US President Joe Biden has said that the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan was the best available option for him to end to country’s longest military campaign, adding that the other option would be going back to war.
“I was not going to extend this forever war, and I was not extending a forever exit,” he said in a televised address on Tuesday, just hours after the last US soldiers evacuated from Kabul airport ending 20 years of war. Biden portrayed the chaotic exit as a logistical success that would have been just as messy even if it had been launched weeks earlier, while staying in the country would have required committing more American troops. In his first remarks since the final pullout of US forces on Monday, Biden said 5,500 Americans had been evacuated and that the United States had leverage over the Islamist terrorist group to ensure 100 to 200 others could also depart if they wanted to. He said Washington would continue to target terrorists who posed a threat to the United States, but would no longer use its military to try to build democratic societies in places that had never had them. “We succeeded in what we set out to do in Afghanistan over a decade ago. And we stayed for another decade. It was time to end this war. This decision about Afghanistan is not just about Afghanistan. It’s about ending an era of major military operations to remake other countries,” he said. The Taliban, which seized control of the country for the second time, celebrated their victory, saying that Afghanistan is finally a “free and sovereign” nation.
