Photo shows the last member of the US service to depart from Afghanistan

New footage shows the moment a decorated US soldier boarded a military cargo plane just before midnight Tuesday in Afghanistan, becoming the last US serviceman to leave the country.

The departure of Major-General Donahue, Commander of the United States. The Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, marked the end of America’s longest war that lasted nearly 20 years.

The landmark moment “also closes the US mission to evacuate US citizens, Afghan special immigrant visa applicants and vulnerable Afghans,” the US Central Command wrote in a statement accompanying the publication of the photo.

Donahue, a graduate of the US Military Academy at West Point, had an illustrious career in the military that began in 1992.

The two-star general has been deployed at least 17 times in support of operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and other locations, according to a profile of him in 2020 on the military’s official website.

Donahue also notably worked at the Pentagon, as Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and was awarded the US Army War College Fellowship at Harvard University.

The last C-17 plane left Hamid Karzai International Airport at 11:59 p.m. Kabul time, just before the August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of troops from the country.

More than 79,000 civilians have been evacuated from Kabul airport on U.S. military planes since August 14, including 6,000 Americans and 73,500 Afghans and third-country citizens, according to General Frank McKenzie Jr., chief of the American Central Command.

The number of evacuated civilians has risen to over 123,000 if we include those evacuated by members of the US-led coalition.

But up to 200 US citizens and thousands of other Afghan allies have been left behind.