| Afghan Armed Forces | |
|---|---|
 The emblem of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan serves as the badge for all branches of the armed forces | |
| Motto | Arabic:الارض لله والحكم لله ("The land ofGod and the rule of God") Arabic:وطن، شرف، إخلاص("Homeland, Honor, Sincerity") |
| Founded | 1997; 28 years ago (1997) |
| Current form | 8 November 2021; 4 years ago (2021-11-08) |
| Service branches | Afghan Army Afghan Air Force |
| Headquarters | Kabul,Afghanistan |
| Website | www |
| Leadership | |
| Supreme Commander | Hibatullah Akhundzada |
| Minister of Defense andHead of the Military Commission | GeneralMullah Yaqoob |
| Chief of Staff | GeneralQari Fasihuddin |
| Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force | Amanuddin Mansoor |
| Personnel | |
| Active personnel | Disputed. Official: 170,000 (2023)[1] IISS: 165,000: 75,000 full time; 90,000 local militias (2022)[2] |
| Related articles | |
| History | Military history of Afghanistan |
| Ranks | Military ranks of Afghanistan |
TheAfghan Armed Forces, officially theArmed Forces of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (Pashto:د افغانستان اسلامي امارت وسله وال ځواکونه,Dari:قوای مسلح امارت اسلامی افغانستان)[3] and also referred to as theIslamic Emirate Armed Forces, is the military ofAfghanistan, commanded by theTaliban government from 1997 to 2001 and again since August 2021.
The Taliban created the first iteration of the Emirate's armed forces in 1997 after taking over Afghanistan following the end of theAfghan Civil War which raged between 1992 and 1996. However, the first iteration of the armed forces was dissolved in 2001 after thedownfall of thefirst Taliban government following theUnited States invasion of Afghanistan. It was officially reestablished on 8 November 2021 after the Taliban's victory in theWar in Afghanistan on 15 August 2021 following therecapture of Kabul and the collapse of theU.S.-backedIslamic Republic of Afghanistan and itsAfghan National Army as a whole, with the re-establishment of theIslamic Emirate of Afghanistan after being out of power for 20 years.
Reporting from 2022-23 placed armed forces and associated groups' personnel totals at 165-170,000; in 2025, reportedly Afghanistan'sMinistry of Defence said total personnel numbered 100,000.[citation needed]Peer-reviewed publications have emphasized how Taliban forces have historically been loose and patrimonial, rather than organised and bureaucratic.[4]
In April 1978, there was a coup, known as theSaur Revolution, orchestrated by members of the government loyal to thePeople's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA). This led to a full-scaleSoviet invasion in December 1979 by the40th Army, plus the103rd Guards Airborne Division. In 1981, the total strength of the Afghan Armed Forces was around 85,000 troops, according toThe New York Times.[5] TheAfghan Army had around 35–40,000 soldiers, mostly conscripts; theAfghan Air Force had around 7,000 personnel; and the total of allmilitary personnel was around 87,000 in 1984.[6] Throughout the 1980s, theAfghan Armed Forces was heavily involved in fighting against themujahideen rebel groups who were largely backed by the United States and trained by thePakistan Armed Forces. The rebel groups were fighting to force the Soviet Union to withdraw from Afghanistan as well as to remove theSoviet-backed government of PresidentMohammad Najibullah. Due to large number of defectors, the Afghan Armed Forces in 1985 were reduced to no more than about 47,000, the actual figure probably being lower.[7] The Air Force had over 150 combat aircraft with about 7,000 officers who were supported by up to 5,000Cuban Revolutionary Air and Air Defense Force andCzechoslovak Air Force advisers.[8]
Under theDemocratic Republic of Afghanistan (1978–1992), weapon deliveries by the Soviets were increased and includedMi-24 helicopters,MiG-23 fighter aircraft,ZSU-23-4 Shilka andZSU-57-2 anti-aircraft self-propelled mounts,MT-LB armored personnel carriers,BM-27 Uragan andBM-21 Grad multiple-launch rocket systems and9K52 Luna-M andScud missile launchers.[9] Some of the weapons that were not damaged during the decades of wars are still being used today.
Weapons supplies were made available to the mujahideen rebel groups through numerous countries; the United States purchased all of Israel's captured Soviet weapons clandestinely, and then funnelled the weapons to the mujahideen rebels, whileEgypt upgraded their own Army's weapons andsent the older weapons to the mujahideen, Turkey sold its World War II stockpiles, and the British and Swiss providedBlowpipe missiles andOerlikon anti-aircraft guns respectively, after they were found to be poor models for their own forces.[10] China provided the most relevant weapons, likely due to their own experience withguerrilla warfare, and kept meticulous record of all the shipments.[10]
Following theSoviet withdrawal in 1989, the mujahideen rebel attacks continued and grew in intensity.[11] For several years the Afghan Armed Forces had actually increased their effectiveness past levels ever achieved during the Soviet military presence. The eleven-yearSiege of Khost ended with the city's fall in March 1991. But the government was dealt a major blow whenAbdul Rashid Dostum, a leading general, switched allegiances to the mujahideen forces in 1992 and together they captured the city of Kabul.[12]
By 1992 theAfghan Army fragmented into regional militias under localwarlords because of thefall of the Soviet Union which stopped supplying theDemocratic Republic of Afghanistan's Armed Forces and later in 1992 when theDemocratic Republic of Afghanistan government lost power.
The fall of the Moscow-backed regime in 1992 disintegrated the state as well as the army. Bits and pieces of the fragmented military either disappeared or joined the warring factions that were locked in a drawn-out power struggle. The warring factions were composed of odd assortments of armed groups with varying levels of loyalties, political commitment, professional skills, and organizational integrity.[13]
— Ahmed Ali Jalali, 2002
After thefall ofMohammad Najibullah's regime in 1992, the various Afghan political parties began to assemble their own more formal armed forces. By February 1992, Massoud'sJamiat-i-Islami had a central force reported at six battalions strong, plus additional second tier units, "the bulk of the army, ..made up of regional battalions, subordinate to local commanders of the Supervisory Council."[14] On 16 January 1993,Jane's Defence Weekly reported that "a special assembly of 1335 delegates elected from across Afghanistan" had both elected ProfessorBurhanuddin Rabbani as President of theIslamic State of Afghanistan for two years, and agreed to "establish a regular army with soldiers mostly drawn from Mojahedin groups." Pakistan had offered training assistance.[15] However, aCivil War started between the various warlords, includingAhmad Shah Massoud,Gulbuddin Hekmatyar,Abdul Rashid Dostum,Abdul Ali Mazari,Jalaluddin Haqqani,Ismail Khan,Atta Muhammad Nur,Abdul Rasul Sayyaf,Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi,Mohammad Yunus Khalis,Gul Agha Sherzai and many others.
The Taliban movement arose aroundKandahar in southern Afghanistan and defeated the various armed movements there that had squabbled since the dissolution of the previousAfghan Army andAfghan Air Force. They moved to confrontAhmed Shah Massoud's forces by marching to the gates of Kabul in March 1995.[16]
During the 1990s the Taliban maintained 400T-54/55 andT-62 tanks and more than 200 armoured personnel carriers.[17][18] The Taliban also began training its own army and commanders. After the removal of the Taliban government in late 2001, private armies loyal to warlords gained more and more influence. In mid-2001,Ali Jalali wrote:[19]
The army (as a state institution, organized, armed, and commanded by the state) does not exist in Afghanistan today. Neither the Taliban-led "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" nor the "Islamic State of Afghanistan" headed by the ousted President Rabbani has the political legitimacy or administrative efficiency of a state. The militia formations they command are composed of odd assortments of armed groups with varying level of loyalties, political commitment, professional skills, and organizational integrity. Many of them feel free to switch sides, shift loyalties, and join or leave the group spontaneously. The country suffers from the absence of a top political layer capable of controlling individual and group violence. ... Although both sides identify their units with military formations of the old regime, there is hardly any organizational or professional continuity from the past. But these units really exist in name only ... in fact only their military bases still exist, accommodating and supporting an assortment of militia groups.
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During the 1990s the Taliban's air force had five supersonicMiG-21MFs and 10Sukhoi-22 fighter-bombers.[20] They also had sixMil Mi-8 helicopters, fiveMi-35s, fiveL-39Cs, sixAn-12s, 25An-26s, a dozenAn-24 andAn-32s, anIL-18, and a Yakovlev. Their civil air service contained twoBoeing 727A/Bs, aTu-154, fiveAn-24s, and aDHC-6.
On 3 August 1995, TalibanMikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 fightersforced a Russian Ilyushin-76 cargo plane carrying arms from Albania to Afghanistan to land atKandahar.[21][22] Negotiations between the Russian government and the Taliban to free the men stalled for over a year and efforts by American senatorHank Brown to mediate between the two parties broke down over a prisoner exchange.[23] Brown was able to get the Taliban to agree that the Russian crew should be allowed to maintain their aircraft.[23] This request paved the way for their escape.[23]
After the formation of theKarzai administration in late 2001, the Afghan armed forces were gradually reestablished as part of theAfghan National Security Forces by the United States and its allies. Over two decades, 2001–2021, the United States spent an estimated $83 billion on the Afghan military through the Afghanistan Security Forces Fund and an additional $36 billion to support the Afghan government.[24]
Initially, a new land force, theAfghan National Army (ANA), was created, along with an air arm, theAfghan National Army Air Corps, as part of the army. The army later includedCommandos and Special Forces. The ANA Air Corps later split off to become an independent branch, theAfghan Air Force. Training was managed initially by the U.S.Office of Military Cooperation, followed by other U.S. organizations and thenCombined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan, and was finally run by theResolute Support Mission.
The army under the Taliban Islamic Movement was inaugurated on 8 November 2021 as theArmy of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,[25] which is also referred to as theIslamic National Army, theIslamic Emirate Army and theAfghan Army. The army itself relies heavily on captured hardware from the defeated Afghan National Army. Approximately 2,000 vehicles fell into Taliban hands after theFall of Kabul, including theHumvee,M1117 Guardian,MaxxPro MRAP andOshkosh ATV. In terms of infantry equipment, captured items include theM4 carbine,M16 rifle, night-vision goggles, body armor suits, communication equipment and shoulder-mounted grenade launchers. These U.S. made firearms are reportedly replacing Russian madeAK-47s andAK-74s carried by most Taliban fighters.[26]
From 1 September 2021 to 10 January 2022, 15,102 newly trained fighters were inducted into the Islamic Emirate Army as calculated on the official site, the average number of new soldiers inducted is 120 soldiers per week not counting paramilitaries.[citation needed]
The conventional land forces of the Islamic Emirate Army were subdivided into eight corps in 2021, mostly superseding the previous corps of the former Afghan National Army. The conventional land warfare corps of the Islamic Emirate Army were renamed in November 2021 byMullah Yaqoob, ActingMinister of Defence.[27] They are listed below.[28]
| Symbol | Corps | Headquarters | Former Designation | Commander(s) | Ref(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | 313 Central Corps | Kabul | N/A | Maulvi Naqibullah "Sahib" (Chief of Staff) Maulvi Nasrullah "Mati" (Commander) Maulvi Nusrat (Deputy Commander) | [29][30] |
| 201 Khalid Ibn Walid Corps | Laghman | 201st Corps | Abdul Rahman Mansoori (Chief of Staff) Abu Dujana (Commander) Ibrahim (Deputy Commander) | [30] | |
 | 203 Mansoori Corps | Gardez | 203rd Corps | Ahmadullah Mubarak (Chief of Staff) Mohammad Ayub (Commander) Rohul Amin (Deputy Commander) | [30] |
| 205 Al-Badr Corps | Kandahar | 205th Corps | Hizbullah Afghan (Chief of Staff) Mehrullah Hamad (Commander) Wali Jan Hamza (Deputy Commander) | [30] | |
| 207 Al-Farooq Corps | Herat | 207th Corps | Abdul Rahman Haqqani (Chief of Staff) Mohammad Zarif Muzaffar (Commander) Abdul Shakur Baryalai (Deputy Commander) | [31][30] | |
| 209 Al-Fatah Corps | Mazar-i-Sharif | 209th Corps | Abdul Razzaq Faizullah (Chief of Staff) Amir Khan Haqqani (Commander) Maulvi Amanuddin (Deputy Commander) | [30][32] | |
| 215 Azam Corps | Helmand | 215th Corps | Maulvi Abdul Aziz "Ansari" (Chief of Staff) Sharafuddin Taqi (Commander) Mohibullah Nusrat (Deputy Commander) | [29][30] | |
| 217 Omari Corps | Kunduz | 217th Corps | Mohammad Shafiq (Chief of Staff) Rahmatullah Mohammad (Commander) Mohammad Ismail Turkman (Deputy Commander) | [30] |
All the corps beyond Kabul can be definitively tied to previousAfghan National Army (ANA) formations. However the number '313' was not utilized by the ANA, in Kabul or beyond, and the only former Taliban unit with that number was theBadri 313 Battalion. Other reported units include the Victorious Force Unit[33] and the Panipat unit.[34]
TheBadri 313 Battalion,[35] theRed Unit,[36] and the "Yarmouk 60 Special Forces Battalion"[37] may have some special forces capabilities. These are not to be confused with the Afghanistan GCPSU, which function under the Islamic Republic up until 2021 as a police tactical unit.
The Taliban created and ran a small air force in from 1996 to 2001. In late 2001Operation Crescent Wind was the initial series of U.S. air strikes on Afghanistan. Initial U.S. targets includedcommand and control nodes, air defenses, as well as the modest Air Force, with the airports ofKabul,Herat,Kandahar,Zaranj andMazar-i-Sharif being targeted. The Taliban were believed to have had 40 pilots capable of getting some 50Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 (ASCC "Fishbed") andSukhoi Su-22s (ASCC "Fitter") airborne, though there was less concern about these as traditional interceptors as there was about them eventually being loaded with explosives and used to suicide bomb American encampments.[38]
After the re-establishment of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and thefall of Kabul during the2021 Taliban offensive, the Taliban established theAir Force of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.[39][40] This was also referred to as theIslamic Emirate Air Force and theAfghan Air Force. The air force acquiredUH-60 Black Hawks,Mil Mi-24s (most of them without engines),Mil Mi-8s/Mil Mi-17s,A-29 Super Tucanos,Cessna 208s, andC-130 Hercules.
On 11 January 2022, the air force successfully repaired and flew unserviceable aircraft which were abandoned by the US Army and the former Afghan National Army afterKabul fell to the Taliban.[41][clarification needed] A new Taliban commander of theAfghan Air Force spoke as part of the announcement.
According to the testimony ofGuantanamo detainees before theirCombatant Status Review Tribunals, the Taliban, in addition to conscripting men to serve as soldiers, also conscripted men to staff itscivil service.[42]
According to a report from theUniversity of Oxford, the Taliban made widespread use of the conscription of children in 1997, 1998 and 1999. During the civil war that preceded the Taliban regime, thousands of orphaned boys joined various militia for "employment, food, shelter, protection and economic opportunity." The report said that during its initial period the Taliban "long depended upon cohorts of youth". Witnesses stated that each land-owning family had to provide one young man and $500 in expenses. In August of 1999, approximately 5000 students aged between 15 and 35 left madrassas in Pakistan to join the Taliban.[43]
After 1945, equipment suppliers included thePeople's Republic of China;Iran; theDemocratic People's Republic of Korea; theSoviet Union; and theRussian Federation.[4]
