Taliban Aims to Manufacture Suicide Drones as “Messengers of Allah”

Four years after Joe Biden’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, the weaponry and technology left behind by evacuating U.S. forces may have the Taliban on the precipice of unlocking new military drone capabilities that could terrorize the Middle East.

The latest reports from Afghan opposition groups allege that the Taliban have now gained the knowledge, skills, and instructors to weaponize abandoned U.S. military drone equipment, as well as Iranian attack drones. As a result, the Ministry of Education has introduced training programs on drone construction, operation, and mechanics at nearly all jihadi schools.

“During the conflict with the former Afghan government and Western forces, the Taliban experienced significant casualties due to airstrikes and drone attacks carried out by the U.S. and NATO,” reads a new 20-page report. “This experience has highlighted for the group the critical need for an air force and drones, particularly suicide bombers, as they now strive to fill this military void.”

As the Daily Mail reported earlier this year, the Taliban have been using a former SAS base “to develop an ‘air force’ of kamikaze drones capable of striking well beyond their country’s borders.” Drones are also being constructed at a former U.S. base, Camp Phoenix. “Hundreds” of international drone experts have flooded to Afghanistan to assist the Taliban, including an engineer educated in the U.K. with links to Osama bin Laden.

The Taliban developers are reportedly copying several drone models, including the MQ9 Reaper, an American system, and the Shahed 136, which is Iranian. They have also carried out several successful tests of suicide drones.

The architect of the program is Sirajuddin Haqqani, a terrorist leader who now serves as Acting Interior Minister in the Taliban regime and first deputy leader of Afghanistan. Sirajuddin is the son of Jalaluddin Haqqani, who founded the Haqqani network, a bloodthirsty terrorist organization responsible for multiple deadly attacks on U.S. and coalition forces. Sirajuddin himself was involved in planning several high-profile bombings that killed Americans.

A retired Japanese intelligence official who requested anonymity told me that Sirajuddin Haqqani came up with the idea to take advantage of the American drone technology just days after U.S. forces left their bases. Amid the rush and chaos, the U.S. forces left behind intact unused drones, launch sites, repair equipment, and even some engines.

Haqqani discovered these treasures at Shindand Air Base, near the Iranian border, as well as at Camp Dwyer and Camp Leatherneck. Additional technology was also found at Bagram and Kandahar bases. The Haqqani intelligence group, operating independently of the Taliban’s official intelligence, now controls all the material findings. Even representatives from the Chinese and Russian militaries, who visited the bases with Taliban permission, were denied access to the drone equipment.

Western analysts believe that, along with a widespread education program, the Haqqani Network, with the assistance of other jihadi groups, concealed drone laboratories in the Koh-e Hindukush mountains in Parwan province in the northeast.

This project has the full support of the Taliban government, as emphasized by Deputy Prime Minister for Economics Abdul Ghani Baradar. “This is the age of technology, as drones and missiles are being launched from one continent to another,” he said, as reported by opposition groups. “They should become the messengers of Allah.”

In September, the Taliban Institute of Technical and Vocational Education recognized engineers who created prototypes and mock-ups of drones and drone infrastructure at its exhibitions in Kabul. The Ministry of Education, which has conducted a widespread campaign to suppress the study of modern science and removed many theoretical courses, nonetheless added a course on drones to its curriculum of “Islamic culture.”

“It appears that the Taliban are seeking a shortcut to acquire knowledge of modern military technologies that would enable domestic production, but without promoting the foundational sciences necessary for understanding these technologies,” said Dr. Jean-Claude Furneaux, who was a U.N. diplomat during the Afghan civil war in the mid-1990s.

The Taliban and Haqqani Network are particularly interested in suicide drones, the “messengers of Allah.” One retired intelligence officer told me that, with the knowledge it has obtained, the Haqqani network could shop for parts to make new drones in China, Iran, and Russia. “International weapons smugglers are also eager to provide their best services,” he said. “The Taliban are attractive customers because they pay generously in gold and rare metals.”

Although the drone project is still in its early stages and the Taliban may not currently pose a serious international threat, the United States and the West should be wary of another Islamist nation building up any sort of military arsenal. Like their neighbors to the West in Iran, the Taliban are eager to rain death and destruction throughout the free world – and they are now seeking to build the modern technology to do just that.

Ben Solis is the pen name of an international affairs journalist, historian, and researcher.