kabul

How YOU can make a difference in Afghanistan

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Silah Report has studied the small arms history, traditions and culture of Middle East & North Africa for many years. Our founder Miles Vining is an Afghanistan veteran and has worked with organisations as a civilian. The US’ hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan has created a humanitarian nightmare centred around a chaotic evacuation from Kabul. There … Read more

The Captured Cannon of Kabul, 1879

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In 1869, the Emir of Afghanistan, Sher Ali Khan, began a process to rapidly improve the quality and quantity of artillery pieces in the Afghan Army. Informed by the experiences of the First Anglo-Afghan War (1839 to 1842) and internal territorial wars that he had previously fought, Sher Ali was determined to see his forces equipped with the latest rifled iron breech-loading guns. Whilst he was able to achieve this, his successes would be short-lived. Ultimately, failings in leadership and discipline would prove more important than his modernised guns.

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Stars and Rifles Part 2: Afghanistan’s Eight-Point Crest

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By 1879, the so-called Great Game between the Russian Empire and Great Britain over Central-Asia entered one of its final phases after the British victory in the Second Anglo-Afghan War. In the web of diplomatic and political maneuvers so apparent during this turbulent period, it was of paramount importance for the British Crown to keep the Russians at bay and reduce their influence on Afghanistan as much as possible. In this article, we will examine the markings on Afghanistan’s indigenously produced rifles.

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Vantage View of the Kabul Arsenal

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In a post for The Firearm Blog, we were able to find a photograph of the Kabul Arsenal from the late 1800s. In trying to locate the arsenal through the photograph, we actually were able to replicate the photograph today by climbing up “Kohe-Asmayee”, the hill that lies across the Asmayee River from the Kabul Arsenal.

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Small Arms Theft Kabul Edition (Again)

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Tolo News has recently reported on a small arms theft from within the Interior Ministry’s headquarters compound in the northern part of Kabul by the international airport. This comes after another major small arms theft that occurred in March of this year. From the news report-

The office has received documents against 14 officials of the ministry over the loss of 105 AK-47 guns, 18 missiles, 80 mortars and 5,000 machine gun bullets.

Two of those accused employees have fled, two of them are in detention and 10 others have been released on bail, Attorney General’s Office spokesman Jamshid Rasuli told TOLOnews.

The nomenclature appears to have gone through some translation confusion when it comes to “missiles” and “mortars”. Kabuli Police certainly don’t use mortars so it would appear that missiles might mean RPG-7 launchers and mortars might be the PG-7 rockets for them. Machine gun bullets might also be a bit of a confusion because why would a thief make out with 105 AKM rifles but no 7.62x39mm ammunition to go with? If indeed these are 7.62x54mmR “Machine Gun Bullets”? Either way, on the current black market those AKMs sell for over a thousand dollars a rifle.

Two significant thefts of small arms within the Ministry of Interior are certainly not good news. It would appear that both of these might purely be financially black market driven rather than the work of an insurgent organization such as the Taliban or ISIS-K. Either way, both involved internal cooperation and were not by a forced or armed nature of attack.

70 Firearms Stolen from Kabul Police Station

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A report on Television One has revealed that 70 firearms and a number of cameras capable of operating at night (possibly meaning infrared capabilities) have been stolen from a central Police armory in Kabul. The article inferred that the firearms were possibly being smuggled to Pakistan but this isn’t known as of yet.

From Television One–

منابع خبرداده اند که هفتاد میل جنگ افزار از یک ذخیرگاه مهمات پولیس در کابل دزدی شده است.

منابع امنیتی که نخواستند نام شان فاش شود از دزدی شدن هفتاد میل جنگ افزار و سه دوربین در ذخیرگاه های مهمات پولیس در کابل خبر داده اند.

این جنگ افزارها شامل تفنگچه ها و دوربین های شب بین بوده که از یک بخش حمایوی پولیس در کابل دزدی شده است.

بر بنیاد گفته های منابع، چندین تن از سوی وزارت داخله در پیوند به این رویداد بازداشت شده اند.

با وجود تلاش های زیاد وزارت امور داخله نخواست در این باره ابراز نظر کند، اما یک مقام وزارت داخله به تلویزیون یک این موضوع را تایید کرده گفت، بررسی ها درباره این موضوع جریان دارد.

Firearms being stolen from a central police repository is somewhat alarming, especially that observing that it has happened the day before Now-Ruz, or the Persian New Year. There is the possibility that maybe the theft was to supply a possible attack in the upcoming festivities but this is most likely not the case as the firearms stolen were mostly handguns. This is most likely a case of lax regulations right before the holiday and an insider taking advantage of them. Similar to many other attacks and thefts within the Afghan government, this was most likely an inside job possibly helped by a corrupt official.