The State Department did not have adequate plans before the collapse of the American-backed government in Afghanistan, according to a report by the administration of President Joe Biden on the actions of that federal agency during the chaotic evacuation of Americans and their Afghan allies.
The report criticizes the actions of the administrations of former President Donald Trump and Biden before and after the withdrawal of American forces from Kabul in August 2021.
Republicans have accused Biden of failing to take responsibility for the intelligence failures that led to the Taliban's takeover of the country and for the chaotic scenes at the Kabul airport, where 13 US soldiers were killed in a suicide attack.
The Biden administration released parts of the long-awaited State Department overhaul, which was completed in March 2022, on the Friday before the July 4th holiday, although most of it was not released. It released a National Security Council report on the withdrawal a day before Good Friday and over the Easter weekend, but declined to release internal estimates from the Pentagon and the State Department.
A State Department task force helped relocate nearly 2021 Afghans in July and August 2.000, ahead of the August 31 deadline for the United States to withdraw its forces.
However, the State Department "failed to establish a broader task force as the situation in Afghanistan deteriorated," the report said.
While the military planned to evacuate American civilians and Afghan allies, "it was unclear who in the State Department was leading the effort," the report noted.
"The decisions of both President Trump and President Biden to end the US military mission in Afghanistan had serious consequences for the viability of the Afghan government and its security. Those decisions are outside the scope of our audit, but the team found that there was insufficient consideration, at a high level, of worst-case scenarios and how quickly they could happen in both administrations," the report said.
As the Taliban captured cities faster than most U.S. officials expected and the fate of Kabul became increasingly uncertain, State Department officials said they began receiving "an overwhelming number of calls and messages" from members of Congress, other government agencies and citizens who appealed to save people in Afghanistan.
Officials working on the evacuation also had confusing guidelines that did not match the conditions on the ground at the time, the report said.
A senior State Department official said the agency used lessons from Afghanistan, when it evacuated people before and after the war in Ukraine and during the crisis in Sudan.
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