The Pentagon announced the last C-17 carrying U.S. service members departed the airport at approximately 3:29 p.m. EDT Monday, meeting President Joe Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline and ending the longest war in the history of the United States.
In total, the U.S. military gave the Afghan military and security forces approximately $83 billion in training and equipment.
U.S. service members reportedly destroyed some of their own weapons while departing Afghanistan, fearing the equipment could fall into Taliban hands.
It is unclear just how much of that equipment, including armoured vehicles, rifles, tactical gear, and even aircraft, is in the hands of the Taliban, though the group has demonstrated possession of some U.S. equipment. On Aug. 21, an image emerged of members of an elite Taliban unit, wearing U.S. military gear, apparently mocking the famous World War II image of the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima in Japan.
Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the head of U.S. Central Command, said American forces in Kabul had to leave behind dozens of armoured Humvees, aircraft, and the C-RAM system that was used to shoot down rockets targeted at the airport in previous days, according to Fox News.
But McKenzie said the equipment was disabled and no longer mission capable.
Along with the equipment, McKenzie said there are U.S. citizens, numbering in “the very low hundreds,” who remain in the Taliban-controlled country.
“We did not get everybody out that we wanted to get out,” he said at the end of the evacuation operations, adding that he believed the remaining U.S. citizens would be able to leave the country.
As of Monday, the U.S. has evacuated more than 120,000 people from Afghanistan, roughly 6,000 of whom were U.S. citizens and their families.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed Monday night that fewer than “200, likely closer to 100” U.S. citizens who wanted to leave the country remain in Afghanistan after the U.S. withdrawal. The administration has said it will try to help get them out, though officials acknowledge continued evacuation efforts remain unclear.
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