Hundreds of Humvees left by US forces in Afghanistan

American and Nato troops abandoned military equipment worth more than $7.2bn, much of which is now in a state of disrepair in the Taliban’s hands, as Arpan Rai reports

- Arpan Rai

Hundreds of American Humvees have been left to rust in scrapyards across Afghanistan, three years after the US abandoned the trucks – so emblematic of its military campaign in the country – to the new Taliban regime.

New satellite images from former Nato and US bases in several Afghan provinces show the US-made vehicles dismantled and hollowed out, with their parts haphazardly strewn around openair garages and compounds.

The US forces tried to dismantle or destroy much of their machinery, from aircraft to computer systems, in the last weeks of their chaotic pull-out from Afghanistan after 20 years of war. But much still fell to the Taliban in August 2021 when the UStrained Afghan military crumbled and surrendered to the Islamist militants, according to US defence officials.

The Pentagon says US forces left behind military equipment worth over $7.2bn at the time. Glimpses of this leftover military hardware are occasionally seen at Taliban events, such as a grand parade held by the Taliban at Bagram airbase in August to mark their three years in power.

Images from the immediate aftermath of the pull-out showed Taliban militants seizing US-supplied firepower, including guns, ammunition, helicopters and other modern military equipment. The Independent has analysed images from Kabul, Kandahar, Herat, Khost and Ghazni which show Humvees, along with other military and heavy vehicles such as rangers and army tracks that were given by the American armed forces to the Afghan National Defence Security Forces and police authorities before the fall of Kabul in August 2021.

The majority of these Humvees are seen in images from the two power centres in Afghanistan – Kabul and Kandahar – with several in the backyard of the Kabul International Airport. Most of the Humvees in Kandahar are also seen at the now-abandoned US military-run airbase near the Spin Boldak road.