There are plenty of failures involved in President Joe Biden’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan, but are there any that are more embarrassing than the State Department?
State Department officials are still droning on about what the Taliban need to do to earn “international recognition.” State Department spokesman Ned Price had a list of things the Taliban need to do to “meet its commitments and obligations,” including “respecting basic rights of people.”
The Taliban needs to meet its commitments and obligations in Afghanistan on freedom of travel, respecting basic rights of the people, upholding its commitments on counterterrorism, not carrying out reprisal violence against those who stayed, and forming an inclusive government.
— Ned Price (@StateDeptSpox) August 31, 2021
There is an obvious follow-up question for Price: Or what? The Taliban need to do these things, or what? There is no U.S. presence in Afghanistan outside of the Americans who were left behind in the atrocious failure that was the frantic evacuation effort. The Taliban had already begun executing Afghans before the last U.S. plane departed, and now, they likely have access to call logs and biometric data that can help them identify Afghans who worked with the United States.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that “the Taliban seeks international legitimacy and support,” but do they? This is a group that just recently executed an Afghan folk singer simply because he was a singer and, as Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid previously said, “music is forbidden in Islam.”
What is there to suggest that the Taliban have changed in their 20 years out of power other than the softer tone they have taken when speaking to Western media? Nothing, which is why the State Department itself is now telling U.S. citizens stranded in Afghanistan to “keep a low profile.”
The State Department can’t even claim it was consistent in warning U.S. citizens to leave the country before the Taliban began making their gains. Biden wasn’t the only one downplaying the possibility of a Taliban takeover: The U.S. Embassy in Kabul, which operates under the State Department, said in July that it would remain open. Less than two months later, the embassy has been shuttered, and diplomats have left.
Despite all available evidence that the Taliban are still the Taliban, Blinken and Price continue to drone on about global recognition and the international community. It’s an embarrassing display, compounded by the fact that everyone, including the Taliban, knows that there will be no consequences if the Taliban don’t do the things the State Department says they “need” to.
