Taliban Claims Ministry of Defense Forces Have Reached Over 181,000 Personnel

Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesperson for the Taliban administration, announced that the number of forces in the Ministry of Defense has risen to 181,084. He shared this figure in a message on the social media platform X, attributing it to recruitment and training efforts over the past year.

According to Mujahid, during this period, 100,300 personnel have been trained in various sectors, including security, criminal affairs, border, logistics, and others. However, the Taliban spokesperson refrained from providing the total number of the regime’s armed forces, raising questions about transparency in the military structure.

In contrast, the United Nations Security Council’s Sanctions Monitoring Committee recently estimated the Taliban’s forces to be between 380,000 and 450,000. According to the report, these forces comprise approximately 150,000 soldiers and nearly 200,000 police and intelligence personnel.

These figures come amid the Taliban administration’s reduction of its administrative structure by about 20% this solar year due to budget constraints, leading to the dismissal of thousands of civil and military employees. Critics argue that the lack of transparency in reporting these numbers, combined with the simultaneous increase in military personnel and decrease in civil staff, demands clear accountability from the Taliban administration.