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And they will use the Panjshir Valley, where the National Force of Resistance is battling a Taliban advance, as a base whether it holds or not.

The move comes as Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Dutch counterpart Mark Rutte agreed to work together to re-establish a diplomatic presence in the country as soon as possible.

The Foreign Office is “using all diplomatic means” to encourage the Taliban to allow all Brits and entitled Afghans to leave safely.

And Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has held meetings in Qatar and Pakistan to make it happen as quickly as possible.

But sources say that there are few signs the Taliban is making any real effort to allow it.

So a plan to insert the Special Forces and intelligence team has now been signed off by Downing Street – but will not be given the green light until the Taliban’s position is clear.

And time is pressing – with acute awareness, the move must be made before winter sets in.

The UK has had no Special Forces or intelligence assets on the ground since 160 SAS, SBS and Special Forces Support Group soldiers, and a further 90 intelligence officers, left Afghanistan on the last plane out of Kabul last weekend.

However, some interpreters awaiting rescue continue to provide vital intelligence.

The plan — which sources emphasise is not a military venture — would see a small force of just 20 officers from the Secret Intelligence Service, known as MI6, and Special Forces coordinate with NRF resistance commanders to locate interpreters and UK nationals in an operation which will be mounted from the north and could take several months to complete.

Last night senior sources confirmed the plan would be enacted even if the Panjshir fell, stating pockets of resistance would continue to operate.

“This will happen soon if the Taliban does not show a willingness to allow UK nationals to leave,” said the source.

“We already have contacts inside Afghanistan and we are developing an exit plan which will require the physical presence of people on the ground. Getting into the country is not a problem but finding those who want to come out will be the challenge.

“The resistance is under immense pressure from the Taliban but we are confident there will always be an NRF presence with which we can co-ordinate.”

The team will operate in the mountainous region at the foothills of the Hindu Kush which has never been conquered, and where the remnants of Afghanistan’s government are, headed by vice-president Amrullah Saleh and Ahmad Massoud.

Massoud, 32, who studied at King’s College London and graduated from Sandhurst, is the son of Ahmad Shah Massoud, a national hero in the war against the Soviet occupation who was assassinated by the Taliban and Al Qaeda just before the 9/11 attacks.

Boasting 10,000 troops, including Special Forces of the UK-trained 444 battalion and the US-trained 333 counternarcotic battalion, the NFA is well-equipped and had already taken control of the Charikar area of the Parwan province from the radical Islamists backed by the Pakistan military.

How will I look back on this extraordinary period? It felt like a six-month tour crammed into two weeks

Lt Col David Middleton

Its recapture is critical as it lies between the passes connecting Kabul with Mazar-i-Shariff, the largest city in Northern Afghanistan.

The NFA has been reinforced with supply drops from Tajikistan and is receiving millions of pounds in donations.

But heavy Taliban counterattacks have seen it struggle to maintain defences in the last 48 hours.

In a video posted on Friday, acting President Saleh said: “We have been under an invasion by the Taliban, their Al Qaeda allies and other terrorist groups backed by Pakistan.

“We have held the ground, we have resisted, and the resistance is not going to surrender.”

Comment by Lt Col David Middleton

The speed of the collapse of Kabul and the swiftness of the Taliban advance meant our response had to be immediate.

We had been preparing for Operation Pitting for months but, as soon as we arrived, the vast scale of the challenge became clear.

There was the sheer volume of the crowds that no one could comprehend. There was the threat from ISK alongside the volatility of the Taliban. And then there was the sheer physicality of operating in the heat, at range, with necessarily limited supplies.

Coupled with a shrinking timeline driven by the threat from hostile Taliban forces, it was an especially intense period.

The pressure to ensure a successful evacuation weighed heavily on all our minds but what became clear very quickly was that this was fundamentally a human enterprise. It was about balancing compassion and humanity for distressed Afghans with the need for control and order at a time of heightened danger.

When you’ve got between 3,000-5,000 anguished Afghans cajoled by the Taliban closing in on the airfield, it’s also about having the courage to apply restraint.

You train for IED attacks, you learn to appreciate the threat and you come to understand what a Taliban gunman may or not do.

But this was of a different order of magnitude. To see all those distressed people was to see the human face of desperation.

At no time could we afford to lose the initiative. But once we increased our force numbers, we were able to strengthen our security. Throughout it all what stood out for me was not just the bravery of our young soldiers but how they kept that vast flow of people moving without the whole thing collapsing.

It was chaotic but it was never chaos. We always had a plan – and that required us to get people into Kabul’s Baron Hotel as quickly as possible. to be processed before their flight.

Once inside there was a real transition from chaos to calm. Whether you were the logistician, the paratrooper on the line, the engineer, medic or the gunner supporting the Foreign Office and Home Office teams”everyone played a part.

Together we managed to get to the point where we were processing over 1,000 eligible people per day.

In the Baron Hotel, there was an oddly serene, if slightly surreal atmosphere. You saw all those families who had been recovered, who were about to get out on to flights and, despite all the difficulties, that made it worthwhile.

But the threats remained. Trying to discern one suicide bomber in a crowd of 20,000-plus is incredibly difficult. When the strike did occur, it was tragic. We had worked intimately with the Americans and built up a really strong relationship.

Not long after the attack, UK forces moved to Hamid Karzai airfield and processed people up until the 11th hour.

How will I look back on this extraordinary period? It felt like a six-month tour crammed into two weeks.

For those 19 and 20-year-old soldiers having to make life-and-death decisions around Kabul airfield in an instant was especially tough.

But as they left on the final flights out of Kabul our forces should be proud of what they achieved.

Thanks to their efforts more than 15,000 people made it through the Baron Hotel and on to a new life. Thanks to their efforts many have been guaranteed a chance for a better future.

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