KABUL – The US is now taking away Russian firearmslink> usedby the Afghan security forces, including the AK-47s Russia once giftedto Afghanistan.

In an interview with Sputnik Dari link>, AfghanArmy spokesman, General Dawlat Waziri, said that the country’s militarywill continue using Russian firearms as long as they are functional.

“When the Russian arms are no longer usable and ammunition runs out, theywill be replaced with US ones. As long as they work, we’ll keep usingthem,” the General said.

Some Afghan and Russian military experts believe that Washington’s programof rearming the Afghan security forces is counterproductive, is not meantto make the Afghan army strong and is undermining the country’s security.

*“Replacing Russian weapons is a crime against the Afghan Army”*

When interviewed by Sputnik, former General and now a military expert,Abdulwahed Taqat, slammed Washington’s move as “treason and a crimeagainst the Afghan people.”

“The protocol we have signed with the Americans does not say that we cannoteither have or buy weapons from other countries. Every Afghan family,especially if they live in dangerous areas, has a Kalashnikov. If they takethem away people will have no weapons to defend themselves and terroristswill kill them. Our soldiers are handy with Russian arms; they have beenweaned on using them. Many of our officers speak Russian,” General Tarqatsaid.

“Throughout this war we have seen US weapons – they simply do not work.They are nothing compared with Russian weapons,” he emphasized.

*“The Afghan Army is just a human shield for the US” *

The editor-in-chief of Arsenal Otechestva (Arsenal of the Fatherland)journal, Alexei Leonkov, said that the weapons being suppliedto Afghanistan by the Americans are similar to their Russian counterparts.

“The Americans have been sending arms to Afghanistan for quite some timenow. Because the Afghan servicemen are familiar with Soviet-made arms, theAmericans are sending in similar types. The US tries to send in weaponsfrom the countries it controls, mainly from Canada and Croatia,” Leonkovsaid.

He added that building a modern Afghan army is not something the Americansreally want.

“They need an Afghan army to serve as a human shield in case something goeswrong so that they can hide behind it. It is the Afghan army that has beenhit the hardest by this war,” Leonkov noted.

Experts believe that rearming the Afghan army could take up to five years –a lengthy process that could have a negative impact of its combatefficiency.

“This is a very drawn-out process and a very painful one too,” said MikhailKhodaryonok, a retired Colonel and now a military observer for theGazeta.ru online paper.

*“The Americans will find someone to sell these weapons to” *

The experts all agree that the Americans will find use for the Russianweapons they take away from the Afghan military.

Alexei Leonkov said that the arms are very likely to end up in the handsof Daesh terrorists who are making their way into Afghanistan.

“The Americans are very practical and they will find someone to sell theseweapons to. The arms could pop up anywhere, above all in areas controlledby […] what remains of the Daesh army, including those who are nowin Afghanistan. [The weapons] won’t go anywhere. The Americans will alwaysfind a way to cash in, so they will not be throwing these arms away.”

General Taqat believes that the Russian arms will be sent to countrieswhere the US forces are currently fighting in only to make their way backto Afghanistan and end up in the hands of the opposition.

“[The Americans] will take these arms away and sell them in Iraq and Syriaand give them to their own soldiers. From there the Russian arms will goto Iran and back to Afghanistan where they will be sold to the Taliban,”the General concluded.

Afghanistan has been engulfed in a long-running warlink>against aplethora of terrorist groups active in the country, above all Daesh and theTaliban.

The almost 17-year-old US military presence in Afghanistan has so farfailed to win the war on terror.

*The views and opinions expressed here are those of the speakers and do notnecessarily reflect those of Sputnik.*