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On August 18th, US Department of Defense officials said that the US was working together with Taliban to evacuate Americans out of Afghanistan.
The White House said that the military evacuated approximately 1,800 people, bringing the total since August 14th to 6,000.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the U.S. intends to increase that flow using various U.S. military aircraft.
“We’re going to get everyone that we can possibly evacuate, evacuated. And I’ll do that as long as we possibly can until the clock runs out or we run out of capability,” Austin said.
President Joe Biden said that if needed, U.S. forces could remain in Afghanistan past his August 31st deadline to get every American out of the country.
“If there’s American citizens left, we’re going to stay to get them all out,” Biden told ABC News in an interview that aired Wednesday evening.
“Americans should understand that we’re going to try to get it done before Aug. 31,” Biden said. “If we don’t, we’ll determine at the time who’s left.”
Austin was asked whether US doesn’t really “have the capability to go out and collect up large numbers of people.”
Austin said the U.S. has “a moral obligation to help those who helped us.”
“Right now our mission is to secure that airfield and defend that airfield and evacuate all those who have been faithful to us,” Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Milley told reporters. “There will be many post-mortems on this topic, but right now is not the time to address that. Right now there are troops at-risk.”
Milley said soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines are working to maintain security at the international airport in Kabul, which he said to date is “stable.” In total, roughly 4,500 American forces remain on the ground, he said.
“We are the United States military, and we will successfully evacuate all American citizens who want to get out of Afghanistan. They are our priority No. 1. In addition, we intend to evacuate those who have been supporting us for years, and we are not going to leave them behind. And we will get as many out as possible.”
Meanwhile, a wave of criticism has been coming US President Joe Biden’s way and that of his administration.
On August 17th, Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan defended the administration’s policy, saying it was doing the best it could to quickly respond to the chaotic withdrawal.
Milley told reporters at the briefing that “there was nothing that I or anyone else saw that indicated a collapse of this army and this government in 11 days.”
Biden himself defended the decision and said that the chaos was unavoidable and suggested that there were no significant blunders made by U.S. officials.
“The idea that somehow, there’s a way to have gotten out without chaos ensuing, I don’t know how that happens,” he said.
Biden said the Taliban is “cooperating, letting American citizens get out, American personnel get out, embassies get out” but that it has been more difficult than expected to evacuate Afghans who assisted the U.S.
Meanwhile, the ordinary Afghans trying to flee the country are all but abandoned.
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Of course the Taliban is helping them leave. The taliban are not going to do anything to instigate any reason for the u.s. to stay any longer than they have to.
Just imagine how much Vodka you could buy with 100 Billion
You could buy half the coke in Florida!
That makes no sense re article. Firstly, they are fundamentalist Sunni – kind of making alcohol irrelevant. But more importantly, they don’t have cash they now have huge cache of US weapons to a certain value. Learn to try and comprehend what you have read.
Soon we will see Turkey involved in Afghanistan,
Turkey had a role – but events outpaced it. Turkey was ‘sposed to send a military contingent to secure Kabul airport for NATO. The idea being Turkish Muslim soldiers could hold the airport as government transition negotiations were underway. But it all kicked way faster than that.