Afghan security forces lets FOB Shank fall apart

Forward Operating Base Shank home to International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) troops actively supporting the Afghan National Security Forces by training the Afghan National Police (ANP).

Among the largest coalition bases at one time, in 2014 the FOB was turned over to the Afghan Security Forces. Its population of U.S. and coalition troops, civilians and contractors topped 8,000.

According to Stars & Stripes, while still battling the Taliban, over 500 bases, shuttering many and downsizing others to be given to the Afghan forces. Some $860 million in property was transferred by 2015, including four logistics hubs, 13 operating bases and hundreds of tactical outposts, the Defense Department has said. About $48 million more was destroyed or abandoned.

Today, Shank’s perimeter walls still stand, tracing a long pill-shape with the Afghan Camp Maiwand on its northern end. About five miles away, the southern tip hosts a small U.S. Special Forces camp and an American outpost called Camp Dahlke West that’s been built up recently.

In between is a vast swath of deserted buildings and ruined tent villages that U.S. troops have dubbed “Zombieland.”

Afghan troops use a similar term: “Houses for demons.” It describes several former coalition facilities “because no one is using them,” said Atiqullah Amarkhail, a retired Afghan general.

Shank’s dilapidation was the result of resource limitations, claimed Safi, who heads a brigade in the army’s 203rd Corps. He has been fighting in Logar province for about 10 years and was posted at Shank in its prime.

Back then, its population of U.S. and coalition troops, civilians and contractors topped 8,000. Today, Safi’s troops here number one-fifth that, he said.

“We do not have the people to maintain the base — we have almost no people here,” Safi said via translator. “The rest are out at checkpoints.”

Even with a base full of troops, Safi couldn’t afford to maintain it, he said, claiming the facilities are too costly to run. Everything the Americans left requires power, he said, even bathroom door locks his troops have replaced with ordinary padlocks.

Despite $2 billion in U.S.-funded power projects, Afghanistan’s grid remains underdeveloped and unreliable, and bases often depend on electric generators to power lights, heaters and other equipment.

For just one of the big tents now rotting in Zombieland, the Americans would burn about 80 gallons of fuel a night, said Safi, who spent hours one January morning searching room to room in his headquarters for a working heater.

“Where are Afghans supposed to get that much fuel?” Safi asked. He said later: “The Americans, money has no value for them.”

In a tent on the nearby snow-covered U.S. camp that same weekend, the Americans cranked the heat so high that one soldier wore shorts and another offered guests cold drinks to cool off.

While DOD provides the Afghans more than a million gallons of fuel a year, Kabul often struggles with logistics challenges, as well as frequent theft of gas and other property.