http://www.rd.com/your-america-inspiring-people-and-stories/american-weapons-in-the-hands-of-the-taliban/article156347.htmlAmerican Weapons in the Hands of the Taliban A platoon of U.S. soldiers crouched in the darkness of Afghanistan one night last April, awaiting a group of approaching Taliban fighters. The men of Second Platoon, Company B, had spent nine months fighting in the area, near the Pakistan border, and 11 of their members had been injured or killed. This time, Company B was primed for revenge. When the Taliban came close enough, the Americans hit them with automatic-weapons fire and grenades, mowing down at least a dozen enemy fighters. It was a decisive victory. But afterward, the troops made a startling discovery.
A check of 30 magazines taken from the dead insurgents' rifles found that at least 17 held ammunition that bore the distinctive factory stamps of U.S. suppliers in California and the Czech Republic. The discovery—first made by a New York Times reporter who examined the ammunition at the scene, and later confirmed by the Pentagon—hints at a long-feared situation: that American-supplied arms are winding up with those trying to kill our troops.
It wasn't the first such incident. In July 2008, Taliban fighters attacked a U.S. outpost in the Afghan village of Wanat, killing nine American troops and wounding 27. Military investigators later discovered a local police chief had helped carry out the attack. At his police post, they found a cache of more than 70 assault rifles that were probably U.S.-supplied. The investigators picked up three more guns near the battle site itself.
But here's the most disturbing part: Pentagon officials say there's no way to know how the Taliban is getting these weapons. They could be stolen or taken from dead government troops. They could even have been sold by our allies. (Private DynCorp contractors working for the United States have reported "multiple instances" of Afghan National Police personnel allegedly selling weapons to anti-American forces.) We just don't know, because we've lost track of tens of thousands of weapons and ammunition in Afghanistan.
That's right. In January, the Government Accountability Office found that the U.S. military was not adequately tracking weapons supplied to Afghanistan's government security forces and in fact could not account for at least 87,000 of them, including machine guns and grenade launchers. Nor did the military keep reliable records for another 135,000 weapons supplied by NATO and other allies.
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