Kabul airport was not the property of the US govt so could not be "gifted". Fully working??? Gonna need a few brooms first. Taliban or no Taliban, the airfield may still be needed if only for aid flights.

You are correct of course.
I too had omitted my "/sarc" marks for that sentence of mine.

The worlds stock of MD530 helicopters is suddenly diminished. A few years ago (when she was in charge at Mesa) Lynn Tilton kicked aside all/most of the civil market aspirations of MDHI and went with the DoD military deal that was going to save the company. The result has been that most of recent production has been the military airframes for the Afghan Air Force. True there have been a few military sales to such as Nigeria but the bulk was Afghan.

Into the future it appeared that the company was assured of regular spares and repairs from the initial sale and then the repeated top up sales.

Now that appears to be in tatters and all of a sudden [it seems] the MDHI management are belatedly approaching the civil US market they abandoned [so callously?] for the golden future that was in Afghanistan. Look we have not really dumped all those 530/902 projects we presented at HAI year after year.... we were just kidding... and look we are no longer putting parts production in house because we have been let down by fellow industrialists ... we are outsourcing [again]. Nose gets longer and longer.

It is possible that the discerning customer, the one that lived through the years of no spares available, may have tired of the duplicity and the hard times in Mesa are going to get harder.

And people really wonder why this lasted 20 years...contracts and $$$$$$..

Not just helicopters, but apparently one or more C-130 aircraft as well.
See BBC news clip https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-asia-58393243

So 2 questions along with apology for some thread drift:

Firstly, would the Taliban be able to fly and service a Herc to any realistic extent, assuming the somewhat unlikely scenario that they would find an actual use for it?
Then secondly, why on earth would machinery of that strategic and monetary value have been left behind?

Machinery is left behind when the cost in human lives exceeds the value of the machinery - To get that machinery out,someone has to guard it while it it being prepped. If it's a helicopter that number will usually exceed the passenger capacity of the helicopter. If not, then as soon as the guards climb into the helicopter, the position is subject to being overrun and the helicopter is an easy target, now filled with people escaping.

No doubt the Taliban will force or otherwise encourage former Afghan forces into service. If any of them were trained to fly, the sure, the Taliban could, conceivably, fly them. However, they aren't much use to the Taliban unless as a transport for the leadership. I expect they were damaged in a way that they are irreparable except by building a new helicopter within the old fuselage sheet metal.

Logged the ipads out of facebook and let the tyres down . . I suspect most false flag operations in the region will be 'confirmed US forces aircraft' for some time to come.

I hate to say it but the 'lone spitfire' pilot in the Dunkirk movie did a far better job in 30 seconds . .

Jetty.. Ah ….that icon ending to the movie, the long final glide to the beach byTHE aircraft of the time. Beautiful.
( No real Spitfire was immoliated in this movie) And I love the Hurricane re BoB also.


Thread…pics in tv show lots of damage to those helicopters. Where’s the spares to do any rebuilds? Maybe useful parts will get sold off or a/c salvaged. Where there’s a wheeler-dealer there’s a way !

Ah So! thanks for that.

More details as to the degree of inoperableness of abandoned aircraft in this fairly detailed video report
A list of aircraft in the hands of Taliban here:

https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2021/08/the-taliban-air-force-inventory.html

mjb

I bet they don't wish they could get their hands on them!

Parts from the burnt BA 747 from Kuwait re appeared on the market.

Probably land up with the Pakistani Air Force who will salvage what they need & fix what they can

From the Daily Mail.....

The Taliban say they are 'angry and disappointed' and feel 'betrayed' after America left so many inoperable helicopters and planes because 'the aircraft belong to Afghanistan'

Taliban fighters have been left feeling 'angry' and 'betrayed' after discovering the US had disabled military helicopters and planes before their departure from Kabul.

US troops 'demilitarised' 73 aircraft before their departure this week according to the commander of the US evacuation mission, Gen. Frank McKenzie.

That left up to 48 aircraft in the hands of the terror group, although it was not known how many were operable.


But the Taliban had 'expected the Americans to leave helicopters like this in one piece for their use', according to an reporter who toured the airport after the withdrawal.

She said: 'When I said to them, "why do you think that the Americans would have left everything operational for you?" They said because we believe it is a national asset and we are the government now and this could have come to great use for us.'

She added: 'They are disappointed, they are angry, they feel betrayed because all of this equipment is broken beyond repair.'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rs-planes.html

More video from Kabul airport. Close up pics of interior "decomissioned" Blackhawk

There must be a good reason
 

I don’t understand why these aircraft didn’t fly out to surrounding countries for later airlift home. There must be a good reason

No contractors left to service them, no Afghan pilots to fly them.

Presume if it was on the other foot the Taliban would have left them rigged with IEDs.

Might be good for propaganda purposes as about 1/2 of the US electorate is ready to believe that the Taliban will be able to fly those abandoned helicopters to the homeland and wreak havoc with them…