Afghanistan
Floor Speech
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Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, now, on a completely different matter, providing for the common defense and protecting the American people is one of the fundamental responsibilities our Founders entrusted to the Federal Government. It is a core obligation of the Commander in Chief.
Yet, to a deadly degree, a parade of mistakes in Afghanistan tells us President Biden and his team have failed this most basic test of competence. For 20 years, the United States has successfully kept terrorists from staging another major attack on our homeland.
Over the years, we have reduced our own military presence in Afghanistan, secured greater assistance in foreign partners, and supported local Afghan forces who did the vast majority of the fighting. This strategy kept al-Qaida on the run. It kept the Taliban from taking control, and it kept Afghanistan from becoming a safe haven for terror.
In only a matter of months, President Biden and his team have squandered all of that--squandered it. The collapse we witnessed wasn't inevitable. It didn't happen on its own. It happened because President Biden pulled the plug on our Afghan partners and pulled the rug out from under our allies who were with us in this shared fight.
Everyone seemed to realize this is a historic disaster for the United States, except maybe the President and his loyal retainers.
Secretary Blinken points to the frantic evacuation of 100,000 desperate people as a huge success. Seriously? They initially didn't envision having to evacuate anyone. The number of people evacuated is not a metric of success for this administration; it is a measure of their failure.
Back in April, my colleague the Democratic leader heaped praise on what he called President Biden's ``careful and thought-out plan with a real timetable and a firm end date.'' Does he stand by this lavish praise for a careful and thought-out plan? Crickets. Was it wise to conduct our retreat during the height of the fighting season? Was it sound strategy to preemptively abandon the strategic Bagram Air Base in the middle of the night without telling our partners? Was it careful and prudent to tie our departure to the 20th anniversary of September 11?
Our botched retreat from a so-called endless war cost more American lives than nearly the prior 2 years combined. And make no mistake, the war against terror hasn't ended--far, far from it. In a rare moment of candor, the Biden administration's own experts have admitted explicitly that we will face new terrorist threats from inside Afghanistan sooner rather than later. We will have to face a more entrenched and emboldened enemy with fewer resources, fewer friends, and more constraints.
So virtually every reason and advantage that President Biden said this policy would bring about has already proven absolutely false.
The administration said leaving Afghanistan would let us focus more resources on China, but its catastrophic retreat has tied up even more resources, including strategic naval assets from the Indo-Pacific. And while the administration's officials are consumed--consumed--with this catastrophe, China is cultivating deeper ties with the Taliban.
The administration told us our military and intelligence community could keep terrorists at bay with over-the-horizon capabilities, but longer distances, fewer assets, and less intelligence are already taking their toll, and innocent civilians appear to be paying the price.
Even still, the White House continues to peddle misleading comparisons with operations in other theaters, ignoring the unique challenges of keeping close eyes on a landlocked country with a hostile government thousands of miles from U.S. bases.
Administration officials like to say there is no imminent threat posed by al-Qaida emanating from Afghanistan. But their abandonment of Afghanistan has already allowed that threat to grow, and we will have fewer resources with which to confront the gathering threat. According to press reporting, just this very morning, the Deputy Director of the CIA has acknowledged they are seeing al-Qaida terrorists flowing back-- back--into Afghanistan, and our intelligence capabilities are already diminished.
But there is a larger pattern of broken promises. The President said that everyone who wanted to get out would be able to do so, that we would leave no one behind. Instead, we left Americans and vulnerable Afghans behind.
Secretary Blinken said the Taliban committed to allow Americans and vulnerable Afghans safe passage to the airport. Instead, we know Americans and Afghans were prevented from getting to the airport. Many still cannot leave.
The administration said that we would have tremendous leverage over the Taliban, that they would need international recognition and funding. Yet the Taliban doesn't seem to be terribly concerned with global PR.
The administration said they would hold the Taliban accountable. They haven't.
The administration seems to believe the Taliban would establish an inclusive and representational government. Look, we are talking about a government of medieval theocrats--medieval theocrats--the same killers, kidnappers, and hostage-takers who aided and abetted the terrorist architects of 9/11.
Well, their government is, however, inclusive in one way. It is inclusive in one way. Listen to this. It includes four--four--of the Guantanamo Bay terrorists released by President Obama in exchange for Bowe Bergdahl; four people who were at GTMO, exchanged for Bowe Bergdahl. And that is only part of the government. It also includes a senior Haqqani terrorist with a $5 million bounty on his head and American blood on his hands--another top official in the government. This is not a government that cares about staying in the good graces of the so-called international community.
Enough fluff. Enough spin. It is time for hard truths and accountability. The Biden administration's conduct over the past several months demands thorough instigation by the Senate. That will begin with Secretary Blinken's hearing at the Foreign Relations Committee today. I hope the Secretary and the administration he represents are prepared to answer some tough questions about past decisions, as well as future plans. The American people and the vulnerable partners we have left behind deserve nothing less.
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