1.媒體來源:
英國衛報 The Guardian
2.記者署名:
Peter Beaumont
3.完整新聞標題:
Afghan anger over US’s sudden, silent Bagram departure
4.完整新聞內文:
簡略翻譯摘要
上禮拜五7/2晚間，在巴格拉姆機場的空軍基地
阿富汗政府軍突然發現怎麼斷電斷水了
原本以為是塔利班打過來，沒想到是美軍全數撤離
美軍很替地球著想，關門前連水跟電都關了
在停電停水的時間，空軍基地慘遭洗劫
美軍因為怕塔利班在美軍撤退的時候攻擊美軍
所以瞞著阿富汗政府軍就偷跑了
阿富汗政府軍整個氣炸
US forces shut off the Bagram airfield’s electricity supply and did not
notify the base’s senior Afghan officer when they departed on Friday,
prompting puzzlement and anger among Afghan soldiers there.
The airfield’s new commander, Gen Mir Asadullah Kohistani, only discovered
the Americans’ departure more than two hours after they left, he said on
Monday.
The fresh details of the American forces’ stealthy nighttime withdrawal from
the sprawling base near Kabul, where they had spent two decades, underlined
the uneasiness with which US forces sometimes regarded their Afghan partners.
“We [heard] some rumour that the Americans had left Bagram … and finally by
7am we understood that it was confirmed that they had already left”
Kohistani told Associated Press.
“We did not know of their timeline for departure. They did not tell us when
they left,” added the commander during a tour of the evacuated and
now-looted base for journalists.
Kohistani’s account appeared to contradict a statement issued last week by
the US that its forces had co-ordinated their departure from various bases
with Afghan leaders. In response to Kohistani’s account, US spokesman Col
Sonny Leggett referred back to the statement.
With 3,000 troops under his command, Kohistani’s forces are far smaller than
the US military presence at the base during its heyday when Bagram resembled
a small, if heavily militarised, town with its coffee shops, sports
facilities, fast food chains and even a cinema.
Commenting on the capabilities of Afghan forces in Bagram, who are expecting
to be attacked by a resurgent Taliban, he added: “You know, if we compare
ourselves with the Americans, it’s a big difference. But according to our
capabilities … we are trying to do the best and as much as possible secure
and serve all the people.”
Within 20 minutes of the US’s silent departure on Friday, the electricity
was shut down and the base was plunged into darkness, said Abdul Raouf, a
soldier of 10 years who has also served in Taliban strongholds of Helmand and
Kandahar provinces.
The sudden darkness was like a signal to the looters, he said. They entered
from the north, smashing through the first barrier, ransacking buildings,
loading anything that was not nailed down into trucks.
“In one night they lost all the goodwill of 20 years by leaving the way they
did, in the night, without telling the Afghan soldiers who were outside
patrolling the area,” another Afghan soldier told AP.
The new details of last week’s secretive withdrawal under cover of darkness
came as Afghan authorities deployed hundreds of commandos and pro-government
militiamen on Tuesday to counter the Taliban’s blistering offensive in the
north, a day after more than 1,000 government troops fled into neighbouring
Tajikistan.
Fighting has raged across several provinces, but the insurgents have focused
primarily on carrying out a devastating campaign across the northern
countryside, seizing dozens of districts in the past two months.
“We are planning to launch a big offensive to retake the lost territories
from the enemy,” Fawad Aman, a spokesman for the Ministry of Defence, told
AFP. “Our forces are being organised on the ground for this operation.”
Troops and pro-government militiamen were deployed in the northern provinces
of Takhar and Badakhshan where the Taliban have captured swathes of territory
at lighting speed, often without any fighting.
The US announced on Friday it had completely vacated its biggest airfield in
the country in advance of a final withdrawal that the Pentagon says will be
completed by the end of August.
The statement said the handover of the many bases had been in process soon
after President Joe Biden’s mid-April announcement that the US was
withdrawing the last of its forces.
Before the Afghan army could take control of the airfield about an hour’s
drive from the Afghan capital, Kabul, it was invaded by a small army of
looters, who ransacked barracks and storage tents before being evicted,
according to Afghan military officials.
Kohistani insisted the Afghan forces could hold on to the heavily fortified
base despite a string of Taliban victories on the battlefield. The airfield
also includes a prison with about 5,000 prisoners, many of them allegedly
Taliban.
The militants’ latest surge comes as the last US and Nato forces pull out of
the country. As of last week, most Nato soldiers had already quietly left.
The last US soldiers are likely to remain until an agreement to protect the
Kabul airport, which is expected to be undertaken by Turkey, is completed.
Meanwhile, in northern Afghanistan, district after district has fallen to the
Taliban. In just the last two days, hundreds of Afghan soldiers fled across
the border into Tajikistan rather than fight the insurgents. “In battle it
is sometimes one step forward and some steps back,” said Kohistani.
The general said the Afghan military was changing its strategy to focus on
the strategic districts. He insisted they would retake them in the coming
days without saying how that would be accomplished.
Kohistani said the US left behind 3.5m objects, all itemised by the departing
military. They include tens of thousands of water bottles, energy drinks and
military ready-made meals.
They also include thousands of civilian vehicles, many of them without keys
to start them, and hundreds of armoured vehicles. Kohistani said the US also
left behind small weapons and the ammunition for them, but the departing
troops took heavy weapons with them
The Afghan soldiers who wandered through the base that had once housed as
many as 100,000 US troops were deeply critical of how they had left Bagram,
going in the night without telling the Afghan soldiers who were patrolling
the perimeter.
On Monday, three days after the US departure, Afghan soldiers were still
collecting piles of rubbish that included empty water bottles, cans and empty
energy drinks left behind by the looters.
5.完整新聞連結 (或短網址):
https://bit.ly/3jOOGHp
6.備註:
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