Islamic Defence Force of Afghanistan

The Afghan Army was effectively disbanded after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan. The Taliban maintained 400 T-54/55 and T-62 tanks and more than 200 armoured personnel carriers.[1][2] The Taliban also began training its own army and commanders, some of whom were secretly trained by the Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence and Pakistani Armed Forces around the Durand Line. After the removal of the Taliban government in late 2001, private armies loyal to warlords gained more and more influence. In mid-2001, Ali Ahmed Jalali wrote:[3]

The army (as a state institution, organized, armed, and commanded by the state) does not exist in Afghanistan today. Neither the Taliban-led "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" nor the "Islamic State of Afghanistan" headed by the ousted President Rabbani has the political legitimacy or administrative efficiency of a state. The militia formations they command are composed of odd assortments of armed groups with varying level of loyalties, political commitment, professional skills, and organizational integrity. Many of them feel free to switch sides, shift loyalties, and join or leave the group spontaneously. The country suffers from the absence of a top political layer capable of controlling individual and group violence. ... Although both sides identify their units with military formations of the old regime, there is hardly any organizational or professional continuity from the past. But these units really exist in name only ... in fact only their military bases still exist, accommodating and supporting an assortment of militia groups.

The Afghan Air Force under the Taliban maintained five supersonic MiG-21MFs and 10 Sukhoi-22 fighter-bombers.[4] In 1995, during the 1995 Airstan incident, a Taliban fighter plane captured a Russian transport. They also held six Mil Mi-8 helicopters, five Mi-35s, five L-39Cs, six An-12s, 25 An-26s, a dozen An-24 and An-32s, an IL-18, and a Yakovlev.[5] Their civil air service contained two Boeing 727A/Bs, a Tu-154, five An-24s, and a DHC-6.[5]

The Afghan Air Force under the Taliban did not see action in the Afghan Civil War and almost all aircraft were destroyed by the US in the War in Afghanistan (2001–present). Most of the MiG-21 fleet met their end in an Afghan junkyard. The roundel of most of the aircraft was a washed over DRAAF Roundel with the green paint of the Taliban.[6][7]

On 3 August 1995 a Taliban Air Force MiG-21 aircraft forced the Russian aircraft to land at Kandahar.[8][9] Negotiations between the Russian government and the Taliban to free the men stalled for over a year and efforts by American senator Hank Brown to mediate between the two parties broke down over a prisoner exchange.[10] The Taliban stated that they would free the airmen if the Russians released Afghans held by the Russian government. However the Russians denied holding any Afghan citizens. Brown was able to get the Taliban to agree that the Russian crew should be allowed to maintain their aircraft.[10] This request paved the way for their escape.[10]

The abandoned wreckage of a Taliban MiG-21

According to the testimony of Guantanamo captives before their Combatant Status Review Tribunals, the Taliban, in addition to conscripting men to serve as soldiers, also conscripted men to staff its civil service.[12]