The U.S. has reportedly handed Bagram Air Base back to Afghanistan after 20 years

Peter Weber, Senior editor
·2 min read
Bagram Air Base
Bagram Air Base Wakil Kohsar/AFP/Getty Images

The U.S. military has left Bagram Air Base after nearly 20 years and handed it over to Afghanistan, two U.S. officials told The Associated Press on Friday. President Biden said U.S. forces will be out of Afghanistan by Sept. 11, but the handover of Bagram Air Base to the Afghan National Security and Defense Force is the latest sign the pullout date will be much sooner, closer to July 4. Most of the 7,000 allied NATO troops have already quietly left the country, AP reports, citing announcements from several European countries.

Bagram Air Base, first built by the Soviet Union in the 1950s, was the center of military power after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the U.S. "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," AP reports. Under U.S. control, CNN adds, "the airfield became a small city in its own right, complete with shops, gyms, and classrooms for the thousands of service members and contractors who worked at the base and its facilities."

In 2012, more than 100,000 U.S. troops passed through Bagram, about an hour's drive north of Kabul, the capital, and Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump all visited the air base. Bagram has two giant runways, three large hangars, a 50-bed hospital, and a notorious prison. Over the past few days, crews have loaded the last of what was deemed valuable enough to remove onto C-17 cargo planes. U.S. Central Command said Tuesday the U.S. military has destroyed another 16,000 piece of equipment.

When the U.S.-led Resolute Support Mission has officially wound down, the U.S. will still have about 650 troops protecting the sprawling U.S. embassy in Kabul under a separate agreement with the Afghan government. The Resolute Support agreement will likely stay in effect until the U.S., Turkey, and Afghanistan work out security arrangements for Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport. The future of Afghanistan's elected government is uncertain as the Taliban makes gains in several parts of the country.

You may also like

Men are rapidly losing their close friends, poll finds

Texas nonprofit shares bizarre cheat sheet for identifying CRT buzzwords in the classroom

Anti-woke zealots are trying to politically purge the military

Our goal is to create a safe and engaging place for users to connect over interests and passions. In order to improve our community experience, we are temporarily suspending article commenting

Recommended Stories

  • Era ends, war looms as U.S. forces quit main base in Afghanistan

    KABUL (Reuters) -American troops pulled out of their main military base in Afghanistan on Friday, leaving behind a piece of the World Trade Center they buried 20 years ago in a country that the top U.S. commander has warned may descend into civil war without them. "All American soldiers and members of NATO forces have left the Bagram air base," said a senior U.S. security official on condition of anonymity. Though a few more troops have yet to withdraw from another base in the capital Kabul, the Bagram pullout brings an effective end to the longest war in American history.

  • EXPLAINER: When is the US war in Afghanistan really over?

    As the last U.S. combat troops prepare to leave Afghanistan, the question arises: When is the war really over? An emboldened Taliban insurgency is making battlefield gains, and prospective peace talks are stalled. For the United States and its coalition partners, the endgame is murky.

  • Taliban has won the war in Afghanistan, says Lord Dannatt as UK and US troops pull out

    The Taliban has “prevailed” in its battle with the West in Afghanistan, the former head of the British Army has said, as it emerged all UK and US troops will be withdrawn on Sunday. Writing in The Telegraph, General Lord Dannatt said the mission had been intended to give the Afghan people the choice of a more “moderate and peaceful” life. “Ultimately, Taliban force of arms has prevailed, and the people of that country have been denied the chance to choose a better way of life,” Lord Dannatt said

  • Tucker Carlson reportedly tells people at Fox News he voted for Kanye West

    Tucker Carlson reportedly tells people at Fox News he voted for Kanye West

  • Democrat calls Noem's use of private money to send military to southern border 'dangerous'

    Rep. Adam Smith, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, called South Dakota's use of private funds to send National Guard members to the southern border "unbelievably dangerous."

  • Air Force special operators face a 'particularly hard' transition after Middle East wars, top general says

    "If it were easy, somebody else would would be able to do it," Lt. Gen. James Slife, AFSOC commander, said in February.

  • ‘Nobody’s winning’ as drought upends life in US West basin

    Ben DuVal knelt in a barren field near the California-Oregon border and scooped up a handful of parched soil as dust devils whirled around him and birds flitted between empty irrigation pipes. DuVal’s family has farmed the land for three generations, and this summer, for the first time ever, he and hundreds of others who rely on irrigation from a depleted, federally managed lake aren't getting any water from it at all. As farmland goes fallow, Native American tribes along the 257-mile-long (407-kilometer) river that flows from the lake to the Pacific watch helplessly as fish that are inextricable from their diet and culture die in droves or fail to spawn in shallow water.

  • Emmanuel Macron warns France is becoming 'increasingly racialised' in outburst against woke culture

    Emmanuel Macron on Thursday warned against the dangers of US-style woke culture in France, saying that debate in the country was becoming increasingly “racialised”. The French president said that creeping racial and identity politics risked “fracturing” the foundations of French society. "I see that our society is becoming progressively racialised," Mr Macron told Elle magazine in an interview coinciding with a UN-sponsored summit on gender inequality in Paris. In particular, he took aim at “int

  • Migrants steal guns and ammunition from Texas ranch house: Border Patrol

    Border Patrol apprehended three migrants Tuesday after they allegedly stole guns and ammunition from a Hudspeth County, Texas, ranch house, agents said.

  • Charlize Theron says the Old Guard sequel will begin filming next year

    A year after its release, The Old Guard continues to hold a certain pride of place among the roster of Netflix’s various original action films. The Charlize Theron-led streamer (directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood, and written by Greg Rucka from his own original comic) was a well-made, good-looking superhero action flick that also happened to arrive online at the exact moment to dull a bit of the pain of the COVID-19 lockdowns. Or, as Tom Breihan put it in his Age Of Heroes column about the film:

  • The Latest: Pakistan gets 2.5M doses of Moderna from U.S.

    Pakistan received 2.5 million doses of the Moderna vaccine from the United States on Friday, easing pressure on Islamabad in overcoming the shortage of COVID-19 vaccines. According to a U.S. embassy statement, the vaccines were delivered to the Pakistani people in partnership with the COVAX global vaccine initiative, UNICEF, and the government of Pakistan. It says this donation was part of the 80 million doses the United States was sharing with the world, “delivering on our pledge to facilitate equitable global access to safe and effective vaccines, which are essential to ending the COVID-19 pandemic.”

  • China building 100 missile launchpads across desert in 'incredible' expansion of nuclear capabilities

    China is building 100 new missile silos in the northwestern desert, according to satellite imagery, raising fears of an 'incredible' expansion of its nuclear capabilities. The satellites picked up construction work on a site near Yumen, including underground bunkers, cable trenches, roads and a small military base, according to researchers from James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies. The silos seem to mirror existing launch facilitie

  • Allen Weisselberg’s former daughter-in-law on tax fraud: ‘It was Donald’

    Jennifer Weisselberg, Allen Weisselberg's former daughter-in-law, reacts to the indictment of Weisselberg and the Trump Organization, and says Donald Trump was behind the alleged tax scheme.

  • China June rentals surge as record numbers of college leavers seek accommodation

    China's home rental prices rose by their fastest for at least 2-1/2 years, according to a private survey, as record numbers of college graduates flocked to big cities in search of jobs as the economy recovers from the coronavirus pandemic. Average prices in 40 cities rose 2.1% in June from a month earlier, compared with May's 0.78% increase, statistics from Zhuge House Hunter, one of China's largest independent real estate research firms, showed on Thursday. Such cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, are the top locations for young job seekers, Zhuge House Hunter said.

  • US hands Bagram Airfield to Afghans after nearly 20 years

    After nearly 20 years, the U.S. military left Bagram Airfield, the epicenter of its war to oust the Taliban and hunt down the al-Qaida perpetrators of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on America, two U.S. officials said Friday. The airfield was handed over to the Afghan National Security and Defense Force in its entirety, they said on condition they not be identified because they were not authorized to release the information to the media. One of the officials also said the U.S. top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Austin S. Miller, “still retains all the capabilities and authorities to protect the forces.”

  • Biden aide charges "sabotage" of Harris after flood of damaging leaks

    Top White House officials are mobilizing to defend Vice President Kamala Harris amid a gusher of leaks about dysfunction and infighting in her office.Driving the news: White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain told Axios in a statement: "The President's trust and confidence in her is obvious when you see them in the Oval Office together." Biden senior adviser Cedric Richmond said in an interview late Thursday night: "It’s a whisper campaign designed to sabotage her."Get market news worthy of your tim

  • Blumhouse sues Hulu over claims it got stiffed for trying to fix Boss Level

    How much is Blumhouse’s reputation as the go-to studio for quick, slightly dirty, and frequently successful genre filmmaking worth? That’s at the heart of a new legal complaint that Jason Blum’s studio has issued against both Hulu and Emmett Furla Oasis Films, the studio behind this year’s Frank Grillo action vehicle Boss Level. Remember Boss Level? Time loop action movie with a smattering of video game logic? Grillo keeps getting killed? Mel Gibson is in it as part of the “I’m a gritty action h

  • Man to be charged for not wearing mask in MRT train, public nuisance

    A 39-year-old man will be charged on Friday (2 July) for failing to wear a mask while in an MRT train, public nuisance and using threatening words towards police officers who were on duty.

  • Texas sheriffs and ICE officers sue Biden for not deporting criminal illegal immigrants

    Texas sheriffs have filed a lawsuit accusing the Biden administration of preventing federal officials from arresting or deporting criminal illegal immigrants.

  • A Former Cop Charged In The Capitol Attack Has Amassed An Arsenal Of Weapons Since Jan. 6

    Thomas Robertson, who was released from custody on the condition that he not possess firearms, had an M4 rifle, ammunition, and a partial pipe bomb when authorities searched his home. And he had just ordered 34 more guns online.View Entire Post ›