EXCLUSIVEState Department STILL didn't have a full Afghanistan evacuation plan when the Taliban stormed Kabul... days before the suicide blast: Devastating new details reveal the chaos in the bungled operation
The House Foreign Affairs Committee is investigating the Afghan withdrawal
13 US service members died and hundreds of Americans were left behind in 2021
Testimony by two officials reveals how speed of Taliban advance surprised them
By Rob Crilly, Senior U.S. Political Reporter For Dailymail.Com In Washington, D.C.
Published: 18:19 EDT, 11 April 2024 | Updated: 07:25 EDT, 12 April 2024
Hours of private testimony by two of the top State Department officials who oversaw the evacuation from Afghanistan lays bare the confusion at the heart of the operation, and how they failed to respond to warning signs that the Taliban was sweeping across the country.
The result was a chaotic operation at Kabul's airport in August 2021 with Americans scrambling to get on flights after the extremist group had seized control of the country.
American citizens had to pass through checkpoints run by the same gunmen who had spent years battling U.S. forces.
Yet even as the Pentagon prepositioned forces to support an evacuation as ground conditions worsened, the officials, Brian McKeon and Derek Chollet, said their priority had been to work out how to keep the U.S. embassy open.
They were still working on a plan to evacuate Americans and their Afghan allies when the militant group overran the capital.
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13293745/donald-trump-afghanistan-withdrawal-investigation-house.html
