On 15th August 2021, the Taliban insurgents had entered Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan. At that exact time, the US was evacuating its diplomats from the embassy in Kabul with the help of a helicopter. The senior officer had said that the Taliban were coming in from all sides. Actually, the Taliban had taken all the preparation needed to capture Kabul beforehand. They had surrounded the fort and kept ammunition ready. The citizens of Afghanistan heard the sound of firing too.
Taliban point of view
The Taliban said they did not want to do so when reporters asked them about it. They wanted to peacefully occupy Kabul. Before Kabul, they had captured the city of Jalalabad without any sign of violence because the head of the city submitted to their demands. He was submissive to the Taliban’s demands.
Help of the US against the Taliban
The troops used the fortified Wazir Akbar Khan district to ferry the US officials from the embassy to the airport. To help with the evacuation of the citizens of Kabul as well, the US would send more troops. After the Taliban captured Kabul, only the airport was in the government’s hands as a way to flee the country.
Taliban’s reaction
In a video, the Taliban members were cheering and shouting Allahu Akbar (God is greatest) as a number of pick-up trucks entered the city with fighters holding machine guns. The white Taliban flag was soaring high in the troubled sky of Afghanistan.
As the military defense systems of Afghanistan appeared to collapse, the Taliban forces paved their way into the country. Joe Biden, the president gave orders to 5000 US troops to help Afghanistan with the evacuation of its citizens. It included 1000 newly approved troops from the 82nd Airborne Division.
The reaction of the Afgan citizens
Thousands of Afghan nationals gathered at the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul. They were in a hurry to leave Afghanistan as the Taliban took over the country.
The crowd mobbed the airport’s tarmac. On finding no other alternative, the US troops started firing in the air. The heavy gunfire killed at least five people. On the next day, a lot of chaos erupted at the airport. So, the government canceled all civilian flights. Desperate to leave the country, two people tied themselves to the wheels of a military plane that was taking off from the runaway. A video showed that those two people fell off the flight mid-air and were found dead. This happened shortly after the take-off.
