WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden’s administration on Thursday released a summary of after-action reports on the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, saying “there were no signs that more time, more funds or more Americans” could have fundamentally changed the trajectory.

In a 12-page declassified summary of the report sent to Congress, the White House insisted that President Joe Biden’s administration had done everything it could.

It blamed a deal struck previously between Donald Trump’s administration and the Taliban for putting the incoming Biden government in an impossible position and it said that no intelligence agency had predicted such a catastrophic collapse of Afghan government forces.

“The departing Trump administration had left the Biden administration with a date for withdrawal, but no plan for executing it. And after four years of neglect — and in some cases deliberate degradation — crucial systems, offices, and agency functions that would be necessary for a safe and orderly departure were in disrepair,” the document said.

“After more than 20 years, more than $2 trillion dollars, and standing up an Afghan army of 300,000 soldiers, the speed and ease with which the Taliban took control of Afghanistan suggests that there was no scenario — except a permanent and significantly expanded US military presence — that would have changed the trajectory,” it said.

The report does fault overly optimistic intelligence community assessments about the Afghan army’s willingness to fight, and says Biden followed military commanders’ recommendations for the pacing of the drawdown of US forces.

“America is on a stronger strategic footing more capable to support Ukraine and to meet our security commitments around the world, as well as the competition with China, because it is not fighting a ground war in Afghanistan,” John Kirby, the National Security Council spokesman, said on Thursday.

The pullout, ending on Aug 30, 2021, shocked Americans and US allies as the Taliban swept aside Western-trained Afghan forces within weeks, forcing the last US troops to mount a desperate evacuation from Kabul’s airport.

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2023