Joint Chiefs chairman calls Afghan withdrawal a ‘strategic failure
International | September 28, 2021
Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, refused to say what advice he gave President Joe Biden last spring when Biden was considering whether to keep any troops in Afghanistan. But he told the Senate Armed Services Committee it was his personal opinion that at least 2,500 were needed to guard against a collapse of the Kabul government and a return to Taliban rule.
In a blunt assessment of the outcome to a war that cost 2,461 American lives, Milley called it a strategic failure.
“The enemy is in charge in Kabul,” he noted, referring to the Taliban having taken control of the capital on Aug. 15. “There’s no way else to describe that,” he said, adding that it’s possible the U.S. military’s biggest failure was to make the Afghan military overly dependent on an American presence and technology… (Excerpt from American Family News)