Joe Biden’s choice: evacuate Afghan civilians or save equipment
US military commanders have only hours to decide whether to prioritise multimillion-dollar Chinooks and other helicopters.
US military commanders have only hours to decide whether to prioritise multi-million-dollar Chinooks and other helicopters over Afghan evacuees in the last flights out of Kabul.
President Joe Biden’s insistence that as much equipment as possible should be saved means commanders will have to choose between reducing the number of Afghan evacuees to make room inside the giant C-17 Globemaster aircraft, or sacrifice the helicopters to provide maximum space for those desperate to leave.
A spokesman at US Central Command, which has overall charge of operations in Afghanistan, said it would not comment on the assets it had left in Kabul, nor its plans for them. However, the Pentagon has said any equipment left behind will be destroyed.
“Obviously there is a strong bias to be able to get our material out with our people (troops). (But) if there needs to be destruction or other disposition of equipment at Hamid Karzai International Airport, then we will do that and do it appropriately,” said John Kirby, the Pentagon’s press secretary.
More than a dozen helicopters are being used at Kabul airport for security missions and evacuations beyond the facility. They include CH-47F Chinooks, UH-60 Black Hawks and AH-64 Apaches. Three Chinooks were involved in evacuating 169 American diplomatic staff to Kabul airport.
In addition, the US army’s elite 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, also present at the airport, has its own modified versions of the Chinook and Black Hawk as well as A/MH-6 “Little Bird” light helicopters.
Standard Chinooks, Black Hawks and Apaches cannot be refuelled in flight and have to be transported beyond their range by aircraft. Those adapted for special operations do have midair refuelling capabilities.
The C-17 Globemaster, which in one notable flight carried 830 Afghan men, women and children from Kabul to al-Udeid airbase in Qatar, will play the key role in shipping military equipment back to the US. A C-17 can carry a single Chinook, two Black Hawks or two Apaches in one flight. In wartime, troops can be carried as well. However, for safety reasons, it seems unlikely that US military commanders would risk that arrangement with Afghan evacuees.
US troops disabled or destroyed large amounts of equipment when they abandoned Bagram airbase north of Kabul early last month. However, all helicopters at the base were extracted.
The only helicopters known to have been destroyed in the US withdrawal have been seven CH-46E Sea Knights used by the state department at the American embassy in Kabul. Those helicopters, belonging to the State Department air wing, along with several light armoured vehicles at the embassy, were disabled or destroyed after the 4000 staff had been evacuated.
The Taliban are also said to control large numbers of Russian-made Mi-17 military transport helicopters that were bought by the US for the Afghan army between 2003 and 2013. Officially, the US has provided the Afghan military with 56 Mi-17 helicopters. 32 were listed as being in the country in July.
The Pentagon said on Wednesday that 37 C-17s and 5 C-130s left Kabul airport with about 11,200 evacuees while other allied planes took 7800 people in 90 flights over the latest 24-hour period. Total evacuees since the airlift began stood at 88,000.
Meanwhile, the Taliban are believed to have seized more than 100 surface-to-air missile systems from the Afghan army.
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said the Islamist group had taken control of dozens of man-portable air defence (Manpad) missile launchers from army weapon depots. Manpad missiles have a range of 5km, making them a danger to low-flying aircraft. The Manpads are believed to have been abandoned by the Taliban after it was overthrown in 2001. Washington is not known to have provided them to the Afghan army, and it is possible that they could date back to the 1980s when the US supplied “Stinger” missiles to mujaheddin fighting the Soviet Union.
The Times
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