Russia will start repairing Afghanistan’s Soviet-era arsenal under a new agreement that’s set to bolster the Taliban’s military strength.
The agreement was signed at the International Security Forum in Moscow last week, the presidential envoy to Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov said.
It’s seen as part of president Vladimir Putin’s effort to strengthen diplomatic and military ties with the Taliban, who remain isolated from the West since taking back power from a Nato-backed government in 2021.
The Taliban inherited hundreds of old tanks, helicopters and military vehicles that were left behind by Soviet forces when they withdrew from the country in 1989 after a decade of occupation and fighting that left at least 13,700 Soviet servicemen and 40,000-50,000 wounded.
The Russian state is the legal successor of the Soviet Union.
The Taliban also came into possession of sizeable, and more modern, Western military hardware when US-led Nato forces hastily left in 2021.
“Afghan partners are primarily interested in the repair and restoration of various Russian-made military equipment,” Mr Kabulov was quoted as saying by the Russian news agency RIA Novosti, adding that this was “the first practical step” in implementing the new agreement.
Afghanistan’s Soviet arsenal includes T-55 and T-62 tanks, BMP-1 and BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicles, and Mi-17 and Mi-24 helicopters, according to the defence ministry.
Ahmad Shuja Jamal, a former Afghan security official who helped manage military equipment under the Nato-backed government, argued there was an irony in defence minister Mullah Muhammad Yaqoob inking the agreement with Moscow. Mr Yaqoob is the son of the Taliban’s founder Mullah Muhammad Omar.
“Many Taliban leaders including the so-called defence minister’s father came of age fighting the Soviets or, as they are often called in Afghanistan, the Russians,” he noted. “Their sons are cutting deals with the same enemy their fathers swore to kill in jihad.”
“There is an irony there that, if you knew the Taliban, you would not be surprised by,” Mr Jamal told The Independent. “The Taliban are a contradiction in that they’re ruthlessly ideological but also shamelessly transactional.”
He said the Taliban government was likely in possession of a few Mi-17s that could still be functional despite missing maintenance for years.
“There are a few mothballed AN-26s, but their number isn’t game-changing,” he added, referring to the giant twin-engine Soviet military transport aircraft. “What few we had we dismantled and cannibalised because we were moving to US-made air assets for interoperability reasons.”
American forces tried to destroy or immobilise some of the hardware, including helicopters, tanks and armoured vehicles, they were forced to leave behind and it was not known if the Taliban had been able to use any of it.
Ahmad Zia Saraj, chief of the National Directorate of Security under the Nato-backed government, said the Western equipment was not a suitable option for the Taliban to rely on. “These equipment are very expensive, hard to maintain and impossible to retain, unless you have Nato support. Therefore, around 18 months ago or so, the leader of the Taliban ordered the repair and restoration of Russian equipment that was left behind from the Soviet era and some equipment such as Russian helicopters purchased by the former government,” he told The Independent.
The new government turned to Russia for help, he claimed, after failing in its attempts to repair the old hardware domestically.
“The Taliban gathered almost all technicians from former regimes who worked in the defence ministry in Kandahar to repair old tanks and other types of heavy equipment,” Mr Saraj claimed. “But it seemed a difficult task without new parts purchased from Russia. The Taliban have moved most of these types of equipment in Kandahar.”
If the old Russian weaponry was successfully repaired, Mr Jamal said, the Taliban’s arsenal would become a “weird combo of US-made small arms like M16s, M4s and a sliver of Soviet legacy heavy hardware.”
“The Talibs,” he added, “can find enough Afghans to run the T-52s and the BMPs.”
