YESTERDAY’S NEWS
Joe Biden dismisses Taliban as ‘yesterday’s threats’ as Afghans face executions and rapes amid jihadi carnage
PRESIDENT Joe Biden has dismissed the Taliban as "yesterday's threats" while Afghans face brutal executions and rapes under their barbaric rule.
said he"stands squarely behind" his decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan as .
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In a televised address to the nation, he said: "Our mission in Afghanistan was never supposed to have been nation building. It was never supposed to be creating a unified centralized democracy."
"Our only interest in Afghanistan remains today what it has always been, preventing a terrorist attack on America's homeland.
"I have argued for many years that our mission should be narrowly focused on counterterrorism, not counterinsurgency or nation-building.
The President told Americans…
- The US’ 20-year mission was not about “nation building” but hunting down al Qaeda
- Americans should not be “dying in a war that Afghans are not willing to fight themselves”
- Taliban has been warned that any attacks on the US will met with “devastating force”
- Taliban’s rapid advance in Afghanistan "unfolded more quickly than we anticipated”
"That's why I opposed the surge when it was proposed in 2009 when I was vice president.
"That's why as president, I am adamant that we focus on the threats we face today in 2021, not yesterday's threats.
"Today, the terrorist threat has metastasized well beyond Afghanistan."
The President's comments come as Afghans desperately attempt to flee the war-torn country - with thousands risking their lives in the process.
I am adamant that we focus on the threats we face today in 2021, not yesterday's threats.
President Joe Biden
Residents have been left to fend for themselves while Taliban gangs set their sights on children as young as TWELVE as they hunt for sex slaves.
Chilling reports emerged in the wake of Kabul's capture, suggesting the terror group are forcing females into marriage and demanding lists of women and girls.
Under their oppressive rule in the 90s, women were brutalized with cruel tortures and public executions - and it seems jihadists want to return to those ways.
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Taliban warlords reportedly view unmarried - or widowed - women and girls aged 12 to 45 as "qhanimat", spoils of war to be divided amongst their fighters.
Biden was criticized for dismissing the increasingly dire situation after already for removing troops in the first place.
But he defiantly told reporters that he stands "squarely behind his decision" to withdraw U.S. forces and heaped blame on Afghanistan's president and military leaders.
He said: “The truth is, this did unfold more quickly than we had anticipated.
"So what's happened?
"Afghanistan political leaders gave up and fled the country."
Biden added that he will not repeat the mistakes of the past.
I stand squarely behind my decision.After 20 years, I've learned the hard way that there was never a good time to withdraw U.S. forces.
Joe Biden
"I stand squarely behind my decision", Biden said in a televised address to the nation from the White House East Room.
"After 20 years, I've learned the hard way that there was never a good time to withdraw U.S. forces."
He added that the decision to leave Afghanistan is the right one for America.
“We will end America's longest war after 20 long years of bloodshed, the President said.
“The events we're seeing now are sadly proof that no amount of military force would ever deliver a stable, united, secure, Afghanistan.
“I am president of the United States of America and the buck stops with me.
I am deeply saddened by the facts we now face...I do not regret my decision.”
'THEY GAVE UP'
Biden heaped blame on the outgoing Afghan administration, which he said had “collapsed, sometimes without trying to fight”.
He said: “It is wrong to order American troops to step up when Afghan forces would not.
“American forces cannot and should not be fighting in a war and dying in a war that Afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves.”
He also said that the Afghan government, led by president Ashraf Ghani, failed to take his advice and negotiate a political settlement with the Taliban.
Biden said: “Mr Ghani insisted that the Afghan forces would fight. But obviously he was wrong.”
American forces cannot and should not be fighting in a war and dying in a war that Afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves.
Joe Biden
The President also threatened "devastating force" against the Taliban if they interfere with US plans of removing troops and allies from Afghanistan.
He told Americans: "We've made it clear to the Taliban [that] if they attack our personnel, or disrupt our operation - the US... response will be swift and forceful.
"We will defend out people with devastating force if necessary."
Biden described the images coming out of Afghanistan, especially of crowds trying fleeing the country at Kabul airport, as "gut-wrenching."
It comes as video of Afghans clinging to a U.S. Air Force plane as it prepared to take off stunned viewers after being shared on social media.
Biden said the U.S. will continue to support the Afghan people, push for regional diplomacy and speak out for the rights of Afghans.
He ended his speech by asking God to "protect our troops and our diplomats."
UNDER FIRE
Biden rushed back to the White House for his speech after spending time at presidential restreat, Camp David.
His critics lined up to take aim at the underfire president saying he was in “hiding” or “on vacation”.
Biden’s decision to completely withdraw from Afghanistan has undone 20 years of work and people’s lives, according to his critics, who also say it has opened up the likelihood of a humanitarian crisis and damaged US credibility.
The withdrawal from the country has been widely compared to the US evacuation of Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War.
Meanwhile has demanded Biden resign over the Taliban's advances in Afghanistan.
And Sunday Boris Johnson blamed the US for the advancement of the Taliban in Afghanistan claiming President Biden "accelerated" their control.
The Prime Minister said the "difficult" situation had been exacerbated by the President's decision to withdraw troops from the war-torn country.
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In the wake of a Cobra meeting on Sunday afternoon, Mr Johnson said it was ";fair to say the US decision to pull out has accelerated things, but this has in many ways been a chronicle of an event foretold."
He urged the West to come together to stop Afghanistan again becoming a "breeding ground for terrorism" after the Defence Select Committee chairman warned of terrorist attacks on the West "on the scale of 9/11."
Boris Johnson blames US for Afghan collapse as Taliban storm president's palace
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