WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden sought to reassure the United States on the dramatic evacuation from Afghanistan, promising no Americans would be abandoned in one of the “most difficult” airlifts in history.
Widely criticized over the chaotic exit after a sudden Taliban victory, Biden warned that the frantic effort to fly Americans, other foreigners and Afghan allies out of Taliban-occupied Kabul was dangerous.
“This is one of the largest, most difficult airlifts in history,” he said in a televised address from the White House. “I cannot promise what the final outcome will be.”
The White House says that about 13,000 people have got out on US military aircraft in less than a week, with the flow increasing. An hours-long pause was ordered Friday due to overcrowding at a base in Qatar, where planes were headed.
Biden cautioned that the US government does not know how many of its citizens are even in Afghanistan after 20 years of war.
But he said firmly: “Let me be clear: any American who wants to come home, we will get you home.”
He also said the United States was “committed” to rescuing Afghans who had worked alongside US forces against the Taliban and who now fear retribution.
Biden poured cold water on the idea of expanding the US military perimeter beyond Kabul´s airport into Taliban-controlled streets, warning of “unintended consequences.”
However, in one incident US troops did exit the airport to get 169 people inside to safety, the Pentagon said.
On the world stage, Biden rejected the notion that the military debacle, in which the US-trained Afghan army imploded and allowed the Taliban to take over almost without a fight, was hurting Washington´s credibility. “I have seen no question of credibility from our allies,” Biden said.
The White House speech was only Biden´s second on the crisis since the Taliban capture of Kabul last weekend. He also took questions from reporters after the address, the only time he has done so apart from an interview.
Critics were attacking Biden not just for being caught unaware by the rapidity of the Taliban takeover but his relatively low profile, Geo News reported.
It remained unclear what went wrong in the Biden administration´s calculations in Afghanistan. However, the 78-year-old president appeared adamant that US voters will eventually forgive him for a terrifying and at times tragic few days in Kabul, instead remembering him as the president who ended 20 years of futile war.
White House Communications Director Kate Bedingfield on Friday echoed Biden´s comments about the impossibility of avoiding a messy exit and said that, rather than being caught flat-footed, the administration had in fact “prepared for every contingency.”
There was “going to be a chaotic situation whether it happened five months ago, whether it happened five weeks ago or whether it happened this week,” she told MSNBC.
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