America devoted more than two decades and over $2 trillion to the fight against the Taliban in Afghanistan. The price was measured not only in dollars, but in sacrifice. More than 2,400 brave Americans gave their lives, while many thousands returned home carrying physical and emotional wounds. Families also bore the burden, spending months and years apart from loved ones serving in one of the world’s most dangerous war zones, and then learning how to take care of those loved ones when they came home.
As someone who fought in Operation Enduring Freedom, this topic hits home for me, especially as we approach the 25th anniversary of September 11th. Nothing prepares you for a war without clear battle lines or for an enemy that operates without rules. But my fellow soldiers and I gave everything we had to defeat the enemy. That’s why watching the way it ended was so heartbreaking.
I distinctly remember watching footage of hundreds of panicked Afghans piling into a C-17 to evacuate as the Taliban captured Kabul — and others chasing after the plane, trying to hang on the side, or hiding in the wheel well. Most also can recall heart-wrenching footage of an infant being handed over the airport wall to a soldier as his parents were being crushed in the surging crowd. And most especially, I remember the 13 flag-draped coffins coming home after the bombing at Abbey Gate.
This outcome was not inevitable. There is no question about it. The Biden administration botched the Afghanistan withdrawal. While the troops on the ground — from the airmen and soldiers to the Marines and sailors did heroic work during the evacuation, there was a major leadership problem. Prioritizing political optics over the reality on the ground and ignoring warnings from military leaders, former President Joe Biden chose an arbitrary withdrawal deadline — and shared it with the world, including the enemy. For Biden, it was more important to get headlines declaring he ended the longest war than it was to protect U.S. troops, State Department personnel, military contractors, and Afghan and NATO allies. In the end, Biden didn’t get the headlines he wanted, and the people of Afghanistan don’t have the freedom they deserve.
The fall of Kabul was no surprise. The Taliban had been making inroads for weeks. They had already captured Zaranj, Herat, and Kandahar. When General Mark Milley testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, he recommended to President Biden that he maintain a minimum of 2,500 U.S. troops on the ground to sustain the Afghan Security Forces until the Taliban met the conditions of the Doha agreement. Despite the Taliban’s failure to meet the requirements under Doha, Biden announced on April 14, 2021, that there would be a complete military withdrawal by Sept. 11, 2021, the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Despite these warnings, the Biden administration’s State Department refused to plan for a noncombatant evacuation operation (NEO) until August 6th, days before Kabul fell. Even worse, the Biden administration didn’t declare an NEO until the Taliban began invading Kabul on August 15.
As a result, there were no contingency plans for evacuating Afghanistan while under Taliban control. State Department officials, U.S. citizens, and other allies were stuck on the ground with no military support. The evacuation had to pause until troops could be sent back into Afghanistan. This led to utter chaos on the ground. Another bad decision with irreparable consequences was staging all evacuations out of Hamid Karzai International Airport (HKIA) in Kabul instead of Bagram Airfield (BAF).
It wasn’t just a tactical error to abandon BAF. It was a strategic error, too. The United States had a lot invested in this base, and its close proximity to Iran and China also made it strategically valuable. But BAF also had two large runways and could have been secured, unlike HKIA. The chaos on the runway and the bombing at Abbey Gate — all could have been avoided if the evacuations had taken place at BAF. This is especially true considering the fact that the ISIS-K terrorist who carried out the Abbey Gate bombing was released from a Bagram prison by the Taliban after the U.S. abandoned it without warning Afghan forces.
It’s been five years since this evacuation, but I know for myself and other Operation Enduring Freedom veterans, the wound is still fresh. According to a poll done at the time, six in ten veterans said the Biden administration had done a poor job in Afghanistan.
Over the years, many veterans have spoken out about the withdrawal, especially those who were there. A Marine sergeant who was present at the Abbey Gate bombing testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee about the withdrawal. He said, “I opened my eyes to Marines dead or unconscious lying around me. … My body was overwhelmed from the trauma of the blast. My abdomen had been ripped open; every inch of my exposed body except for my face took ball bearings and shrapnel.” On top of the 13 servicemembers that were killed, 45 were injured, including lost organs and limbs.
During the disastrous withdrawal, I was asked by multiple people if I was okay. I wasn’t — and neither were those I served with. We all had the same question — was it worth it? Was sacrificing twenty years of blood, sweat, and treasure worth the Afghanistan we were leaving behind?
The answer most of us came to was absolutely. I deployed to Afghanistan eight times with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR), also known as the Night Stalkers. Our mission was to go after high-value terrorist targets. We were not focused on regime change. We were sent to Afghanistan to hunt Osama bin Laden and kill the terrorists who planned the attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. And we were successful. We degraded and eliminated terrorist networks in Afghanistan and surrounding areas. This regional degradation of terrorist networks made the world a safer place. This is my solace.
However, knowing this did not make it any easier to see the Taliban take over Afghanistan, especially when images appeared on our television screens depicting the Taliban holding a military parade using U.S.-funded military equipment. The $7.12 billion in weapons the Biden administration left behind includes specialized sniper rifles, night-vision devices, surveillance devices, 12,000 Humvees, 42,000 trucks, and even several U.S.-funded Afghan UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters. Knowing we armed the very enemy we fought for twenty years is a hard pill to swallow — and something that could have been avoided with more careful planning.
Leaving behind this equipment is still having negative consequences today. According to a new report, there is mounting evidence that terrorist organizations like the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) are using some of the more than 316,000 U.S. weapons that the Biden administration left behind to wage terrorist attacks in Pakistan.
This disastrous withdrawal also harmed the United States’ reputation. Our allies ceased to trust us. We lost credibility. We lost respect on the world stage. Fortunately, under President Donald Trump’s peace-through-strength agenda, this is changing.
AS A MARINE, ABBEY GATE WASN’T A MILITARY DISASTER. IT WAS A BIDEN ADMINISTRATION BETRAYAL
Yet one thing hasn’t changed. Neither Biden nor his top Cabinet officials have ever truly admitted that the way they carried out this withdrawal was a mistake. They have refused to take responsibility or accountability for the Abbey Gate terrorist attack, refusing to declare a NEO, giving up Bagram to the Taliban, stranding our NATO allies, or leaving 1,000 Americans behind. For this reason, I have introduced a resolution condemning the Biden administration for its catastrophic failures.
The purpose of this resolution isn’t to rehash the past or win political points — it is to ensure mistakes like the Afghanistan withdrawal never happen again. Our country, our allies, and our servicemembers deserve better — better than poor planning and better than politicians who put headlines above lives. I applaud the brave servicemembers and State Department officials who risked their lives during this withdrawal, but as a veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom, I call on Biden to finally do the right thing — apologize.
Congressman Matt Van Epps is a Member of the United States House of Representatives, representing Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District. After graduating from West Point, he served ten years on active duty, including nine combat tours as an Army aviator, deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan and flying the AH-64D Apache and MH-47G Chinook with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment. He continues to serve in the Tennessee Army National Guard and brings his military, public-sector, and private-sector experience to Congress, where he serves on the House Committee on Homeland Security as well as the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.