Previously, Waltz accused President Biden and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin of “selling this country a fiction” that the U.S. could manage a resurgence of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan “with nothing” there, following the U.S. pullout of troops.
Rep. Mike Waltz Slams Biden’s ‘Callous, Incompetent’ Afghan Withdrawal: ‘Never Been More Disgusted with My Own Government’
The Biden administration’s “callous, cold-hearted, incompetent” withdrawal from Afghanistan was a “failure at leadership at the most senior levels,” according to Republican lawmaker Mike Waltz, who claimed he had “never been more disgusted with my own government” which he accused of having “betrayed” veterans, as he argued that neither the Taliban, al Qaeda, nor ISIS has yet to “get the memo” the war is over.
During Wednesday’s House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on the Biden administration’s 2021 emergency evacuation from Afghanistan, Congressman Mike Waltz (R-FL), a member of the House Armed Services Committee, heard testimony from veterans and Afghan evacuation groups concerning the “disastrous” withdrawal of American troops from the area.
Waltz, who served as a Special Forces commander in Afghanistan and currently serves on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, described the “deeply personal” events, relaying how a personal interpreter of his whom he fought alongside was executed by the Taliban.
“I know this is painful,” he began, “and it’s deeply personal. It’s deeply personal to many of us.”
“I have here pictures of one of my interpreters, Spartacus, who was beheaded by the Taliban,” he continued. “A young man of 19 years old who only wished to one day come to America as he was literally saving my life.”
Waltz, a colonel in the National Guard as well as a former White House and Pentagon policy adviser and the first Green Beret to be elected to Congress, also presented a picture of an interpreter who was able to escape through the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program for Afghans.
“I have here a picture of Rahim who we did manage to get out on the SIV program; I’m standing next to him building a well for his village,” he said.
However, Waltz explained the reality for such escapees remains difficult.
“What did the Taliban do when we ‘successfully’ — since this was such an outstanding ‘success’ — get these people out? They’re hunting down his family,” he said, noting:
They’ve captured his cousin, tied him up behind a Taliban truck, [dragged] him through the village, and killed him, [all in order] to say: ‘Don’t you dare ever work for America or work with America, or work with the West again.’ And they’ve also beaten his brothers nearly to death.
“So even when we’re ‘successful,’ they start targeting and going after the families,” he added.
Addressing Allied Airlift 21 executive chairman Francis Hoang and Task Force Pineapple founder Lt. Col. (Ret.) David Scott Mann, who both worked to help evacuate Americans and allies from Afghanistan, Waltz suggested the two had to become their “own state department.”
“You had to charter international flights, you had to arrange country clearances, [and] you had to deal with international borders because the State Department failed,” he said.
“Is that an accurate statement?” he asked. “Do you disagree with that statement?”
“I don’t disagree with that, congressman,” replied Mann.
“The State Department found itself in a very difficult situation with very little guidance, as far as we can tell, no advanced planning for this exact scenario and unclear lines of authority,” replied Hoang.
“And so while many individuals at the State Department tried their best to help us, they found themselves hamstrung by the bureaucracy,” he added.
As a result, Waltz asserted that the evacuation was a “failure at leadership at the most senior levels of the [Biden] State Department and the White House.”
He then asked Mann if American veterans of his Task Force Pineapple — founded by Mann to rescue Afghan allies in danger — had “exhausted their personal savings trying to help these Afghans.”
“I do,” replied Mann, noting a friend in the veteran-run Moral Compass Federation who claimed “so many of our veterans have basically taken on an Uncle Sam-size problem with their pension funds.”
He also noted members that “exhausted their children’s 529 plans,” some whose marriages “survived multiple deployments” but are now heading to divorce, and others who have committed or considered committing suicide as a result.
Waltz mentioned his own operations officer who was “now dead because of this moral injury,” adding that “there’s been a 40 percent increase just in the last anniversary in texts to the suicide hotline.”
When asked by Waltz if it was “fair to say these veterans feel betrayed by their own government,” Mann responded in the affirmative, adding that it was quite “hurtful” that President Biden did not even mention the “successful” Afghanistan operation in two State of the Union addresses.
Waltz questioned whether the war in Afghanistan had indeed reached its conclusion:
Is this war over? Does anybody think this war is over? Because we’ve had members of this committee, the House Foreign Relations Committee, Foreign Affairs Committee, the United States government, United States House of Representatives and the President of [the] United States and the Secretary of Defense and Secretary of State celebrate the fact that the war is over. Did the Taliban, al Qaeda, ISIS, get the memo that we decided — that the president decided — the war was over?
Referencing the over 80,000 people still “trapped behind enemy lines,” Waltz described a “desperate e-mail” he received from an interpreter that morning.
“Today, this morning at 9:23 AM, I received a desperate e-mail from one of my interpreters who was formerly a school teacher but decided to work for a better future for women and children in Afghanistan,” he said. “He’s now being hunted; he’s been in hiding for two years.”
“Do you think he thinks this war is over?” he asked. “Are the Taliban systematically hunting these people down? Anybody disagree with that; that this is top down, top driven?”
Arguing that “what happens in Afghanistan does not and will not stay in Afghanistan,” Waltz recalled how “members of this committee celebrated when President Obama pulled us out of Iraq in 2011 with no follow-on plan [and then the] ISIS Caliphate comes roaring in three years later and we now have more military members back dealing with that than when we left in 2011.”
“They were wrong then, and they’re wrong now,” he stated.
Waltz concluded by simultaneously expressing pride in Americans, and this group of veterans in particular, and “disgust” in the Biden administration.
“I’ll just close with saying I have never been more proud of my fellow Americans and veterans as I am with this group,” he said. “But I’ve also never been more disgusted with my own government.”
“This was a callous, cold-hearted incompetent episode on the part of this administration, and it is not worthy of the men and women that we all carry on these bracelets and their sacrifice,” he added.
Previously, Waltz accused President Biden and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin of “selling this country a fiction” that the U.S. could manage a resurgence of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan “with nothing” there, following the U.S. pullout of troops.
The Biden administration has continuously come under fire for a lack of coordinated planning in the 2021 summer withdrawal of U.S. troops and the swift Taliban takeover of the country despite the billions of dollars spent by the U.S. and NATO over nearly two decades to build up Afghan security forces.
Last month, top House Oversight Committee Republicans launched a probe into the president’s deadly Afghanistan withdrawal, demanding all associated documents and communications from the Biden administration, including the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Follow Joshua Klein on Twitter @JoshuaKlein.
Military Could Have Stopped Afghanistan Bomber Who Killed 13 Americans, Service Member Testifies
Leaders would not authorize sniper to take shot during botched withdrawal
U.S. military snipers stationed at the Afghanistan airport in 2021 prior to a deadly terror attack that killed 13 Americans had an opportunity to kill the suspected bomber but were not given authority from military leaders, according to one of the American service members on the ground that day.
Tyler Vargas-Andrews, a sergeant in the U.S. Marine Corps who was dispatched to Kabul during the Biden administration's bungled evacuation, on Wednesday told lawmakers on the House Foreign Affairs Committee that his sniper team was stopped from taking out the suspected terrorist bomber. Vargas-Andrews also recounted how the Biden State Department turned Afghans away from the airport, "condemning them to death" at the Taliban's hands. The Aug. 26 bombing left 13 U.S. military members dead and Vargas-Andrews severely wounded.
Vargas-Andrews's sniper team was provided with detailed information about the suspected bomber, including what he looked like. "I asked the intel guys why he wasn't apprehended sooner since we had a full description," the military veteran testified before the Foreign Affairs Committee during its first public hearing on the bungled withdrawal operation. "I was told the asset could not be compromised."
Soon after, Vargas-Andrews and his team spotted the bomber but were told to stand down by a commander in charge. "We reassured him of the ease of fire on the suicide bomber," Vargas-Andrews said. "Pointedly, we asked him for engagement authority and permission. We asked him if we could shoot. Our battalion commander said, and I quote, 'I don't know.'"
"Plain and simple, we were ignored," Vargas-Andrews testified. "Our expertise was disregarded. No one was held accountable for our safety."
Soon after that exchange, the suicide bomber attacked. Vargas-Andrews recounted "a massive wave of pressure. I'm thrown 12 feet onto the ground, but instantly knew what had happened. I opened my eyes to Marines dead or unconscious lying around me." Vargas-Andrews lost multiple organs and two of his limbs. He has had 44 surgeries to date as a result of the attack.
Following the explosion, Vargas-Andrews said that "no one wanted my report post-blast. Even [the Naval Criminal Investigative Service] and the FBI failed to interview me." The withdrawal, he said, "was a catastrophe and there was an inexcusable lack of accountability and negligence."
Vargas-Andrews laid a large portion of the blame on the Biden State Department, which he said turned away scores of Afghans seeking refuge from the Taliban.
"Some Afghans turned away from [Hamid Karzai International Airport] tried to kill themselves on the razor wire in front of us that we used as a deterrent," the veteran said. "They thought this was merciful compared to the Taliban torture that they faced."
The State Department would not process those seeking to board American evacuation planes during the evening, according to Vargas-Andrews, creating a backlog. The State Department pulled Marines from their security posts to help remove Afghans whom the department was unable to process, Vargas-Andrews said, accusing the administration of "condemning [these Afghans] to death."
Under questioning from committee chairman Michael McCaul (R., Calif.), Vargas-Andrew said, "both myself and team leader asked for engagement authority and [the commander] responded [by saying] he does not have that authority."
"As a result we have 13 dead service men, woman, 170 afghans killed, and 35 including yourself injured because that threat could not be taken out because your commanding officer could not give you the order," McCaul said.
Retired Lt. Col. David Scott Mann, who also helped coordinate civilian-led evacuation efforts after the Biden administration stopped chartering flights for those still trapped in the country, said the suicide bombing reignited mental health issues for scores of American veterans who fought in the Afghanistan war.
Mann described a "mental health tsunami" in the year after the bungled evacuation, saying that "73 percent of our Afghan war veterans say they feel betrayed by how this war eneded." Calls to veterans hotlines spiked 81 percent in the year after the withdrawal.
"My friend Brad was found dead a few months ago in a Mississippi hotel room," Mann said. "His wife, Dana, confirmed to me that the Afghan abandonment reactivated all the old demons he managed to put behind him from our time in Afghanistan together, and he just couldn’t find his way out of the darkness of that moral injury."
"We might be done with Afghanistan but it’s not done with us," Mann warned. "The enemy has a vote."
He said the administration's failure to implement a follow-up plan after removing U.S. troops resulted in the country becoming a safe haven for dozens of violent extremist groups.
"This colossal foreign policy failure," Mann said, "will follow us home and ultimately draw us right back into the graveyard of empires where this all started."
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