WASHINGTON: The U.S. Republican-led House Foreign Affairs Committee released a lengthy report Sunday evening on its investigation into the hasty American withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021, with the report detailing preparation failures and department-level mistakes that led to the deaths of 13 soldiers.
The report claims that “America’s credibility on the world stage was severely damaged” with the withdrawal and that President Joe Biden failed to mitigate the “likely consequences of the decision” to withdraw, made by the previous administration of Donald Trump.
Political observers noted that he report has rekindled criticism over the US’ longest war, just months before the presidential election in November.
The report, a result of a three-year investigation led by Representative Michael McCaul, the Republican chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, slams the Biden administration on many counts, including for its delayed decision to evacuate non-combatants — formally ordered only on Aug. 16.
The Doha agreement, which paved the way for the US withdrawal, was signed in February of 2020 by former President Trump. The deal was agreed to between the Trump administration and the Taliban, without involving the then-government of Afghanistan.
Biden has been criticized for pushing through the agreement without holding the Taliban to conditions of the deal and ensuring a cease-fire between the group and the government in Kabul.
“Biden’s decision to withdraw all US troops was not based on the security situation, the Doha agreement, or the advice of his senior national security advisors or our allies,” the report claimed.
“Rather, it was premised on his longstanding and unyielding opinion that the United States should no longer be in Afghanistan.”
“America’s credibility on the world stage was severely damaged after we abandoned Afghan allies to Taliban reprisal killings — the people of Afghanistan we had promised to protect,” the report said.
Moreover, the Taliban’s forceful retaking of Kabul has “increased threats to our homeland security, tarnished standing abroad for years to come, and emboldened enemies across the globe,” it said.
Sharon Yang, a White House spokesperson, said the report was based on “cherry-picked facts, inaccurate characterizations, and preexisting biases.”
“Because of the bad deal former President Trump cut with the Taliban to get out of Afghanistan by May of 2021, President Biden inherited an untenable position,” to either ramp up the war against a strengthened Taliban, or end it, Yang said.
House Democrats said in a statement that the report by their Republican colleagues ignored facts about Trump’s role.
Previous investigations conducted on the withdrawal, like the US State Department’s report released in 2023, have placed blame on both the Trump and Biden administrations.
Democrats also questioned the timing of the report.
“If they have had three years to assess what happened, why are they delivering a report after Labour Day in a presidential election year?” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg asked on Saturday, before the report was released.
“Look, this administration made the decision not to allow this war to be inherited by a fifth president and to end that conflict,” he told US news channel CNN.
President Biden has previously defended his actions to make a rapid exit from the war-torn country and refused to take blame.
The Republican-authored report comes soon after Trump, who is the party’s nominee for the November election, visited the Arlington military cemetery outside Washington and posed for photographs with the relatives of US service members who were killed in Afghanistan.
The visit led to an altercation with Arlington staff, one of whom has said she was verbally abused by Trump aides when she tried to make them aware of regulations about taking photographs and videos at the cemetery.
