Sunday, August 15, 2021

Chaotic Afghanistan Exit Creates Hurdles for U.S., Allies

 

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Taliban fighters take control of Afghan presidential palace after the Afghan President Ashraf Ghani fled the country, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Aug. 15, 2021.© AP Photo/Zabi Karimi Taliban fighters take control of Afghan presidential palace after the Afghan President Ashraf Ghani fled the country, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Aug. 15, 2021.

WASHINGTON—While Biden administration officials sought to cast blame on the Trump administration and Afghan forces for the fall of Kabul, the withdrawal of U.S. troops is creating a set of new problems that will now be even harder to manage.

U.S. officials have said they must continue to monitor the rise of new terrorist risks in the region, and hope to protect the gains women and girls have made in Afghanistan. There are also concerns about foreign adversaries attempting to fill the void left by the American departure, and there is the question of what happens to the military equipment left behind.

Some of those issues were raised by lawmakers in Sunday briefings with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Others were addressed in media appearances in which Mr. Blinken sought to defend the president’s policy.

Mr. Blinken expressed hope that the Taliban would safeguard human rights, including those of women, if it assumes power in the coming days in order to gain wide international recognition and secure the easing of sanctions.

“Ultimately, it is in the Taliban’s self-interest,” Mr. Blinken said on ABC’s “This Week.” “If they’re in a position of power and they don’t do that, then I think Afghanistan will become a pariah state.”

In a message to followers Sunday, the Taliban’s leader, Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada, urged his fighters to treat conquered cities with a benevolent hand. However, the frantic flight from the city, with traffic jams and crowded airport terminals, exposed the fear many Afghans have that the Taliban won’t follow those instructions.

The administration’s threat to isolate the Taliban if it deviates from international norms on human rights may also face challenges from Moscow and Beijing, which have hosted Taliban officials last month.

a train on a track with smoke coming out of it© Rahmat Gul/Associated Press

The plight of Afghan women has been a special concern for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, (D., Calif.), who issued a statement Saturday that the U.S., international community and Afghan government “do everything we can to protect women and girls from inhumane treatment by the Taliban.”

Under Taliban rule from 1996-2001, Afghan women were subjected to severe restrictions including being banned from working outside the home and appearing in public without a close male relative, according to Amnesty International. Women and girls were further denied access to education and had limited access to healthcare. These restrictions still invariably apply to women in areas currently controlled by the Taliban.


Video: Afghan forces battling to retake Kunduz as Taliban advance in north (Reuters)

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Afghan forces battling to retake Kunduz as Taliban advance in north

Mr. Blinken said that the U.S. would use long-range air power, including drones, to monitor and respond to new terrorist threats, should they be detected.

“Our capacity to do that is far different and far better than it was before 9/11” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “At the same time, the Taliban have a certain self-interest in this. They know what happened the last time they harbored a terrorist group that attacked the United States. It’s not in their self-interest to allow a repeat of that.”

But its plan to carry out counterterrorism strikes “over the horizon” from Arab Gulf states or U.S. carriers also faces some difficulties, according to Pentagon officials.

The flight time for a U.S. drone from Qatar, for example, is so long that it would have only a limited period to carry out reconnaissance or conduct missile strikes in Afghanistan. Central Intelligence Agency director William Burns has also noted that intelligence-gathering efforts will be more difficult without a U.S. military presence in the country.

On Friday, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby acknowledged concerns that the Taliban might seize Black Hawk helicopters, A-29 planes and other equipment that the U.S. has provided to the Afghan military, though he declined to say if the U.S. military would go so far as to destroy it as it has in other situations.

“We are always worried about U.S. equipment that could fall into an adversary’s hands,” he said. “What actions we might take to prevent that or to forestall it, I just really won’t speculate about today.”

After Islamic State militants captured American-made vehicles from the Iraqi army in Ramadi, the U.S. bombed the equipment.

A more immediate problem is evacuating Afghans who worked with the U.S. and other personnel.

In a call with senators, Mr. Austin said that the U.S. could evacuate about 1,000 people a day from the airport, according to one person familiar with the call.

Mr. Austin reinforced several times that if the Taliban interfered with the evacuation the U.S. would retaliate.

U.S. officials on a separate call with House lawmakers said that a small contingent of workers would be kept at the airport for the administrative work associated with processing the departures of Afghans who worked with the U.S., a person familiar with the call said.

U.S. officials suggested to lawmakers that there would be limits to their ability to evacuate all non-Americans in the country. They suggested that if non-Americans were in Kabul, there was a chance to get them out, but if they weren’t in Kabul by now, the U.S. doesn’t have the resources in the country to get them to the capital, the person said.

“There will be time to debate the failures, missteps, and lost opportunities of the past 20 years, but today our mission is clear: hold the Kabul airport as long as possible and get all U.S. citizens and as many Afghan partners out as possible,” said Rep. Jason Crow (D., Colo.), a veteran of the war who led a bill to increase the number of special immigrant visas for Afghans who helped the U.S.

Mr. Austin, responding to a question about the use of the airport by civilian aircraft, said that he supports keeping the airport open to civilian aircraft. The U.S. is using return flights of the Pentagon aircraft that are delivering the 5,000 newly deploying troops to evacuate people from Kabul, one person said.

Write to Michael R. Gordon at michael.gordon@wsj.com and Siobhan Hughes at siobhan.hughes@wsj.com

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