I have lost count of the security briefings that end with the same picture: a table of weapons recovered from terrorists, laid out neatly for the cameras. For a long time I looked at them as evidence of an operation’s success.

Lately, however, I have started looking at the markings. More and more of them are American-made, and none of them was ever meant for the men who carried them. They were supplied by the US to the Afghan security forces, and were left behind in Afghanistan when those forces collapsed and the US withdrew in August 2021.

One was recovered after the Jaffar Express hijacking last year, a Colt carbine whose serial number traced back to those stocks. The US Army and the Pentagon later confirmed to the Washington Post that 63 weapons seized from terrorists in Pakistan had come from the same source. Alongside them, officials displayed American night-vision devices.

It is the night-vision gear that troubles me most. A police officer from the province worst hit by TTP violence told Radio Free Europe that the terrorists could see the police in the dark, while the cops could not see them. That one sentence explains much of what our police have endured since 2021.

Two questions follow: How did weapons meant to defend Afghanistan end up with the TTP? And what can be done to stop their misuse?

From Afghan stores to TTP hands

Pakistan saw this coming. Ambassador Masood Khan, Pakistan’s envoy in Washington in 2023, told me he had raised the issue both publicly and in private meetings. When I interviewed Ambassador Jalil Abbas Jilani, former Ambassador to Washington who later served as foreign minister, he said Pakistan had been conveying its concerns to the US “for a long time”, and shared the evidence whenever night-vision goggles and weapons were recovered from TTP terrorists.

Part of the answer is the market. A 2023 UN report found that the Taliban let local commanders keep a fifth of seized American weapons, and arms bazaars on both sides of the border did the rest. But the market does not explain everything.

The Geneva-based Small Arms Survey found that the Taliban guard M4 rifles and night sights more carefully than anything else they inherited. Yet, these are precisely the items that keep reaching the TTP. When the best-guarded weapons keep reaching one group, I find it hard to call that leakage. Kabul is choosing who gets them.

Ambassador Khan put it plainly: “Several United Nations Security Council reports have confirmed that the Afghan Taliban are giving military equipment, specifically M4 carbines, specialised firearms, and night-vision gear from left-behind stockpiles.” Even the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (Sigar), America’s own watchdog for Afghanistan, concluded in its final report that what was left behind had “formed the core of the Taliban security apparatus”.

A haven built on an arsenal

None of this should surprise anyone. A country awash with modern weapons, ruled by a movement with deep ties to militant groups, was always going to become a sanctuary for terrorists. Ambassador Jilani told me that about two dozen terrorist organisations now operate from Afghan soil, and that a nexus has developed between the Afghan Taliban, the TTP and Al Qaeda. The UN Monitoring Team has reported that Al Qaeda provides training to the TTP, and has warned that the group could become a threat beyond the region.

Today, it is Pakistan that buries its soldiers and police personnel; 2025 was the deadliest year for our security forces since 2011. Tomorrow it may be Central Asia, which the UN already counts among those facing an “enduring threat” from Afghanistan, or countries much further away. Weapons do not respect borders, and neither do the groups that carry them.

What must be done

Retrieval is a dead end. Ambassador Khan told me it is “nearly impossible without a massive ground operation”, and the Taliban, who call the weapons spoils of war, won’t simply hand them back. The task is not to recover the arsenal but to blunt its effect. Four steps would do that.

First, close the gap at home. Ambassador Khan argues that the US, as part of the two countries’ counterterrorism cooperation, should supply Pakistan with “matching asymmetric-warfare armaments” through the Foreign Military Sales programme or one-time assistance. This, he said, would allow Washington “to fulfil its obligations regarding the spillover effect of the abandoned arms”. The first to benefit should be the police and Counter Terrorism Department units at frontier posts, who need thermal sights, night-vision devices and the training to use them. An advantage in the dark lasts only as long as one side lacks it.

Second, make Kabul pay a price. Ambassador Jilani told me that efforts by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Türkiye and China to persuade the Taliban to rein in the TTP have not worked. Persuasion has run its course. In his view, the situation could improve if donor countries made their assistance conditional on action against the TTP. Afghanistan still depends heavily on foreign money; the US alone has disbursed more than $3.38 billion since the takeover. That dependence is leverage, and it should be used.

Third, turn seizures into evidence. Every weapon recovered from a terrorist should be logged, its serial number traced, and the results published. The Washington Post’s investigation showed this can be done. A public record would be harder for Kabul to deny and for the world to ignore.

Fourth, use the law that already exists. The TTP is a UN-listed entity under a binding arms embargo, so supplying it is a sanctions violation, not a favour between allies. Pakistan should press the Security Council to have its Monitoring Team report specifically on arms reaching the TTP, and to name those who facilitate the flow.

The price of leaving

Pakistan and Afghanistan are now in open conflict, and the arsenal left behind in 2021 is part of the reason. “The war on terror for them is over,” Ambassador Masood Khan told me, “but not for Pakistan, which is continuing to pay a heavy price in blood and treasure.”

That is the lesson of August 2021. When a superpower leaves in haste, the war does not leave with it. Its weapons stay behind, the wrong hands inherit them, and the neighbours pay the bill. Pakistan is paying first. Unless the world acts, it will not be the last.