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Last night in Kabul, the United States ended 20 years of war in Afghanistan. The longest war in American history. We completed one of the biggest air lifts in history with more than 120,000 people evacuated to safety. That number is more than double what most experts felt were possible. No nation, no nation has ever done anything like it in all of history, and only United States had the capacity and the will and ability to do it. And we did it today.
The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravely and selfless courage to the United States military and our diplomats and intelligence professional. For weeks, they risked their lives to get American citizens, Afghans who helped us, citizens of our allies and partners and others onboard planes and out of the country. And they did it facing a crush of enormous crowds seeking to leave the country.
They did it knowing ISIS-K terrorists, sworn enemies of the Taliban, were lurking in the midst of those crowds. And still, the women and men of the United States military, our diplomatic corps and intelligence professionals did their job and did it well. Risking their lives, not for professional gains, but to serve others. Not in a mission of war, but in the mission of mercy.
Twenty service members were wounded in the service of this mission, thirteen heroes gave their lives. I was just at Dover Air Force Base for the dignified transfer. We owe them and their families a debt of gratitude we can never repay, but we should never, ever, ever forget.
In April, I made a decision to end this war. As part of that decision, we set the date of August 31st for American troops to withdraw. The assumption was that more than 300,000 Afghan National Security Forces that we had trained over the past two decades and equipped would be a strong adversary in their civil wars with the Taliban.
That assumption that the Afghan government would be able to hold on for a period of time beyond military draw down turned out not to be accurate. But, I still instructed our National Security Team to prepare for every eventuality, even that one, and that’s what we did.
So we were ready, when the Afghan Security Forces, after two decades of fighting for their country and losing thousands of their own, did not hold on as long as anyone expected. We were ready when they and the people of Afghanistan watched their own government collapse and the president flee amid the corruption of malfeasance, handing over the country to their enemy, the Taliban, and significantly increasing the risk to us personnel and our allies.
As a result, to safely extract American citizens before August 31st, as well as embassy personnel, allies, and partners, and those Afghans who had worked with us and fought alongside of us for 20 years, I had authorized 6,000 troops, American troops to Kabul to help secure the airport.
As General McKenzie said, this is the way the mission was designed. It was designed to operate under severe stress and attack and that’s what it did. Since March, we reached out 19 times to Americans in Afghanistan with multiple warnings and offers to help them leave Afghanistan. All the way back as far as March.
After we started the evacuation 17 days ago, we did initial outreach and analysis and identified around 5,000 Americans who had decided earlier to stay in Afghanistan but now wanted to leave. Our operation Allie Rescue ended up getting more than 5,500 Americans out. We got out thousands of citizens and diplomats from those countries that went into Afghanistan with us to get bin Laden. We got out locally employed staff in the United States Embassy and their families, totalling roughly 2,500 people. We got thousands of Afghan translators and interpreters and others who supported the United States out as well.
Now we believe that about 100 to 200 Americans remain in Afghanistan with some intention to leave. Most of those who remain are dual citizens, long time residents, but earlier decided to stay because of their family roots in Afghanistan. The bottom line, 90% of Americans in Afghanistan who wanted to leave were able to leave. And for those remaining Americans, there is no deadline. We remain committed to get them out if they want to come out.
Secretary of State Blinken is leading the continued diplomatic efforts to ensure safe passage for any American, Afghan partner or foreign national who wants to leave Afghanistan. In fact just yesterday, the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution that sent a clear message about the international community expects the Taliban to deliver on moving forward. Notably, freedom of travel, freedom to leave.
Together we are joined by over 100 countries that are determined to make sure the Taliban upholds those commitments. It will include ongoing efforts in Afghanistan to reopen the airport as well as overland routes, allowing for continued departure for those who want to leave and deliver humanitarian assistance to the people of Afghanistan.
The Taliban has made public commitments broadcast on television and radio across Afghanistan on safe passage for anyone wanting to leave, including those who worked alongside Americans. We don’t take them by their word alone, but by their actions. And we have leverage to make sure those commitments are met.
Let me be clear, leaving August the 31st is not due to an arbitrary deadline. It was designed to save American lives. My predecessor, the Former President, signed an agreement with the Taliban to remove US troops by May the first, just months after I was inaugurated. It included no requirement that the Taliban work out a cooperative governing arrangement with the Afghan government. But it did authorize the release of 5,000 prisoners last year, including some of the Taliban’s top war commanders among those who just took control of Afghanistan.
By the time I came to office the Taliban was in it’s strongest military position since 2001, controlling or contesting nearly half of the country. The previous administration’s agreement said that if we stuck to the May 1st deadline that they had signed on to leave by, the Taliban wouldn’t attack any American forces. But if we stayed, all bets were off.
So we were left with a simple decision, either through on the commitment made by the last administration and leave Afghanistan, or say we weren’t leaving and commit another tens of thousands more troops going back to war. That was the choice, the real choice between leaving or escalating. I was not going to extend this forever war and I was not extending a forever exit.
The decision to end the military lift operation at that Kabul airport was based on the unanimous recommendation of my civilian and military advisors. The Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint chiefs of Staff and all the Service chiefs and the commanders in the field, their recommendation was that the safest way to secure the passage of the remaining Americans and others out of the country was to continue with 6,000 troops on the ground in harm’s way in Kabul, but rather to get them out through non-military means.
In the 17 days that we operated in Kabul, after the Taliban seized power, we engage in an around the clock effort to provide every American the opportunity to leave. Our State Department was working 24/7 contacting and talking, and in some cases walking Americans into the airport. Again, more than 5,500 Americans were airlifted out. And for those who remain, we will make arrangements to get them out if they so choose.
As for the Afghans, we and our partners have airlifted 100,000 of them, no country in history has done more to airlift out the residents of another country than we have done. We will continue to work to help more people leave the country who are at risk. We’re far from done.
For now, I urge all Americans to join me in grateful prayer for our troops and diplomats and intelligence officers who carried out this mission of mercy in Kabul at a tremendous risk with such unparalleled results. An air-lift that evacuated tens of thousands. To a network of volunteers and veterans who helped identify those needing evacuation, guide them to the airport and provided them for their support along the way. We’re going to continue to need their help. We need your help and I’m looking forward to meeting with you. And to everyone who is now offering or who will offer to welcome Afghan allies to their homes around the world, including in America, we thank you.
I take responsibility for the decision. Now some say we should have started mass evacuation sooner and, “Couldn’t this have been done in a more orderly manner?” I respectfully disagree. Imagine if we’d begun evacuations in June or July, bringing in thousands of American troops and evacuated more than 120,000 people in the middle of a civil war. There still would have been a rush to the airport, a breakdown in confidence and control of the government, and it still would have been a very difficult and dangerous mission.
The bottom line is there is no evacuation from the end of a war that you can run without the kinds of complexities, challenge and threats we faced. None. There are those who would say we should have stayed indefinitely, for years on end. They ask, “Why don’t we just keep doing what we were doing? Why do we have to change anything?” The fact is, everything had changed.
My predecessor had made a deal with the Taliban. When I came into office, we faced a deadline, May one. The Taliban onslaught was coming, we faced one of two choices. Follow the agreement of the previous administration, or extend to have more time for people to get out. Or send in thousands of more troops and escalate the war.
To those asking for a third decade of war in Afghanistan I ask, “What is of vital national interest?” In my view, we only have one. To make sure Afghanistan can never be used again to launch an attack on our homeland. Remember why we went to Afghanistan in the first place, because we were attacked by Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda on September 11th, 2001, and they were based in Afghanistan.
We delivered justice to bin Laden on May 2nd, 2011 over a decade ago. Al-Qaeda was decimated. I respectfully suggest you ask yourself this question, “If we’ve been attacked on September 11th, 2001 from Yemen, instead of Afghanistan, would we have ever gone to war in Afghanistan, even though the Tali bond controlled Afghanistan in the year 2001?” I believe the honest answer is no. That’s because we had no vital interest in Afghanistan other than to prevent an attack on America’s homeland and our friends, and that’s true today.
We succeeded in what we set out to do in Afghanistan over a decade ago, then we stayed for another decade. It was time to end this war. This is a new world. The terror threat has metastasized across the world, well beyond Afghanistan. We face threats from al-Shabab in Somalia, al-Qaeda affiliates in Syria and the Arabian Peninsula, and ISIS attempting to create a caliphate in Syria and Iraq and establishing affiliates across Africa and Asia.
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If Trump had a cabinet mostly filled with Chinese loyalists, it would be raising red flags. So why does Biden give so many powerful positions to Jews, and has all his children marry Jews? Why are jews so over represented in positions of power?
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Biden has announced that he is banning guns. In part because he envisions a future where Patriots are defenseless against tyrants. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/jun/24/biden-says-future-patriots-face-lost-cause-against/
He essentially is threatening to send military grade weapons against dissidents who want a voice in their government.
The ruler of the United States is out of control.
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Biden has shut down almost 100 news sites he disagrees with.
Freedom of speech should also include my freedom to digest whatever source of guy speech I want to as well.
If I want to read a book financed by the Saudis, that should not be Biden's business.
If you buy a domain and own it, the government has no right to hack your hosting company or threaten them to shut your site down, especially if their justification is that they don't agree with the message of that site.
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Yes or no? Why?
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I will be supporting Biden over Trump, what do you think?
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Let me preface this by saying that if I was the one seeing this headline in the poltiics thread, I would have immediately dismissed it as bullshit without giving it a second thought.... If you're skeptical about the bold claim being made, I completely understand, I find it difficult to forsee happening myself
Just hear me out.
Warren and Bernie have been competing for the more liberal wing of the Dem party. I dont think anyone really disputes that. If you consider Bernie is further to the left of Warren enough to really establish himself as the representative of the far left is one thing, but at the end of the day the only two candidates who could even make an appeal to the liberal wing of the party was Sanders and Warren..... For that reason, its easy to conclude that should one drop out, they would almost certainly endorse the other. With Sanders now the frontrunner and Warren down to 4th, you could conclude that Warren would likely drop out and likely endorse Sanders
Heres the counterargument.
#1) In 2016, Warren never endorsed Bernie over Hillary.
In 2016 we had a clear 1v1 faceoff between a very centrist establishment candidate (Hillary) against a leftist outsider opponent (Bernie) in the primary. Shit, a lot of people wanted Warren to run against Hillary as the leftist representative but instead Bernie was the one who jumped in and carried the torch. You might think that because of how much the two had in common and the legitimate race between the two, Warren would have endorsed Bernie over Hillary since Warren was not campaigning, the primary was a close race, and Bernie clearly was closer to her ideologically than Hillary.... But Warren never endorsed Bernie...... Warren waited until the race was practically over before endorsing Hillary, so even though Warren offered high praise for Bernie all throughout the campaign, she still endorsed Hillary instead.
Maybe though she just knew Hillary would win, or that it was more important to unite behind whichever candidate won to defeat Trump in the general election. Fair theory, fair conclusion.
#2) Following this election, Warren's political career will likely be capped/over thanks to Sanders
In 2018, Warren handily won reelection to the Senate in Massachusetts by an almost 2 to 1 margin. While her Senate term doesnt expire until 2024, right when the next presidential election would be taking place, at that point she would be 74 years old. While the oldest current senator is Dianne Feinstein from California (86 years old), the ability of ANY candidate to win votes in a presidential contest at that age would become a stark problem that would be borderline impossible to overcome..... If Trump loses in 2020 and a Dem takes the White House in 2020, then the next opening for Dems to jump in would be 2028, where Warren would be approaching 80 if she tried running then.
To summarize, this election and this run for President was arguably Warren's last good shot where she had decent odds to actually win the nomination. Assuming she doesnt win at this point, she will not get a better opportunity to win in the future and will be relegated to being a Senator for the remainder of her career barring a VP selection of some sort. If this is the end of the road for a run for president, which it very well appears to be, then SANDERS would be the one most responsible. Not Biden, not Hillary, not the DNC, not the media or some sort of scandal or flip-flop on a policy issue, it would be Sanders. Sanders has flat out eaten her base of support and united the progressive wing of the party behind himself and away from Warren..... If Warren is salty enough at missing out on her shot to be President thanks to Sanders taking over her base, she could endorse a more moderate candidate out of spite.
Maybe though she is not that type of person. Maybe she wouldnt sink to that level over something as petty as spite, that being president was not the only thing in the world she cared about, and losing because Sanders took her base wont upset her in the long term. Fair theory, fair conclusion.
#3) Bernie and Warren have butted heads in the past.
If you watched that last shit-slinging of a Dem debate, 3 things happened. #1, everyone was yelling. #2, Bloomberg sucked a fat dick. #3, Warren was firing shots at EVERYONE, including Bernie. Warren has shifted to total war in the campaign in just about every stage, and that has included against Bernie who is the closest ideological comparison to her in the race.
- She has lumped Bernie together with Biden and Bloomberg in ads for her campaign as "politicians and billionaires won't cut it"
- She has claimed that Bernie "consistently calls for things he fails to get done"
- She has infamously claimed that Bernie told her "A woman cannot defeat Donald Trump" which Bernie fiercely denies
- She has pledged to fight all the way to the convention, ignoring calls to drop out and endorse Sanders to unite the progressive wing
- Theres the infamous debate moment where Sanders went for a handshake at a debate and Warren refused
- Staffers on both Sanders and Warren's campaigns haev complained over dirty tactics used by the other side
If the competing shots between Sanders and Warren is more then just political chess-moves to try to win the progressive base of the party, the two may have at some point crossed the line from being supposed allies with much in common to being any other rival in the Dem primary. If thats the case and that line has supposedly been crossed, then Warren would not owe any allegiance to Bernie just because they are ideologically similar. If the campaign has really left its mark, Warren may endorse Biden or another candidate over Bernie if the strategic benefits in doing so outweigh the benefits of uniting the progressive base behind the best option.
Maybe this is just part of campaigning for president and that these spats and sparring will not leave their mark. Maybe Warren will be able to forgive all of this and still stands firmly with Sanders if she cant represent the progressive wing herself. Fair theory, fair conclusion
#4) Warren's interest in beating Trump may, well, trump her interest in supporting the next ideological candidate
The predominant fact of Dem primary is that voters care more about selecting a candidate best able to beat Donald Trump in a general election than it is to select a candidate that most closely represents ones political beliefs.... While more candidates than ever have run for the nomination and represent many different political stances, in this primary voters just want someone who can beat Trump...... While Biden's position of appealing to centrist and undecided voters unsatisfied with Trump is a pretty easy sell to make, Bernies position of beating Trump by exciting non-voters to come out and support his candidacy is by default riskier. It is just as likely that someone who likes Sanders as a candidate supports him as it is for a centrist and undecided voter to not like Sanders and instead just tough it out with Trump for the last 4 years..... A majority of Dems care more about having someone capable of beating Trump then it is voting for someone that shares their values, we have to consider that Elizabeth Warren might be one of them.
If Warren figures that helping Biden to beat Trump will likely be more successful than if she decided to help Sanders to beat Trump, then she would go with Biden.
She did the same thing in 2016 with Hillary over Bernie
#5 Biden might respect Warren as a VP candidate more than Bernie would respect Warren.
Biden sat out the race in 2016 despite calls for him to enter the race, though he did toy with the idea of entering the race while the opportunity was present. While deciding to jump in or not, Biden made some calls to talk to people about whether or not they would support his campaign over Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders. One of the people he turned to, and was actively considering having as his VP on the ticket, happened to be Elizabeth Warren.
Biden values Warren, both her voice and her stances, to the point that from the get-go he was considering having Warren be his VP on a 2016 ticket. Warren's hard stance against Wall Street and subsequent legislation on banking regulations really caught Biden's eye when he considered entering the race, and he actively sought out Warren as a possible VP candidate to see if it was worth running in 2016. based on reports, Warren liked the idea but was still skeptical since Hillary effectively had the moderate/centrist vote on lockdown, leaving Biden with a very difficult path to even winning the nomination to begin with. Even when Hillary was campaigning people thought Warren should VP for her, since it would supposedly unite the moderates and progressives in the Dem party behind one ticket.... Warren liked THAT idea too because she figured it would give her some leverage in pulling Hillary more to the left on certain issues in order to secure her agreement to be VP.
Biden values Warren, and Warren could strategically pull Biden to the left on certain issues if she was VP while also uniting the party behind one ticket to beat Trump.
Thats not the case with Sanders though. If Sanders was the nominee and Warren his VP, then she doesnt get to have much of a say at all. Sanders as the face of the progressive movement would be able to go with whichever policy or agenda he feels is right since voters have made him the representative of the progressive faction in the first place. Sure, Warren would likely agree with Bernie's policies more regularly than Biden, but thats assuming that they get to the White House in the first place. Preaching purely to the left wing faction of the base to drive out fanatical levels of support is what Bernie is basing his entire argument that he can beat Trump on. Thats a very risky strategy that could very well fall short considering how conservative many swing states in the country are and will be..... Biden's strategy on the other hand would be to appeal to centrist and moderate voters more easily swayed away from Trump while Warren becomes the advocate for the progressive faction in an administration, which has better odds of succeeding just from the nature of politics in America.
To summarize, Warren might endorse Biden over Bernie even though Bernie is ideologically closer to her.
1 - Warren went strategy over ideology in 2016 by endorsing Hillary over Bernie
2 - Her political future as of right now appears to have hit its ceiling thanks predominantly to Bernie
3 - Warren and Bernie have not gotten along recently in the campaign
4 - If Warren's biggest goal is to defeat Trump, Warren may again put strategy over Ideology and endorse Biden over Sanders in 2020
5 - Warren would have more of a voice and boost chances of winning as Biden's VP compared to being Sanders' VP
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