Blistering House Report: Biden Was Bent On Leaving Afghanistan – Ignoring Military Advice, NATO Objections and Afghan Pleas

President Joe Biden was so determined to leave Afghanistan that he disregarded advice against it, ignored requests from the Afghan government, and dismissed concerns from American allies.

This was one of the key conclusions drawn from the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s over two-year investigation into the disorderly and tragic Afghanistan withdrawal, according to a damning report published on Sunday.

“Throughout his lengthy service as a US senator from Delaware, his eight years as vice president, and nearly four years as president, Mr. Biden has shown distrust toward military experts and advisors. He has prioritized politics and his legacy over the national security of the United States,” the roughly 350-page report declared.

The Biden administration repeatedly misled and deceived the American public in an attempt to garner support for his unwavering belief that the US should quickly conclude its 20-year conflict in Afghanistan, the investigation revealed.

The prior administration, under President Donald Trump, had negotiated the Doha Agreement with both the Afghan government and the Taliban to bring an end to the US war in Afghanistan.

However, Biden moved forward with minimal regard for the agreement’s terms—regardless of the potential consequences—despite later blaming the same agreement for his decision, the report concluded.

The Doha Agreement, which was signed in 2020, outlined that the US would withdraw its forces from Afghanistan if the Taliban fulfilled specific obligations.

These included cutting ties with al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups, halting attacks on US and coalition forces, reducing violence against Afghan forces, and initiating negotiations with the Afghan government, the report stated.

But Biden’s unwavering determination pushed aside these critical provisions, according to the document.

Purely for Appearances

On February 4, 2021, then-State Department spokesman Ned Price announced that the US would begin reviewing the Taliban’s compliance with the Doha Agreement to assess whether a swift withdrawal from Afghanistan was appropriate.

Yet “during his testimony before the committee, contrary to his public remarks, Mr. Price admitted that the Taliban’s compliance with the Doha Agreement was actually ‘irrelevant’ to the Biden-Harris administration’s decision to leave Afghanistan,” the report found.

The administration’s “deceptions” and “false statements” only continued, according to the review.

“Press releases lacked crucial information about the Taliban’s non-compliance with the Doha Agreement, the ongoing terrorist presence in Afghanistan, the capabilities of the Afghan government and military with and without U.S. support, and NATO allies’ disagreements with the US withdrawal plan,” the report said.

“The Taliban violated key parts of the Doha Agreement, but the Biden-Harris administration insisted it was evaluating the group’s compliance,” the report said.

“In reality, the conditions were completely irrelevant to them.”

Expert Advice Dismissed

Biden made the decision to withdraw entirely despite the near-unanimous opposition from military leaders, according to the findings.

“Contrary to President Biden’s public statements, our investigation has uncovered that the secretary of defense, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the commander of US Central Command, the secretary of state, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the commander of NATO’s Resolute Support Mission and US Forces-Afghanistan all advised against withdrawing all US forces from Afghanistan—both during and after the interagency review,” the report said.

The Biden administration also disregarded the concerns of the international community, charging ahead despite objections from NATO nations that had supported the US effort in Afghanistan.

Afghan leaders themselves also pleaded for more time, arguing the country wasn’t ready for a complete US departure.

“General Haibatullah Alizai—former Afghan Army general—informed the committee staff that he begged American commanders on the ground for additional time, saying, ‘Just tell your leadership to stay with us for two more years. … We’re going to take the initiative … it’s in our favor and we can defeat the Taliban,’” the report noted.

Lack of Preparation

The report painted an image of an administration that was far more concerned with the political optics of the withdrawal than with planning for foreseeable events.

In a particularly pointed section, the report highlighted that Biden didn’t officially authorize a noncombatant evacuation operation (NEO)—the largest such effort in US history—until August 16, 2021, a day after Kabul had already fallen to the Taliban and just two weeks before the last US troops left the city.

“The failure to plan for a NEO had consequences not just for Americans and allies in Afghanistan, but also for US personnel on the ground who were forced to evacuate desperate civilians in a dangerous setting,” the report explained. “These concerns were sidelined by the Biden-Harris administration in favor of optics.”

“Rather than acknowledge their failure, US service members and foreign service officers were told to prioritize evacuating as many individuals as possible, regardless of the risks to their own lives.”

Implications for Harris

Vice President Kamala Harris was mentioned only sparingly in the report, a detail that led former committee senior investigator Jerry Dunleavy to resign from the investigation in protest.

“Harris was the last person in the room when President Biden decided to pull out all US forces from Afghanistan; she even boasted about this shortly after Biden gave the go-ahead,” the report emphasized, referring to earlier media coverage.

She was among 15 administration officials the report urged Congress to formally condemn for their role in the Afghanistan debacle.

The report’s publication comes just two days before Harris’s televised debate against Trump in Philadelphia. Some, like Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, have accused the committee of timing the release for political gain.

But the committee’s chairman, Michael McCaul (R-Texas), defended the timing in a Sunday appearance on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” saying, “It’s taken me two years to get to this point because of obstruction—I’ve had to issue subpoena after subpoena.”

McCaul did fault Trump for excluding the Afghan government from the Doha Agreement negotiations, which took place under his administration.

Ongoing Investigation

Despite the committee’s release of its expansive report, its inquiry into the Afghanistan withdrawal is far from finished.

“There are still many unanswered questions regarding the [Department of Defense] … [concerning] what happened on the ground,” McCaul said.

The committee, which conducted 18 transcribed interviews, reviewed over 20,000 pages of documents, and held seven public hearings, is also pushing for reforms to the National Security Council and the State Department.

“Chairman McCaul’s report is riddled with cherry-picked details, inaccurate portrayals, and preconceived biases that have tainted the investigation from day one,” said Sharon Yang, a White House representative for oversight and investigations.

{Matzav.com}