Inside the Final Hours at Kabul Airport
Alone on the airfield after hundreds of other U.S. troops had left, five handpicked joint tactical exfiltration crews blew up the last remaining defenses and took off in the dark.
By Tara Copp
Senior Pentagon Reporter, Defense One
August 30, 2021
Marine Corps
The final hours of the 20-year war in Afghanistan were some of the most dangerous.
“The security perimeter was steadily collapsing around the planes” at Hamid Karzai International Airport, a defense official said on the condition they not be named.
The emergency airlift operation that began Aug. 14 had become the largest ever executed by the U.S. military, involving more than half of the U.S. Air Force’s fleet of 222 C-17 Globemaster IIIs. As the clock ticked toward Aug. 31, just five airlifters remained on the ground in Kabul, manned by handpicked joint tactical exfiltration crews who were taking care of the last tasks on the ground.
https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2021/08/inside-final-hours-kabul-airport/184975/
