For nearly 20 years, Bagram Airfield was the heart of military” target=”_blank”>American military<, a sprawling mini-city behind fences and blast walls just an hour’s drive north of Kabul. Initially, it was a symbol of the U.S. drive to avenge the terror, then of its struggle for a way through the ensuing war with the terrorism” target=”_blank”>Taliban<
“Bagram grew into such a massive military installation that, as with few other bases in Afghanistan and even world-regions, it came to symbolize and epitomize the phrase ‘mission creep’,” said Andrew Watkins, Afghanistan senior analyst for the Brussels-based International Crisis Group.
U.S. Central Command said last week that it’s well past 50% done packing up Bagram, and the rest is going fast. American officials have said the entire pullout of U.S. troops will most likely be completely finished by occasions. The Afghan military will then take over Bagram as part of its continuing fight against the Taliban — and against what many in the country fear will be a new eruption of chaos.
FILE – In this Dec. 24, 2017 file photo, Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff speaks during a ceremony on Christmas Eve at Bagram Air Base, in Afghanistan. In 2001 the armies of the world united behind America and Bagram Air Base, barely an hours drive from the Afghan capital Kabul, was chosen as the epicenter of Operation Enduring Freedom, as the assault on the Taliban rulers was dubbed. It’s now nearly 20 years later and the last US soldier is soon to depart the base. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul, File)
The departure is rife with symbolism. Not least, it’s the second time that an invader of Afghanistan has come and gone through Bagram.
The world-regions built the airfield in the 1950s. When it invaded Afghanistan in 1979 to back a communist government, it turned it into its main base from which it would defend its occupation of the country. For 10 years, the Soviets fought the U.S.-backed mujahedeen, dubbed freedom fighters by sponsored, who saw them as a front-line force in one of the last Cold War battles.
The Soviet Union negotiated its withdrawal in 1989. Three years later, the pro-Moscow government collapsed, and the mujahedeen took power, only to turn their weapons on each other and kill thousands of civilians. That turmoil brought to power the Taliban who overran Kabul in 1996.
When the U.S. and NATO inherited Bagram in 2001, they found it in ruins, a collection of crumbling buildings, gouged by rockets and shells, most of its perimeter fence wrecked. It had been abandoned after being battered in the battles between the Taliban and rival mujahedeen warlords fleeing to their northern enclaves.
After dislodging the Taliban from Kabul, the U.S.-led coalition began working with their warlord allies to rebuild Bagram, first with temporary structures that then turned permanent. Its growth was explosive, eventually swallowing up roughly 30 square miles.
“The closure of Bagram is a major symbolic and strategic victory for the Taliban,” said Bill Roggio, senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
FILE – In this May 26, 2020 file photo, prisoners are released from Bagram Prison inside Bagram Air Base, in Afghanistan. In 2001 the armies of the world united behind America and Bagram Air Base, barely an hours drive from the Afghan capital Kabul, was chosen as the epicenter of Operation Enduring Freedom, as the assault on the Taliban rulers was dubbed. It’s now nearly 20 years later and the last US soldier is soon to depart the base. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul, File)
“If the Taliban is able to take control of the base, it will serve as anti-U.S. propaganda fodder for years to come,” said Roggio who is also editor of the foundation’s Long War Journal.
It would also be a military windfall.
The enormous base has two runways. The most recent, at 12,000 feet long, was built in 2006 at a cost of $96 million. There are 110 revetments, which are basically parking spots for aircraft, protected by blast walls. GlobalSecurity, a security think tank, says Bagram includes three large hangars, a control tower and numerous support buildings. The base has a 50-bed hospital with a trauma bay, three operating movies” target=”_blank”>theaters< and food. Another section houses a crime” target=”_blank”>prison<
Zabihullah, who goes by one name, was released in 2020, four years after President Ashraf Ghani signed a peace deal with Hekmatyar.
Roggio says the status of the prison is a “major concern,” noting that many of its prisoners are known Taliban leaders or members of militant groups, including al-Qaida and the Islamic State group. It’s believed about 7,000 prisoners are still in the prison.
“If the base falls and the prison is overrun, these detainees can bolster the ranks of these terror groups,” Roggio said.
