I recently wrote a blog post for ARES (Armament Research Services), Silah Report is a subsidiary of ARES, about weapons captured by the Taliban during their 2021 offensive which toppled the Afghan Government. You can check out the article here.
This article will go over some of the modifications made to the weapons captured from ANSF (Afghan Security Forces) by the Taliban during their 2021 offensive. These modifications appear to have been made by the ANSF before they were captured.
Our guest speaker and main presenter in this week’s edition of the SR podcast is Ed Nash, author of Desert Sniper. Ed took part in the fighting against the so-called Islamic State when he travelled to Syria to fight with the Syrian Democratic Forces, ending up as a precision rifleman in the campaigns of Hasakah, Shadaddi, and eventually Minbij where he ended his tour. He covers everything from the odd tactics in use with the YPG, types of precision rifles employed, and some of the bits of kit that helped him through the fighting.
Recently disclosed photographs supplied to Silah Report have suggested that the local GoIRA supported militias are armed with more than the standard Kalashnikov self-loading rifles often seen throughout the country. One example of these forces is the Afghan Local Police, or ALP. Although these forces are seen as cost-effective, many local Afghans compare them to the days of the War Lords that roamed the country in the Civil War.
The photograph below depicts five 5.56x45mm NATO M4-patterned carbines in configurations that are identical to that of the ANA Commandos. This includes the AN/PEQ-2 TPIAL mounted at the 12 o’clock position on the Picatinny rail, the Trijicon 4x RCO day optic, the MaTech BUIS, and even the spray painted rifle in the center. Also present is a 40x46mm NATO M203 UBGL mounted to the carbine at the bottom. Notice on the painted carbine the coupled STANAG magazine inverted from a usual “rounds up” position.
As indicated by this photograph, a small arms inventory such as this is consistent with what the ANSF Commandos are generally issued.
This photograph was provided by the same source and features a similar magazine coupling technique as illustrated above. What appear to be UTG rail covers and what is most likely a Harris bipod copy appear to be third party modifications from the standard issue. Myna Bird perched on the 6-inch barrel comes unissued.
MaTech BUIS as in use.
However in this angle present are Streamlight TLR Picatinny mounted weapon lights, in addition to Kalashnikov patterned rifles, which are rarely in use by ANSF Commandos, if at all. Although rare, there are some TLRs that have been spotted among the group.
Although contextual information about the photographs are scare, a source has suggested that the militia checkpoints are perhaps funded by a shadow entity with a large supply budget. Such as the “Kandahar Strike Force” that was indeed set up by the CIA. In Afghanistan, this is immediately assumed to be the “CIA”, but until we have further information, we cannot venture more into the origins of these carbines.
Due to the efforts of ISAF forces during Operation Enduring Freedom, Taliban fighters had to change their tactics constantly to stay tactically ahead of coalition efforts. Because of the reliance on fire support assets and modern armament that much of ISAF could afford, the Taliban in Helmand and Kandahar provinces couldn’t sustain a protracted fight as they could against ANA or AUP positions. Thus the insurgent force had to adapt and overcome. One of the ways in which they employed small arms against ISAF forces was through their usage of compounds and firing positions. Being in Helmand or Kandahar, firing from an open position or fields is almost certainly suicide against ISAF forces because of the lack of egress routes and being cut down. Thus, many Taliban fighters adopted the technique of utilizing “murder holes” as firing positions from compounds. Most of these compounds were taken over from the families that owned them, often threatening them with death if they spoke to coalition forces about the compound’s usage.
Compound/housing structures in rural southern Afghanistan have a number of advantages for maneuver insurgent warfare. Because the walls are made from mud, they can have holes busted through them to use as firing ports, but at the same time can be extremely resistant to incoming rounds, even up to .50 BMG. These compound walls can be anywhere from six feet to twelve feet in height and easily conceal the numerous motorcycles that the Taliban used. Motorcycles are essential for the kind of “shoot n’ scoot”maneuver warfare because of the ease of transportation and the possibility of swiftly getting away from lumbering MRAPs and MAT-Vs along twisting narrow roads. In addition, a single PKM machine gun team could be concealed and broken up among three or five motorcycle driving Talibs. One carrying the receiver, another the barrel, another the ammunition. This way, all three could move to a new firing location discreetly, and most importantly separately.
The Taliban’s worst threat was being fixed in place and destroyed. The force knew that it could not sustain a long drawn out, small arms fight even against a single ISAF patrol. Once their position has become known, the key to surviving a protracted fight is to quickly pick up, mount up, and push to another firing position to further engage the patrol, preferably from a completely different angle than the first one. The problems thus presented to the ISAF patrol were twofold. One the one hand, it would be very difficult to determine the source of the fire, especially if it was from a PKM beyond 400-600 meters. And second, even if the Taliban location was found and positive identification was made, the patrol would have to maneuver around to get into a position to return accurate rifle and light machine gun fire, by which time the PKM position would already be broken down, and repositioned at a completely different angle to the patrol. This entire scenario is also not even taking into account the IED threat that complex ambushes would often be initiated with, thereby adding another layer of complexity to the mix of that ISAF patrol maneuvering.
Firing positions themselves are very well thought out. As an example in the title photograph, typically Talib fighters will use a pre-existing “murder hole” or they will create one themselves as the other photograph shows. Using blankets, they will place them underneath the PKM, and then on the base of the murder hole as well. This way, the ground blanket will catch all the spent shells, and the murder hole blanket will prevent the PKM from leaving black residue on the caked mud. When the MG team leaves the position, all they have to do is wrap up the blanket with shells in it, then use the murder hole blanket to conceal the PKM parts in it and the firing position will appear to have been relatively unoccupied even if an ISAF patrol were to literally get to it after a firefight.
And to conclude this analysis, this a Talib fighter wearing a Marine Corps woodland digital utility jacket!
Note- The title photograph of the firing position is actually of Government ALP fighters, and not Taliban fighters. This photograph was used because it does display what the TTPs that the Taliban utilize.
Mirwais Afghan published this on his Twitter feed earlier, of the Taliban deputy district chief for the Chaperhar district of Nangarhar province in eastern Afghanistan. He was recently killed by a U.S. airstrike. His AKM features a Trijicon RCO with what appears to be directly mounted to the receiver cover of the rifle, possibly via a rudimentary method of welding or otherwise non-standard mounting procedure.
Of course, if this is the case, accuracy will most likely suffer greatly because of the severe vibrations of the receiver cover during the course of fire. Maintaining zero will be next to impossible. But was a status piece for a deputy district chief, it will certainly get the point across.
Although very few in number, several news sources have documented the usage of 7.62x51mm SCAR-Heavy rifles in use by the Taliban in Afghanistan. The most recent documentation we have in the summer of 2016 covered by Lost Weapons on Twitter, in addition to the summer of 2015 as covered by Nathaniel F. on The Firearm Blog. There is a possibility that both of these SCAR-Hs are the same rifle over the course of two years, but we can’t exclude the fact that there may be more. How it got into the hands of the Taliban is possibly by way of the Afghan Commandos who are primarily armed with M4A1s but might have been supplied a SCAR-H by their U.S. Army advisors.
