Both agencies deferred to the Defence Department to comment on the report, and raised questions about the inspector general’s jurisdiction.

A USAID spokesman said the agency gave written responses to hundreds of questions and provided thousands of documents to the inspector general. A State Department spokesman reiterated its challenge to the special inspector general’s jurisdiction, but said it would work with the appropriate congressional committees and “accommodate their legitimate need for information to help them conduct oversight for legislative purposes”.

In looking at the reason for the swift collapse of the Afghan government, the report cites as a turning point the 2020 Doha Agreement, when the Trump administration pledged to withdraw American troops and contractors from the country in exchange for guarantees from the Taliban.

The report says senior Afghan officials didn’t expect the Biden administration to go through with the withdrawal. “The character of the withdrawal left many Afghans with the impression that the US was simply handing Afghanistan over to a Taliban government-in-waiting,” the report says.

The Afghan forces were dependent on US contractors for support, including supply and maintenance, and when the US pulled those personnel from the country in June 2021, the Afghans abruptly lost those capabilities, according to the inspector general.

“Even the US military underestimated the significance of pulling contractor support in Afghanistan,” the report says.

Among other issues cited in the report is that at least $US7.2bn of military equipment – a number that hasn’t been previously reported – including aircraft, missiles, communications gear, and biometric devices, was left behind under Taliban control in August 2021. The final tally of military equipment abandoned in Afghanistan can’t be confirmed, in part, because the electronic database used to track the materiel crashed in early 2021, investigators said in the report.

The US over two decades provided approximately $US18.6bn to equip the Afghan military.

The Wall Street Journal