'Now hiring': Pentagon recruits ex-Afghan forces for Ukraine training

A military-diplomatic source told TASS on Monday that the Pentagon will start training former Afghan pilots in California to deploy them to Ukraine via Poland, adding: "As we know, the Pentagon began recruiting former Afghan pilots who ran to the US together with the Americans a year ago. Their training now kicks off in California with plans to dispatch all of them to Ukraine via Poland afterwards". 

According to the source, this entails not only the former pilots, but other Afghans who served in special units. The source commented: "They are also offered to undergo training and sign a contract which involves the subsequent deployment to the combat zone in Ukraine". 

These actions and measures won’t affect the outcome of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine, as the source stated, saying: "All these hysterical attempts ‘to plug holes’ will only somewhat postpone the Kiev regime’s military catastrophe and the political one of its sponsors in Washington. Yet they won’t impact the end result."

In June, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said that Poland will sign the largest contract in 30 years to supply almost $630 million worth of weapons to Ukraine, and the US, in a series of non-stop aid packages, has announced its latest aid in the amount of $182 million for three NASAMS missile systems. The US has already been supplying weapons and arms to the frontlines in Ukraine which partly have been ending up on the black market, and many with no trace of receipt. 

Just over 10 days ago, the Russian Foreign Ministry revealed that some of the former Afghan Special Forces are fighting alongside Ukrainian nationalists, adding: "These special forces, some of them join Islamic State [ISIS] and fight in Iraq and Syria. It is very predictable, in my opinion. We have already discussed that this is a repeat of the Iraq scenario, which resulted in the IS emergence. And the other part of these former special forces apparently were promised money as mercenaries because they need to make a living, so they join the Ukrainian Nazis. But this does not depend on the Taliban in any way". 

Since the start of the war, around 20,000 mercenaries were deployed in Ukraine from various European countries, which was followed by the US's release of former IS members to be deployed who were part of the 3,000 US "volunteers" to arrive in Ukraine.