Former President Donald Trump on Monday is Vice President Kamala Harris on the chaotic withdrawal from the Afghanistan war on the third anniversary of the suicide attack that killed 13 US soldiers.
Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, laid wreaths at Arlington National Cemetery in memory of three of the slain soldiers – Sergeant. Nicole GeeSergeant Major. Darin Hoover and Staff Sgt. Ryan KnaussLater in the day, he traveled to Michigan to speak at the National Guard Association of the United States conference.
Monday marks the third anniversary 26 August 2021, suicide attack at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in which American soldiers and over 100 Afghans were killed. The terrorist militia “Islamic State” claimed responsibility for the attack.
The Biden administration was after a take-back obligation and timeline that the Trump administration negotiated with the Taliban in 2020. A review by a government-appointed special counsel in 2022 concluded that decisions by both Trump and President Joe Biden were the main factors that led to the rapid collapse of the Afghan military and the Taliban’s seizure of power.
On his website Truth Social, Trump called the withdrawal on Monday “the most embarrassing moment in our country’s history. Gross incompetence – 13 DEAD American soldiers, hundreds injured and dead.”
“You don’t take out our soldiers first, you take them out LAST, when everything else has been successfully accomplished,” he said in the post.
Since Biden ended his re-election campaign, Trump has focused on Harris, now the Democratic presidential nominee, and her role in foreign policy decisions. He has particularly highlighted the vice president’s statements that she was the last person in the room before Biden made the decision on Afghanistan.
“She boasted that she would be the last person in the room, and she was. She was the last person in the room with Biden when the two of them decided to pull troops out of Afghanistan,” he said at a rally in North Carolina last week. “She had the final vote. She had the final say, and she was all for it.”
In her own statement on the anniversary of the attack on Kabul airport, Harris said she mourned the 13 US soldiers killed. “My prayers are with their families and loved ones. Their pain and loss breaks my heart,” she said.
Harris said she honors and remembers all Americans who served in Afghanistan.
“As I have said before, President Biden has made the bold and right decision to end America’s longest war. Over the past three years, our administration has proven that we can take out terrorists, including the leaders of al-Qaida and ISIS, without troops in combat zones,” she said. “I will never hesitate to take any action necessary to counter terrorist threats and protect the American people.”
The relatives of some of the killed American soldiers appeared on stage at the Republican National Convention last month and said Biden never publicly mentioned the names of their relatives.
“Joe Biden has refused to acknowledge their sacrifice” Christy ShamblinSergeant Gee’s mother-in-law told the crowd, “Donald Trump knew the names of all our children. He knew all their stories.”
In a statement on Monday on the anniversary of the attack in Kabul, Biden said the 13 Americans killed were “patriots in the highest sense” who “embodied the best of what defines us as a nation: courageous, committed, selfless.”
“Every day since I became vice president, I have carried a card with me listing the exact number of American soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan – including Taylor, Johanny, Nicole, Hunter, Daegan, Humberto, David, Jared, Rylee, Dylan, Kareem, Maxton and Ryan,” Biden said.
Also on Monday: Speaker of the House of Representatives Michael Johnsona Republican from Louisiana, announced that Congress will honor the 13 soldiers posthumously by awarding their families the Congressional Gold Medal next month, the highest civilian honor Congress can bestow.
Under Trump, the United States signed a peace agreement with the Taliban aimed at ending America’s longest war and bringing U.S. troops home. Biden later referred to that agreement as he sought to deflect blame for the Taliban’s overrun of Afghanistan, saying it obliged him to withdraw troops and prepared the ground for the chaos that gripped the country.
A Review of withdrawal by Biden administration acknowledged that the evacuation of Americans and their allies from Afghanistan should have begun sooner, but attributed the delays to the Afghan government and military, as well as to assessments by the U.S. military and intelligence agencies.
The two highest-ranking U.S. generals overseeing the evacuation said the government had inadequately planned the withdrawal. The country’s highest-ranking military officer at the time, then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General … Mark Milley, told lawmakers Earlier this year, he had asked Biden to keep a remaining force of 2,500 men for reinforcements. Instead, Biden opted for a much smaller force of 650 men, which would be limited to securing the US embassy.
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Republished with permission from The Associated Press.
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