At least 12 U.S. service members died from two attacks outside the Kabul airport Thursday. But the number of dead and the number of attacks keep rising.
What had been a stain on President Joe Biden’s administration is now a historic catastrophe. It is time for the White House to stop trying to convince people that the Afghanistan withdrawal was planned and executed competently. Only a fool would believe that to be true. Instead, it is time for people to start resigning.
As recently as Wednesday, the White House was in full spin mode, trying to portray the chaotic situation in Kabul as a historic accomplishment for Biden. White House chief of staff Ron Klain was busy on Twitter retweeting Democrats who compared the effort to evacuate Americans out of Afghanistan to the Berlin airlift, while the previous day, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the campaign, which she touted as “the largest airlift in U.S. history,” could not be described as “anything but a success.”
The nation cannot afford any more of these Biden successes.
Reportedly both Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley tried to advise Biden against the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Afghanistan. But after Biden made his decision to withdraw anyway, it fell to these men to execute the president’s orders as effectively as possible. They have failed miserably. Maybe Gen. Milley should have spent less time studying “white rage” and more time planning how to extricate the last 2,500 Americans out of the country without getting any Americans killed.
This crisis is not over. There are thousands of Americans still trapped inside Afghanistan, along with tens of thousands of Afghan allies who will be killed by the Taliban unless they escape the country. It appears as though ISIS-Khorasan carried out the attacks Thursday, but it is still unclear how much, if any, help they had from the Taliban. Even if the Taliban did not help ISIS-K, it is now abundantly clear that we cannot trust the Taliban to protect Americans in Afghanistan. The U.S. military must provide that safety.
On that point, why is Biden so determined to kowtow to the Taliban? The president has seemingly done everything in his power to avoid alienating the terrorist group. First, he heavily restricted U.S. operations outside of the airport. Then, he agreed to the Taliban’s demand that the United States withdraw all forces by Aug. 31. Next, the president failed to hold the Taliban to their pledge to allow timely access to the airport to all those who needed it.
The Pentagon hasn’t been much better. Central Command’s top officer on Thursday pledged to “continue to coordinate with the Taliban” on security concerns. This does not inspire confidence in the security of Americans still in Afghanistan.
If Biden won’t admit that he has made terrible decisions in Afghanistan, then he needs to hold accountable those who failed to execute his orders competently. It is simply not believable that the deaths of a dozen and possibly more Americans was the best possible outcome.
Who miscalculated how quickly the Afghan government would collapse? Who decided that giving up Bagram Airfield and operating out of Kabul airport was the best option? Who decided to trust the Taliban to provide security?
Somebody made these decisions and must be held accountable. For starters, Austin and Milley must resign.
