Rep. Barry Moore denounces Biden's botched Afghanistan retreat

Statement

U.S. Representative Barry Moore (AL-02) released the following statement after joining freshman Republicans in a letter to President Biden denouncing his administration's catastrophic failures in Afghanistan. The lawmakers urged the administration to immediately prioritize the evacuation of American citizens and the many Afghans who worked alongside U.S. forces.

"The Biden administration's botched retreat that has triggered the shocking and total collapse of the Afghanistan government is a painful betrayal of our Afghan allies, an unforgivable insult to the thousands of Americans who spilled their blood on Afghan soil, and an inconceivable abandonment of the many Americans who at this moment await rescue from the escalating warzone," said Moore. "I join my fellow freshman Republican Congressmen in demanding President Biden provide a briefing to Congress on his plan to salvage the situation on the ground before our nation suffers even more irreversible damage to our global reputation among allies and foes alike."

American men and women have served in Afghanistan for 20 years, making the war the longest in our history. Unfortunately, President Biden rejected the conditions-based withdrawal developed by the Trump administration. According to Trump's plan, final successful peace negotiations between the Taliban and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's government were necessary before any final withdrawal.

Under President Trump's leadership, which established clear consequences for Taliban intransigence through Trump's personal engagement with the leader of the Taliban delegation, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, clear progress was made towards an honorable withdrawal. In fact, no U.S. soldiers were killed in Afghanistan in the final 11 months of the Trump administration. Through working closely with President Ghani, the groundwork was laid for Afghans to take the future of their country into their own hands.

The Biden administration's stunning failure of leadership in Afghanistan is yet another in Biden's long history of, as President Obama's Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said, being "wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades." President Biden and his administration own this sad chapter in American history.

Read the full letter here.

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