Democrats on Monday strongly defended the hasty military withdrawal of President Biden from Afghanistan during a hearing by the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in which Secretary of State Antony Blinken was assaulted on the management of the exit. of the administration.
Representative Gregory Meeks, DN.Y., chairman of the committee, said ending the war in Afghanistan “will never be easy” and has repeatedly criticized Biden critics for executing the withdrawal last month.
FLASHING TO RETIRE FROM THE CONGRESS TO THE WITHDRAWAL OF AFGHANISTAN
“Unraveling the war in Afghanistan has never been easy,” Meeks said. “And for my friends who presume there is a clean solution to the retreat, I’d like to hear what exactly a fluid retreat from a messy, chaotic, 20-year war is like. In fact, I haven’t heard the option yet. of net withdrawal, because I don’t think it exists. “
“They are masking their discomfort with criticism, but they are not offering feasible alternatives,” he said. “Once again, we see domestic policy being injected into foreign policy.”
Meeks also criticized former President Donald Trump for his negotiations with the Taliban during his tenure in office. Meeks said that in addition to Blinken, the committee should listen to former Trump administration officials, as well as the Obama and Bush administrations.
In his interrogation of Blinken on Monday, Rep. Brad Sherman, D-California, argued that there was an ongoing “stampede” last month at Kabul airport, where the U.S. carried out its evacuation, and that “there is simply no way the administration can have an orderly or successful stampede.”
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Sherman also blamed Trump for setting the original May 1 withdrawal date and for closing a deal with the Taliban last year that forced Biden to choose between withdrawing now or send more troops to war.
“We inherited a term, we didn’t inherit a plan,” Blinken agreed.
Virginia Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly also accused Republicans of being “quite selective” in their concerns about terrorists, pointing to Trump-era negotiations with the Taliban.