Did the United States send $45 million in freshly-printed cash to the Taliban in Afghanistan on a chartered flight on December 8, 2025? No, that's not true: The photo used to make the claim was published in 2023 in a report about United Nations cash shipments to Afghanistan as humanitarian aid. The UN -- not the US -- has sent nearly $3 billion in cash to the country since the Taliban regained control in 2021. An inspector general report did conclude that some of the money, which was sent for relief groups, did come from US contributions and some of it ended up with the Taliban.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) published by the National Uprising News account on X on December 8, 2025. The text caption with the photo of cash read:
Today, December 8, 2025, in Kabul, the United States provided forty-five million dollars ($45,000,000) in cash--freshly printed--to the Taliban in the early morning. The money was flown in via a chartered flight by Moalem Airlines.Yet Afghanistan does not feature in the US national security strategy. Isn't it amazing.
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This is what the post looked like at the time of writing:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of X.com)
A reverse image search found the same image in a KabulNow.com article (archived here) titled "Afghanistan has received nearly $2 billion in cash assistance since the Taliban takeover" published on February 21, 2023. It opened:
Since the Taliban returned to power in August 2021, the total amount of cash shipments to Afghanistan has almost reached $2 billion. The latest shipment of $40 million arrived in Kabul today, bringing the total amount to $1.993 billion.
As with previous cash shipments, the newly arrived package of $40 million was deposited in a commercial bank in Kabul. In a statement today, Da Afghanistan Bank, which is controlled by the Taliban, confirmed that it received the deposit.
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of kabulnow.com)
A ProPublica article (archived here) titled "U.N. Has Flown More Than $2.9 Billion in Cash to Afghanistan Since the Taliban Seized Power, Diverting U.S. Funds" published on March 20, 2024, explained where the cash came from.
The United Nations has delivered more than $2.9 billion in cash to Afghanistan since the Taliban seized control, resulting in the flow of U.S. funds to the extremist group, according to a recent government report.
The U.N. deposits the cash into a private Afghan bank and disburses funds to the agency's aid organizations and nonprofit humanitarian groups. But the money does not stop there, the report found. Some winds up at the central bank of Afghanistan, which is under the control of the Taliban. The group took over the country after the withdrawal of U.S. forces in August 2021.
The report, from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, provides the first detailed account of how U.S. cash falls under the control of the Taliban and adds to a growing body of evidence that contributions to the U.N. are not always reaching Afghans in need. It did not specify how much U.S. funding has been channeled to the central bank.
The inspector general report referenced in the ProPublica article can be read here:
