The war in Ukraine aside from the thousands of dead Russian and Ukrainian soldiers has some admittedly very strange aspects, such as the fact that US-trained Afghan commandos are fighting for Putin, against Washington’s Zelensky ally.
Shortly after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, reports emerged of Afghan special forces escaping the Taliban and fighting as mercenaries on the Ukrainian side in the battle of Mariupol.
But now it has emerged that the same Afghan commandos are fighting on the Russian side as Russian President Vladimir Putin pushes to capture the strategically important city of Bakhmut.
Their US-NATO training
During the Afghan War, the US and British forces allocated a lot of resources to the training of Afghan special forces units. Having a capable military to protect the US-installed Afghan government was a key part of NATO’s strategy in Afghanistan and keeping the Taliban at bay.
The US trained them far better than regular Afghan army soldiers, but some of the CIA-trained units had a reputation for committing extrajudicial killings and settling personal disputes with impunity.
What happened after the Americans fled Afghanistan
When the US left Afghanistan in 2021, an estimated 20,000-30,000 commandos were left unemployed and hunted by the Taliban. According to several reports, these Afghan commandos fled to Iran, where they were recruited by the Russian mercenary company Wagner, who promised them good wages and help in relocating their families.
As fighting intensifies in Bakhmut, which has become Russia’s highest-priority Objective Purpose (OBPU), Wagner is the one sending Afghan commandos ahead of the operational hot zone and posting recruitment ads on Telegram.
The US military has spent hundreds of billions of dollars training Afghan special forces. They have also spent hundreds of billions of dollars training Ukrainian soldiers since 2014 and pouring money into the conflict.
And now, just as when the US-backed Mujahideen fighters from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan used US training and weapons to fight against them during the US-Afghanistan war, they seem to be doing the same once again in Ukraine.
