Three years ago, the U.S. military was at Kabul’s international airport frantically organizing evacuation flights out of Afghanistan as the Taliban returned to power in the capital city after a 20-year hiatus. The evacuation mission was rushed, with overwhelmed U.S. forces working to get as many Afghans out of the country as possible. The last U.S. military plane flew out of the airport on Aug. 31, ending a two-decade-long military mission, the longest in U.S. history.
The Biden administration received significant criticism both during and after the evacuation. Former national security advisor John Bolton said the Taliban would again provide a safe haven and support to Al Qaeda as it planned attacks against the United States. Retired Gen. David Petraeus, a onetime commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, stated that the withdrawal damaged America’s credibility around the world. Leon Panetta, the CIA director and Defense secretary during the Obama administration, went so far as to suggest that Biden may eventually have to send troops back to Afghanistan as President Obama did in Iraq.
In the three years since, none of these doomsday predictions have come to pass. Nonetheless, the weeks-long evacuation remains fodder for the campaign trail; former President Trump constantly reminds rallygoers of the “Afghanistan catastrophe,” hoping to use the chaotic withdrawal as a referendum on the Biden-Harris administration’s foreign policies.
Let there be no mistake: Afghanistan under the Taliban is a dismal place. The Afghan people have seen a significant reduction in their personal freedoms. Women and girls face severe restrictions, including on their right to education, work and travel.
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