Democrat President Joe Biden, facing pressure and widespread backlash over his decisions regarding Afghanistan, announced on Saturday that he will be sending at least an additional 1,000 troops into the middle eastern nation. The troops are being deployed to assist with evacuation efforts as the Taliban has seized on the Biden administration’s disastrous withdrawal and now control the majority of the country.
Biden said in a statement:
First, based on the recommendations of our diplomatic, military, and intelligence teams, I have authorized the deployment of approximately 5,000 U.S. troops to make sure we can have an orderly and safe drawdown of U.S. personnel and other allied personnel, and an orderly and safe evacuation of Afghans who helped our troops during our mission and those at special risk from the Taliban advance.
Second, I have ordered our Armed Forces and our Intelligence Community to ensure that we will maintain the capability and the vigilance to address future terrorist threats from Afghanistan.
Biden then tried to blame former President Donald Trump for the actions that his administration has made that have seriously backfired in the Middle East.
“When I came to office, I inherited a deal cut by my predecessor — which he invited the Taliban to discuss at Camp David on the eve of 9/11 of 2019 — that left the Taliban in the strongest position militarily since 2001 and imposed a May 1, 2021 deadline on U.S. Forces,” Biden claimed, without noting that Trump did not end up meeting the Taliban because the meeting was canceled. “Shortly before he left office, he also drew U.S. Forces down to a bare minimum of 2,500. Therefore, when I became President, I faced a choice — follow through on the deal, with a brief extension to get our Forces and our allies’ Forces out safely, or ramp up our presence and send more American troops to fight once again in another country’s civil conflict.”
However, foreign policy experts quickly slammed Biden’s attempts to blame Trump for the situation that is unfolding under Biden’s leadership. Mike Pompeo, the former director of the CIA and secretary of state, said in an interview last week that Trump’s plan to withdraw from Afghanistan appeared to be very different than what Biden was doing. Pompeo noted that Trump told the Taliban that if there were any problems, the U.S. Military would be going directly to their homes to hunt them down.
Rebeccah Heinrichs, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, blasted Biden’s statement, telling The Daily Wire that Biden was leading from behind and that he needed to immediately address the nation because “there are a lot of military families who deserve it and so much more.”
“He begins by listing what his administration is scrambling to do to avoid American and partner deaths, and to have the ability to conduct counterterrorism operations,” Heinrichs told The Daily Wire. “And this horrible scramble with high stakes is all because of Biden’s order to withdrawal immediately. There is plenty of blame to go around for the failures in Afghanistan, but what happens as a result of the way the withdrawal happened will be Biden’s alone. He can’t pass this off on Trump. He owns all of this.”
Andrea Stricker, research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), told The Daily Wire that “the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan fits a pattern of this administration deciding on a course of foreign action without consideration for the ramifications.”
“Biden wanted out regardless of the cost to the Afghan people, regional security, and years of effort and dedication by many brave Americans and allies,” Stricker added. “This poorly planned exit will go down in history as a major U.S. strategic failure.”
Jamil N. Jaffer — who serves as Founder and Executive Director of the National Security Institute and as an Assistant Professor of Law and Director of the National Security Law & Policy Program at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University — also slammed Biden in a statement.
“Pathetic for the President to lay the situation he created by his own choices at the feet of his predecessor,” Jaffer said. “Having inherited whatever he inherited, it was his job to do what the nation required, and the President ought admit he made the wrong choice. Be better @JoeBiden.”
Pathetic for the President to lay the situation he created by his own choices at the feet of his predecessor.
Having inherited whatever he inherited, it was his job to do what the nation required, and the President ought admit he made the wrong choice.
Be better @JoeBiden. https://t.co/J8nbokoyuk
— Jamil N. Jaffer (@jamil_n_jaffer) August 14, 2021