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A report by the US state department on Friday criticised the Biden administration’s handling of the military withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, saying it had failed to prepare for “worst-case” scenarios and made critical mistakes during the evacuation from the country.
The report — some of the findings of which remain classified — represents the clearest admission of fault from Washington about its execution of the pullout, which is considered one of President Joe Biden’s biggest blunders.
The document said the decision by both the Trump and Biden administrations to remove the US military had “serious consequences for the viability of the Afghan government and its security”.
It blamed the administrations for “insufficient senior-level consideration of worst-case scenarios and how quickly those might follow”.
Biden set an August 31 2021 deadline for the military pullout. But the US did not foresee that Taliban forces would rapidly take over the country, including its capital Kabul in the weeks leading up to the withdrawal.
This led to a chaotic pullout of military and civilian personnel in the final days of the American presence in the country, including a deadly attack on US military personnel.
According to the state department report, there had been “a plan to retain some US forces to provide critical security, but the details of that . . . had not been clearly established by the time Kabul fell to the Taliban”.
It also noted that while military planning for a possible evacuation of civilians “had been under way . . . for some time”, it was “unclear” who at the state department was leading the effort, hindering the planning.
The report also charged that “senior administration officials had not made clear decisions regarding the universe of at-risk Afghans who would be included by the time the operation started nor had they determined where those Afghans would be taken”.
Further, the operation was complicated by “prolonged gaps in filling” senior positions, including the senior state department official responsible for south and central Asia.
The Biden administration has remained adamant that pulling troops out of Afghanistan was good policy that is allowing it to focus on bigger security challenges related to Russia and China.
When pressed by a journalist about the report on Friday, Biden defended the decision.
“Do you remember what I said about Afghanistan? I said al-Qaeda would not be there. I said it wouldn’t be there. I said we’d get help from the Taliban,” he said. “I was right”.