Biden was “seriously restrained” by his predecessor Trump’s policy of evacuating Afghanistan

The chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021 is largely due to the previous US administration led by President Trump. This is one of the results of a withdrawal operation evaluation report published by the current US administration.

Much of the report’s content has been declassified and shared only with the Congressional Security Committee, but a summary of its conclusions was released to the press today by National Security Council Coordinator John Kirby.

In August 2021, the Taliban captured the Afghan capital, Kabul, and over 100,000 people were evacuated at lightning speed. This was necessary as the security situation deteriorated rapidly.

Kirby says the Afghan military’s readiness to defend the country has been misjudged by the security services. But Kirby says what makes the evacuation of Americans and other Western participants even more difficult is the Trump administration’s agreement that the Americans will leave in May 2021.

Trump agreed, but did not devise a withdrawal plan. While this deal weakened the position of the US-backed government, it would also benefit the Taliban.

According to Kirby, Biden managed to evacuate more than 100,000 people despite being “seriously constrained” by his predecessor’s decisions. To this extent, the operation was successful.

Republicans had previously harshly criticized the withdrawal from Afghanistan, highlighting that 13 military personnel were killed in a suicide attack at an airport that killed 170 civilians.

Lessons learned

According to Kirby, lessons were learned from the evacuation in Kabul. Also, the Americans did not want to undermine the Afghan government by asking people to leave the country immediately. Later, when instability was threatened in Ethiopia and Ukraine, Americans and other Westerners in those countries were encouraged to leave the country immediately.

Source: NOS

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