From Beirut to Kabul another American defeat.
President Joe Biden “You forgot that in America we never leave a man behind .”
President Biden always has empathy with people who have lost a family member; he has always been willing to show his sorrow to the American people. Joe Biden uses this firewall to protect him from scrutiny during tragic issues of human loss. His family has had deaths and grief. On August 26 in Kabul, Afghanistan, 13 U.S. military personnel were killed by a suicide bombing by ISIS-K at the Kabul airport. More than 150 Afganese attempting to leave were also killed. In front of the media, the President revealed his sorrow and anger and vowed revenge for the attack. He would justify removing all U.S. military forces from Afghanistan and the Americans that were there by August 31.
The withdrawal from Afghanistan has moved more than 120,000 people and more than 5,000 Americans out of the country. But the U.S. will have to leave by August 31. The Trump administration created the date as May 1 of 2021. The Biden administration later altered the total departure of Americans as August 31, 2021. President Biden was convinced that this war needed to end, and it was his mindset to see it end while he was in office. In an interview with George Stephanopoulos of ABC NEWS, he stated that he was committed to ensuring that U.S. troops stay until every American who wants out is out. President Biden would say that “even if the mission needed to be extended beyond August 31 U.S.troops would remain”.
Today there are more than 200 Americans still in Afghanistan and thousands of former men and women who served with U.S. forces facing possible death from the Taliban.
The U.S. State Department received requests to begin processing Afgan SIV requests months before August 31 to complete the mission.
But most of the veteran groups working to help former interpreters reported that they had little help from the Biden administration. However, bipartisan support has been with Senators like New Hampshire Democrat Jeanne Shaheen and Iowa Republican Joni Ernst sending a letter to the White House for help. The U.S. has 34,500 SIV that need to be processed, but it is feared that many will not leave Afghanistan on the 31st.
There have already been reports that the Taliban have killed and are hunting Afghans supporting the U.S. military, education, and human rights efforts. The administration has publicly stated now that it may not be able to get everybody out.
Thirty-seven years ago, America fought in its first battle against terrorism in the Middle East as a peace-keeping force. The results in Kabul are reminiscent of the years of American combat against terrorism.
Beirut, Lebanon 1983 was the country and Islamic Jihad a militant wing of Hezbollah claimed responsibility for the attack.
On Sunday morning, November 23, a truck drove up to the main gate of the Airport and exploded. And later that day, a second truck exploded in front of a hotel. Unlike current President Biden, President Regan was angry and defiant that the terrorist would not push America out of Beirut. President Regan’s administration and the NATO forces had plans to leave Lebanon. But, unfortunately, the bombing on October 23, 1983, killed 241 American service members. The French military had 90 deaths in the second suicide bomber attack; later, suicide bombers struck the nine-story Drakkar building.
President Joe Biden swore like President Reagan that America would find the terrorist, and within 24 hours, two members of ISIS were dead following a Drone strike outside of Kabul. President Reagan could not find those responsible, but the New Jersey battleship launched a bombardment of suspected terror sites in Syria.
The Biden administration was determined to complete evacuation from Afghanistan on August 31, knowing that intelligence reports expected a second attack on the Airport. However, the fate of Americans who have not been evacuated and military interpreters will not leave on August 31. Nevertheless, the Biden State Department is convinced that economic pressure and collaboration with other governments will work this evacuation.
In a speech following the last flight, President Biden stated his administration was working to evacuate Americans. President Biden said, “The Taliban has made public commitments, broadcast on television and radio across Afghanistan, on safe passage for anyone wanting to leave, including those who worked alongside Americans. We don’t take them by their word alone but by their actions, and we have the leverage to make sure those commitments are met”.
The Biden Administration depends on the Strength of the current Taliban government, but the Islamic State Khorasan (ISK), who attacked the Kabul airport, is willing to threaten them. The Islamic State Khorasan (ISK) is seeking a Sunni-Shia war in Afghanistan. In addition, the Iranian Fatimiyoun Afghan Shia fighters have returned since the capture of Kabul and pose an additional threat. The Taliban have learned from the history of Islamic terrorism that began with the methods in Beirut.
President Regan was forced to later pull out of Beirut and fired on the suspected terrorist strongholds with artillery but failed to stop The terrorist attacks in the region. Still, the removal of U.S. forces taught terrorists that they could defeat America. As a result, president Regan faced criticism from Democrats and Republicans for the security failures and for removing the American troops. Moreover, President Regan’s abandonment of Lebanon was credited with the beginning of the Islamic Caliphate that would later become Al-Qaida and the ISIS-K.
Osama bin Laden “stated that America was weak” he would use the methods in the bombing at Beirut and attack Kenya and Tanzania and later 9/11. President Regan’s failure to continue the fight in Beirut with Hezbollah allowed their organization to expand beyond Lebanon and become an arm of Iran. Following the airport bombing, the Regan administration was convinced that the Lebanon National Army supported and trained by the U.S. and NATO by 1983 had collapsed.
President Joe Biden has ended a 20-year war, but he has left them with a dire future for the people in Afghanistan. The technically skilled and professionals all want out and cannot be replaced with the Taliban’s Sharia law as an era of educated women will be wiped away. In addition, the Taliban cannot depend on the illegal poppy trade that had become a fundamental part of the Afghanistan economy and was expected to boost the country.
The poppy drug trade has earned more than $400 million between 2018 and 2019 from the drug trade, and the U.S. had spent more than 8 million trying to destroy it but failed. May 2021 U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan (SIGAR).
After 8/31, the Taliban military control of the country and the Kabul airport; they have taken over U.S. military hardware, including Black Hawk helicopters and A-29 Super Tucano attack aircraft. They have also gained control of C-208 and PC-12 intelligence, reconnaissance, and surveillance airplanes. The C-208 can fire the hellfire missile which was used on the two ISIS targets.
Three months after the bombing in Beirut, President Reagan ordered the withdrawal of all U.S. forces and left the people of Lebanon with a fractured economy. Its educated class left Lebanon for careers in Europe and America.
The retreat of America from Lebanon marked the beginning of a political and military approach by Islamic fundamentalist that America can be forced to give up.
As a world power, it is the only one that has repeatedly retreated from the middle east multiple times from military conflicts.
President Biden stated that he no longer wanted to commit future Presidents or Americans to a war that we cannot win as a nation. The war cost $2 trillion, 2,448 American lives, and NATO forces lost 1,144 soldiers in 20 years.
But the failures of President Reagan are now facing President Joe Biden. A destabilized region with the Taliban’s leadership needs to create an infrastructure to run the government without an educated population.
That population was a part of the U.S. evacuation. As a result, thousands have been left behind who supported Americans during the war. The Biden administration has to ask if the Taliban’s leaders who had mass executions will now be concerned with nation-building or become frustrated using force to keep needed workers in Afghanistan to make the country run. The International Monetary Fund suspended $440 million in new monetary reserves, and the Biden administration is hoping to leverage with other nations to provide economic support to Afghanistan. Currently, the assets of the Taliban are frozen by the U.S., World Bank, and European Union.
ISIS-K’s attacks on the Airport at Kabul have shown their willingness to fight America regardless of the Taliban.
On August 31, the last flight of the U.S. military left Afghanistan but not without the scars of war, and it even claimed the lives of U.S. military people who were babies during 9/11. Their deaths from a terrorist attack may be the most incredible legacy of the Afghanistan war. The 13 U.S. service members killed in Kabul were a humanitarian force; the men who died in Beirut were called “peacekeepers.”
President Biden today continued to claim that the evacuation was to end a war without an end and make sure that no Americans would be killed in a twenty-year conflict. But thirty-seven years ago, a U.S.President left a different Middle East country hoping for the same results. Instead, on 9/1, the Taliban took control of the U.S. section of the Airport in Kabul; they wore the uniforms of the U.S. forces and carried their U.S. weapons they had defeated America. As a result, the Taliban has more than 100 Americans and more than thousands of SIV interpreters and their families facing possible death from the Taliban.
The U.S Secretary of state Anthony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin are in the middle east meeting with allies seeking support for the evacuation.
The Taliban special forces used force to prevent protests in Kabul by women for their rights in the new government.
The Taliban military forces defeated the National Resistance Forces in the Panjshir province revolt with thousands of Taliban fighters using U.S.equipment. As a result, the Panjshir province was the last active battle to control Afghanistan from the Taliban.
This week America will begin burying its fallen heroes in the same uniforms worn by the Taliban. But in America, “we never leave a man behind.”
