The Home Democrats on the Overseas Affairs Committee launched their very own memo on President Biden’s chaotic 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan after committee Republicans launched a report criticizing the president for what went down on the time.
Texas Rep. Mike McCaul, the Republican chair of the committee, launched a GOP-led report disputing Biden’s claims that his arms have been tied to the settlement former President Trump had made with the Taliban establishing a deadline for U.S. withdrawal for the summer time of 2021. It additionally mentioned State Division officers had no plan for serving to People and allies out whereas there have been nonetheless troops within the area to guard them.
McCaul’s report additionally famous the failure to adequately reply to terror threats forward of the ISIS-Ok bombing at Abbey Gate on the Kabul airport that killed 13 U.S. service members and greater than 150 Afghan civilians, and that the Taliban possible had entry after the withdrawal to $7 billion in deserted U.S. weapons and as much as $57 million in U.S. funds that have been initially given to the Afghan authorities.
However New York Rep. Gregory Meeks, the Democrat rating member of the committee, launched a dueling report in response to the GOP-led report, accusing Republicans of criticizing the Biden administration for the withdrawal for political functions and failing to supply possible alternate options.
HOUSE GOP RELEASES SCATHING REPORT ON BIDEN’S WITHDRAWAL FROM AFGHANISTAN
A U.S. Marine grabs an toddler over a fence of barbed wire throughout an evacuation at then-Hamid Karzai Worldwide Airport in Kabul on Aug. 19, 2021. (Courtesy of Omar Haidiri/AFP by way of Getty Pictures)
Meeks additionally mentioned Republicans didn’t contain Democrat members of their report and confused that plans for withdrawing from Afghanistan started underneath the Trump administration.
He mentioned within the memo’s abstract that Republicans sought to keep away from information involving Trump, together with “his committing the US to a full, date-specific withdrawal in a deal he negotiated with the Taliban that excluded the Afghan authorities or any reference to the rights of Afghan ladies and women.”
The rating member additionally knocked Trump’s “unilateral bulletins to withdraw troops, usually a shock to lots of his personal senior officers, which undercut U.S. leverage as a result of these bulletins have been divorced from Taliban compliance with the deal; and his forcing the Afghan authorities to launch 5,000 Taliban fighters again to the battlefield earlier than a ultimate Taliban offensive in the end took Kabul.”
“When former President Trump took workplace, there have been roughly 14,000 American troops in Afghanistan,” Meeks wrote. “Days earlier than leaving workplace, the previous President ordered an additional discount to 2,500. President Trump initiated a withdrawal that was irreversible with out sending considerably extra American troops to Afghanistan to face renewed fight with the Taliban.”
Taliban fighters have a good time the third anniversary of the withdrawal of US-led troops from Afghanistan, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024. (AP Photograph/Siddiqullah Alizai)
“All witnesses who testified on this situation agreed that the US would have confronted renewed fight with the Taliban had we not continued the withdrawal,” he added. “Fairly than ship extra People to struggle a struggle in Afghanistan, President Biden determined to finish it.”
Addressing the Abbey Gate bombing. Meeks mentioned Republicans “knew for months that the assault was not preventable and that, though a witness instructed our Committee he thought he had the ISIS-Ok bomber in his sights, he didn’t.”
Republicans, Meeks mentioned, made partisan makes an attempt to garner headlines fairly than acknowledge the complete information and substance of their investigation in the course of the peak of the election cycle. He additionally mentioned Republicans tried to tie Vice President Kamala Harris, now the Democrats’ presidential nominee, to the withdrawal though she is referenced solely thrice in 3,288 pages of the committee’s interview transcripts.
HOUSE COMMITTEE SUBPOENAS BLINKEN OVER AFGHANISTAN WITHDRAWAL
U.S. Marines with Particular Goal Marine Air-Floor Job Power – Disaster Response – Central Command, help with safety at an Evacuation Management Checkpoint (ECC) throughout an evacuation at Hamid Karzai Worldwide Airport, Kabul, Afghanistan, Aug. 26. ((U.S. Marine Corps picture by Workers Sgt. Victor Mancilla) )
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“American taxpayers have funded this Committee’s oversight, and the American individuals deserve the reality,” Meeks mentioned. “We owe it to them to focus on the information elicited on this investigation with out undue spin and with respect for the seriousness of the topic and the witnesses who’ve voluntarily testified to us about it.”
“It strikes me now because it did throughout that listening to that lots of these vital of the withdrawal effort merely have a basic objection to President Biden fulfilling his pledge to be the final Commander-in-Chief to preside over the struggle in Afghanistan,” he added. “They’re masking their displeasure with criticisms however have failed to supply possible alternate options. We should proceed to wrestle with these issues to not rewrite the previous or assign partisan blame, however to determine classes that may assist us higher struggle and finish wars sooner or later.”
