Afghan Military Trainees Have Gone AWOL in the U.S.

A report from the Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) revealed that 152 out of 320 foreign military trainees that went Absent Without Leave (AWOL) while training in the United States since 2005, were from Afghanistan.

Between 2005-2017, 253,977 foreign trainees came to the United States for training, 2,537 of these trainees were from Afghanistan.

Currently of the 152 which went AWOL, 70 fled the United States, 39 obtained legal status, 27 were arrested, removed or are being processed for removal from the U.S. 13 are currently AWOL and unaccounted for, and 3 are no longer AWOL. Almost all the soldiers who fled during training were at the rank of lieutenant or captain. 56 of the Afghan Security trainees who went AWOL were stationed at the Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas.

Once an individual goes AWOL, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) under the Department of Homeland Security is responsible for investigating the trainee’s whereabouts.

Several of the trainees who went AWOL and were found, were interviewed and of their responses the three most common for leaving was, they did not expect a job upon return to Afghanistan, that they were asked to pay bribes to get their jobs back if returned, and that the Taliban was visiting their homes, sending letters and receiving phone calls threatening their families because of involvement with the U.S.

Each of the Afghan trainees that were administered to the U.S. were granted a A-2 visa. This is usually given to full-time employees assigned to the government, government officials, and military members station at a U.S. base. However, due to the number of individuals gone AWOL, the government should consider other means of vetting foreign military trainees.

There have been several responses  from Congressmembers such as Senator Grassley (R-IA) saying that, “This is bad for national security, bad for Afghan military readiness, and bad for U.S. taxpayers.” Senator McCaskill (D-MO) who also responded saying, “the fact that any of them remain unaccounted for is deeply concerning and it’s important we get more information on how this happened.” The State Department also responded to the report saying that the number of AWOL cases was “unacceptably high.”

In a separate report released in early October, SIGAR reviewed the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) and U.S. decisions from the 15-year campaign in the country. This report noted major problems of the ANDSF including high attrition, low re-enlistment rates, high illiteracy rates in administrative support systems, as well as a tendency to over-prioritize force protection, which leads for ANDSF to limit missions to urban areas in an attempt to reduce casualties.

The Taliban uses of rural areas to their advantage as a platform to plan and launch assaults into urban area, enabled by the lack of Afghan forces in these areas.  This only prolongs the fight against the terror group.

President Trump on August 21st  discussed a new strategy for American involvement in Afghanistan. In this plan he decided to abandon the fixed timeline of removal of troops from the country, and intends to train 17,000 new member of the Afghan special forces unit, the only Afghan unit with high marks for reenlistment and mission success. Trump’s proposal is primarily focused on tackling the role of Pakistan in funding and harboring terrorist groups which destabilize Afghanistan.

The report is very concerning as a high risk national security threat. While there haven’t been any terror-related attacks tied to AWOL Afghan soldiers, having individuals unaccounted whose motives or intentions remain unknown is worrisome.

The different military bases which hold the trainees need to account for these individuals more closely, with better cooperation between the military and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.   ICE needs to act quickly and effectively to investigate the locations of the remaining individuals that are AWOL before a serious event occurs.