A Defeat of Choice

The attacks Thursday at the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, killed 13 U.S. troops, making it the deadliest single day of the war for Americans in more than a decade. More than 90 Afghans trying to escape a return to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan also died. Losing Americans is always tragic, but losing them in the process of a chaotic capitulation is unforgivable. And that’s what the incompetence and hubris of the Biden administration has produced. 

When President Joe Biden addressed the country after the attacks, he offered somber and appropriate gratitude for the sacrifices of our servicemembers. But as he has so many times over this crisis of his own making, Biden also offered politically self-serving distortions that spun the reality of the unfolding crisis to a point that it was almost unrecognizable. He celebrated “an airlift and evacuation effort unlike any seen in history,” as if the chaotic retreat of American forces were a moment of triumph. He said “this is the way [our mission] was designed to operate, operate under severe stress and attack,” as if it was all part of the plan. He pledged that “these ISIS terrorists will not win” and emphasized that they are “an archenemy of the Taliban,” an awkward attempt to contrast the jihadists who conducted these attacks with the jihadists his administration is relying on as the U.S. military’s new counterterrorism partner. 

 

A Defeat of Choice