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Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III has ordered six commercial airlines to supply airliners to aid the growing United States military operation to evacuate Americans and Afghan allies from Kabul, the Afghan capital, a the Pentagon announced on Sunday.
Mr. Austin activated the Stage 1 Civilian Reserve Air Fleet, established in 1952 after the Berlin Airlift, to provide 18 airliners to help transport passengers arriving at bases in the Middle East from Afghanistan, said Pentagon spokesman John F. Kirby in a statement.
The current activation involves 18 aircraft: four from United Airlines; three from American Airlines, Atlas Air, Delta Air Lines and Omni Air; and two from Hawaiian Airlines.
The Pentagon does not foresee a major impact on commercial flights, Kirby said.
Army Transport Command spokesman Captain John Perkins said on Sunday the airliners would enter service on Monday or Tuesday and transport evacuees from the Middle East to Europe and Europe to the United States.
Captain Perkins said in a telephone interview that the military had requested long-haul widebody aircraft capable of carrying several hundred passengers. He said talks started with airlines last week and some carriers have offered planes for the evacuation. But, he added, the demand was large enough for Austin to order more airlines to meet their obligations under the reserve fleet program.
Civilian planes would not fly to or from Kabul, where a rapidly deteriorating security situation hampered evacuation flights. Instead, pilots and crews from commercial airlines would help transport thousands of Afghans arriving at US bases in Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
Commercial airlines are said to ease the burden on those bases, which fill up quickly as the Biden administration rushes to increase the number of flights for thousands of Afghans fearing retaliation from Taliban fighters.
From bases in the Middle East, airliners would increase military flights carrying Afghans to Germany, Italy, Spain and other stopovers in Europe, and then ultimately to the United States for many Afghans. , officials said.
This is only the third time that the reserve air fleet has been activated. The first took place during the Persian Gulf War (August 1990 to May 1991). The second took place during the war in Iraq (from February 2002 to June 2003).
For the evacuation mission, one of the most important the Pentagon has ever undertaken, the military has expanded beyond its fleet of C-17s, the cargo plane of choice in hostile environments, to include giant C-5s and KC-10s, a refueling plane. which can be configured to carry passengers.
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