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The Taliban’s swift seizure of Kabul has altered key regional states’ calculus toward Afghanistan. Russia, China, Iran, and Turkey are weighing how to take advantage of the United States’ hurried withdrawal while mitigating the new terrorist threats and refugee waves from Afghanistan that will likely follow. All four states will likely recognize the Taliban as the official government of Afghanistan in the coming months. The Taliban’s victory also presents an opportunity for al Qaeda and other Salafi-jihadi groups to expand their havens in Afghanistan and intensify ongoing efforts to inspire terror attacks in the West capitalizing on the 20th anniversary of the September 11th attacks.

The Russian National Guard (Rosgvardia) demonstrated new capabilities and readiness during its first-ever operational-strategic exercise from July 12 to 30. Rosgvardia conducted Zaslon-2021 as a nationwide exercise and readiness check of its full spectrum of capabilities, not a localized exercise as it originally claimed. Rosgvardia falsely announced in early July that Zaslon-2021, its first strategic exercise since its establishment in 2016, would occur only in the Central, Volga, and Southern federal districts and support preparations for the Russian military’s upcoming Zapad-2021 exercise. Zaslon-2021 instead occurred simultaneously in every Russian federal district except the North Caucasian. Rosgvardia conducted four large-scale exercises involving all Rosgvardia units in the announced Central, Volga, and Southern districts, supported by unannounced small-scale exercises across Russia. Twenty-three of Zaslon’s component exercises occurred in the announced districts, while 42 exercises occurred in other, unannounced districts across Russia.