Remember the blood spilled in Afghanistan when you vote later this year.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden gave his annual State of the Union address, in which he angrily tumbled his way through countless lies and accusations while still claiming the union is stronger than ever.
Biden was also jeered by a man in the balcony who was then promptly arrested. That man was the father of a service member who was killed in an Islamic State suicide bombing, a suicide bombing that likely would not have occurred had Biden not conducted such an incompetent withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021.
Biden’s precipitous April 2021 announcement that all U.S. troops would leave Afghanistan by Sept. 11 of that year threw our Afghan allies into a confused panic. Biden’s top military advisers warned him that this would effectively hand Afghanistan over to the Taliban. The Taliban ramped up their offensives and were unable to rely on U.S. contractors to maintain much of their equipment. Afghan forces abandoned their posts or were overrun.
Biden cared most about the domestic politics of his unfolding debacle.
On July 23, Biden called Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to tell him that “the perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan, I believe, is that things aren’t going well in terms of the fight against the Taliban” and to ask him to “project a different picture.” Two weeks earlier, Biden had assured the public that it was “highly unlikely” that the Taliban would take over Afghanistan.
By Aug. 15, with the rushed evacuation still underway, the Taliban effectively took over Afghanistan by toppling its government and seizing the capital Kabul. Fearful Afghan allies were seen desperately clinging on to fleeing planes. Then, on Aug. 26, a suicide bomber blew up 13 U.S. service members and 170 Afghan citizens. On Aug. 30, the disastrous pullout concluded. One hundred and twenty-four thousand Afghan allies were forced to leave their homes, and thousands of U.S. citizens and the rest of the Afghan population were abandoned to the Taliban’s evil.
How is life in Afghanistan now?
Well, the Taliban rule with an iron fist using $7 billion worth of military equipment Biden clumsily left behind. Despite negotiations, 175 U.S. citizens are still held captive. Women are once again forced to wear burkas while suffering grotesque torture and abuse. Children are married off, trafficked, turned into soldiers, and harvested for their organs.
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Biden’s withdrawal made the U.S. look weak, incompetent, and unreliable. China immediately began pressuring Taiwan. The following year, Russia invaded Ukraine. Biden never expresses remorse for his actions. He prefers to say his withdrawal constituted an “extraordinary success.”
That’s worth remembering this November.
Parker Miller is a 2024 Washington Examiner winter fellow.
