Unless you’ve been living under a rock you are aware that Taliban forces began a military offensive in May 2021 that finally reached Kabul limits by August 2021. The Taliban took control of Afghanistan’s capital city of Kabul on August 15th, 2021. The capture took place hours after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country. Most of the provincial capitals of Afghanistan had fallen in succession in the midst of a US troop withdrawal under a February 2020 US–Taliban agreement that concluded on August 30, 2021. With the conclusion of the withdrawal, we did leave behind some interesting vehicles.
Humvees (HMMWV)
Of course we had Humvees in Afghanistan and of course some of these were left behind, after all the plan was to leave many of them in the hands of the Afghan Army anyway. The Humvee, or also known as the HMMWV, is light-weight, four-wheel drive, military vehicle produced by AM General. They have been in service since 1983 and we have deployed them to every conflict zone we have had troops in since then. Many of these were unfortunately left in running condition however the servicing on them is not easy and the Taliban will have a hard time sourcing parts for them. It is believed each unit costs about $200,000 although this varies of course depending on which unit variant you are talking about.
International M1224 MaxxPro MRAP
The International M1224 MaxPro MRAP (Mine Resistant Ambush Protected) is an armored fighting vehicle specifically designed by Navistar International under the US Military’s Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle program. These vehicles are relatively new to service, being deployed as late as 2007 and the Afghan and Iraq wars were the first combat zones they saw action in. There are several variants of these trucks as they are highly configurable for whatever unit they are going to be serving under so it’s hard to put an exact estimate on their value. It is believed they will each cost somewhere around $550,000 a unit. Many of these were left in functional condition unfortunately however it is unknown how many exactly were left behind.
M1117 Guardian Armored Security Vehicle
The M1117 Guardian Armored Security Vehicle (ASV) is an internal security vehicle which was developed in the late 1990s for service with the US Miltiary Police Corps. Since then the vehicle has seen action in other units and has been deployed through several conflicts. The M1117 Guardian was one of the first vehicles to be deisgned with a specialized mine-resistant hull and due to the Afghan war in particular had seen additional modifications to increase security. In particular, the M1117 Guardian that was left behind in Afghanistan was designed to better defend against IEDs and had it’s weapons systems upgraded. It is unknown the exact amount of functional units that were left behind however it is believed on average these cost about $820,000.
MD530F Helicopters
The MD530F helicopter is basically an armed variant of the OH-6 Cayuse light observation helicopter built by MD Helicopters. It has a variety of functions and can be used as a scout attack, armed escort and/or close air attack capabilities helicopter. In 2018, an order by the military was placed for these at a cool $2.4 million each. It is unknown how many of these are actually airworthy, but they are considered to be pretty easy helicopters to fly. With that said, pretty much all the photos I’ve seen of these show catastrophic damage to them.
UH-60A Blackhawks
It is unknown how many of the UH-60A Blackhawk helicopters were left behind and how many of them are actually functional. The UH-60A Blackhawk is no doubt one of the best medium-lift utility helicopters that can serve a variety of purposes. In 2014, the government order 102 of these units from Sikorsky for a whooping $1.3 billion which places each UH-60A Blackhawk at $12.7 million. If there were any truly functional and airworthy units left behind it would also require the Taliban learning how to fly these. The UH-60A Blackhawk is not an easy helicopter to fly and I doubt the Taliban will be able to just learn on the fly.
Pretty unfortunate series of events but hopefully these are for the most part destroyed units.
