House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff cast doubt on the ability of the United States to evacuate all U.S. citizens, Special Immigrant Visa applicants, allies, and at-risk Afghans from the country by an Aug. 31 deadline to withdraw military forces.
The California Democrat’s comments came after a classified briefing on Monday with intelligence officials.
Schiff said evacuations by Aug. 31 are “possible” but “very unlikely given the number of Americans who still need to be evacuated, the number of SIV’s, the number of others who are members of the Afghan press, civil society leaders, women leaders.”
“I am encouraged to see the numbers of people evacuated, increasing readily to the point where we evacuated 11,000 people in a single day,” Schiff continued. “Nonetheless, given the logistical difficulties of moving people to the airport and the limited number of workarounds, it’s hard for me to see that being fully complete by the end of the month. And I’m certainly of the view that we maintain a military presence as long as it’s necessary to get all U.S. persons out and to meet our moral and ethical obligation to our Afghan partners.”
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Lawmakers in both parties have pressed President Joe Biden to extend the deadline for all troops to leave the country in the wake of the Afghan government’s collapse and the Taliban’s swift takeover of the country. The Taliban have warned there will be “consequences” if the U.S. is not gone by the deadline.
Biden signaled on Sunday that U.S. troops may stay past Aug. 31.
“The security environment is changing rapidly,” the president said.
Schiff’s expressed concerns the chaotic situation at the Kabul airport could make it an attractive target for terrorists. U.S. defense officials warned over the weekend the Islamic State affiliate ISIS Khorasan may be trying to target American citizens near the evacuation center in Afghanistan.
Schiff also said, “Intelligence agencies’ assessments of the Afghan government’s ability to maintain itself became increasingly pessimistic over the course of the last six months.”
“There were any number of warnings that the Taliban might take over, and some that included a potential of a very rapid takeover,” Schiff said, but added no one predicted such a rapid collapse.
Several lawmakers in both parties have signaled the messy troop pullout from Afghanistan will prompt a barrage of congressional inquiries into what went wrong. Schiff said he considered the briefing on Monday the start of such an effort.
“That review will look at more than just the last couple of weeks, but rather why after 20 years, and our efforts to stand up an Afghan government and military force that could be self-sustaining, it ended falling apart so quickly,” Schiff said.
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But some Democrats warned against prematurely deeming the problem an intelligence failure.
“I do not believe at this point, sitting here today, that I have any evidence of an intelligence failure,” Colorado Democratic Rep. Jason Crow, a former Army ranger, told CNN.
