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Biden administration scrambled as its orderly withdrawal from Afghanistan unraveled
Washington Compost ^ | August 14, 2021 | Missy Ryan Image without a caption By Missy Ryan Reporter covering diplomacy and national security
Posted on 8/14/2021, 7:53:01 PM by ConservativeInPA
By the middle of the week, as cities across Afghanistan were falling like dominoes to the Taliban and U.S. diplomats appeared increasingly at risk, President Biden’s plan for an orderly end to the United States’ longest war was quickly falling apart.
On Wednesday evening, Biden convened his top advisers to assess the ominous turn of events. One by one, in the cramped Situation Room in the White House basement, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken outlined the administration’s options for ensuring the security of U.S. personnel. Biden asked them to return with recommendations.
When the aides reconvened early the next morning, things had gotten worse. The Taliban was taking control of more and more of Afghanistan’s 34 provincial capitals, most of them seized without a major fight, and the militants were bearing down on Kabul, the national capital. After being briefed by Sullivan and Austin, Biden gave the order to activate a plan deploying troops to secure the Kabul airport and create an evacuation route for Americans on the ground.
Blinken called Kabul, where the U.S. Embassy’s top diplomat was already presiding over packing and document destruction, and told him most embassy personnel would move to the airport. At U.S. Central Command in Tampa, military leaders ordered intensified airstrikes on militants driving toward Kabul, hoping to slow their advance as U.S. personnel and their allies scrambled to get out.
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