Biden report on Afghanistan mostly blames Trump for chaotic US withdrawal
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National security spokesman John Kirby said Mr Biden's choices for how to execute a withdrawal were severely constrained by the conditions created by Trump.
PHOTO: EPA-EFE
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WASHINGTON - US President Joe Biden’s administration on Thursday released a summary of classified reports that mostly blamed the chaotic US pullout from Afghanistan
The Democratic administration’s summary, drawn from top-secret State Department and Pentagon after-action reviews sent to Congress, ignited angry reactions from Republican lawmakers who have demanded the documents for their own assessment of the August 2021 pullout.
US House of Representatives Oversight Committee chairman James Comer, a Republican, issued a statement calling the summary an “excuse for the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal”.
The summary said: “President Biden’s choices for how to execute a withdrawal from Afghanistan were severely constrained by conditions created by his predecessor.”
It added: “The outgoing administration provided no plans for how to conduct the final withdrawal or to evacuate Americans or Afghan allies.”
The withdrawal that ended America’s longest war hanging on to departing aircraft.
The Trump administration also “gutted” refugee support services and virtually halted the processing of Special Immigration Visas for thousands of Afghans seeking evacuation because they worked for the US government, leaving a massive backlog, the summary said.
“Transitions matter. That’s the first lesson learnt here. And the incoming administration wasn’t afforded much of one,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told a White House briefing.
The 12-page summary placed some responsibility for the chaos of the pullout and evacuation operation on flawed US intelligence and military assessments that failed to foresee the speed of the Taliban takeover and predicted that Afghan security forces would hold Kabul.
“As late as May 2021, the assessment was still that Kabul would probably not come under serious pressure until late 2021 after US troops departed,” the summary said.
Pressed on whether Mr Biden bore any responsibility for the disorder that embroiled Kabul airport, Mr Kirby replied: “Just by dint as the commander-in-chief, he assumed responsibility for the orders he gives.”
Chaotic end to 20-year war
The 20-year war in Afghanistan, the longest conflict involving US troops, was started under then President George W. Bush and furthered under his successor, Mr Barack Obama.
More than 100,000 people were killed and about three million displaced as a result of the war, according to data from the non-partisan Costs of War project at Brown University.
Mr Biden pledged during his 2020 campaign to end the country’s “forever wars” and withdraw from Afghanistan, although he postponed the pullout to which Trump had agreed by three months, until the end of August 2021.
The US-backed Kabul government collapsed on Aug 15, 2021,
The disorganisation and chaos as US troops left raised questions about the new President’s leadership, the quality of US intelligence and America’s commitment to human rights and the thousands of Afghan citizens it had relied on during the war.
An Islamic State Khorasan suicide bomber killed 13 US service members and 170 Afghans
Thousands of American citizens, green card holders and Afghans who had applied for Special Immigration Visas were unable to leave on the largest-ever US airlift.
Altogether, around 100,000 Americans, green card holders and Afghans – many of whom were not vetted – were flown out before the US withdrawal ended just shy of the 20th anniversary of the US-led invasion.
The Trump administration agreed in a February 2020 accord with the Taliban
The Islamist militants agreed to stop attacking American troops and hold peace talks with the Western-backed Kabul government.
In laying out the withdrawal chronology, the summary said that successive troop reductions ordered by Trump had left 2,500 US troops in the country when Mr Biden took office in January 2021.
“As a result… the Taliban were in the strongest military position that they had been in since 2001, controlling or contesting half the country,” the summary said.
Taliban security personnel standing guard at a checkpoint in Afghanistan.
PHOTO: AFP
Faced with the choice of delaying the pullout or increasing the number of US forces and facing renewed Taliban attacks, Mr Biden chose the former and ordered planning for the withdrawal and evacuation operation, the summary said.
The document acknowledged that the administration learnt lessons from the withdrawal, and now errs on the side of “aggressive communication” about risks in a destabilised security environment.
The report cited “deliberate degradation” by the Trump administration, a charge that Mr Kirby said referred to Mr Trump’s successive US troop reductions, the release of thousands of Taliban prisoners, and the exclusion of the Kabul government from the US-Taliban talks. REUTERS
