Follow us on social

Commandos-scaled

US-trained Afghan commandos join Russian campaign in Ukraine

This is what happens when we leave our friends behind.

Analysis | Asia-Pacific

According to two key reports by Foreign Policy and Associated Press this week, Afghan commandos trained by the United States military during our war there are going to fight Ukrainians on behalf of a Russia for $1500 a month.

“They don’t want to go fight — but they have no choice,” said one of the former Afghan generals who spoke to the AP, emphasizing the fear the commandos have of being deported back to Afghanistan. “They ask me, ‘Give me a solution. What should we do? If we go back to Afghanistan, the Taliban will kill us.’”

So this is where the U.S. war in Afghanistan, the withdrawal, and Washington's failure to keep these men and their families safe from Taliban vengeance has left them: fighting for the descendants of the former Afghan enemy (the Soviet Union) in a Ukrainian hellscape 3,000 miles away.

While there are tens of thousands of Special Immigrant Visa holders/applicants (translators and others who worked closely with the U.S. State Department or military over a 20-year span) still waiting to leave Afghanistan, the soldiers headed to Ukraine are among the 20,000-30,000 Afghan commandos who worked with U.S. forces but do not qualify for an official ticket out of the country because they did not technically work for Uncle Sam.

These men were stood up, trained, and paid for with American taxpayer dollars, but that doesn't matter, according to the AP. While "a couple of hundred" were airlifted out during the U.S. withdrawal in August 2021, the remaining are getting out any way they can. Afghanistan, writes AP reporter Bernard Condon, is rife with stories of Taliban fighters going door-to-door looking for these guys, "torturing or killing them, or doing the same to family members if they are nowhere to be found."

So the Russians, who need all recruits they can get, are reportedly bringing these Navy SEAL/Green Beret-trained commandos in. No one knows how many. Another irony is that these trained fighters, considered among the fiercest in Afghanistan, will be facing Ukrainian fighters, also trained by U.S. special forces. Perhaps, they may even face their former American partners, many of whom have gone to Ukraine to fight the Russians.

We talk about Great Power politics, but this is Great Power abuse. Now, our former battlefield compatriots will be killing Ukrainians, the very people we are supposed to be aiding, or vice versa. While Biden has so far kept U.S. troops from the ground there, our hands are far from clean.


Afghan Commando forces armoured convoy leaves toward the front line, at the Ghorband District, Parwan Province, Afghanistan June 29, 2021. REUTERS/Omar Sobhani
Analysis | Asia-Pacific
operating table
Top photo credit: Inside Creative House/Shutterstock

On Russia-Ukraine, the misdiagnosed patient is flatlining

Europe

With the imposition of new U.S. sanctions on Russian oil producers and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s dismissal of visiting Russian envoy Kirill Dmitriev as a “propagandist,” the Trump administration’s efforts to end the war in Ukraine seem to be hanging by a thread.

Their success or failure will depend on a simple premise: one must understand a problem in order to resolve it. Unfortunately, the West has been misdiagnosing the problem it faces in Ukraine for more than a decade, with increasingly tragic consequences. And the time in which President Trump can correct this diagnosis — and corresponding policy prescription — is quickly running out.

keep readingShow less
Why German rearmament isn't happening
Top image credit: German Chancellor Friedrich Merz arrives at the European Council meeting, where EU leaders gathered to discuss Ukraine, European defense, recent developments in the Middle East, competitiveness, housing and migration, in Brussels, on October 23, 2025.

Why German rearmament isn't happening

Europe

On October 13, Germany’s government had to cancel at the last minute a press conference at which it planned to announce a new bill expanding military conscription. It was the result of disagreements between the two major parties in the governing coalition, the Social Democrats (SPD) and Christian Democrats (CDU/CSU).

This episode reveals the fundamental fragility of Berlin’s much-touted defense renewal.

keep readingShow less
Patriot-missile
An MIM-104 Patriot missile is fired by members of Battery B, 8th Battalion, 43rd Air Defense Artillery. (US National Archives)

Inflating Russian missile costs hides our own weapons crisis

Europe

The West likes to inflate the cost of Russian weapons as a way to suggest Moscow is in a financial bind and manipulate the narrative of a looming Ukraine victory — while also masking real inefficiencies in the U.S. defense industry.

By assuming Russian weapons have input costs similar to U.S. systems or conflating export prices with Russia’s internal costs, Western estimates produce misleading figures. These inflated costs bolster the narrative that the strain on Moscow is tremendous, while downplaying the increasing challenges for Ukraine and NATO to effectively counter Russia’s relatively inexpensive missiles and drones.

keep readingShow less

LATEST

QIOSK

Newsletter

Subscribe now to our weekly round-up and don't miss a beat with your favorite RS contributors and reporters, as well as staff analysis, opinion, and news promoting a positive, non-partisan vision of U.S. foreign policy.