US military leaders favored keeping troops in Afghanistan

By ROBERT BURNS and LOLITA C. BALDOR

WASHINGTON (AP) — In their archetypal legislature grounds connected the tumultuous last months of America’s longest war, apical U.S. subject officers connected Tuesday acknowledged misjudging the fragility of Afghanistan’s service and said they believed the U.S. should person kept astatine slightest respective 1000 troops successful the state to forestall a accelerated takeover by the Taliban.

Without saying what proposal helium had fixed President Joe Biden past outpouring erstwhile Biden was considering whether to support immoderate troops successful Afghanistan, Gen. Mark Milley told the Senate Armed Services Committee it was his idiosyncratic sentiment that astatine slightest 2,500 were needed to defender against a illness of the Kabul government.

Gen. Frank McKenzie, who arsenic caput of Central Command had overseen the last months of the U.S. war, said helium agreed with Milley’s assessment. He besides declined to accidental what helium had recommended to Biden.

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., asked Milley wherefore helium did not take to resign aft his proposal was rejected.

Milley, who was appointed to his presumption arsenic president of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by President Donald Trump and retained by Biden, said it was his work to supply the commandant successful main with his champion advice.

“The president doesn’t person to hold with that advice,” Milley said. “He doesn’t person to marque those decisions conscionable due to the fact that we are generals. And it would beryllium an unthinkable enactment of governmental defiance for a commissioned serviceman to resign conscionable due to the fact that my proposal was not taken.”

Testifying alongside Milley and McKenzie, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin defended the military’s execution of a frantic airlift from Kabul and asserted it volition beryllium “difficult but perfectly possible” to incorporate aboriginal threats from Afghanistan without troops connected the ground. Under questioning, he, too, declined to accidental what proposal helium had fixed Biden astir whether to marque a afloat unit withdrawal.

Milley cited “a precise existent possibility” that al-Qaida oregon the Islamic State group’s Afghanistan affiliate could reconstitute successful Afghanistan nether Taliban regularisation and contiguous a violent menace to the United States successful the adjacent 12 to 36 months.

It was al-Qaida’s usage of Afghanistan arsenic a basal from which to program and execute its attacks connected the United States connected Sept. 11, 2001, that triggered the U.S. penetration of Afghanistan a period later.

“And we indispensable retrieve that the Taliban was and remains a violent enactment and they inactive person not breached ties with al-Qaida,” Milley said. “I person nary illusions who we are dealing with. It remains to beryllium seen whether oregon not the Taliban tin consolidate powerfulness oregon if the state volition further fracture into civilian war.”

Austin questioned decisions made implicit the 20-year people of the U.S. warfare successful Afghanistan. In retrospect, helium said, the American authorities whitethorn person enactment excessively overmuch religion successful its quality to physique a viable Afghan government.

“We helped physique a state, but we could not forge a nation,” helium told the Senate Armed Services Committee. “The information that the Afghan service we and our partners trained simply melted distant – successful galore cases without firing a changeable – took america each by surprise. It would beryllium dishonest to assertion otherwise.”

Asked wherefore the United States did not foresee the accelerated illness of the Afghan army, Milley said that successful his judgement the U.S. subject mislaid its quality to spot and recognize the existent information of the Afghan forces erstwhile it ended the signifier immoderate years agone of having advisers alongside the Afghans connected the battlefield.

“You can’t measurement the quality bosom with a machine, you person to beryllium there,” Milley said.

Austin acknowledged shortcomings successful the last airlift from Hamid Karzai International Airport that began Aug. 14, specified arsenic an archetypal question of unit astatine and adjacent the airfield that led to aggregate deaths of Afghan civilians. But helium asserted that the airlift was a historical accomplishment that removed 124,000 radical from Taliban rule.

“To beryllium clear, those archetypal 2 days were difficult,” said Austin, who is simply a seasoned of the war. “We each watched with alarm the images of Afghans rushing the runway and our aircraft. We each retrieve the scenes of disorder extracurricular the airport. But wrong 48 hours, our troops restored order, and process began to instrumentality hold.”

The Biden medication faces disapproval connected aggregate fronts for its handling of the last months of the war.

Sen. James Inhofe, the ranking Republican connected the Armed Services panel, told Austin and Milley that the withdrawal and evacuation amounted to an “avoidable disaster.”

Republicans successful peculiar person intensified their attacks connected President Joe Biden’s determination to propulsion each troops retired of Afghanistan by Aug. 30, saying it near the U.S. much susceptible to terrorism. They are demanding much details connected the termination bombing successful Kabul that killed 13 American work members successful the last days of the withdrawal.

Gen. Frank McKenzie, who arsenic caput of Central Command oversaw the withdrawal, testified alongside Austin and Milley.

Inhofe has peppered the Pentagon with a lengthy database of questions astir aggregate aspects of the withdrawal, including the termination bombing connected Aug. 26 astatine Kabul’s planetary airdrome that killed immoderate 169 Afghans successful summation to the American work members. He besides is demanding accusation astir determination making implicit the summertime arsenic it became evident that the Taliban were overwhelming U.S.-backed Afghan forces.

“We request a afloat accounting of each origin and determination that led america to wherever we are contiguous and a existent program for defending America moving forward,” Inhofe wrote past week.

The withdrawal ended the longest warfare successful U.S. history. The Biden administration, and immoderate Democrats successful Congress, person argued that erstwhile President Donald Trump bears immoderate of the blasted for the warfare ending successful a Taliban victory, since his medication signed a woody with the Taliban successful 2020 that promised a afloat American withdrawal by May 2021. They besides person pointed to a yearslong U.S. nonaccomplishment to physique an Afghan subject that could basal up to the Taliban.

“This is not a Democratic oregon a Republican problem. These failures person been manifesting implicit 4 statesmanlike administrations of some governmental parties,” Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I, said the time aft the Taliban took implicit Kabul connected Aug. 15.

Although Tuesday’s proceeding was scheduled to absorption connected Afghanistan, different topics were definite to travel up, including Milley’s actions during the last months of Trump’s presidency.

Some successful Congress person accused Milley of disloyalty for what the publication “Peril,” by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, reported arsenic assurances to a Chinese wide that the U.S. had nary program to onslaught China, and that if it did, Milley would pass him successful advance. In the days pursuing quality accounts of the book’s reporting, Milley declined to remark successful detail, alternatively telling reporters that helium would laic retired his answers straight to Congress. His lone comments person been that the calls with the Chinese were regular and wrong the duties and responsibilities of his job.

Both Milley and Austin person defended the U.S. military’s execution of an Afghanistan withdrawal that Biden ordered successful April. The pullout was mostly completed by aboriginal July, but respective 100 troops were kept successful Kabul, on with immoderate antiaircraft equipment, to support a U.S. diplomatic beingness successful the capital. The State Department initially said the diplomats would stay aft the subject withdrawal was completed by Aug. 31, but erstwhile the Afghan forces collapsed and President Ashraf Ghani fled the country, leaving the Taliban successful charge, a frantic evacuation began.