Ark Salus: ‘angel investors’ pay for private planes to fly Afghans out of Kabul

A privately funded US project has begun a mission dubbed “Wings of Eagles” to fly almost 5,000 Afghans fleeing the Taliban out of Kabul.

Ark Salus, “described as a US special operations veterans-based charity”, is chartering private planes in order “to extract members of the Afghan commando anti-terrorism units, trained by SAS and US Special Forces since 2003, along with family members”, reported The Telegraph.

A Boeing 737 and an L-100 aircraft will be used to transport approximately 4,650 women, children and other family members, Ark Salus director Peter Quinn told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this morning. The Alabama-based group has already flown 107 US citizens and 38 Afghans from the Afghanistan capital to Bahrain, he said.

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According to Quinn, a veteran of five combat tours in Afghanistan, six private “angel investors” are funding the project, which also aims to provide housing and logistical support for the rescued people while they apply for refugee status.

Quinn said that one of the angels is a skateboarding fan who had heard about a female Afghan skateboarder on the ground in Kabul. The investor had asked for assurances that she can be saved, but was told the mission cannot guarantee her safety.

Ark Salus hopes to fly out up to 700 Afghans a day over the next eight days, amid growing debate about who should be taking responsibility for the rescue of at-risk Afghans.

Quinn told Today that “It should be done by others”, and pointed to national governments. But the Ark Salus team “know how to be creative with canvas - we know how to create operational art”, he added.

The charity’s website argues that “we have a moral obligation to our fellow Afghan Warriors to safeguard them, their wives and children, and rescue them from Kabul, just as they have brought us home to our families”.

The group say they have raised $500,000 to date towards the costs of the mission, which has been praised by fellow US military members and veterans.

In an article for Coffee or Die, an online magazine that reports on military issues, retired US army ranger Jariko Denma said: “As soon as the United States announced a final withdrawal date from Afghanistan, I knew the elite Afghan special operations warriors, who had inflicted the most damage on the Taliban, would be targeted first.”

The Ark Salus team and their Afghan counterparts “bled together and lost friends together”, Denma wrote. And now, “given the rapidly deteriorating situation on the Afghan battlefield, Ark Salus sees this as the time to hold up our end of the deal, both morally and strategically”.