U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken testified virtually at a House Foreign Affairs Committee on Capitol Hill on September 13, 2021 in Washington, DC.
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WASHINGTON – Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday during a disputed hearing in Congress that the Taliban are the de facto government of Afghanistan, a statement marking the apparent end of a Western attempt to create a stable democracy in the country tired of war.
“Is it like that [the Taliban] it is the de facto government of Afghanistan. These are just the facts, “Blinken told the House Foreign Affairs Committee when asked if the administration recognized the Taliban as a legitimate government.
“This is the product, unfortunately, of a side taking control in a civil war,” the nation’s top diplomat added.
During the three-hour hearing, Blinken defended the withdrawal of the Biden administration from U.S. troops in Afghanistan. At least three Republican lawmakers told him during the hearing that he had to resign.
“We made the right decision in ending America’s longest war,” Blinken said in an emotional response.
“We made the right decision not to send a third generation of Americans to fight and die in Afghanistan. We have done the right thing for our citizens and we have worked hard to get them all out. We have done the right thing for 125,000 Afghans, but to bring them to security, and we are now working to do the right thing to keep the Taliban up to the expectations of the international community to ensure that people can continue to travel freely, to ensure that the rights of Afghans are respected, ”he said. to say .
President Gregory Meeks (D-NY) (2nd-L) speaks at the House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at Capitol Hill on Sept. 13. 2021 in Washington, DC.
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Earlier this month, reporters pressured Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on whether the U.S. would recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.
“It’s hard to predict where this will go in the future with respect to the Taliban,” Austin said during a Sept. 1 press conference.
“We don’t know what the future holds for the Taliban,” General Mark Milley, chairman of the joint chief of staff, said alongside Austin.
“I can tell you from personal experience that this is a ruthless group from the past and that whether they change or not, it remains to be seen,” Milley said, adding that he and Austin fought the group during their careers. military.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, General Mark Milley, participate in a briefing at the Pentagon on July 21, 2021 in Arlington, Virginia.
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The United States began its war in Afghanistan in October 2001, weeks after the 9/11 attacks. The Taliban at the time provided sanctuary for al-Qaeda, the group that planned and carried out the devastating terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Since then, about 2,500 members of the U.S. service have died in the conflict, which also claimed the lives of more than 100,000 Afghan soldiers, police personnel and civilians.
Now the Taliban are back in power.
In the last weeks of a planned exodus of foreign forces from Afghanistan, the Taliban carried out a succession of shocking gains on the battlefield. On August 15, the group captured the presidential palace in Kabul, prompting Western governments to speed up the evacuation efforts of Afghan nationals, diplomats and civilians at risk.
After the capture of the Taliban, President Joe Biden defended his decision for the US to leave the war-torn country.
“I am clearly behind my decision. After 20 years I have learned in the hardest way that there was never a good time to withdraw US forces,” Biden said a day after Afghanistan collapsed the Taliban.
“American troops cannot and should not fight in a war and die in a war for which Afghan forces are unwilling to fight on their own,” Biden said. “We gave them every chance to determine their own future. We couldn’t give them the will to fight for that future.”
Biden ordered the deployment of thousands of U.S. troops in Kabul to help with the colossal humanitarian airlift and secure the perimeter of the airport.
In the last week of evacuation efforts, ISIS-K group terrorists killed 13 members of the US service and dozens of Afghans in an attack outside the airport. U.S. forces retaliated and launched strikes in an attempt to thwart other attacks.
The U.S. military mission in Afghanistan ended on August 31 after the evacuation of approximately 125,000 people out of the country. Of that total, about 6,000 were U.S. citizens and their families.
Blinken told lawmakers Monday that fewer than 100 Americans remain in Afghanistan seeking evacuation.