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EXCLUSIVE Taliban uses former SAS base as test site to build kamikaze drone 'air force' 'capable of striking beyond country's borders'
The Taliban are using a former SAS base to develop an 'air force' of kamikaze drones capable of striking well beyond their country's borders, the Mail can reveal.
Used by British special forces during the UK's two decades in Afghanistan, the base in Logar Province is now the main test site for the deadly fleet.
To the alarm of Western security agencies, more than three years after seizing back power in Afghanistan, the brutal Taliban regime has recruited international experts to produce hundreds of drones.
They include an engineer suspected of links to Osama Bin Laden's terror group Al Qaeda and a specialist said to have studied in the UK, the Mail can reveal.
The drones are being constructed at another former base, Camp Phoenix which was a major US hub for logistics and training Afghan troops during the war with the Taliban in which 457 British servicemen and women lost their lives.
Troops at Pheonix, near the capital Kabul, had a cinema, library, coffee shop, post office and a 'British pub'. After the chaotic exodus from Afghanistan in 2021, masses of abandoned military hardware was studied by the Taliban's engineers.
It is unclear if components of the drones were among the arsenal of equipment left behind, but the Mail can reveal the base now houses a secretive production line for unmanned warplanes.
A number of test flights of 'suicide' or 'kamikaze' warplanes that explode on impact with their targets have been successfully carried out at the former SAS base in Logar Province, south of Kabul, intelligence sources say. Some were used recently in an attack on the border area of Pakistan.
The Taliban developers are said to be copying several drone models - including the MQ9 Reaper, an American system, and the Shahed 136 which is Iranian.
Both are said to have been supplied by Tehran to Moscow and used in Ukraine. They are also believed to have been used by Iran during recent attacks on Israel.
The Taliban's engineers – several of whom studied at Kabul University's faculty of engineering during the two decades British and US forces were in Afghanistan - are looking to increase both the distance they can travel and the size of the explosive 'payloads'.
Intelligence sources revealed the Taliban drone development programme had been in place for at least two years and that its 'capability is expanding significantly.'
Sources say that the Taliban has recently 'showcased' the growing drone programme to potential partners and customers in Afghanistan that included demonstration flights.
The project will concern Western intelligence agencies as the notoriously-primitive Taliban seeks to develop sophisticated drones capable of attacking enemies beyond its borders.
The alarm will be further heightened by the involvement of an engineer with links to Al Qaeda - whose figurehead Bin Laden plotted the 9/11 atrocity from his bolthole in Afghanistan which triggered the 20-year military campaign by the US and UK.
One source claimed the Al Qaeda engineer once studied in the UK. Al Qaeda and other terrorist training camps are said to have returned to Afghanistan since the Taliban regained control in August 2021.
The engineers are considered 'prized assets' by the Taliban and have been assigned personal bodyguards.
It emerged recently an Afghan drone technician who helped MI6 spy on the Taliban has been forced to live his life on the run after the UK refused to give him sanctuary.
Described as 'potentially a prized asset' to the Taliban, the Afghan is said to have worked for MI6 from 2017, at first helping to intercept Taliban phonecalls, before flying drones alongside British agents.
After western forces left the country in 2021 he was approached by the Taliban, who tried to recruit him because his skills were deemed to be so valuable.
He turned them down and applied for relocation to the UK but has twice been refused and is appealing the case from hiding.
One source said: 'With his expertise, he would be an easy fit for the drone programme which is why the Taliban have been looking for him over many months. He has knowledge of many of the types of drone under development.'
The Iranian version of the MQ9 Reaper can currently fly at heights up to 24,000ft at speeds of 130mph while carrying a bomb up to 660lb which the Taliban's engineers have been asked to increase.
Dubbed the 'hunter-killer' because of its ability for intelligence gathering and surveillance of a target prior to attack, it is remotely piloted. The US version has been successfully used against Taliban targets.
The Shahed 136 is cheap to build and can be used to devastating effect as a kamikaze drone. It can fly low, at speeds up to 115mph, and travel distances of 1,200 miles before exploding on targets. It has been extensively used by Russia in Ukraine to devastating effect. It is also been used by Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen during attacks on shipping and during attacks on Israel.
Taliban engineers are experimenting with different quantities of explosives, detonation techniques and means of launch.
According to intelligence officials, expertise from Turkey, China, Russia, Belarus and Bangladesh is being drawn on, for the drone programme. Intelligence sources say a Russian is working closely with the drone programme and has accompanied the Taliban engineers on fact-finding trips to other countries working developing drones. Drone components have been purchased in China and Turkey, the sources said.
