In the cold, grey light of a Washington winter, the heart of the American capital has become the unlikely front line in a terrifying new security crisis. For months, intelligence sources have been quietly sounding the alarm, but a bloody ambush just streets from the White House has turned whispered warnings into a national emergency.
Intelligence officials are now warning of a ‘shadow army’ of radicalised individuals living within the United States, remnants of the chaotic 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan, who may be waiting for the signal to strike.
The catalyst for this renewed fear was a horrific Thanksgiving Eve attack that left one young soldier dead and another fighting for his life. Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, just 20 years old and a high school graduate who had volunteered for the National Guard, succumbed to her injuries a day after the assault.
Her colleague, 24-year-old Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe remains in critical condition. They were targeted in a ‘lone wolf’ style ambush that many insiders believe is merely the first wave of a more serious, embedded threat.
The Enemy Within: Uncovering Embedded Security Threats
The suspected assailant, 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal, represents the intelligence community’s worst nightmare: a man trained by the very country he allegedly turned against. Lakanwal was once an ally, trained by American military advisers in Kandahar and embedded with CIA counter-terrorism teams.
When the Biden administration oversaw the frantic exit from Kabul, Lakanwal was among the thousands evacuated to the US under Operation Allies Welcome.
Lakanwal has pleaded not guilty to charges including first-degree murder, but his background has exposed a systemic failure in the vetting process. ‘He was trained by us, he knew our tactics, and he was allowed to walk right through the front door,’ says one CIA source.
The urgency of the 2021 evacuation meant that thousands were processed with what the Department of Homeland Security now admits was ‘fragmented’ oversight.
This isn’t an isolated incident. Just days before the Washington shooting, 30-year-old Mohammad Dawood Alokozay was arrested in Fort Worth, Texas, after posting chilling videos on TikTok detailing plans to bomb a local building.
Meanwhile, in Oklahoma City, two other Afghan nationals, one of whom worked as a security guard for the CIA in Kabul pleaded guilty to plotting an ISIS-inspired mass shooting at a polling station.
Vetting Failures and the Push for Mass Deportation
While the US resettled approximately 200,000 Afghans, Department of Justice data indicates that at least 855 individuals have yet to clear significant national security ‘red flags’.
Even more concerning is the revelation that 55 people on the terrorist watch list were among those admitted during the initial chaos.
John Ratcliffe, the current Director of the CIA, has been scathing about the oversight. ‘In fairness, the urgency was there, but it is more than crazy that we are now left to root out agitators,’ he noted, adding that individuals like Lakanwal ‘should never have been allowed to come here’.
In response to the escalating violence, President Donald Trump has enacted a total freeze on Afghan immigration and ordered the tracking of roughly 2,000 individuals already slated for deportation who have vanished into the American interior.
Taking to Truth Social, the President vowed to re-examine every single entry from the Biden era, declaring: ‘If they can’t love our country, we don’t want them.’
As federal agents scramble to uncover further cells, the tragic death of Sarah Beckstrom stands as a grim reminder of the human cost of a botched retreat.
The focus has now shifted from the mountains of the Hindu Kush to the suburbs of America, where the hunt for those who slipped through the cracks has only just begun.
Originally published on IBTimes UK
