Following the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan which has left hundreds of people still stranded in the country along with 13 dead troops, the Biden administration is still pointing fingers at each other to cover for this foreign policy disaster. Back in August, in various interviews, President Biden was asked whether he received advice to leave soldiers in the country over concerns that the Taliban would immediately take control. Biden said no such advice was given and everyone in his cabinet was of the same mindset.
Turns out, at least according to congressional testimony, someone is lying about the differences of opinion on the Afghanistan withdrawal.
Speaking under oath on Capitol Hill, several top generals and Pentagon officials directly contradicted claims made by the President regarding whether they recommended leaving troops in place to facilitate an orderly exit and help Americans and friendly Afghans escape the country:
Top generals told lawmakers under oath on Tuesday that they advised President Joe Biden early this year to keep several thousand troops in Afghanistan — directly contradicting the president’s comments in August that no one warned him not to withdraw troops from the country.
The remarkable testimony pits top military brass against the commander-in-chief as the Biden administration continues to face tough questions about what critics are calling a botched withdrawal that directly led to the deaths of 13 American service members, scenes of chaos at the Kabul airport, and the abandonment of American citizens and at-risk Afghans in the war-torn country.
Where to even begin with this bombshell? Is President Biden lying about advice he received but chose to ignore, or are these top generals now trying to cover their own backsides as a means to protect their own careers in the Defense Department? Surely amid a large group of generals and advisors, there would be differing opinions, so why would Biden say this back in August to George Stepahanoplpus?
STEPHANOPOULOS: But your top military advisors warned against withdrawing on this timeline. They wanted you to keep about 2,500 troops.
BIDEN: No, they didn’t. It was split. Tha– that wasn’t true. That wasn’t true.
STEPHANOPOULOS: They didn’t tell you that they wanted troops to stay?
BIDEN: No. Not at — not in terms of whether we were going to get out in a timeframe all troops. They didn’t argue against that.
STEPHANOPOULOS: So no one told — your military advisors did not tell you, “No, we should just keep 2,500 troops. It’s been a stable situation for the last several years. We can do that. We can continue to do that”?
BIDEN: No. No one said that to me that I can recall.
It’s clear now that Stephanopoulos was getting that number, 2,500, from somewhere specific. Biden also couched his answer saying that he didn’t “recall” anyone saying that to him at the time. In other words, they might have said, but Biden can’t remember or doesn’t want to admit being wrong by ignoring advice from his top military commanders.
In any case, the testimony today should lead to some further hearings and investigations into why and how the Biden administration went forward, against the distinct advice of generals, with a plan that was destined to leave death and chaos in its wake.
The testimony was direct enough that Gen. Frank McKenzie, Commander of U.S. Central Command, said he spoke directly with Biden relaying recommendations that “several thousand” troops should be left in the country:
McKenzie also acknowledged that he talked to Biden directly about the recommendation by Gen. Scott Miller, the commander of U.S. Forces Afghanistan until July, that the military leave a few thousand troops on the ground, which Miller detailed in closed testimony last week.
“I was present when that discussion occurred and I am confident that the president heard all the recommendations and listened to them very thoughtfully,” McKenzie said.
Where does Biden go from this? He plowed ahead with a reckless withdrawal plan against the advice given to him by military leaders on the ground. Thirteen troops ended up dead amid the chaos at the Kabul airport in a terrorist attack from ISIS-K.
As we’re now finding out, the situation surrounding the botched Aghanistan withdrawal is even worse than we’ve previously been led to believe.
