Just days before the 10th anniversary of U.S. special operations forces killing al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, President Joe Biden told a joint session of Congress it is time to leave Afghanistan.
“American leadership means ending the forever war in Afghanistan,” Biden told some members of Congress in a slimmed-down version of a president’s annual report to the legislative branch.
“We have, without hyperbole, the greatest fighting force in the history of the world,” he said, before adding about his late son and war veteran Beau Biden: “And I’m the first president in 40 years who knows what it means to have had a child serving in a war zone.”
The 46th commander in chief announced April 14 that he would begin withdrawing troops from Afghanistan on May 1, the day former President Donald Trump said all U.S. troops would be gone. The Trump team-brokered peace agreement, inked with the Taliban last February, was teetering for months as violence rose and the Taliban refused to break with al Qaeda. Democrats and Republicans lined up on either side of the decision, with the president’s party supporting the withdrawal and Republicans saying it was opening the way for the return of al Qaeda and threats to national security.
BIDEN ANNOUNCES PLANS TO END AFGHANISTAN CONFLICT AS GOP WARNS OF AL QAEDA THREAT
Biden’s son Beau served a tour in Iraq before dying years later of brain cancer that some veterans groups believe was related to exposure to toxic burn pits. The president, one day shy of his 100th in office, referenced the multigenerational nature of the Afghanistan War.
“We delivered justice to bin Laden. We degraded the terrorist threat of al Qaeda in Afghanistan,” he said.
Bin Laden was killed in a raid on his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, in May 2011. Biden argued that removing bin Laden and diminishing the threat of terrorism was enough reason to leave.
He also said the terrorist threat had spread globally. Critics argued the Afghan government will not survive.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley, the only representative of the Joint Chiefs to attend the address, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, one of the few Cabinet members in attendance, looked on as the president spoke.
Reports indicate generals had wanted to keep a footprint in the country to continue rooting out terrorists.
Instead, Biden will not risk more American lives.
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“We have to remain vigilant against threats to the United States wherever they come from,” he said, noting the threats from the Islamic State and al Qaeda have spread to Yemen, Syria, Somalia, and elsewhere in Africa, the Middle East, and beyond.
More than 2,000 Americans died and tens of thousands more have seen and unseen injuries from the nearly 20-year-old conflict. Biden promised all U.S. troops will be out by Sept. 11.
