Whichever way you look at it, President Biden’s pullout of U.S. forces from Afghanistan has become nothing short of a full meltdown this week. In what one prominent observer called “a stunning demonstration of battlefield momentum” that “echoes of the fall of Saigon in 1975,” Taliban militants late this week took the second and third largest Afghan cities, and now control half of the country’s 34 regional capitals as they prepare for an all-out assault on Kabul. The AP called the week’s developments “a stunning collapse of Afghan forces after the United States spent nearly two decades and $830 billion trying to establish a functioning state.”
The Biden Administration’s response to the fast-moving situation signaled nothing but weakness and lack of planning. Thursday afternoon, Biden left it to his spokespeople at the departments of State and Defense to convey two huge pieces of news– first, that we are all but evacuating our embassy in Afghanistan, and second, that we are deploying some 3,000 troops to the international airport in Kabul to get that done. In any other administration, the secretaries of state and defense would make such big announcements directly, if not President Biden himself, not department flacks. Yet it was radio silence from Secretaries Blinken and Austin Thursday afternoon, and minutes later President Biden refused to answer questions from the White House press corps as he ambled to his helicopter en route to his home in Wilmington, Delaware. So much for clear communications from our leaders in a time of crisis and shifting plans on arguably the biggest issue of the past six months.
Former secretary of State Mike Pompeo perhaps said it best: “It appears Team Biden may not have planned adequately. They look panicked. This will embolden the Taliban and encourage Al Qaeda. The Biden administration’s sending of over 3,000 American troops back into Afghanistan is a result of poor planning and poor leadership in attempting to execute an operation that had been set up for success by the Trump administration.”
Faced with this public relations nightmare telegraphing their lack of planning for the bipartisan, planned exit from Afghanistan, what should President Biden do now? (And the answer is not, as Biden did with China earlier this year in his administration’s first visit to that country’s leaders, to send climate-change czar John Kerry to talk global warming with the Taliban.)
The way forward is clear, and two-fold. First, Biden needs to convey clearly and personally to the Taliban leadership that any move against Kabul between now and our designated departure date of August 31 will be met with severe and unacceptable consequences to them, militarily, diplomatically and economically. And this goes for retribution to Afghan forces that surrender to the Taliban, as well. In President Trump’s words late this week, “I personally had discussions with top Taliban leaders whereby they understood what they are doing now would not have been acceptable.” President Biden needs to do the same, and make Taliban leaders understand the heavy and personal cost they will bear for any move on Kabul by August 31, and any mistreatment of surrendering Afghan forces between now and then.
Second, Biden must provide for the swift and organized departure from the country of all remaining Afghan and third-country personnel and contractors who worked with U.S. forces over the last twenty years. Much of this work has been underway for months, with several thousand such contractors already out of country, primarily through the special immigrant visa (SIV) program, but the need is far greater. In an urgent cable made public late this week, U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Ross Wilson made the case that the current program is leaving tens of thousands of contractors and their families unable to depart the country by our scheduled withdrawal date of August 31. These brave families are “under threat because of their work with the U.S. government ... but cannot get out,” he noted.
Biden needs to let the Taliban know that we are going to get our contractors out over the next two-and-a-half weeks, and once again, that any move to prevent us from doing so will result in severe consequences. Then, Biden needs to make clear that we will devote the additional airlift resources to get them out of country. To his credit, the administration has been surging our provision of visas for this group, but the results are unfortunately too little, too late at this stage. We need to continue ramping up ways to get them out of country, and including as many of them as we can on departure flights. If we can let hundreds of thousands cross our southern border each month with little to no documentation, we can surely err on the side of extracting as many Afghans as we can without finalized visas.
There is no doubt – proper planning would have prevented the situation in which we find ourselves now in Afghanistan. Yet the Biden team can still right this ship with an unequivocal message of strength to Taliban leaders, and rapid and smart adjustments to our exit plan for both U.S. personnel and our Afghan friends. Above all, though, we need to hear directly from President Biden and his senior team – not leaving it to spokesmen to deliver an uncertain call.
John Ullyot was Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs and NSC Spokesman from 2019-2021.