The White House announced Thursday that it has handed Congress a long-awaited confidential report on the US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, defending the course of this withdrawal, which ended 20 years of failed attempts to defeat the Taliban.
The White House National Security Council said nothing could have “changed the course of the withdrawal” and that “President (Joe) Biden refused to send another generation of Americans to fight a war that should have ended for the United States long ago.”
The White House released an unclassified 10-page summary of the withdrawal, which has long been heavily criticized by Republicans.
A Republican deputy summons Blinken to reveal the withdrawal documents from Afghanistan
Main points of the summary:
- The White House said that the Biden administration had two options at the beginning of its term, either to withdraw from Afghanistan or to resume fighting with the Taliban, and decided to withdraw.
- A review of the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan suggests that Biden was severely constrained by conditions left over from his predecessor Trump.
- There are no signs that more time, more money, or more Americans” could fundamentally change the course it took.
- The 12-page document said the administration made a mistake and learned its lesson, and now tends to “communicate aggressively” about risks in a volatile security environment.
- The Taliban gained control of Afghanistan in August 2021 as the previous Western-backed government in Kabul collapsed with surprising speed and the last US soldiers withdrew.
- Under former Republican President Donald Trump, the United States struck a deal with the Taliban for the withdrawal of all American forces.
A year since the fall of Kabul