This revelation has some veterans furious.
“This has to stop now. We are sending billions of dollars to the Taliban while failing to take care of our veterans who are struggling day-to-day with both physical and mental wounds,” Shadow Warriors Project founder Mark “Oz” Geist said to The Post.
“This is not only a slap in the face of every servicemember who served in the 20 years of war with Afghanistan and the Taliban it things even more so to those 13 families that bore the loss of their loved one when they were killed at Abbey Gate,” he said.
He said the finding was “appalling and a disgrace to those who have served in sacrificed so much.”
Former Green Beret Scott Mann echoed those comments.
“US funds — marked as humanitarian relief and counterterrorism dollars in Afghanistan — are being funneled into operationalizing, planning, and preparation of terror operations against US interests, and the homeland,” he said to The Post.
Former Navy SEAL and CIA contractor Shawn Ryan, who hosts his own podcast, was similarly furious.
“As a veteran who served in Afghanistan during the Global War on Terror, the notion of the US funding the Taliban is morally reprehensible and fundamentally against our national security interests, especially as we approach the three-year anniversary of Abbey Gate,” he said.
“Once again, the US State Department has failed to properly manage US taxpayers’ dollars. This time, $293 million has ended up in the hands of the Taliban terror regime, potentially funding future attacks on America,” The Mighty Oaks Foundation founder and Marine Chad Robichaux said.
