January 1, Taliban seized US weapons from Afghan forces, White House confirms

The Taliban seized a significant amount of military hardware and weaponry from Afghan security forces, national security advisor Jake Sullivan admitted Tuesday. The Biden administration is still determining the exact amount of US military equipment that Taliban insurgents now have in their possession.

“We don’t have a complete picture, obviously, of where every article of defense materials has gone but certainly, a fair amount of it has fallen into the hands of the Taliban, and obviously, we don’t have a sense that they are going to readily hand it over to us at the airport,” Sullivan said.

The Taliban rapidly took control over Afghanistan and acquired a wide variety of US weapons supplied to Afghan forces, including guns, ammunition, and Blackhawk helicopters.

Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) said that with the weapons the Taliban seized, they are more powerful now than they were ahead of 9/11.

“Now the Taliban have access to massive caches of heavy weaponry, artillery, armored vehicles, ammunition,” Waltz said. “We have no bases, no allies, no host government, not even a northern alliance. This is far worse.”

Source

• White House says armed Taliban have US weapons taken from Afghan forces