KABUL, Afghanistan — The last U.S. forces flew out of Kabul’s airport, the Pentagon said Monday, bringing down the curtain on America’s longest war.
Shortly after midnight Tuesday in Kabul, Taliban fighters swiftly moved into Hamid Karzai International Airport, the scene of a massive airlift that carried more than 116,000 people out of the country since the militant group seized power two weeks earlier in a swift but nearly bloodless offensive.
Taliban fighters fired salvos into the air and shouted “Allahu akbar!’’ Strings of tracers lit the sky as the last U.S. plane flew toward the horizon.
Throughout the day Monday, the airlift continued, with military cargo planes landing and taking off. As the airport was emptied, with hours remaining before the final U.S. departure, militants from the Taliban’s bitter rival, Islamic State, fired a volley of rockets at the airport, but caused no injuries.
Various squads of Taliban converged on the runway, pausing to enter a hangar with a number of partially disassembled Chinook helicopters. One squad, the Fateh Zwak, posed for a photo op in front of one of the Chinooks and called over a Taliban cameraman. They lifted M4 rifles into the air as they cheered.
