Nancy Pelosi spoke out again this morning on the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan. Yet, by her rhetoric, you’d assume everything was going perfectly to plan. In fact, she thinks we should all be commending Joe Biden for his “strong” leadership on this issue which has led to thousands of Americans stranded on the ground at the mercy of the Taliban.
Maybe she can take him out for ice cream later?
Yes, it was indeed decisive, but not in the way Pelosi wants you to think. Rather, it was stupidly impulsive and dangerous to do what Biden did knowing that 1) intelligence reports said this would happen and 2) we moved ahead with the full withdrawal before getting Americans out of harm’s way despite the knowledge this would happen.
There’s no excuse for needing to redeploy thousands of troops to resecure an airport that never should have been relinquished in the first place before the evacuation was done. Having people storm runways while Americans are stuck with no way to the airport was clearly not part of any plan. Rather, Biden is reacting to the events as they dictate the situation to him. That’s not leadership, that’s incompetence.
Pelosi’s claim that “this is what happens when you withdraw” is also laughable regarding the Taliban’s seizure of weapons. Yesterday, a picture was circulating from the now Taliban-controlled U.S. embassy showing a short-barrelled M4 rifle and night-vision setup leaning up against a wall. The latter is worth about $50,000. There’s no possibility that was the kit of an Afghan soldier who surrendered. It was all SOCOM gear so we know it was left there by a U.S. military member.
And while that’s one small example, there are tons of weapons — and I mean literal tons — that have fallen into Taliban hands that should have been removed from the country months ago. Vehicles, top-secret drones, piles of non-surplus M4s and scopes (i.e. the stuff we weren’t equipping the Afghans with) biometric devices, etc. have all been shown in videos as in possession of the Taliban. Again, that’s pure incompetence by the Pentagon and the president leading it.
There was a way to withdraw that didn’t end this way. Joe Biden and the military establishment had seven long months to transport equipment, American citizens, and war-time allies out of there, but by lying about the possibility of Kabul falling, they created a situation where war materials and people were left behind until it was too late. Now, a rushed, dangerous evacuation is happening while our technology is no doubt on its way to Iran and China. What’s an absolute disaster, and Joe Biden owns every ounce of it.