A large portion of the Afghan Air Force has ended up in neighboring Uzbekistan, after hundreds of Afghan service members used U.S.-supplied planes and helicopters to flee the Taliban, U.S. officials said.
While U.S.-trained Afghan special forces put up stiff resistance in some places, the Taliban took most of the Afghan countryside and major cities without a fight.
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Tuesday that the U.S. provided the aircraft and other arms to the Afghan National Security Forces to enable them to defend the country.
The Uzbek government said that one of the fleeing Afghan aircraft collided with one of Uzbekistan jet fighters, causing both to crash.
The departing Afghan aircraft mirrored a larger number of ground troops who have been fleeing across some of Afghanistan’s borders from the Taliban in recent weeks.
Afghan aircraft mechanics relied on U.S. on-site help to keep the aircraft flying.
As American forces and maintenance contractors withdrew and the Taliban offensive expanded during the spring and early summer, the Afghan air force and other military units were quickly overwhelmed, eventually collapsing.
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