[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
AFGHANISTAN 2001-2021:
EVALUATING THE WITHDRAWAL AND U.S.
POLICIES PART 1
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
SEPTEMBER 13, 2021
__________
Serial No. 117-73
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/, http://
docs.house.gov,
or http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
45-496PDF WASHINGTON : 2023
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York, Chairman
BRAD SHERMAN, California MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas, Ranking
ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey Member
GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey
THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida STEVE CHABOT, Ohio
KAREN BASS, California SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania
WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts DARRELL ISSA, California
DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois
AMI BERA, California LEE ZELDIN, New York
JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas ANN WAGNER, Missouri
DINA TITUS, Nevada BRIAN MAST, Florida
TED LIEU, California BRIAN FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania
SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania KEN BUCK, Colorado
DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee
ILHAN OMAR, Minnesota MARK GREEN, Tennessee
COLIN ALLRED, Texas ANDY BARR, Kentucky
ANDY LEVIN, Michigan GREG STEUBE, Florida
ABIGAIL SPANBERGER, Virginia DAN MEUSER, Pennsylvania
CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania AUGUST PFLUGER, Texas
TOM MALINOWSKI, New Jersey PETER MEIJER, Michigan
ANDY KIM, New Jersey NICOLE MALLIOTAKIS, New York
SARA JACOBS, California RONNY JACKSON, Texas
KATHY MANNING, North Carolina YOUNG KIM, California
JIM COSTA, California MARIA ELVIRA SALAZAR, Florida
JUAN VARGAS, California JOE WILSON, South Carolina
VICENTE GONZALEZ, Texas
BRAD SCHNEIDER, Illinois
Sophia LaFargue, Staff Director
Brendan Shields, Republican Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
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Page
WITNESSES
Blinken, Honorable Antony J., Secretary, U.S. Department of State 11
APPENDIX
Hearing Notice................................................... 105
Hearing Minutes.................................................. 106
Hearing Attendance............................................... 107
STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD
Statement for the record from Representative Connolly............ 108
RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
Responses to questions submitted for the record.................. 110
AFGHANISTAN 2001-2021: EVALUATING THE WITHDRAWAL AND U.S. POLICIES PART
1
Monday, September 13, 2021
House of Representatives,
Committee on Foreign Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:12 p.m., in
room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Gregory W.
Meeks(chairman of the committee) presiding.
Chairman Meeks. The Committee on Foreign Affairs will come
to order.
Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare a
recess of the committee at any point, and all members will have
5 days to submit statements, extraneous material, and questions
for the record subject to the limitation of the rules. To
insert something into the record, please have your staff email
the previously mentioned address or contact full committee
staff.
As a reminder to all members, please keep your video
function on at all times, even when you are not recognized by
the chair. Members are responsible for muting and unmuting
themselves. Consistent with House rules, staff will only mute
members, as appropriate, when they are not under recognition to
eliminate background noise.
Just a second. We are now waiting--we are putting up the
Secretary. Let's see.
Secretary Blinken. I am here, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Meeks. Great. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Before I make my opening remarks, Mr. Secretary, thank you,
No. 1, for being here. And this is--the importance--given this
topic and the importance of this topic and this committee's
constitutional responsibility of oversight, I wanted to ask you
whether or not you would be willing to stay to answer all
member questions.
We want all members to have the opportunity knowing that it
is--this is the first time that we are having some testimony in
regards to pulling out since August 31 of this year. Can you--
would you have the ability to stay to answer all members'
questions?
Secretary Blinken. Mr. Chairman, I am prepared to stay
until every member has had an opportunity to ask a question,
yes.
Chairman Meeks. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. We thank you for
that.
And I see that we have a quorum, and I now will recognize
myself for opening remarks.
Pursuant to notice, we meet today to evaluate the United
States' withdrawal from Afghanistan and the series of policies
from the past 20 years that led to the events of August 2021.
Mr. Secretary, it is good to have you back here before our
committee a third time since you have been Secretary, and thank
you, and we appreciate your recognition of the important role
this legislative body plays in conducting oversight on the
executive.
I want to start off today by citing some numbers. 800,000.
That is the number of Americans who served with the U.S.
military in Afghanistan since 2001; 2,461. That is the number
of American military personnel who died in Afghanistan,
including the 13 brave Americans who were killed facilitating
the evacuation of 124,000 people over the course of 17 days;
66,000. The number of Afghan national security forces killed in
the conflict; 47,245. That is the number of Afghan civilians
killed since 2001.
Twenty. That is the number of years we have been fighting
in Afghanistan.
A war that has gone on for almost 20 years is a disaster.
Disentangling ourselves from the war in Afghanistan was never
going to be easy. And for my friends who presume a clean
solution where the withdrawal existed, I would welcome hearing
what exactly a smooth withdrawal from a messy, chaotic, 20-year
war looks like. In fact, I have yet to hear the clean
withdrawal option because I do not believe one exists.
Now, are there things the administration could have done
differently? Absolutely, yes, as always. Foremost for me is for
the State Department to evaluate how it could better evacuate
Americans when events unravel quickly.
I look forward to hearing from the Secretary how the State
Department intends to complete its evacuation of the 100 to 200
Americans remaining in Afghanistan who want to come home as
well as for evacuating those Afghans who worked alongside us
during the past 20 years.
However, it is important to separate fair criticism from
criticism that isn't made in good faith and divorced from the
realities on the ground in Afghanistan. We have heard some
criticize the decision to close Bagram which they claim would
have been better suited for evacuations, as though it would
have been easier to evacuate hundreds of thousands of people
from an airfield 40 miles outside of Kabul.
Others criticize the decision to not keep a small
counterterrorism force in the country. I ask, where was this
protest when the Trump administration sidelined the Afghan
government in order to cut a deal with the Taliban? Where were
the protests when the Trump administration negotiated a deal
with the Taliban just 1 month after the abduction of Navy
veteran Mark Frerichs? And where was this protest when then
President Trump and Secretary Pompeo agreed to withdraw all
troops by May 21, 2020.
And let me remind everyone that Trump's deal forced the
Afghan government to release 5,000 prisoners and offered
international legitimacy to the Taliban. It was a deal that
failed to require the Taliban to separate from al-Qaeda
terrorists and did not require the Taliban to stop attacking
the Afghan government. The deal altered the political order of
the country.
Now, some may say Trump's agreement was conditions-based,
but it was different, that it came with stronger conditions,
but that is simply not true. The choice before President Biden
was between a full withdrawal and the surging of thousands of
Americans to Afghanistan for an undefined time.
To argue that there was a third option, a limited troop
presence where the safety of our personnel could be preserved,
in my mind is a fantasy. Had we not removed American troops
from Afghanistan, we would have left them in the middle of a
rapidly deteriorating war zone with no assurances that they
would be spared by the Taliban.
And it strikes me that many of those critical of the
administration's evacuation efforts are really just angry that
the President made good on his pledge to end America's
involvement in the war in Afghanistan. They are masking their
displeasure with criticism but fail to offer feasible
alternatives. Once again, we are seeing domestic politics
injected into foreign policy.
The Taliban's quick takeover of provinces, Afghan security
forces laying down their arms, and President Ghani's abrupt
departure from the country he led, watching 20 years of effort
crumble in only a matter of days has made it all the more clear
that we could no longer occupy Afghanistan and the President's
decision to bring our troops home was the right one.
And for me, as I close, closing this chapter of the U.S.
Afghanistan book is a difficult one. I voted to authorize the
war back in 2001 after the terrorist attacks on September 11.
In the 20 years since, I have seen how this conflict cost the
lives of countless Americans, Afghans, and our NATO partners.
And what makes this all the more difficult is this is a war
that should have ended 19 years ago with a different outcome.
But our hubris, our own desire to remake Afghanistan, our own
willingness to negotiate got in the way of that victory. These
are hard truths, but only by examining these hard truths will
we be able to understand what went wrong in Afghanistan.
The task before us on this committee, one that I am
committed to making, will explore the past 20 years. We will be
talking to individuals from the Bush Administration, from the
Obama Administration, from the Trump administration, as well as
the Biden Administration,
And I now recognize Mr. McCaul for his opening statements.
Mr. McCaul. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank the
Secretary also for agreeing to stay until every member has been
heard. I believe every member has a right to ask questions on
such an important topic.
Over the last several weeks, we witnessed Afghanistan
rapidly fall to the Taliban and the chaotic aftermath that
followed. This did not have to happen, but the President
refused to listen to his own generals and the intelligence
community who warned him precisely what would happen when we
withdrew. This was an unmitigated disaster of epic proportions.
I never thought in my lifetime that I would see an
unconditional surrender to the Taliban.
For weeks, our offices were flooded with requests to help
people get out of Afghanistan, requests that were coming to us
because the State Department failed to provide help. And then
the unimaginable happened.
On August 26, 13 American servicemen and women were
brutality murdered by ISIS-K trying to help American citizens
and our Afghan partners escape from the Taliban.
Two days ago, we commemorated the 20th anniversary of 9/11.
And while we mourned the loss of almost 3,000 innocent people,
the Taliban at the same time celebrated by raising their flag
over the Presidential palace. Days before, they emblazoned
their flag on the wall of our United States embassy,
proclaiming the defeat of the United States of America.
Shockingly, the White House has described this Taliban
regime as businesslike and professional, so let's meet a few of
these professionals of the so-called new and improved Taliban.
The acting Prime Minister, Mullah Hasan Akhund, one of the
Taliban's founding leaders. He is also sanctioned by the United
Nations and sheltered Osama bin Laden for years.
The infamous members of the Taliban five released from
Guantanamo under the Obama Administration also all hold senior
positions in the new government. And, finally, the worst,
acting Interior Minister Haqqani. He is responsible for
overseeing policing and counterterrorism. He is also wanted by
the FBI. He is the head of the brutal Haqqani network with
close ties to al-Qaeda and is currently sanctioned by the
United States. Most of the new and improved Taliban leaders
hold the same or similar positions they held prior to 9/11.
And we are now at the mercy of the Taliban's reign of
terror, all while a dark veil of Sharia law covers Afghanistan.
The freedoms our troops helped secure for Afghan women and
girls have been stripped away in a matter of weeks. This, in my
judgment, is not only disgraceful, it also dishonors the men
and women who served our Nation so bravely.
Mr. Secretary, the American people do not like to lose,
especially not to the terrorists, but that is exactly what has
happened. This has emboldened the Taliban and our adversaries.
The Taliban, a designated terrorist group, now equipped with
American weapons than most countries in the world. Just a few
weeks ago, thousands of terrorists, the worst of the worst,
were all released from prisons as the Taliban overran the
country.
The situation we find ourselves in is far worse, in my
judgment, as a former Chairman of Homeland Security Committee,
far worse than pre-9/11. To make matters worse, we abandoned
Americans behind enemy lines. We left behind the interpreters
who you, Mr. Secretary, and the President both promised to
protect.
I can summarize this in one word: betrayal. The America I
know keeps its promises. The most important promise in our
military is no man left behind, no one left behind, but you
broke this promise.
Unfortunately, it wasn't the only promise this
administration broke. In April, President Biden promised,
quote, we will not conduct a hasty rush to the exit, and we
will do it responsibly, deliberately, and safely. But that
promise was broken. And then in July, the President said,
quote, there is going to be no circumstance where you see
people being lifted off the roof of the United States Embassy
in Afghanistan. That promise was also broken.
Our standing on the world stage has been greatly
diminished. Our enemies no longer fear us, and our allies no
longer trust us. And our Afghan veterans are questioning if
their sacrifice was worth it.
For those veterans who are watching this today, I have a
message for you. Your service was not in vain. It is because of
your heroism that we have not witnessed a large scale attack by
the terrorists since 9/11 in the last 20 years. And for that, I
say to all of you, thank you.
And so we are here today to better understand how this
administration got it so wrong, and I hope you will directly
answer our questions, Mr. Secretary, succinctly because we have
quite a few.
And with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman yields back.
I now turn to the chair of the subcommittee on ASIA, the
Pacific, Central Asia, and Nonproliferation, Ami Bera, for 1
minute.
Mr. Bera. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Mr.
Secretary, for coming before the subcommittee.
Obviously, this is not going to be an easy hearing. There
will be a lot of questions back and forth. And we certainly,
over the course of the next few months at the subcommittee and
full committee level, will do some more oversight on the
information and so forth that decisions were made on.
I want to focus, though, on the mission that is still at
hand. You know, my district has the largest Afghan refugee
population in the country. We have submitted over 10,000 names
of U.S. citizens, visa holders, family members, et cetera. And,
you know, that mission still remains.
I have got close to 30 school age kids that are still in
Afghanistan, U.S. citizens, visa holders along with their
parents. We have got to do everything we can to get those folks
to safety.
And I look forward to working with you, your staff, and
others to make sure we do not leave folks behind, and we get
those folks out as reasonably as possible to safety, and I look
forward to the testimony.
And, with that, I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. Thank you, Chair Bera.
I now turn to the ranking member, Mr. Chabot, for 1 minute.
Mr. Chabot. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, this administration's bungled pullout from
Afghanistan just may be the worst foreign affairs disaster in
American history. You essentially surrendered that country and
its people to the good graces of the Taliban, and the Taliban
does not have good graces. Afghanistan is once again a haven
for terrorists, and those terrorists now have our weapons and
equipment to use against us.
As Mr. McCaul directly stated, our allies may well not
trust us as much, and our enemies may not fear us as much. Yes,
the majority of the American people wanted to leave Afghanistan
but not like this. Pulling our troops out before civilians,
abandoning Americans behind enemy lines, as well as thousands
of Afghans who worked with us and fought with us and their
families, and leaving half the population, about 20 million
women and girls, to be brutalized once again by the Taliban,
this is a disgrace. And I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. Thank you. I will--thank you, Mr. Chabot.
Now I will introduce our witness. Secretary of State Antony
J. Blinken was sworn in as the United States Secretary of State
on January 26, 2021. And as I mentioned in my opening
statement, this will be the third time Secretary Blinken
testified before this committee, and we are grateful for his
appearance before us today.
I now recognize the witness for his testimony which I
understand will be a little longer than 5 minutes, but being
that he is going to be here for all of our questions, I think
it is important for his statement to be heard in its entirety.
Secretary Blinken, I now recognize you.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ANTONY J. BLINKEN, SECRETARY, U.S.
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Secretary Blinken. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. And,
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member McCaul, thank you for today. I
welcome this opportunity to discuss our policy on Afghanistan
including where we are
[inaudible] And where we are going in the weeks and months
ahead.
For 20 years, Congress has conducted oversight and provided
funding for the mission in Afghanistan. I know from my own time
as a staff member for then Senator Biden how invaluable a
partner Congress is.
As I said when I was nominated, I believe strongly in
Congress' traditional role as a partner in foreign
policymaking. I am committed to working with you on the path
forward in Afghanistan and to advance the interests of the
American people.
On this 20th anniversary of 9/11, as we honor the nearly
3,000 men, women, and children who lost their lives, we are
reminded why we went to Afghanistan in the first place; to
bring justice to those who attacked us and to ensure that it
would not happen again. We achieved those objectives long ago.
Osama bin Laden was killed in 2011, a decade ago. al-
Qaeda's capabilities were degraded significantly, including its
ability to plan and conduct external operations. After 20
years, 2,641 American lives lost, 20,000 injuries,
[inaudible] Dollars spent, it was time to end America's
longest war.
When President Biden took office in January, he inherited
an agreement that his predecessor had reached with the Taliban
to remove all remaining forces from Afghanistan by May 1 of
this year. As part of that agreement, the previous
administration pressed the Afghan government to release 5,000
Taliban prisoners, including some top war commanders.
Meanwhile, it reduced our own force presence to 2,500
troops. In return, the Taliban agreed to stop attacking U.S.
and partner forces and to refrain from threatening
Afghanistan's major cities.
But the Taliban continued a relentless march on remote
outposts, on checkpoints, on villages and districts, as well as
the major roads connecting them. By January 2021, the Taliban
was in the strongest military position it had been in since 9/
11, and we had the smallest number of troops on the ground
since 2001.
As a result, upon taking office, President Biden
immediately faced a choice between ending the war or escalating
it. Had he not followed through on his predecessor's
commitment, attacks on our forces and those of our allies would
have resumed, and the Taliban's nationwide assaults on
Afghanistan's major cities would have commenced.
That would have required sending substantially more U.S.
forces into Afghanistan to defend themselves and prevent a
Taliban takeover, taking casualties, and with, at best, the
prospect of restoring a stalemate and remaining stuck in
Afghanistan under fire indefinitely.
There is no evidence that staying longer would have made
the Afghan security forces or the Afghan government any more
resilient or self-sustaining. If 20 years and hundreds of
billions of dollars in support, equipment, and training did not
suffice, why would another year, another 5, another 10?
Conversely, there is nothing that our strategic competitors
like China and Russia or adversaries like Iran and North Korea
would have liked more than for the United States to reup a 20-
year war and remain bogged down in Afghanistan for another
decade.
In advance of the President's decision, I was in constant
contact with our allies and partners to hear their views and
factor them into our thinking. When the President announced the
withdrawal, NATO immediately and unanimously embraced it.
We all sat together on the drawdown. Similarly, we were
intensely focused on the safety of Americans in Afghanistan. In
March, we began urging them to leave the country. In total,
between March and August, we sent 19 specific messages with
that warning and with offers to help, including financial
assistance to pay for plane tickets.
Despite this effort, at the time the evacuation began,
there were still thousands of American citizens in Afghanistan,
almost all of whom we evacuated by August 31. Many were dual
citizens living in Afghanistan for years, decades, generations.
Deciding whether or not to leave the place they know as home
was an incredibly wrenching decision.
In April, we began drawing down our embassy, ordering
nonessential personnel to depart. We also used this time to
significantly speed up the processing of the special immigrant
visas for Afghans who had worked for us and by our side these
past 20 years.
When we took office, we inherited a program with a 14-step
process based on a statutory framework enacted by Congress and
involving multiple government agencies and a backlog of more
than 17,000 SIV applicants. There had not been a single
interview in the SIV program in Kabul for 9 months going back
to March 2020.
The program was basically in a stall. Within 2 weeks of
taking office, we restarted the SIV interview process in Kabul.
On February 4, one of the very first executive orders issued by
President Biden directed us to immediately review the SIV
program, to identify causes of undue delay, and to find ways to
process SIV applications more quickly. This spring, I directed
significant additional resources to the program, expanding the
team in Washington of people processing applications from 10 to
50 and doubling the number of SIV adjudicators at our embassy
in Kabul.
Even as many embassy personnel returned to the United
States under ordered departure, we sent more consular officers
to Kabul to process SIV applications.
As a result of these and other steps, including working
with Congress, by May, we had reduced the average processing
time for special immigrant visas by more than a year. Even amid
a COVID surge in Embassy Kabul in June, we continued to issue
visas.
And we went from issuing about 100 special immigrant visas
per week in March to more than 1,000 per week in August when
our evacuation and relocation efforts began.
That emergency evacuation was sparked by the collapse of
the Afghan security forces and government. Throughout the year,
we were constantly assessing their staying power and
considering multiple scenarios. Even the most pessimistic
assessments did not predict that government forces in Kabul
would collapse while U.S. forces remained.
As General Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff has said, nothing I or anyone else saw indicated a
collapse of this Army and this government in 11 days.
Nonetheless, we planned and exercised a wide range of
contingencies. Because of that plan, we were able to draw down
our embassy and move our remaining personnel to the effort
within 48 hours. And the military, placed on standby by
President Biden, was able to secure the airport ask start the
evacuations within 72 hours.
The evacuation itself was an extraordinary effort under the
most difficult conditions imaginable by our diplomats, by our
military, by our intelligence professionals. They worked around
the clock to get American citizens, Afghans who helped us,
citizens of our allies and partners, and at-risk Afghans on
planes out of the country and off to the United States or to
transit locations that our diplomats had arranged and
negotiated in multiple countries.
Our consular team worked 24/7 to reach out to Americans who
could still be in the country, making in those couple of weeks
55,000 phone calls, sending 33,000 emails, and they are still
at it.
In the midst of this heroic effort, an ISIS-K attack killed
13 servicemembers working the gates at HKIA, wounding 20
others, and killing and wounding scores of Afghans. These
American servicemembers gave their lives so that other lives
could continue.
In the end, we completed one of the biggest airlifts in
history with 124,000 people evacuated to safety. And on August
31 in Kabul, the military mission in Afghanistan officially
ended and a new diplomatic mission began.
I want to acknowledge the more than 2 dozen countries that
have helped with the relocation effort. Some served as transit
hubs, some welcoming Afghan evacuees for longer periods of
time. And I want to recognize the extraordinary efforts by
Congress as well. To name just a few examples, Congressman
Fitzpatrick worked with the State Department to reunite an
Afghan family in New Jersey.
Congressman Keating worked with our folks on the ground to
help a Voice of America reporter and his family get to the
airport. Congresswoman Jacobs and Congressman Issa worked
across party lines to draw attention to cases of legal
permanent residents and Afghans at risk.
Please know your emails, your calls made a real difference
in getting people out, and we continue to use the list and
information you are providing in the next phase of the mission.
Let me now just briefly outline what the State Department
has done over the next--over the last couple of weeks and where
we are going in the days and weeks ahead. First. We moved our
diplomatic operations from Kabul to Doha where our new Afghan
affairs team is hard at work. Many of our key partners have
joined us there.
Second. We are continuing our relentless efforts to help
any remaining Americans as well as Afghans and citizens of
allied and partner countries leave Afghanistan if they so
choose.
This past Thursday, a Qatar Airways charter flight with
U.S. citizens and others on board departed Kabul and landed in
Doha. On Friday, a second flight carrying U.S. citizens and
others departed Afghanistan. These flights were the results of
a coordinated effort by the United States, Qatar, and Turkey to
reopen the airport and intense diplomacy to start the flights.
In addition to those flights, a half dozen American
citizens and about a dozen permanent residents of the United
States have also left Afghanistan via an overland route with
our help.
We are in constant contact with American citizens still in
Afghanistan who have told us that they wish to leave. Each has
been assigned a case management team to offer specific guidance
and instruction. Some declined to be on the first flights on
Thursday and Friday for reasons of needing more time to make
arrangements, wanting to remain with extended family for now,
or medical issues that precluded traveling last week.
We will continue to help them, and we will continue to help
any American who still wants to leave and Afghans to whom we
have a special commitment, just as we have done in other
countries where we have evacuated our embassy and hundreds or
even thousands of Americans remained behind, for example, in
Libya, in Syria, in Venezuela, in Yemen, in Somalia. There is
no deadline for this mission.
Third. We are focused on counterterrorism. The Taliban has
committed to prevent terrorist groups from using Afghanistan as
a base for external operations that could threaten the United
States or our allies, including al-Qaeda and ISIS-K.
We will hold them accountable for that. That does not mean
we will rely on them. We will remain vigilant at monitoring
threats. We will maintain robust counterterrorism capabilities
in the region to neutralize those threats, if necessary, and we
do that in places around the world where we do not have
military forces on the ground.
Fourth. We continue our intensive diplomacy with allies and
partners. We initiated a statement joined by more than half the
world's countries, over 100 countries, as well as a United
Nations Security Council resolution setting out the
international community's expectations of a Taliban-led
government.
We expect the Taliban to ensure freedom of travel, to make
good on its commitments on counterterrorism, to uphold the
basic rights of the Afghan people, including women, girls, and
minorities, to name a broadly representative permanent
government, to force
[inaudible] Reprisals. The legitimacy and support the
Taliban seeks from the international community will depend on
its conduct.
We have organized contact groups with key countries to
ensure the international community continues to speak with one
voice on Afghanistan and to leverage our combined influence.
Last week, I led a ministerial meeting of 22 countries, NATO,
the EU, the United Nations, to continue to align our efforts.
And fifth. We will continue to support humanitarian aid to
the Afghan people consistent with sanctions that they will not
flow through the government but rather, through independent
organizations like NGO's and U.N. agencies. Just today, we
announced the United States is providing nearly $64 million in
new humanitarian assistance to the people of Afghanistan to
meet critical hands on nutrition needs, address the protection
concerns of women, children, and minorities, to help more
children, including girls, go back to school. This additional
funding means the United States has provided nearly $330
million in assistance to the Afghan people this fiscal year.
In Doha and Ramstein, I toured the facilities where Afghans
that we evacuated are being processed before moving on to their
next destinations. Here at home, I spent some time at the
Dulles Expo Center where more than 45,000 Afghans have been
processed after arriving in the United States. It is
remarkable, remarkable to see what our diplomats, our military,
and employees from other civilian agencies across the U.S.
Government have been able to achieve in a very short time. They
have met an enormous human need.
They have coordinated food, water, sanitation for
thousands, tens of thousands of people. They are arranging
medical care, including the delivery of babies. They are
reuniting families who are separated and caring for
unaccompanied minors. It is an extraordinary interagency effort
and a powerful testament to the skill, the compassion, and the
dedication of our people.
We should all be proud of what they are doing. And as we
have done throughout our history, Americans are now welcoming
families from Afghanistan into our communities and helping them
resettle as they start their new lives. That is something to be
proud of as well.
Thanks very much for listening. And, with that, Mr.
Chairman, Ranking Member McCaul, I look forward to your
questions. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Secretary Blinken follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Meeks. Thank you, Secretary Blinken, for your
testimony.
I will now recognize members for 5 minutes. And pursuant to
House rules, all time yielded is for the purposes of
questioning our witness.
I will recognize members by committee seniority,
alternating between Democrats and Republicans. Please note that
I will be strict in enforcing the 5-minute time limitation for
questions. What do I mean? I do not want members to ask
questions for 5 minutes and then not leave the Secretary time
to respond. So when addressing your questions, please keep in
mind that the 5 minutes is for questions and answers. I will
start by recognizing myself.
Mr. Secretary, you mentioned that an area of concern that I
know is shared by all is the status of American citizens, green
card holders, and our SIV heroes who are yet to be evacuated.
Can you tell us how many of them remain in the country--in
country, and what is our plan to facilitate their evacuation
now?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So as of
the end of last week, we had about 100 American citizens in
Afghanistan who had told us that they wished to leave the
country. And I want to emphasize that this is a snapshot in
time. It is, more accurately, a moving picture.
As you know, stepping back for a minute, to know precisely
at any given moment in time exactly how many American citizens
are in any country is something we cannot and do not know.
Americans are not required to register when they go to a
foreign country or if they reside there.
And so from the start of this effort, we have been engaged
in an intense effort to identify every American citizen that we
could in Afghanistan, to be in touch with them, in contact with
them, and to work with them if they wanted to leave.
We have also benefited greatly from information provided by
Congress to help us fill out this picture. But as of last week,
there were about 100 who we were in contact with who continued
to express an interest to leave. We offered seats on the planes
that got out last week to about 60. Thirty came forward and
used those seats.
What happens in any--at any given moment is that people are
making decisions hour by hour, if not day by day, about whether
to leave or not. And as I said earlier, these are incredibly
wrenching decisions because, for the most part, this is a
community of people who have been living, residing in
Afghanistan for all their lives.
Afghanistan is their home. They have extended families. And
it is very, very hard for them, understandably, to make that
decision. But that is the group that we are working with.
Now, what also happens is people will identify themselves,
including since the end of the evacuation, as American citizens
in Afghanistan who wish to leave, so they get added to the
picture. We get information from you, from NGO's, from other
groups, veterans' groups, about people purporting to be
Americans in Afghanistan. We immediately seek to contact them,
to engage with them, to find out if, in fact, they are in
Afghanistan, and if, in fact, they want to leave.
So this is a picture that will continue to change over
time, but that is the rough population that we are working with
right now.
Chairman Meeks. Thank you. Let me ask the next question. I
know that the Trump administration's deal with the Taliban
meant that there were 2,500 troops remaining with less than 5
months to complete the withdrawal. At any time did the Biden
Administration consider whether to renegotiate the deal with
the Taliban?
Secretary Blinken. The Taliban made abundantly clear in
many public statements, private statements to us, to others
around the world that it was going to hold us to the deadline
that the previous administration negotiated in terms of
withdrawing the remaining American forces. It made very clear
that if we move past that deadline, it would resume the attacks
that it had stopped on our forces and on our allies and
partners as well as to commence the onslaught on the cities
that we have seen in recent months.
And so that was exactly choice that President Biden faced,
whether to go forward with the agreement and the commitments
that his predecessor had made in terms of withdrawing all
forces by May 1 or return to war with the Taliban and escalate,
not end the war.
Now, Mr. Chairman, as you know, what the President did do
was to take some risk in extending past May 1 the time we would
use to actually withdraw our forces so that we could do it in
the safest most orderly way possible, and so we extended that--
--
Chairman Meeks. One more question.
Mr. Brown [continuing]. Deadline until September.
Chairman Meeks. So, also, we know there was a point
recently in the government hard liners and the new Taliban
group, Taliban's commitment to share power with other Afghan
political and social groups excludes women and minorities.
How does this--does the appointment of this new government
factor into the administration's strategy to engage with the
Taliban or assumptions that the Taliban may have changed?
Secretary Blinken. So the interim government named by the
Taliban falls very short of the mark that was set by the
international community for inclusivity, that is, to have a
government that was broadly representative of the Afghan
people, not just the Taliban and its constituency, to include
women which this interim government does not. And as has been
noted, it includes many key members who have very challenging
track records.
We have been very clear that when it comes to engaging with
that government or any government to be named on a more
permanent basis, we are going to do so on the basis of whether
or not it advances our interests, and those interests are very
clear.
They are the expectations that we have set and the
international community has set for the ongoing treatment of
travel for a government that makes good on the Taliban's
commitments to combat terrorism, not allow Afghanistan to be
used as a haven for launching attacks directed against other
countries, to support the basic rights of the Afghan people,
including women and minorities, and to allow humanitarian
assistance to get to people who so desperately need it.
That will be the basis upon which we engage any Taliban-led
government, whether it is the central government or one they
may name in the days and weeks ahead.
Chairman Meeks. I now yield for questions to Ranking Member
McCaul.
Mr. McCaul. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, in the weeks before the fall of Kabul, the
surrender to the Taliban, I was on the phone with very high-
ranking officials at State, DoD, White House, trying to save
lives. We had Americans that couldn't get out. We had
interpreters that couldn't get through the perimeter of the
Taliban. They are left behind. They will be executed. They do
have a bull's eye on their back.
We had four buses of Afghan girls, orphans, at the American
University School of Music that sat there for 17 hours when I
was finally told the State Department would not lift the gate
to let them in to safety even though they had an aircraft
waiting. Will you guarantee to this committee--now we are at
the mercy of the Taliban, though.
Can you guarantee to this committee that we will get them
out?
Secretary Blinken. First, Ranking Member McCaul, thank you
for every effort that you made, as well as other members of
this committee made, to help people in need, to try to help
them get out. Those are deeply appreciated, and going forward,
we continue to look to you.
Now, I have men and women in my Department, the State
Department, who raised their hands from around the world and
ran into the building. They went from posts around the world
into that airport to help people get out. They were serving at
the gates right alongside our brothers and sisters in uniform,
including the 13 who gave their lives, literally trying to pull
people in as necessary or to walk them in, to talk them in, to
do everything they possibly could to bring American citizens,
to bring Afghans at risk, to bring the nationals of our
partners and others into the airport, taking extraordinary----
Mr. McCaul. I am reclaiming my time at it is limited.
Secretary Blinken. It is important, sir, for you to
recognize what was----
Mr. McCaul. We also thank the service--and we also thank
the service of people like--that worked in Operation Pineapple
and Dunkirk. I would ask that the State Department work with
them. Those are heroes as well as the State Department
officials you are talking about.
My last question, very important. Bagram went down, the
embassy went down, and we went dark. We have no eyes and ears
on the ground. We have lost intelligence capability in the
region, and that includes Russia, China, and Iran, as you know.
This is a national security threat as China moves in. For
all I know, they may take over Bagram Air Base. But this over
the horizon capability I believe is exaggerated. It is not a
viable option. It is too far away. Do you negotiate with
countries like Uzbekistan or Tajikistan to put an ISR
capability there?
And my last question. Is it true that President Putin
threatened the President of the United States, saying he could
not build intelligence capabilities in the region?
Secretary Blinken. This is an important question and one
that in its detail and substance I think we need to take up in
another setting for reasons that I know that you very much
appreciate.
Let me just say this very broadly, and you know this very
well, given your focus and expertise on these issues. The
terrorist threat has metastasized dramatically over the last 20
years, and it is most acute in places like Yemen, like Libya,
like Iraq, like Syria, like Somalia. And, of course, we have
much greater and different capabilities than we had 20 years
ago in terms of dealing with that threat.
And in many countries around the world, we deal with it
effectively with no U.S. boots on the ground. We lost some
capacity for sure in not having those boots on the ground in
Afghanistan, but we have ways, and we are very actively working
on that to make up for that, to mitigate for that, to make sure
that we have eyes on the problem, to see if it reemerges in
Afghanistan, and to do something about it.
But what I would propose is that we have this conversation
in another setting----
Mr. McCaul. I would like to work with you because if we
cannot see what's happening on the ground, we cannot see the
threat, we cannot be respond to it, the threatis only going to
grow. It is going to get worse, not better, and we have to have
that capability.
You know, let me ask you one last question. We had these
planes grounded at Mazar-e-Sharif, and the Taliban seems to be
holding these planes up. Are you currently negotiating with the
Taliban with respect to these Americans that are trying to get
out on these planes?
And, also, are you negotiating with the Taliban on the
issue of legitimizing them as a real government?
Secretary Blinken. Not only us, but virtually the entire
international community, including the United Nations Security
Council resolution, has made clear what we expect and will
insist on from the Taliban if they want to seek any legitimacy
or any support, and that includes--it starts with freedom of
travel.
So we have been intensely engaged with Turkey and Qatar to
get the airport in Kabul up and running again which is now the
case, and we started to get flights out last week with American
citizens on board.
And with regard to Mazar-e-Sharif, you are correct. There
have been charter flights there that have been there for some
time that have not been allowed to leave. We want to see those
flights leave. We need to see a process put in place to allow
those flights to start to move, and we are working on that
every day.
Mr. McCaul. Thank you. I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. Thank you.
Mr. Secretary, we requested such a classified briefing not
too long ago, and we welcome your assurance to schedule this
briefing sometime in the immediate future.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Absolutely.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize representative Brad Sherman
from California for 5 minutes.
Mr. Sherman. Secretary Blinken, thank you for reminding us
that Americans were not required to register if they were in
Afghanistan, and I hope my colleagues will support my
legislation to require Americans to register if they go to a
war zone.
The ranking member says that he never thought he would see
an unconditional surrender of the United States to the Taliban.
He saw it in 2020 when President Donald Trump announced that we
would be out by May 1 of 2021, forced the release of 5,000 of
the Taliban's best fighters, and most importantly, created a
circumstance where there was not even a credible possibility
that we would engage in force to support the Afghan government.
There are those who say we should get out all of our Afghan
allies and all those who face oppression or death from the
Taliban. I would point out that the Afghan Army, together with
all of its veterans over 20 years, together with all their
families, you are talking about millions of people. And while
the Taliban may be harsh to the girls who are music students,
who are orphans, imagine how harsh they will be to a girl whose
father was in the Afghan Army trying to kill the Taliban.
When the administration took over, the American people made
it clear we had to get out in 2021. The Afghan government, some
thought, had some chance to fight to a stalemate. But by
spring, those closest to us, those most in the know were
demanding visas to get out, to flee as quickly as possible.
They weren't asking for guns to build trenches around Kabul to
fight the Taliban.
They were asking for visas. They were demanding visas. They
were making videos about how they were going to be killed. When
they started to flee, that started a stampede, and there is
simply no way the administration could have an orderly or
successful stampede.
And it seems absurd, at least in retrospect, to think that
the average Afghan grunt would fight in the trenches while
seeing those who are best connected desperate to flee in a
matter of days.
Secretary Blinken, when you came into office on January 20,
we were committed to pulling everyone out of Afghanistan within
3 months, by May 1. Did the Trump administration leave on your
desk a pile of notebooks as to exactly how to carry out that
plan? Did we have a list of which Afghans we were going to
evacuate? Did we have a plan to get Americans from all over
Afghanistan to Kabul and out in an orderly way? How meticulous
was the planning for the Trump administration declared May 1
withdrawal?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, Congressman. We inherited a
deadline. We did not inherit a plan.
Mr. Sherman. So no plan at all. It is amazing that it
wasn't much, much worse. It was controversial when we gave up
five Taliban for Bergdahl, not the most meritorious of American
fighting men, but the Trump administration gave 5,000 of the
Taliban's top fighters back to the Taliban. What did we get for
that other than empty promises that were broken?
Secretary Blinken. Congressman, the deal that the previous
administration struck involved, as you rightly said, committing
to remove all U.S. forces from Afghanistan by May 1 of this
year. And, in addition, as that deal was being negotiated and
put into effect, pressing the Afghan government to release
these 5,000 prisoners, many of whom went back to the
battlefield, and at the same time, in return, getting from the
Taliban two commitments. One, not to attack our forces or
allied and partner forces during the time of the agreement,
from the time it was reached until May 1 when we were supposed
to pull out all of our forces as well as not to go at the major
cities and to take steps to ensure that Afghanistan would not
be used by al-Qaeda or any other
[inaudible]
Mr. Sherman. Mr. Secretary, I need to get one more
question. You are criticized for not getting our weapons out.
Our weapons were given to the Afghan military. They were all
over the country. Was there a way to disarm the Afghan
government without being seen by the world as betraying the
Afghan government? And was there a way without casualties to go
all over Afghanistan and grab the trucks and the tanks, et
cetera?
Secretary Blinken. Simply put, no. Of course, a lot of
excess equipment was handed over to the Afghan security and
defense forces, partners that we had worked with for 20 years,
supported, financed, and equipped for 20 years to take on some
of that equipment.
And, of course, when those forces collapsed in the space of
about 11 days, some of that equipment wound up in the hands of
the successor forces, the Taliban. Our folks worked very hard
to disable or dismantle equipment that we still controlled
before we left Afghanistan.
And what we see now is much of the equipment that was left
behind, including in the hands of the Afghan forces that then
fell to the Taliban, much of it, based on what I understand
from my colleagues at DoD, is inoperable or soon will become
inoperable because it has to be maintained.
It is not of any great strategic value in terms of
threatening us or threatening any of Afghanistan's neighbors,
but it does give the Taliban, as we have seen in pictures, all
of us, uniforms and guns and some other equipment that is now
in their hands.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Chris Smith of New Jersey
who is the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Africa, Global
Health, and Global Human Rights, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, you testified that you had encouraged
Americans to leave the country, but you know, simultaneously
with that was statements being made, including by President
Biden, that Afghans' military capability was 300,000 men strong
and that they had the best training imaginable.
So at best, I would say they were misled. And you do not
mention withdrawal conditions that were placed by President
Trump on any exodus from Afghanistan.
But I do have a couple of questions I would like to ask.
Did you concur and support President Biden's July 23 phone call
telling President Ghani to be untruthful about the Taliban's
success? According to Reuters, which reviewed both the
transcript and the audio, President Biden said, quote, and
there is a need--whether it be true or not, there is a need to
project a different picture. Was that an ad lib by President
Biden, or was that lie scripted into the phone call? And if it
was scripted, by who?
Second. Have any Americans been arrested, beaten, abducted,
or killed by the Taliban or ISIS-K since we left, and do we
have the capacity or the capability to know that?
Third. Were there any gaps or weaknesses in the vetting
process of Afghan evacuees, especially in light of the fact
that reliable information on some, perhaps many who got parole,
wasn't available to conduct a meaningful background check? Are
you concerned that the Taliban may have embedded its members as
evacuees?
I visited our base at Fort Dix recently with some other
Members of Congress and our Governor and asked a number of
questions, but I was very concerned about the vetting or lack
thereof and the fact that parolees, about 70 percent strong at
our base, at least, are going to go up to about 13,000, they
could leave if they would like. They are free to leave. It is
not clear whether or not they could return, but they are free
to leave.
And, finally, one of the profoundly negative consequences
outside of Afghanistan has been China and Taiwan. The State-
controlled Chinese Communist Party media, including CCP run
Global Times, and I read it every day, are saturating the
Taiwanese with messages to give up and surrender to Beijing
because the United States will, just as it did in Afghanistan,
abandon them too. That is what the Global Times is saying. But
if you could start off with the first question, I would
appreciate it. And go to----
Secretary Blinken. Thank you very much, Congressman. Let me
see if I can address all those questions.
First. With regard to the phone call you cited, I am
obviously not going to comment on leaked--purportedly leaked
transcripts of phone calls. Here is what I can tell you. What
the President said in that conversation with then President
Ghani is exactly what he was saying in public, and it is this:
That the issue was not the capacity at that point of the Afghan
government and the Afghan security forces to hold the country
and to hold Kabul. It was their will and whether they had a
plan to do so, and we were concerned that they were not
demonstrating that will or that plan.
He pressed President Ghani on the need to consolidate his
forces
[inaudible] From military advice from our military leaders
to make sure that he could defend the places that needed
defending and not overstretch those forces, and he needed to
bring people together, the different factions, to show a united
front. That was what--that is what he said----
Mr. Smith. I have only got a few minutes.
Secretary Blinken. I will answer the rest of the questions
if I can.
Mr. Smith. Was it a real--I mean, is the transcript untrue?
Secretary Blinken. Again, I am not commenting on any
purportedly leaked transcripts. I am telling you what, based on
my knowledge of the conversation the President said, and what
he said is exactly what he said in public.
Second. With regard to American citizens remaining behind.
The ones we are in contact with, we have 500 people on a task
force and teams dedicated to them to be in regular contact with
them, and I have not heard from those people that concern
raised.
I cannot say whether there are any American citizens who we
are not in contact with or do not know of who may have been
mistreated in some fashion in Afghanistan.
Third. With regard to the background checks, and this is
very important, and you are right to focus on it. You know, as
you know, before Afghans evacuated from Afghanistan reached the
United States, they go to a transit country, and that is where
the initial checks are done.
We have surged Customs and Border Patrol. We have surged
our intelligence and law enforcement capacity to do those
initial checks. And then when they get to the United States,
first at a military base, those checks are continued, using all
of law enforcement intelligence, security agencies, to do that
so that we can make sure that we are not letting anyone into
the country who could pose a threat or a risk.
It is exactly that balance that is so important as well in
the SIV program. We all want to bring Afghans at risk in the
United States. We also have an obligation, that you rightly
point out, to the security of our fellow citizens.
Finally, on China and Taiwan. As I said earlier, whatever
protestations they may be making in newspapers or in their
propaganda, there is nothing that China would have liked more
than for us to have reupped the war in Afghanistan and to
remain bogged down for another 5, 10, or 20 years.
That would have been profoundly against our strategic
interests and profoundly in China's strategic interests. Thank
you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Albio Sires of New Jersey
who is the chair of the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere,
Civilian Security Migration, and International Economic Policy
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Sires. Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being with us for
the third time.
And I want also to say thank you to the work done that the
State Department has done in getting people, including 11
members of one family that were all united and are here now in
this country. So I--my hat is tipped off to those people who
worked so hard.
The question that I have is the Taliban seems to be having
a complete hold in the country while I understand there are
other groups in Afghanistan. How fragile or how strong or firm
is the Taliban's hold on this country?
And do you see that breaking apart as everybody wants their
piece down the line because it seems that this country is made
up of pieces--of people that control certain pieces of the
country.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you. It is a very good question
and an important one. And it is very hard to predict with any
certainty.
The country is in so many ways, as you have pointed out,
fractured among different groups, different ethnic groups--
north, south, east, and west--different outside actors that may
be supporting one group or another. And so for the Taliban to
fully consolidate control, I think that remains an open
question. It is also why, ironically, it would be profoundly in
the Taliban's interest to actually put forward a genuinely
inclusive and representative government.
Because to the extent it does not, to the extent that
everyone other than the Taliban is left out, that is only
likely to--at some period in time, whether it is tomorrow, next
week, next year, or thereafter, cause those who are left out to
try to assert, one way or another, their rights and needs. So
all of that, I think, is an open question at this point.
One last thing I would mention. The country itself is in
desperate straits. The U.N. estimates that fully half the
population is in need to humanitarian assistance. We have
severe malnutrition, health problems, COVID-19, droughts, et
cetera, and so there too the Taliban has a big problem on its
hands. And, of course, it is generating very, very little
revenue in order to deal with that, all of which, I might add,
gives the international community very significant leverage and
influence going forward.
Mr. Sires. I also read where they are running out of food
in the next few months?
Secretary Blinken. Yes, that is correct. We have seen, you
know, a terrible drought, growing nutrition problems. It is one
of the reasons that we think it is so important to make sure
that, regardless of anything else, we and other countries find
ways to continue humanitarian assistance to the people of
Afghanistan.
We have committed additional funds to do that. There is a
pledging conference called by the United Nations that is
ongoing, and we can and will do that consistent with the
sanctions, consistent with our laws, by directing assistance
through NGO's, through the United Nations' agencies, not
through the government.
We need to do everything we can to make sure the people of
Afghanistan do not suffer any more than is already the case.
Mr. Sires. I would like to see, if we are going to help
Afghanistan with food and aid, that we extract certain
commitments from them before we just give them food.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Mr. Sires. And the last thing I want--and the last thing I
want to say----
Secretary Blinken. Please.
Mr. Sires [continuing]. I want to commend the country of
Colombia. I think they have taken thousands of Afghanistans and
they are vetting them before they get here. Is that accurate?
Secretary Blinken. There are a number of countries around
the world that have made those commitments that are either
serving as transit countries or serving as resettlement
countries, taking in Afghans as refugees, and we deeply
appreciate the countries that have stood up and agreed to do
that.
Mr. Sires. Thank you. I do not have any more questions,
Chairman.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman yields back.
I now recognize Representative Joe Wilson of South
Carolina, who is the ranking member of the Subcommittee on the
Middle East, North Africa, and Global Counterterrorism, for 5
minutes.
Mr. Wilson. Thank you very much, Chairman Greg Meeks. And I
am glad to join with our dear colleague, Albio Sires, in
thanking our great ally of Colombia, of helping the Afghan
refugees.
Sir, in my service on the Foreign Affairs Committee, the
Global Terrorism Subcommittee, the Armed Services Committee,
the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, and the Helsinki Commission, I
have always been impressed by American Foreign Service
diplomats worldwide. Their dedication to service is inspiring.
That is why I am shocked at your actions superseding military
advice, leading to the surrender in Afghanistan to be a safe
haven for murderous terrorists.
Biden and Harris have also opened the southern border,
stopping the wall of President Donald Trump. This allows
identified terrorists of the terror watch list to enter
American neighborhoods as lone wolf suicide bombers to murder
as many Americans as possible. In American history, American
families have never been at a greater risk of attack at home
than today, as the global war on terrorism is not over, it has
been moved from abroad to Americans homes.
As the grateful father of an Afghanistan veteran, I
especially see your actions as indefensible. With 12 visits by
me across Afghanistan to thank the South Carolina Army National
Guard troops, the 218th Brigade, commanded by General Bob
Livingston, I know firsthand they appreciated serving with
their Afghan brothers.
I saw the United States Agency for International
Development success in building schools, agricultural projects,
hospitals, and bridges and roads.
My beliefs have been actually expressed by the New York
Post Editorial Board on September 1, and that is, quote, ``6
lies Joe Biden told about Afghanistan.'' How can any American
believe anything Biden says after he has lied so blatantly?
Lie: If there are American citizens left, we are going to
stay until we get them out.
Truth: Biden himself admits Americans remain stranded in
Afghanistan.
Lie: We are making the same commitment, Biden said, to
Afghanistans who assisted America.
Truth: A senior State Department official confessed to NBC
News that the majority of Afghans did not make it out of Kabul.
Lie: The United States stands by its commitment that we
have made to vulnerable Afghans, such as women leaders and
journalists.
Truth: Team Biden did not even ensure American-employed
journalists made it to safety.
Lie: Asked by a reporter, do you see any parallels between
what happened in Vietnam? None whatsoever. Zero.
Truth: Not even a month later, pictures came from Kabul of
a helicopter flying over the American Embassy.
Lie: Biden vowed to continue to provide Afghan army with
air support.
Truth: In the wake of Biden's withdrawal decision, he
pulled the air support, intelligence, and contractors. The
Afghan militaries couldn't operate.
Lie: July 8, Biden added that the likelihood there is going
to be a Taliban overrunning everything is highly unlikely.
Truth: In fact, Biden knew the Taliban were overtaking the
Afghan Government and asked President Ghani to lie about it.
Whether it is true or not.
Sadly, the advance military equipment left to the
terrorists--and I end the quote of that article--sadly, the
advance military equipment left to the terrorists is comparable
to all of the military equipment that we have provided to
Israel since 1948.
The countries who have suffered most from Islamic extremist
terrorist attacks--India, Israel, and America--are in danger.
They chant death to Israel, death to America.
We must never forget the May 8 bombing in Kabul, where
Islamic extremist terrorists slaughtered over 80 innocent young
girls. You should have changed course then because of this
gruesome revealing fact. The murderers of that attack now will
have a safe haven to attack American families at home.
Your bizarre abandoning of Bagram Airfield led directly to
13 Marines murdered in Kabul. You should resign.
I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. Mr. Secretary, we only had 43 seconds left
of the 5 minutes. So your response, I know you will not be able
to answer many of the questions that was put forward by
Representative Wilson, but if you choose, you have 43 seconds
of which to respond for whichever questions were asked to you.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me simply thank the member for his support for the men
and women of the State Department. I appreciated that part of
his statement. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Gerry
Connolly of Virginia, who is the president of the NATO
Parliamentary Assembly, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Connolly. Mr. Chairman, thank you.
I guess I would say to my friend from South Carolina, if I
were the Member of Congress who committed one of the most
grievous acts in the state of the Union Address when the
President of the United States, Mr. Obama, was our guest, to
shout out, ``You lie,'' I might take more care about
enumerating other alleged lies in a hearing with the Secretary
of State.
Mr. Secretary, what we are listening to on the other side
of the aisle, sadly, is sort of a salad mix of selective facts
and a lot of amnesia in the salad dressing.
The history of instability in Afghanistan did not begin on
August 14 of this year, did it?
Secretary Blinken. It did not.
Mr. Connolly. Am I correct in remembering that, in fact,
you could trace direct routes to 1977, 1978, when there was a
communist coup and the President of Afghanistan was
assassinated in the Presidential palace. Is that correct?
Secretary Blinken. It is.
Mr. Connolly. And 1 year later, the Soviet Union, because
of that instability, decided to invade Afghanistan. Is that
correct?
Secretary Blinken. It is.
Mr. Connolly. And 10 years later, the Soviets left
Afghanistan because they had mounting and maybe really
unsustainable military casualties and felt that they were
engaged in a process that could not be won. Is that correct?
Secretary Blinken. It is.
Mr. Connolly. And, meanwhile, because the United States
decided once that happened, it would disengage primarily from
Afghanistan, groups like the Taliban had 12 years in which to
create political power. Is that correct?
Secretary Blinken. It is.
Mr. Connolly. And in 2001, we reentered Afghanistan in
response to the tragedy we just remembered--20-year remembrance
this week--and we rolled up the Taliban by making alliances
with various militia groups in the north and moved south until
they lost control of the country in that year, in 2001. Is that
correct?
Secretary Blinken. Yes, it is.
Mr. Connolly. And the purpose of our involvement was to
defeat al-Qaeda because the Taliban were harboring this
virulent terrorist group that had attacked America. Is that
correct?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Connolly. Would it be fair to say that we achieved that
objective?
Secretary Blinken. It would.
Mr. Connolly. Would it be it fair to say that, in fact, 10
years later, the leader of that group, who masterminded the
attacks of 9/11, was, in fact, killed by a United States
specially trained military unit?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Connolly. So what happened ultimately on August 14 has
lots of history. I know it is convenient to pretend that did
not happen. And I know that we want to give ourselves sort of
the pleasure of attacking a political leader of the other
party, and so let me engage in that too.
I am going to assert that the events of August 14had their
direct antecedent with a bad decision by President Trump and
Secretary Pompeo, in 2018, to elevate and legitimize the
Taliban in Doha, Qatar, by agreeing to have face-to-face
negotiations.
That tragedy was compounded exponentially by an
unbelievable decision to exclude the Government of Afghanistan,
ostensibly we were defending, from those very negotiations. Is
that an accurate statement, Mr. Secretary?
Secretary Blinken. Certainly that is what we inherited.
Mr. Connolly. But the Afghan Government was, in fact,
excluded from the negotiating table in Doha by the Trump
administration. Is that not correct?
Secretary Blinken. It is essentially correct, yes.
Mr. Connolly. And when those 5,000 people were released
from prison, since the ranking member is so concerned, and
correctly so, about two Haqqani members in the current cabinet
of Taliban, were there any known terrorists or declared
terrorists by the United States among those 5,000 people
released with the consent and negotiated agreement of the Trump
administration?
Secretary Blinken. Almost certainly, yes.
Mr. Connolly. Ah, I guess our concern about terrorists is
pretty selective and limited to partisanship.
I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman yields back his time.
I now recognize Representative Steve Chabot of Ohio, who is
the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific,
Central Asia, and Nonproliferation, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Chabot. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
On August 16, Mr. Secretary, President Biden said that the
administration had considered every contingency and was
executing the evacuation according to your plan.
Was it part of your plan to rely on the Taliban to ensure
the safety of Americans trying to flee the country? Because
that is what happened.
Secretary Blinken. We, through the course of the spring and
summer, did indeed, as the President said, look at every
contingency for dealing with our drawdown. And as part of
that----
Mr. Chabot. And we relied upon the Taliban to be our
security. In essence, we ended up getting 13 of our military
personnel and over 150 Afghan civilians killed by relying upon
the Taliban. They did not provide very good security. We never
should have relied upon them.
But let me move on----
Secretary Blinken. We were not relying upon the Taliban. As
you know what happened, was the Afghan security forces and the
government collapsed within the space of 11 days. We then
executed the plans that we had in place to safely draw down our
embassy, move it to the airport. The military came in, took
over the airport, and started getting evacuation flights out
within 72 hours. Those were the plans that were in place.
Mr. Chabot. We certainly relied upon it at the airport. It
did not work out so well.
Mr. Secretary, President Biden has laid the blame for the
evacuation debacle in Afghanistan on others rather than on
itself, where it really belongs. He blamed President Trump, as
we have discussed already to some degree here, basically
claiming that he was just following Trump's policy.
But he has not hesitated to disregard every other major
Trump policy: our southern border, the Keystone Pipeline, the
Paris climate accord, the Iran deal, Mexico City policy, and on
and on.
Yet this was the one Trump policy that he had to follow. Do
you understand why this is pretty hard to fathom for a lot of
people?
Secretary Blinken. I think what is perhaps, Congressman,
hard to fathom or people just do not understand, is that the
agreement reached by the previous administration required all
U.S. Forces to be out of Afghanistan by May 1. In return, the
Taliban stopped attacking our forces, our partners, and it did
not commence an onslaught of the Afghanistan cities.
Had the President not followed through on the commitments
that his predecessor made, those attacks would have resumed, we
would have re-upped the war in Afghanistan after 20 years, for
another 5, 10, or 20 years. We would have had to send more
forces back in.
And I recognize that a lot of people do not understand
that, do not know the agreement that was reached, and the
choice that President Biden faced for May 1.
Mr. Chabot. Well, let me ask you this. When he wasn't
blaming Trump, he was blaming the Afghan military forces for
allegedly not being willing to fight.
But whereas we hadn't suffered a single U.S. military death
in a year and a half--and that is a wonderful thing--the Afghan
military forces had lost about 3,000 of their military
personnel during that same time.
So wasn't the President being a little unfair to those
3,000 Afghans who lost their lives fighting the Taliban during
that period of time?
Secretary Blinken. Congressman, many Afghan soldiers fought
with incredible bravery and gave their lives, you are right.
But as an institution, after 20 years of investment by the
United States, by the international community, hundreds of
billions of dollars, equipment, support, training, as an
institution, it collapsed in 11 days.
Mr. Chabot. Mr. Secretary, we went into Afghanistan in the
first place because the Taliban had harbored al-Qaeda, correct,
and they attacked us on September 11.
Now, 20 years later, we have the Taliban back in charge
there, and they have billions and billions of dollars worth of
our equipment and our weaponry, and once again, they are a
haven for terrorists. How is this not a debacle of monumental
proportions?
Secretary Blinken. Congressman, as we were discussing a
little bit earlier, al-Qaeda, the group that attacked us on 9/
11, long ago was vastly degraded to the point where it is
currently not capable, in the assessment of our intelligence
agencies, of conducting an externally directed attack against
us or against others.
The Taliban should remember as well what happened the last
time it did, as you rightly said, harbor al-Qaeda, and it
engaged in an outwardly directed attack against us. It knows
the consequences of continuing to do that, and it has made
commitments not to allow that to happen.
But, of course, we are not relying on those commitments. As
we discussed a little bit earlier, we are putting in place what
we do in countries around the world where we do not have boots
on the ground, which is an over-the-horizon capacity to detect
the reemergence, should it happen, of any threat, including
from al-Qaeda, and the means to do something about it.
Mr. Chabot. This pullout was----
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Chabot. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Ted Deutch of Florida, who
is the chair of the Subcommittee on the Middle East, North
Africa, and Global Counterterrorism, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Deutch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, I appreciate you being here today. And we do
need to look back--this is a really important hearing--but we
also need to look forward.
The reality is, we have a Taliban government, we have
terrorist groups already surging, potential threats to U.S.
interests remain. It is true that we are not the world's
policeman, but we know that a strengthened ISIS-K or al-Qaeda
pose a threat, not only to the U.S. homeland, but to Americans
abroad, our interests abroad in the region.
The Middle East and North Africa in particular were
fundamentally changed in the aftermath of 9/11, with the rise
of al-Qaeda and ISIS affiliates. We clearly cannot trust the
Taliban to keep terrorists at bay.
So, Mr. Secretary, you traveled to Doha to conduct
diplomatic talks with partners and allies on our continued
counterterrorism role. What do you assess to be the operational
capacities of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan? And how is the
administration planning to hold the Taliban to its commitment
to ensure that al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups are unable
to use Afghan soil to plan terrorist attacks on or threaten the
security of the U.S. and our allies?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you very much. A few things on
this. First, as we were discussing a little bit earlier, as you
know from your focus on this, the terrorist threat has
metastasized significantly from 9/11, and it is much more acute
now in terms of potential threats to the homeland and threats
beyond the countries in question, from Somalia, from Yemen,
from Libya, Iraq, Syria, a number of other countries in Africa
as well.
And so we have to be able to make sure that we are focused
everywhere that is a possibility and resourced appropriately.
And we are. And in a number of those places, as you know very
well, we do not have boots on the ground, but we find ways to
deal with that threat, including with over-the-horizon
capabilities.
In the case of Afghanistan, a couple of things. The current
assessment of the intelligence community is that long ago al-
Qaeda was so significantly degraded, that it is not in a
position to conduct externally faced--externally directed
attacks. But we will remain hypervigilant about any reemergence
of that threat, and we will be working closely with partners
and other countries to be in a position to do that.
I think the chairman referenced earlier that we hope and
expect in the near future to be able to do some classified
briefings on this because there are a number of things that it
would not be appropriate to discuss in this setting.
Mr. Deutch. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. And we appreciate
your commitment to ensuring that those classified briefings
occur.
Secretary Blinken, the war in Afghanistan was the first
mission in the history of NATO arising out of the invitation of
article 5, and over 50 NATO members and partner countries sent
troops. Thirty-six, it has been reported, had troops there at
the time of the drawdown.
They invested political capital--our allies invested
political capital and funds and certainly troops, and often
those troops gave their lives as well.
The criticism that we have heard from some of our allies is
that there was not adequate consultation and coordination with
our NATO allies. We heard the Secretary General of NATO say
just this week that there was others doubting that. I would
like you to speak to that.
But finally this. We had an administration, Mr. Secretary,
that wanted to go it alone, a President who failed to
appreciate and often criticized the importance of NATO allies,
while embracing Xi and Putin.
If you could also, in your final time with me, speak to, at
a time when democratic values are being threatened and at risk
in so many places around the world, if you could also speak to
the importance of that transatlantic relationship and how to
reassure those allies of ours who have raised concerns about
how we went about pulling out of Afghanistan and about failing
to coordinate with them as we did.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you. Couple of things. First, you
are so right to point to our allies and partners who stood with
us on 9/11 and in all the days and time thereafter. And you are
exactly right that article 5 of NATO, an attack on one is an
attack on all, in essence, was invoked for the very first time
in its history in our defense by our allies and partners,
something that I will never forget and I suspect no one on this
video conference today will ever forget.
And we determined that when it came to Afghanistan, we went
in together and we would go out together. And that is exactly
what we did. We engaged--I engaged, for the Secretary of
Defense, in intense consultations with our NATO partners well
before the President made his decision, going to Brussels for a
special session of the North Atlantic Council and listening
intently to every single partner, relaying what we heard
directly to President Biden, to factor that into our thinking
and into our planning.
I have spent more time in Brussels, either in person or
virtually, than in any other place since I have been on this
job, working very closely with these allies and partners. On
the day that the President's decision was announced, I was back
in Brussels, again with the Secretary of Defense, and NATO
immediately and unanimously endorsed that decision.
Now, in the discussions and conversations that we had
throughout this time, including individual conversations,
people brought various perspectives to the table, but each
recognized that given the deadline that existed, that is, that
our forces had to depart Afghanistan by May 1, pursuant to the
agreement negotiated by the previous administration, that the
alternative, should we choose to stay, was for the Taliban to
resume attacks, not just on us, but on our NATO partners and
allies, as well as to engage in this countrywide offensive that
we have seen to retake the major cities, in effect, to re-up
the war. And all unanimously endorsed the proposition that we
would leave together, and that is exactly what we worked on
doing and what we have been doing.
I know from talking to many allies and partners the
tremendous solidarity we saw at the Kabul Airport, working to
help each other, to make sure that we could get out our fellow
nationals, Afghans who had helped each of us, and our embassy
personnel.
I heard a lot of gratitude from allies and partners about
the work that our folks did in making sure that we could
deliver on that commitment to them.
So, from my perspective at least, there was tremendous and
genuine consultation with allies and partners throughout this
process. And going forward, right now, we are deeply engaged
with them, at NATO and in other organizations, on working
together on the way forward, to collectively hold the Taliban
to the commitments that it has made to the international
community.
Chairman Meeks. Thank you. The gentleman's time is expired.
I now recognize Representative Scott Perry of Pennsylvania
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Perry. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Blinken, assuming it is not classified, can you tell us
where you are today?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. I am at the State Department.
Mr. Perry. Oh, couldn't be bothered to come down here and
see Congress. All right. That is great.
Secretary Blinken. My understanding--excuse me, sir. My
understanding is that the House is not in session, and that is
why the session has been convened----
Mr. Perry. I am right here, Secretary, so----
Secretary Blinken. If the chairman would like to correct
me, I will stand corrected.
Mr. Perry. Reclaiming my time. Did State at any point in
the evacuation process block American citizens from leaving
Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. No, we did not.
Mr. Perry. None? Your testimony before Congress is that
State did not block any American citizens leaving?
Secretary Blinken. To the contrary, my officers, men and
women, ran into the building from around the world to help
Americans get out, and----
Mr. Perry. You can do it with Mr. Connolly, you can do it
with me. Yes or no? I just want to clarify, you did not block
anybody?
Secretary Blinken. No. They were there to help Americans
get out, not to block----
Mr. Perry. How many Afghans not meeting the qualifications
of SIV have been brought to the United States, prior to--how
many Afghan citizens came to the United States that had not met
the qualifications for a special immigrant visa?
Secretary Blinken. We are in the process of going through--
--
Mr. Perry. How many? How many? How many did you bring? You
were just at Dulles. How many did you bring?
Secretary Blinken. We have--we will have, by the end of the
month, we will have brought a total of approximately 60,000 to
the United States.
Mr. Perry. That have met the SIV process.
Secretary Blinken. Some of those will be--some of those
will have been through the SIV process. All of them, regardless
of SIV status, will have gone through rigorous security checks,
first at the transit points outside of the United States and
then the United States.
Mr. Perry. [Inaudible] Before we brought these people to
the United States of America.
Mr. Secretary, are Afghan refugees required to be
vaccinated for COVID before coming to the United States of
America?
Secretary Blinken. They are vaccinated in the United States
before they are--before they are resettled into the United
States.
Mr. Perry. There are none of these Afghan citizens that are
allowed to leave these resettlement communities--Fort Dix,
Dulles, et cetera--that are allowed to leave at any time they
want. None of them are leaving unless they are vaccinated for
COVID. Is that your testimony?
Secretary Blinken. They are tested for COVID and vaccinated
for COVID.
Mr. Perry. Vaccinated before they leave?
Secretary Blinken. That is my understanding.
Mr. Perry. All right. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Is it the policy of the United States of America to take
hard-earned tax dollars and pay terrorist organizations?
Secretary Blinken. It is not.
Mr. Perry. It is not. So your testimony earlier was, is
that we are sending taxpayer dollars to Afghanistan right now
for humanitarian relief. Who are we sending that to?
Secretary Blinken. To NGO's and to United Nations' agencies
who are using that assistance. Not to the Afghan Government.
Mr. Perry. Not to the Afghan--the Taliban government. How
are you accounting for that? How are you making sure that the
Afghan--the Taliban government is not receiving that?
Secretary Blinken. As we do around the world in places of
conflict where we provide humanitarian assistance, working
through United Nations, working through NGO's, with long-tested
methods to make sure that the assistance provided goes to the
people who need it, not to the government in question.
Mr. Perry. All right. Let me ask you this. Is it your
understanding that over the past 20 years, United States
taxpayers have paid Pakistan, who has then used that money to
support the Taliban, the Haqqani Network, ISIS-K, Khorasan
group, et cetera, for the past 20 years? Is that not true?
Secretary Blinken. There is a long history that we should
all look at together about the involvement of Pakistan in the
last 20 years.
Mr. Perry. I would say that we should no longer pay
Pakistan and we should pay India.
Let me ask you this. I just have a couple more questions
for you, a little off topic here, but I think it is
interesting.
How long was your recent interview with the FBI, and was it
a deposition?
Secretary Blinken. I am sorry. I do not know to what you
are referring.
Mr. Perry. Are you saying that you have not had a recent
interview with the FBI since becoming Secretary of State?
Secretary Blinken. I am not sure what you are referring to,
and I am happy to take that up with you offline.
Mr. Perry. Did the State Department turn over documents to
the FBI related to Hunter Biden, Burisma, and/or the Blue State
Strategies Corporation?
Secretary Blinken. You will have to ask the----
Mr. Perry. You have no knowledge of this. You have had no--
are you saying you have not had an interview with----
Secretary Blinken. It would not be appropriate for me to
comment in a public forum on any legal proceedings that the
Department or I may or may not have been involved in.
Mr. Perry. I am not asking you to comment on the legal
proceedings. I am just asking if you have been interviewed by
the FBI since becoming Secretary of State.
Secretary Blinken. Again, I am not going to comment one way
or another on any legal proceedings or not that may or may not
have happened.
Chairman Meeks. Let me remind the gentleman that the topic
of this hearing is Afghanistan. That is what we are----
Mr. Perry. I appreciate it, Mr. Chairman, but the Secretary
generally refuses to answer questions about Afghanistan, so I
just figured we would talk about something he should be
intimately familiar with.
Have you sought to alter any of your testimony from last
year's Senate investigation regarding this topic, Mr.
Secretary?
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
And let me also for the record make clear that this is a
hybrid hearing. Just as members had an option to come or to be
other places, the Secretary also. It is a hybrid hearing
because we are not in session.
Mr. Issa. Mr. Chairman, point of inquiry, if I could?
Chairman Meeks. Who seeks recognition?
Mr. Issa. This is Congressman Issa. Just for my
edification, was it expressed to the Secretary that he had a
choice of either one, or was he invited to come here, or was he
alerted to remain there?
And I only ask because I think we all agree that if he
could have been here in person, it would have been better, but
if it was an option or for whatever reason--because I want to
make sure that it is clear that the Secretary may have done no
wrong, even though many of us would prefer him to be here.
Chairman Meeks. The Secretary has done no wrong. It was an
option, and I made it as an option as I have done with every
member.
Mr. Issa. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Karen Bass
of California, who is the chair of the Subcommittee on Africa,
Global Health, and Global Human Rights, for 5 minutes.
Ms. Bass. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
And thank you, Secretary Blinken, for attending this
hearing and for your patience with putting up with the
theatrics of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. I
want to thank you, again, for spending the time and agreeing to
take everyone's questions for 5 minutes.
The departure from Afghanistan has provided really
unprecedented insight into our foreign policy, in addition to
demonstrating the bravery, dedication, and professionalism of
our military, diplomats, and Afghan partners. It has also shown
how a 20-year effort and billions of dollars have really raised
questions about what the return of investment is that we
desired in terms of sustaining peace and stability in
Afghanistan.
The assumption of power by the Taliban has secondary and
tertiary effects on the most vulnerable segments of the
population, especially women and children, and we are concerned
that it will reverse any gains that were realized in the last
two decades.
So my first question, yes or no, Mr. Secretary, did the
agreement from the last administration include any protections
for girls and women?
Secretary Blinken. Not to my knowledge.
Ms. Bass. So many people are concerned about the status of
women and girls in Afghanistan under the Taliban. The
restrictions on education, movement, health, physical safety,
under their regime paints a grim picture.
I would like to know how the administration will work with
partners to support Afghan women's rights and the rights of
ethnic and religious minorities in Afghanistan. Go ahead.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, Congresswoman. One of the
truly great achievements of the last 20 years was the progress
made by women and girls in particular in Afghanistan. And one
of the things that we should be proud of is the support--the
leading support that we gave to that when it comes to access to
education, to healthcare, to the work force, entrepreneurship.
Those gains were significant, and we were the leading
contributor.
I was in Kabul in April. I sat with a number of women who
had benefited from our assistance, including women who had gone
on to become leaders in their parliament, in the media, NGO's,
et cetera, and, of course, heard their profound concerns about
the future.
Just recently when I was in Doha and at Ramstein talking to
people who had been evacuated from Afghanistan, I spoke to a
lot of women and girls and heard their deep concerns about the
future, as well as people who were still in Afghanistan.
And so we have an ongoing commitment to use every tool at
our disposal through our diplomacy, through our economic
assistance, humanitarian assistance, programmatic assistance,
to do whatever we can to continue, in coordination with many
other countries, to support women and girls and minorities in
Afghanistan. The assistance that we announced today will go in
that direction. The assistance we will provide going forward
will do that.
And with regard to women and girls in particular, given the
incredible fragility of the situation that they are now in, I
will be naming a senior official here at the State Department
to focus entirely on the ongoing effort, both from the U.S.
Government and in coordination with other countries, to support
them.
Ms. Bass. Well, thank you very much. And so will the
administration expand the license to operate humanitarian
programs in Afghanistan? And how will that take place? And
which partners do you see us continuing to work with?
Secretary Blinken. In short, yes, that is exactly what we
are looking at. And you rightly point out, we have already
issued a license to make sure that humanitarian assistance
could go forward. We are looking at whether that needs to be
expanded, consistent, of course, with our sanctions and
consistent with our national security, to allow appropriate
assistance to get to those who need it.
Ms. Bass. Who approves that license? Who are we making that
request to?
Secretary Blinken. The Treasury Department is responsible
for the licenses, but we do this in coordination or
consultation with us and other agencies in the government, as
well as, of course, the White House.
Ms. Bass. And which partners on the ground are we
continuing to work with?
Secretary Blinken. We have--and we can get you the list. We
have a number of NGO's that remain active in Afghanistan, as
well as----
Ms. Bass. Are these SGOs (ph) or NGO's?
Secretary Blinken. Some are--there are, I believe, a couple
of U.S. NGO's that are still active, international NGO's, and
U.N. agencies. I met with the head of the U.N.'s Humanitarian
Assistance Program just a few days ago when I was in Doha, and
we spent a lot of time talking about how this assistance could
continue to go forward and what some of the mechanisms were
that could be put in place to make sure that it was getting to
the right people and being used effectively.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Darrell Issa from California
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Issa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, before we get into the tougher part of this,
I want to thank you for the effort that has gone on by the men
and women of both the State Department and the Department of
Defense, and a lot of independent actions that occurred to try
to help get people out in the aftermath of the withdrawal.
I would not be doing my job, though, if I did not ask some
tough questions. One of them is up here on this board, and it
is pretty straightforward. A response I received from the State
Department said to my staff when we asked about continued work
to get people out, it said, make contingency plans to leave
when it is safe to do so that do not rely on U.S. Government
assistance.
How do we square the fact that in an official response that
I waited weeks for, that we do not have any assurance for
assistance but that when people get out, typically they are
lauded by the State Department as success stories. That
includes an 80-year-old couple that was announced to have
gotten out when, in fact, we saw no real assistance by the
State Department, had to find out it was a nongovernment flight
and get these two American citizens onto that flight, and we
still have a number of others.
So, in a nutshell, how do I explain, do not rely on the
United States? Do we or do we not rely on the United States of
America for blue passport holder American citizens who want to
get out?
Secretary Blinken. The answer to that is, yes, absolutely.
And could you tell me, because I am sorry, I cannot see it
clearly from here, you know, when and to whom that statement
was made?
Mr. Issa. We will give it to your staff so that you get it
without it being fully disclosed----
Secretary Blinken. And, Congressman, I would really welcome
following up with you, with your team, with your staff to make
sure that we are following up on that particular request.
I have got here--because I really want to express deep
appreciation to Members of Congress, this committee--I have
here a very lengthy document of all of the inquiries that we
have received just from HFAC, from members of HFAC, on people
who have come to you seeking assistance, all of which has been
factored into our data bases, our information, our efforts. But
if someone is not getting the response they need, please come
back to us and let me know, and we would be very happy to work
with you on that.
Thank you.
Mr. Issa. We will do that. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Now, if I can quickly go through a few dates and a few
statements. On July 8, President Biden was asked if he listened
to the intelligence assessment that the Afghan Government was
likely to collapse. He answered, that is not true. They are
not--they did not reach that conclusion. In other words, the IC
hadn't reached that conclusion.
I believe that we will find that as of July 8, the
President misspoke.
The President also said the likelihood there is going to be
the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country
is highly unlikely. Two days later, on July 10, the Taliban was
reported to have 85 percent of the country.
Then on August 12, The Wall Street Journal reported that on
July 13, you received an urgent dissent memo from 23 U.S.
Embassy personnel in Kabul warning that the advances of the
Taliban and the rapid collapse of Afghanistan. Your spokesman
said you read every memo sent to you from the Dissent Channel.
So if you do, then you knew that, in fact, a major portion of
people in the embassy believed that they were going to quickly
overrun.
On August 18, President Biden said, the intelligence
community did not say, back in June or July, that, in fact,
this was going to collapse like it did. But the embassy told
you, or at least a great many, in July, that it would.
The question really is, how do we regain confidence in the
State Department and its spokespeople, yourself included, and
the President, if, in fact, we cannot square what we receive,
Members of Congress, both publicly and privately, that indicate
some of those statements that I just read, including ones by
the President, are not supported by the facts?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you. As you know from tracking
this as well, throughout the year, assessments were made of the
resilience of the Afghan Government, the Afghan security
forces, and the possibility of the Taliban taking over the
country.
And this was typically done in a series of different
scenarios: worst, mid case, best case scenarios. In the worst
case scenarios throughout the spring, I think it is fair to say
that the general assessment was that the government and
security forces would be able to hold on to the country well
into next year, 2022.
At some point in July, there was an assessment that it was
more likely than not that that timeframe was down to the end of
the year. Then, of course, as things fully unraveled in August,
that changed.
To my knowledge, Congressman, no one predicted the
unraveling before our forces and embassy left Afghanistan on
August 31.
The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Milley, has said,
nothing I or anyone else saw indicated a collapse of the
government and the security forces in 11 days.
The Director of National Intelligence has said, in the days
leading up to the Taliban takeover, intelligence agencies did
not say collapse was imminent.
This unfolded more quickly than we anticipated, including
in the intelligence community. And there are a number of other
conclusory statements of that kind that I can share with you.
With regard to the so-called Dissent Channel cable, it is
something I am immensely proud of, it is a tradition that we
have. And you are right, I read every such cable, I respond to
it, I factor it into my own thinking and actions. And that
cable did not predict the collapse of the government or
security forces before our departure. It was very focused, and
rightly focused, on the work we were doing to try to get
Afghans at risk out of the country and pressing to speed up
that effort.
As it happens, a number of the things that were suggested
in that very important cable were things that we were in the
process of doing. The very next day--I think the cable came in
on the 13th of July--the 14th, we launched Operation Allies
Refuge, which, of course, had been in training for some time,
as well as the 24/7 task force to help those in the SIV program
get out and even to relocate them, which is not part of the
program.
So that was a very important cable. I am grateful for it,
and grateful that we have a process at the State Department
where people can clearly express their views and differences on
policy or recommendations on policy. That is hugely important.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Bill Keating of
Massachusetts, who is the chair of the Subcommittee on Europe,
Energy, the Environment, and Cyber, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you, Mr. Secretary, for your service, and as head
of the Department of State for our country. I want to thank all
of your people for the work they have done. They stood side by
side with our military, risking their lives in helping people
evacuate in the most dangerous situation. So my sincere
appreciation to everyone----
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Mr. Keating [continuing]. At State who was part of that.
I am also glad that you reinforced, as my conversations
have, the renewed commitment, the strength that is there with
our transatlantic allies going forward on our mission, not just
in the region, but also worldwide through our counterterrorism
efforts.
I must say this, though. This is a period of reassessment,
I think, as we go forward, where we have some lessons learned,
where we go embarking on a new mission, where we are trying to
do the best in that area and so many fronts. But there is one
relationship that really has always troubled me a great deal,
certainly over the last couple of decades, and that is our
relationship with Pakistan. You know, from its--Pakistan has
played an active and, by so many accounts, a negative role in
Afghan affairs for decades, not just recently but for decades.
From the very beginning, its inception, they helped in
actually branding the name Taliban. And by 2005, when the
Taliban was reconstituting in east and south Afghanistan and,
importantly, across the border in Pakistan, and as Pakistan's
ISI, their Inter-Services Intelligence agency, had such strong
ties and cooperation with the Haqqani Network, responsible for
so many things, including the deaths of some of our soldiers.
And even recently when the Taliban took over, in the last
month, Pakistan's Prime Minister Khan claimed that Afghanistan
had, quote/unquote, broken the shackles of slavery.
So we used to always hear diplomatically that we have a
complicated relationship with Afghanistan--I mean with
Pakistan. I would say it is often duplicitous.
So as we go forward in the region, as we go forward dealing
with our counterterrorism missions, how do we reassess that
relationship? How have we learned from their actions? And when
we go forward, what do we do? What are some of the big issues
that we should have, stakes in the ground that we should have
in dealing with Pakistan and the way they have acted over these
decades?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, Congressman. And I think you
are very right to point at the role that Pakistan has played
throughout the past 20 years and even before. And it is one
that has involved hedging its bets constantly about the future
of Afghanistan. It is one that is involved harboring members of
the Taliban, including the Haqqanis. It is one that has also
involved, at different points, cooperation with us on
counterterrorism.
And so there are a number of things that have come into
play. It has a multiplicity of interests, some that are in
clear conflict with ours when it comes to Afghanistan. It is
focused, of course, as well on India and the role that India is
playing in Afghanistan. It looks at it through that prism as
well.
All of these things, I think, have influenced what it has
done on many occasions detrimental to our interests; on other
occasions, in support of those interests.
And so going forward, what we are looking at, what we have
to look at is an insistence that every country, to include
Pakistan, make good on the expectations that the international
community has of what is required of a Taliban-led government,
if it is to receive any legitimacy of any kind or any support
going forward, to include ensuring freedom of travel, to
include making good on its commitments on not allowing
Afghanistan to be used as a haven for outward-directed
terrorism, to include upholding the basic rights of the Afghan
people, including women and girls and minorities, to include
allowing humanitarian assistance in, to include having a more
representative government.
And so Pakistan needs to line up with the rest of the--with
the broad majority of the international community in working
toward those ends and in upholding those expectations.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I would like to----
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Keating [continuing]. Another time and thank for your
work with the U.S. Agency for Global Media. We will continue to
work on that front and many others.
I yield back.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Kinzinger. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, thank you for being here and spending this
time. It is very important.
You know, watching some of this debate, I think it is
important to remind people, yes, the Trump administration
failed in the setup, and I think the Biden Administration
absolutely failed in the execution of this.
I also want to make it clear, Mr. Secretary, we support the
members of the State Department and their heroic action in the
evacuation. I think the broader point is, they never should
have been put in a place where they had to act heroically.
We found ourselves--many times we talk about Bagram and
leaving that, and I think that it is important to point out,
but there was also moments where the U.S. military, with the
6,000 people that we sent in, could have defended Kabul proper.
It was clear that the Taliban were not intending to move into
Kabul as early as they did. But we put them in a position where
they had to act heroically, and we shouldn't ask that of our
State Department employees, even though we appreciate that they
did.
I also think it is important to point out, you know, that
there is a lot of blame of the Afghan military. And I
certainly, as a military man myself, wish that the Afghan
military would have helped. But keep in mind, prior to that,
there were assessments coming out that it was only a matter of
time, maybe it is 6 months, maybe it is a year, till the whole
place collapsed.
You know, we had pulled--we had built a military in our own
image that relied on air power, that relied on logistics, and
then we pulled our logistic and air power support from the
Afghan military. And as they received night letters from the
Taliban saying, we are going to kill your family because the
United States is vacating, they are leaving you, it is--to me,
as much as I would have loved for them to have stayed and taken
a stand heroically, I do not know many even of our allies'
militaries that, frankly, could have stood in those conditions
in that kind of an onslaught.
Let me ask you, though, Mr. Secretary, you know, you talk a
little about the Taliban legitimacy, and we are going to see
how they act. I want to ask you a question because I am not
sure where that changed. At the beginning of all of this, we
were talking about building a worldwide coalition to not
recognize the Taliban, and all of a sudden this is on the
table.
Is the Taliban the legitimate government of Afghanistan;
and if not, would you consider what the Taliban have done in
Afghanistan to be a coup d'etat?
Secretary Blinken. First, let me just start by thanking you
for your strong words in support of the men and women of the
State Department. I very much appreciate them and appreciate
you saying them.
Second, with regard to the Taliban and your question, it is
the de facto government of Afghanistan. Those are just the
facts and----
Mr. Kinzinger. I do not mean to interrupt, but I need to.
Has there been any discussion of an Afghan government in exile
with the Vice-President? Even if the President had left, is
there any discussion of that? Because this, to me, appears to
be an armed military coup against the legitimate elected
government of Afghanistan.
Secretary Blinken. Congressman, I will certainly look to
see what the lawyers say. From where I sit, this is the product
alas of one side getting the upper hand in a civil war.
Mr. Kinzinger. Let me ask a couple of questions here on
something too about that. So if we look at the list of new key
players in the regime, we have the current Prime Minister, who
was deputy during the 9/11 attacks, the current Deputy Prime
Minister, who served as No. 2 defense official during the 9/11
attacks. The current Foreign Minister, who is your counterpart,
was the Minister of Culture and Information during the 9/11
attacks. And we have designated terrorists in key positions,
like those that are responsible for preventing Afghanistan from
becoming a safe haven in terror once again.
So we look at that list and we see those individuals who
not only defended al-Qaeda but have committed crimes against
women and vulnerable populations, and I think anybody would
look at that and say this is the same regime that failed to
hand over Osama bin Laden 20 years ago.
But let me just ask you, have these individuals committed
to denouncing al-Qaeda, to denouncing the Haqqani Network, and
ensuring that they will execute any attacks against them should
they try to organize in their territory?
Secretary Blinken. Well, in the agreement that was secured
by the previous administration, the Taliban, now represented by
these individuals, made commitments not to allow Afghanistan to
be used as a launching ground for externally directed
terrorism, whether by al-Qaeda or by anyone else.
The big question now--and you are right to point to it--is
whether they will make good on that commitment. But, of course,
we cannot and will not rely on them to do that even as we
insist that they do.
Mr. Kinzinger. Let me ask you too--thank you, and I am
sorry to cut you off.
Secretary Blinken. No, please, go ahead.
Mr. Kinzinger. Just a couple of quick points. No. 1, we
would need--we absolutely have to be executing any attack
against al-Qaeda that we can, where we see them form.
And secondarily, because I am running out of time, let me
stress to you the importance of State Department working hand-
in-hand in a public and private way with these NGO's, made up
of former veterans, that are doing stuff that unfortunately the
government can no longer do, and let me encourage you to give
them top cover and work with them to provide the assets
necessary to get these people out.
Thank you, Mr. Chair and Mr. Secretary. I yield back.
Secretary Blinken. Let me just say, I really appreciate you
saying that and putting the spotlight on that, because veterans
groups are doing remarkable work. We are in close contact with
them. I met with about 75 veterans organizations and groups
virtually about a week ago. We followed up with a number of
other meetings, and we deeply appreciate the work that many
veterans on this committee, as well as organizations are doing,
and we are looking to work even more closely together on that.
Thank you.
Mr. Kinzinger. Good news.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative David
Cicilline of Rhode Island for 5 minutes.
Mr. Cicilline. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. You know, you
explained that you inherited an agreement with a deadline but
no plan, a backlog of 17,000 special immigrant visas, and a
responsibility to evacuate safely both Americans and those who
helped us in this effort.
As a candidate, President Biden promised to end the war in
Afghanistan, and he kept his word. I agree with him it was the
right thing to do.
And while today's hearing is focused on the U.S.
withdrawal, I think it would be a mistake to lose sight of the
misjudgments and lessons learned over the long arc of the past
20 years. And I hope Congress will have an opportunity to do
its own self-reflection.
But I want to begin, Mr. Secretary, my question about the
evacuation. You were cutoff when you were trying to explain the
vetting process, and I wonder if you could quickly finish that
answer about what the State Department did with respect to
vetting people that were being evacuated out of Afghanistan.
Secretary Blinken. Sure. And two things. And by the way, I
very much agree with you, and I heard the chairman say at the
outset that this committee, among other things, will be
focusing on the 20-year history of our engagement in
Afghanistan. And I think there are lots of lessons to be
learned across the board, through every administration,
including our own.
With regard to the vetting, two things I would point out
here. First, you know, we spent a lot of time talking about the
special immigrant visa program and our commitment, and the
commitment, I know, of so many members of this committee, to
the Afghans who worked with us, who sit side by side with us,
and the work that we did these first months of the
administration to take a program that was in pretty much a dead
stall and to put it into third, fourth----
Mr. Cicilline. Okay. I do not want to be impolite, but if
you could just quickly say what you did, because I know how
thorough it was, I just----
Secretary Blinken. Sure. Thank you. Simply put, when it
comes to vetting people coming out of Afghanistan, they go to
transit countries. We negotiated agreements with more than a
dozen countries to transit Afghans at those countries, and we
do security screenings there.
We have sent Customs and Border Patrol agents to all of
those countries. We have the law enforcement, intelligence, and
security agencies all there doing vetting, biometrics,
biographic information.
Then they come to the United States. But before they are
resettled anywhere, they are also at one of our military bases,
and any vetting continues there.
And under authorities that we have asked Congress for,
including the ability for people who are resettled in a year's
time to apply for a green card, the vetting and background
authorities will continue so that if anything comes up, we can
continue to do that.
Mr. Cicilline. Great. Thank you. As you know, Mr.
Secretary, the LGBTQI community in Afghanistan is extremely
vulnerable to punitive actions from the Taliban. It is
important, in my view, that we take steps to ensure that those
who would be subjected to violence or worse because of their
sexual orientation or gender identity are safe.
The Council for Global Equality, the human rights campaign,
and LGBTQI+ refugee support groups released a ten-point plan to
protect Afghan LGBTQI refugees. My question is have you seen
this plan? And if so, is the administration prepared to
implement it, and is it consistent with the Presidential
memorandum of early 2021 that speaks of the responsibility to
help Afghan refugees that make it to neighboring States as
outlined in that memorandum.
Secretary Blinken. Well, thank you for rightly putting the
spotlight on concerns about the LGBTQI+ community in
Afghanistan and the particular threat they may find themselves
under. This is something that we are focused on. I have not
personally seen the report that you referred to. I am going to
ask to see it. I am pretty sure that my team has, but I will
take a look at that myself, and I thank you for sending it to
us.
Mr. Cicilline. Great. And I look forward to following up
with you on that.
And, finally, Mr. Secretary, the Brown University Cost of
War Project has compiled a sobering list of figures as it
relates to post 9/11 conflicts including Afghanistan, trillions
of dollars spent, over 900,000 lives lost in Afghanistan, 2,641
Americans, and 38 million people displaced around the world.
And, Mr. Secretary, the war in Afghanistan went on, as you
know, for 20 years, leading to extraordinary costs in terms of
dollars spent, lives lost, and political capital expended.
Taking stock of these costs, my question is, what do you
think are the most important lessons after 20 years in
Afghanistan and 20 years of post 9/11 conflict that we should
learn?
Secretary Blinken. I think all of us have to come together
to do just that, to try to look at the lessons and then reflect
those lessons in what we do together going forward. To my mind,
at least, one of the lessons is while we are very effective at
dealing with terrorist threats to our country and eliminating
them, which we did very successfully in Afghanistan, the idea
of using military force to try to remake a society is something
that is beyond our means and beyond our capacity, and we need
to think really hard about whether we want to engage in these
enterprises going forward.
You are right to point to the costs. Let me just say very
quickly that I think that Brown study concluded that on the
basis of about $2 trillion being spent on Afghanistan over the
last 20 years when you include indirect costs, that averages
out to $300 million a day for 20 years. And I know people will
say, well, that wasn't the case the last year or so.
But had we not ended the war and brought our people home,
we would have had to have reupped it to deal with the renewed
attacks by the Taliban, to deal with the onslaught nationwide.
And those costs would have gone right back up again, and we
have to ask ourselves very hard questions about whether that is
the right way to spend our money.
Mr. Cicilline. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. Thank you. The gentleman's time has
expired.
I now recognize Representative Lee Zeldin of New York for 5
minutes.
Mr. Zeldin. Mr. Secretary, one of my colleagues claimed
earlier in this hearing that the last administration's
agreement with the Taliban was unconditional. That was false.
In fact, you, sir, actually started to outline some of those
conditions, and you were stopped. To recap, Mr. Secretary, the
last administration's agreement with the Taliban was
conditions-based, correct?
Secretary Blinken. The conditions that you referred to
included a commitment not to allow Afghanistan to harbor
outwardly directed terrorists. Let me just be clear, though, in
response to your question.
Mr. Zeldin. The question is, it was a conditions-based
agreement, correct?
Secretary Blinken. Yes, except that those conditions were
so loose, particularly with regard to commitments it made----
Mr. Zeldin. You can criticize it all you want, Mr.
Secretary. I just want you to answer the question.
Next, are you aware that President Biden says in the
transcript of his George Stephanopoulos interview that he would
have withdrawn from Afghanistan regardless of that prior
agreement?
Secretary Blinken. Yes, that is right, but not necessarily
in the time, place, and manner that we did which was imposed on
us by that agreement.
Mr. Zeldin. On July 8, as Congressman Issa referred to
earlier in this hearing, President Biden said, quote, the
likelihood that there is going to be the Taliban overrunning
everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely.
That is a very different prediction than what the U.S.
intelligence community actually was saying.
Mr. Secretary, where did the President get the highly
unlikely intelligence estimate from?
Secretary Blinken. As the intelligence community has
actually said, including in the days leading up to the Taliban
takeover, they were not and no one was predicting the rapid
collapse of the government and the security forces. Throughout
the year--throughout the year, the intelligence community
looked at a range of scenarios, worst case to best case, about
the durability, resiliency of the government security forces--
--
Mr. Zeldin. Reclaiming my time. The question is, where did
the President get highly unlikely from?
Secretary Blinken. Again, based on what the intelligence
community was saying and the military. The Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs has said that no one anticipated that the
government or the security forces would collapse in 11 days.
Mr. Zeldin. Mr. Secretary, it would be good, though, if you
were giving answers that were consistent with the answers that
we were getting behind a closed door briefing that we had with
you and others.
What is the number of Americans who are in Afghanistan as
of the last update you received?
Secretary Blinken. Congressman, going back to this weekend,
we had about 100 American citizens in contact with us who
were--who seek to leave Afghanistan. Those are the Americans we
are working with.
Mr. Zeldin. Do you have an exact number?
Secretary Blinken. I cannot give you an exact number. We
were talking about this a little bit earlier. It is really a
snapshot at any given moment because what happens is----
Mr. Zeldin. That is why I asked you as of the last update
you received.
Secretary Blinken. As of the last update, it was about--
about 100.
Mr. Zeldin. Okay. How many green card holders?
Secretary Blinken. Green card holders is something that we
do not track directly, so what we have done is we have
solicited people, if they are green card holders, to let us
know. I think the best estimates are that there are several
thousand green card holders in Afghanistan.
Mr. Zeldin. How many SIV applicants?
Secretary Blinken. SIV applicants? Those are numbers that
we are working on right now. As people come out of Afghanistan,
some of them in the United States already, others at these
transit points, we are collecting all of that information.
The overwhelming majority of Afghans who have come out are
Afghans who are at risk in one way or another. Some of them
will be SIVs, applicants. Others will be people who are
eligible for refugee visas. Still others will be at risk in
some fashion. We are putting all those numbers together, and we
should have that in the next couple of weeks.
Mr. Zeldin. Yes. I mean, this was fatally flawed, poorly
executed. We had the lost of U.S. servicemembers as a result.
We should not have been operating off of an arbitrary July 31
deadline.
Instead, what we should have done was tell the Taliban that
we are going to leave Afghanistan when we are done bringing
last every American home, not operating off of some arbitrary
date. We shouldn't have collapsed Bagram when we did. We
shouldn't have been relying on the Taliban to provide security
at the airport. We shouldn't have been allowing billions of
dollars worth of U.S. weapons and equipment to get turned over
to Afghanistan.
You, the administration, should not have been lying and
misleading the American public like the White House press
secretary is standing out there to the press and to the
American public and saying that Americans aren't stranded even
though we all know that they are.
And I am concerned that this administration with
incompetency is exposing a vulnerability that other countries
like we see North Korea now testing long-range missiles. We see
Iran enhancing uranium enrichment.
What happens when China and Russia and Hamas and Hezbollah
and al-Qaeda and the Taliban--they continue to press forward
because we have an administration that does not know how to
confront an adversary, understanding that they do not respect
weakness. They only respect strength. And it is so greatly
unfortunate, the consequences, and I believe that you, sir,
should resign. That would be leadership.
I yield back.
Secretary Blinken. To the contrary, Congressman, I believe
that there is nothing that our strategic competitors like China
or Russia or our adversaries like Iran, like North Korea would
have liked more than for President Biden to have reupped the
war in Afghanistan for another 5, 10, or 20 years, to be bogged
down in that conflict, nothing they would have liked more.
And we are now able as a result of the decision the
President made that none of his predecessors made to end the
war after 20 years, to ensure that a third generation of
Americans did not have to go off and fight and die in
Afghanistan while bringing 125,000 people out. We are now in a
much better position to confront the challenges and threats
that we actually face in 2021.
Mr. Zeldin. This is the Democratic National Committee's----
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Ami Bera of California, the
chair of the Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, Central Asia,
and Nonproliferation for 5 minutes.
Mr. Bera. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, Mr. Secretary, once
again, I want to reiterate our thanks as a committee for your
appearing before us, answering all the questions and giving
every member a chance. That is nothing something your
predecessor did very easily.
Look. I agree with President Biden's decision to withdraw.
I think most of the American public agrees with that decision.
I have sat in many hearings, sat in many classified and open
briefings as we were looking at various scenarios of what that
withdrawal looks like, what the capabilities of the Afghan
government were. And, you know, unfortunately, the worst case
scenario played out. And the images that we saw coming out of
Afghanistan were painful, frankly, in the last few weeks of
August.
And I do think the men and women in the military and State
Department in difficult circumstances stepped up. I do think
the logistics of that airlift and getting the numbers of
American citizens, visa holders, SIVs, vulnerable Afghans out
in such a short period of time was remarkable.
I think we all mourn the loss of life of Afghan civilians
but also the 13 men and women serving our country and leading
the mission. And there will be time to go through and do the
oversight and get a sense of where did our estimates go wrong,
where were the flaws.
But at this moment in time, knowing that we still have
American citizens there, knowing that we still have vulnerable
Afghans and so forth, I really do want our focus to be getting
those folks to safety, the visa holders, the SIVs, and others.
I will not ask you to guarantee a commitment that you will
get everyone out. Nobody can make that promise. But what I will
ask is working with my office, working with the various
congressional offices, the men and women of the State
Department, that we will use every resource that we can in a
difficult situation, in a challenging security situation on the
ground to do the best job possible to get every American
citizen, visa holder, SIV, and vulnerable Afghan out to safety.
Can I get that promise that we will do that?
Secretary Blinken. Absolutely. You have that commitment,
and I welcome working with every member of this committee to do
just that.
Mr. Bera. Great. Thank you. And your staff, and again, the
men and women within the State Department and elsewhere, again,
in trying circumstances have been very readily available to
work with us. You know, again, we have submitted over 10,000
names of folks just given the size of our population in the
community.
Second, and we haven't talked about this, is, as I
mentioned earlier, we have the largest Afghan refugee
population in the country, and we are proud of that, you know.
We have welcomed these men and women. We have got great
resettlement agencies that are working with folks, but we have
also got real challenges just because of the rapidity of folks
leaving country and arriving after being vetted in the United
States.
Many of these folks now are coming as humanitarian parolees
under a visa status that does not necessarily have the
resources that are available. I know we will be working on a
budget supplement to help provide the resources to get medical
resources, get visa resources, and ramp up your staffing of the
State Department to process these refugees.
I would hope that the men and women on this committee,
Democrat, Republican, as well as everyone in the House and
Senate overwhelmingly support the supplemental requests that
will be coming hopefully within the next few weeks to provide
those resources.
It is the one thing when I talk to our veterans community,
and, you know, many that have served in Afghanistan and are,
you know, wondering about that service, the one thing we can to
make them whole is to welcome these folks that, you know,
served them, worked with them side by side and often saved
their lives and really do everything we can to get those folks
to safety. Those that are coming to the United States, to help
them reassemble our lives.
So, you know, Mr. Secretary, I would imagine that
supplemental is coming. We have already heard some top line
numbers the President has asked for. Are there specifics that,
you know, from your vantage point that the men and women who
work for you that you see on that horizon?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Thank you so much for flagging
that. Let me just say very quickly yes. We are going to be
looking for support from all of you on this and particularly a
few things for Afghans who are paroled into the United States
to receive the same benefits that refugees do so that they have
some ongoing support, the ability to work in the United States,
HHS benefits that they wouldn't otherwise get.
We would also like them to be able to apply for a green
card after 1 year of being in the United States. And there is
some significant funds that will be requested to support both
the efforts that we have already made at the different transit
points where we have incurred significant expenses a well as to
continue to relocate people, to bring them to transit points
into the United States, process them, et cetera.
So that is coming, and in fact, we need to get this done
quickly in the CR, I think, so we have just a few weeks to do
it, and I really welcome your support and everyone's support
for that. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Ann Wagner
of Missouri who is the Vice Ranking Member of the full
committee for 5 minutes.
Mrs. Wagner. Secretary Blinken, I represent the people of
Missouri's Second congressional District, and today I am also
here on behalf of the family of Lance Corporal Jared Schmitz of
our region. Let me tell you about this heroic and selfless
young man.
Lance Corporal Schmitz from Wentzville, Missouri, was 20
years old when he lost his life at the terrorist attack at the
airport in Kabul just days before Joe Biden's arbitrary
deadline of August 31. He was passionate about his military
service. He was totally committed to making a difference as a
U.S. Marine and had gotten his parents' permission to enlist at
just 17 years old.
I do not believe that this hearing will allow us to truly
understand why he and his fellow military servicemen and women
were killed on August 26 of 2021. His family, their families,
and all Americans deserve answers, sir.
I am outraged to hear this administration claim its retreat
from Afghanistan, its surrender was a success. How could anyone
say that 13 precious young men and women lost their lives is a
success? I am not asking for my own peace of mind. I am asking
on behalf of the families that are burying their sons and their
daughters this week, and they deserve accountability, and they
deserve transparency, and they deserve answers.
The Biden Administration outsourced the security of our
military stationed at the Kabul airport to the Taliban. It was
a total betrayal. He put the lives of our men and women in the
hands of a brutal terrorist organization after you claimed that
the Taliban would never even be in charge of the country. Then
he said they would never be in charge of Kabul. He said we
would never leave Americans and allies behind. It was lie after
lie.
President Biden wanted out at any cost, and that cost sir,
was 13 American lives and $85 billion in equipment, our Bagram
Air Base, our United States embassy, our credibility with the
allies and the Afghans who stood and fought with us, and our
national security and safety of our homeland. Make no mistake,
Mr. Secretary. The Biden Administration's egregiously inept
withdrawal has left America and the world a much less safe
place 20 years after September 11.
Secretary Blinken, will you honor these families and give
the American people the answers they deserve in the wake of
this ongoing disaster? Who will be held accountable?
In your opening statement, you said the Taliban. You said
several times the Taliban made it clear that we had to
withdraw. The Taliban made it clear, or they would escalate.
Now, we hear in testimony President Putin was dictating our
counterintelligence. And you tell us NATO made us do it. Trump
made us do it.
The Taliban made it clear. Do you take any responsibility,
Secretary Blinken, for this disastrous withdrawal, or do you
still want to call it a success?
Secretary Blinken. Congresswoman, I am responsible for the
decisions that I make. I am responsible for the actions of the
State Department. I am responsible for looking at any lessons
to be taken from those decisions and those actions. I am also
responsible for being accountable for those decisions and
actions.
Mrs. Wagner. I asked you a simple question.
Secretary Blinken. If you will let me answer, please.
Mrs. Wagner. Reclaiming my time.
Secretary Blinken. The way that I am accountable is doing
exactly what I am doing today which is to you and through you
to the American people hold myself accountable for those
decisions and we made the right decision in ending America's
longest war.
We made the right decision in not sending a third
generation of Americans to fight and die in Afghanistan. We did
the right thing by our citizens and working feverishly to get
every one of them out. We did the right thing by 125,000
Afghans to bring them to safety.
And now we are working to do the right thing to hold the
Taliban to the expectations of the international community to
ensure people can continue to travel freely, to ensure that the
rights of Afghans are upheld, to ensure that they make good on
commitments they have made on counterterrorism. That is what we
are doing.
Mrs. Wagner. I hope you plan----
Mr. Malinowski [presiding]. The gentlewoman's time has
expired.
I now recognize Representative Castro of Texas for 5
minutes.
Mr. Castro. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you, Secretary,
for your testimony today. Thank you for your work and the work
of the many very devoted employees at the State Department.
And I want to talk to you for a second about a way that
Congress can be helpful in that work. Secretary Blinken, the 9/
11 Commission's report held that only 56 percent of the Bush
Administration's senior National Security positions were filled
at the beginning of September 2001, impeding its ability to
respond to crises.
Today, only 26 percent of the State Department's Senate
confirmed positions are filled. This isn't because President
Biden has not presented nominees. It is because a single
Senator has thrown a tantrum and blocked these nominees from
getting a vote and prevented national security positions from
being filled. So I am going to ask you a few yes or no
questions regarding very important staffing at the State
Department.
Do we have a Senate confirmed Assistant Secretary of State
for Conflict and Stabilization Operations who would inform U.S.
policy in war zones like Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. We do not.
Mr. Castro. Do we have a Senate confirmed Assistant
Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs who
would cover Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. We do not.
Mr. Castro. Do we have a Senate confirmed Assistant
Secretary of State for East Asia and Pacific Affairs who would
guide U.S. policy toward China, a country deeply involved in
south Asia?
Secretary Blinken. We do not.
Mr. Castro. For African affairs.
Secretary Blinken. We do not.
Mr. Castro. European and Eurasian affairs.
Secretary Blinken. We do not.
Mr. Castro. Western hemisphere affairs.
Secretary Blinken. We do not.
Mr. Castro. International organization affairs,
international narcotics and law enforcement affairs, and
educational and cultural affairs.
Secretary Blinken. We do not.
Mr. Castro. For each of these positions, President Biden
has nominated a candidate. The candidate has testified in front
of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, been vetted and
recommended by that committee for a vote, only to be delayed by
a hold by Senator Ted Cruz of my home state of Texas. This has
delayed many other positions as well and is denying you the
team you need to advance our Nation's interests abroad and
protect our own national security.
Despite this, the State Department rose to the occasion.
Over 120,000 people were successfully evacuated from
Afghanistan in a short period of time in one of the biggest
humanitarian operations the United States has ever seen. But
the work continues and having seen--having Senate confirmed
people in these positions will be critical as we marshal our
allies for what comes next in Afghanistan.
And I want to ask you, Mr. Secretary, as you have done this
very hard work, and your people at the department are stretched
thin because the Senate has not confirmed these nominees, what
would you say to Senator Cruz who is singlehandedly blocking
key national security appointments and jeopardizing our
national security?
Secretary Blinken. Look. I would just simply ask the
Senator and ask the Senate to move forward in confirming our
nominees, virtually all of whom went through the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee and were sent to the floor, and that is
where they now lie.
And to your point, we need all these people. We need them
to do the business of the United States. We need them to
advance the interests of the United States, especially at this
critical time, so I hope very much that we can work through
this very, very quickly, and I would hope that the Senate can
get our nominees confirmed.
Mr. Castro. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I am going to ask
another question on Pakistan, and you may have to take it, some
of it for the record, but I want to get to the question real
quick.
Secretary Blinken. Sure.
Mr. Castro. I want to followup on Rep Keating's line of
questioning about Pakistan. As you just noted, over the years,
Pakistan has harbored Taliban leaders and provided other forms
of support to the group. As my colleague noted, Pakistan's
leader cheered the Taliban taking over Afghanistan. You began
discussing what we will be looking at with Pakistan moving
forward.
And on that note, Pakistan is currently a major non NATO
ally of the United States, giving it a number of benefits,
including privileged access to U.S. arms sales.
And so based on their past actions, our conversation today,
all of it, I want to ask you. Given its long-time support for
the Taliban, is it time for the United States to reassess its
relationship with Pakistan and reassess its status as a major
non NATO ally?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you. For the reasons you have
cited, as well as others, this is one of the things that we are
going to be looking at in the days and weeks ahead, the role
that Pakistan has played over the last 20 years, but also the
role that we would want to see it play in the coming years and
what it will take for it to do that.
Mr. Castro. Thank you.
I yield back, chairman.
Mr. Meeks [presiding]. The gentleman's time has expired. I
now recognize Mr. Brian Mast of Florida for 5 minutes.
Mr. Mast. Mr. Secretary, as the transcript, the leaked
transcript, as you referred to it says, did President Biden
work with the coward, exiled president of Afghanistan to
manipulate the intelligence about the Taliban?
Secretary Blinken. What the President said to president--
then President Ghani in private is exactly what he said in
public, that the issue was not whether Afghanistan had the
capacity to withstand the Taliban. It is whether it had the
will and the plan to do so. He urged him to have that plan----
Mr. Mast. Is the transcript wrong? It is incorrect?
Secretary Blinken [continuing]. And to bring people
together in unity.
Mr. Mast. Are you saying it is false, it is a lie, it is
incorrect? He did not work to tamp down the intelligence on the
Taliban.
Secretary Blinken. Absolutely not.
Mr. Mast. So the transcript is incorrect. That is your
testimony today.
Secretary Blinken. The intelligence that we had, we have
already discussed at some length about what the assessments
were of the Taliban and its capacity to take over the country.
Mr. Mast. I think that everybody looking for an explanation
about what happened and how everybody got it so wrong, how your
administration got it so wrong needs to look at that as the
most likely explanation, asking the President to manipulate the
intelligence of what was actually going on with the Taliban.
And I am going to tell you. The 13 families that deserve most
to really hear the honest answers on that, it is these
families.
Marine Lance Corporal Kareem Nakoui. His family deserves to
truly know that. Marine Corporal Daegan Page. His family truly
deserves to know if that is why they are missing their son
because intelligence was manipulated. Marine Lance Corporal
Rylee McCollum, 20, wife expecting their first child, sister
said he was going to be the best dad ever. They deserve to know
if that is what happened, and that is why everything went so
wrong. Marine Sergeant Nicole Gee, 23 years old. You can see
her there holding a young child. Her family deserves to know if
that is why everything went so wrong because that intelligence
was manipulated.
Marine Lance Corporal David Espinoza, just 20 years old,
family deserves to know if that is why everything went so wrong
is because the intelligence was manipulated. Marine Corporal
Humberto Sanchez, just 22 years old, mother said my kid was a
hero. That is what was said. That is what his mother said.
Deserves to know if that is why everything went so wrong
because the intelligence got manipulated.
Marine Lance Corporal Jared Schmitz, just 20 years old. His
family deserves to know if that is why everything went so
wrong. Marine Corporal Hunter Lopez, just 22, son of two
sheriffs, planned to follow in their footsteps. Their family
deserves to know if that is why everything went so wrong is
because you all worked to manipulate the intelligence of what
was going on on the ground there.
Marine Corps Staff Sergeant Darin Hoover. His family said,
I love you, son. Check in on us. We will try to make you proud.
They deserve to know if that is what happened, if that is how
everything went so wrong in Afghanistan. Marine Corps Sergeant
Johanny Rosario-Pichardo. Her family deserves to know if that
is why everything went so wrong because you all worked to
manipulate the intelligence of what was going on with the
Taliban.
Marine Lance Corporal Dylan Merola, just 20. The family
said he always had a smile on his face, was the kindest person.
They deserve to know if that is why everything went so wrong
because you all manipulated intelligence. Army Staff Sergeant
Ryan Knauss. The ultimate honor he could give was to give back
to his country. He would not be sorry. He would not regret it.
That is what his family said. They deserve to know if you
manipulated intelligence, if President Biden manipulated
intelligence, and that is what led to everything going so
wrong.
Navy Corpsman Maxton Soviak, just 22. His family deserves
to know if that is why everything went so wrong. We deserve
hearings on what is going on with that leaked transcript. We
deserve to know why there are others that remain in
Afghanistan. Mark Frerichs, Navy veteran, disappeared in Coast
Province January 30 of 2020. We deserve to know what is going
on with his release.
These are things that have to be answered for. I do not
believe whatsoever what you are saying about the administration
not working to manipulate that intelligence.
To me, that is the most logical, the most logical
explanation of how so many in the intelligence community got
this so wrong about what was going to happen in Afghanistan.
Why would it seem somehow logical for President Biden to leave
the, quote, most advanced military weaponry, why some would not
speak out against that. If they were getting the false
intelligence because it was coming from the top down, to
manipulate it, in my opinion, that is absolutely aid and
comfort to the enemy.
I absolutely wonder if you were complicit in this as well.
I find it hard to believe that President Biden would do that
without you being aware of this, and these are things that we
deserve to know, better answers, have better hearings on this.
I do not believe a word that you are saying on this.
Secretary Blinken. Simply put----
Mr. Mast. I do not wish to hear from you. I am----
Secretary Blinken. Simply put, Congressman, what you have
said is dead wrong.
Mr. Mast. Reclaiming my time. I do not wish to hear--from
you. You tell lies every time you are in front of the cameras--
--
Secretary Blinken. There was no manipulation of
intelligence, period. You have all been regularly apprised of
the intelligence assessments all the way through over these
many months--this is not true.
Mr. Mast. I am not looking to hear----
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Mast. And so has the Secretary's.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Mast. And so has the Secretary's.
Chairman Meeks. The Secretary can answer the question.
Mr. Mast. I did not ask him a question.
Chairman Meeks. You did ask a question.
Mr. Mast. I do not want to hear from the Secretary.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Mast. He lies every time he steps in front of the
camera. That is what he does----
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr.
Secretary--the gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Mast [continuing]. Least believable thing I have ever
heard.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Mast. People need to use common sense in this area.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired. We are
here to hear from the secretary.
Mr. Mast. Not to Hear lies.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Secretary, if you wish, you may answer the question.
Mr. Mast. We do not need to hear lies.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just to respond
briefly, what the Congressman said is simply wrong, period.
Second. I think virtually every member of this committee
has had access to or been apprised of the intelligence
assessments throughout the year. And you know what they were;
you know what they are. And we will continue to provide those
assessments and those briefings in the weeks and months ahead.
You have heard the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
say that he has not seen anything that indicated to him or to
anyone else that the Afghan government and military would
collapse in 11 days. The Director of National Intelligence has
said that even in the days leading up to the Taliban takeover,
intelligence agencies did not say collapse was imminent.
This unfolded more quickly than we anticipated including in
the intelligence community, and I could go on. So what has been
said and alleged is simply not true.
Mr. Mast. And that would be----
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize the gentlewoman from
Nevada.
Mr. Mast. President Biden specifically----
Chairman Meeks. The Representative from Nevada is now
recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Mast. It makes sense. That is why it all adds up.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired----
Mr. Mast. Mr. Chairman, he definitely proved the point.
Chairman Meeks [continuing]. The gentleman will cease
immediately.
Mr. Mast. He definitely proved the point. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman will cease immediately.
Mr. Mast. Well, he proved the point. Thank you for letting
him prove it. I appreciate that.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize the gentlelady from Nevada,
Ms.--Representative Dina Titus, for 5 minutes.
Ms. Titus. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and Mr.
Secretary for being here. I would like to go back to a point
made by Mr. Connolly on the Doha agreement.
I wonder if you would discuss for us what impact you think
that agreement may have had on the morale of the Afghan defense
forces and on the unity of the Afghan government.
Secretary Blinken. Well, that agreement committed the
United States to leave Afghanistan by may 1 of this year, and
so that certainly factored into the thinking and concerns of
the Afghan government and of the Afghan security forces. The
extent of that impact, hard to know for sure, but certainly
that had to factor into their thinking as well as into their
concerns.
Ms. Titus. I believe so, and it let to that perhaps quicker
than realized collapse that occurred that we did not
anticipate.
I have got just a couple of other questions. We have been
hearing about domestic and foreign journalists being abused by
the Taliban and also some of the NGO or healthcare workers or
just nongovernment humanitarian workers.
I wonder if there is anything going on, any talks between
the U.S. and any of our international partners of how to defend
them, to be assured that they are able to continue their work
once we are gone.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Very much so. Two things. One, we
have been working very hard to make sure that basic
humanitarian assistance can still get into Afghanistan, working
with and through NGO's, working with and through the United
Nations agencies, and also putting in place mechanisms to make
sure that that assistance is used in the way we intend it to be
used, that is, to the benefit of the Afghan people, the
recipients, not the Taliban-led government.
Second. We have been working full time around the world to
bring country after country on board with the expectations that
we are setting of the conduct of a Taliban-led government to
include upholding the basic rights of the Afghan people, to
include women and minorities, and we have put in place a U.N.
Security Council resolution setting those expectations.
More than 100 countries around the world led by our efforts
to sign onto that, and to the extent that the Taliban is
looking for any kind of legitimacy or any kind of support from
the international community, that will not be forthcoming in
any fashion if it is not making good on those basic
expectations and on commitments it itself has made.
So going forward, its conduct will define its relationship
with the rest of the world.
Ms. Titus. Thank you. They seek to be legitimate, I know,
but in the meantime, one of the challenges they are facing, of
course, is the economy, and that is not new. That existed under
the Ghani government. But we see Pakistan and China rapidly
positioning themselves to kind of take advantage of this
destabilized economy.
I wonder how that is going to impact the U.S. and U.S.-
international relations, especially in light of the World Bank
and the International Monetary Fund freezing distributions of
funds to Afghanistan. Could you maybe talk about that?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. You are certainly right to point to
that, and the fact of the matter is, though, that there is a
Security Council resolution that should also bind Russia and
China in their conduct going forward.
The international community over the last years was
providing every year about 75 percent of the Afghan
government's budget. Needless to say, that has been frozen.
Virtually all of Afghanistan's foreign reserves are here in
the United States. They are frozen. International financial
institutions are not going forward with their own assistance or
the ability for Afghanistan to engage in international
financial transactions.
And so all of that is on the ledger when it comes to what
we can do to have the Taliban meet the expectations that have
been set by the international community when it comes to how it
conducts itself.
Ms. Titus. Well, thank you, Mr. Secretary.
I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady yields back.
I now recognize Representative Brian Fitzpatrick of
Pennsylvania who is the ranking member of the Subcommittee on
Europe, Energy, and the Environment and Cyber for 5 minutes.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Mr. Secretary, just to get to the core of
what your philosophy is on national and international security,
sir, do you believe in the maxim and the precept of the
stronger that we exert ourselves overseas, the safer we are
here in America, i.e., peace through strength?
Secretary Blinken. I believe first the stronger we are at
home, the stronger we are going to be overseas, and that
requires unity. It requires coming together. It requires making
investments in ourselves. And I hope we can see those forward
together.
Second. To your point around the world, it requires
absolutely having the strongest military and defense in the
world, but it also requires using all the tools at our disposal
to include our diplomacy, to include our economic tools, to
include political tools, cultural tools. All of that is in the
mix, and all of that defines our strength in the world.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Mr. Secretary, do you believe that what
the world witnessed over the past several weeks in Afghanistan
was American strength?
Secretary Blinken. I believe that what the world witnessed
was the President ending a war that had gone on for 20 years,
making sure----
Mr. Fitzpatrick. But did they witness American strength in
the past few weeks.
Secretary Blinken. They witnessed an extraordinary effort
that no other country could or would have made under the most
extreme conditions in bringing 125,000 people out to safety, in
making sure that we stood by our allies and partners and
helping them to get out as well. And things we have heard from
allies and partners around the world is no other country could
or would have done what we did.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Mr. Secretary, I recently left Ukraine
just a few days ago. I returned, and my next step----
Chairman Meeks. Just hold off 1 second. We are having
technical problems. I do not see the Secretary that is on. We
should be able to see him visually. And I want to make sure you
get all of the time to ask the questions that you are putting
forward and his response.
Secretary Blinken. Mr. Chairman, can you hear me?
Chairman Meeks. We hear you, Mr. Secretary, but we do not
see you.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. It looks like the image is frozen
here, so let's see if we can----
Chairman Meeks. Yes. Let's see if we can fix that. The
technical staff is working on that. I want to make sure Mr.
Fitzgerald gets the--all of the time. Mr. Fitzpatrick. Mr.
Fitzpatrick.
Secretary Blinken. How is that, Mr. Chairman?
Chairman Meeks. Okay. I do not have a visual of the
Secretary. Now--Okay.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. I reclaim my time, sir.
Chairman Meeks. Yes. Let's give Mr. Fitzpatrick--how much
time when I stopped him?
Voice. 4 minutes and 10 seconds.
Chairman Meeks. No, when I stopped--continue the questions
that you had asked. When I stopped, 4 minutes? Okay. We can
resume.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Mr. Secretary, I just returned from
Ukraine 2 days ago. My next stop would be Taiwan. Sir, these
people are scared to death. They are scared to death.
So can we get you on the record today, sir, to tell this
committee, this Congress, and our Nation that we will
unequivocally and unapologetically do whatever it takes,
whatever it takes to have the backs of our friends in Ukraine
and our friends in Taiwan?
Our friends in Ukraine in the event of Russia aggression,
our friends in Taiwan in the event of Chinese aggression.
Secretary Blinken. Absolutely. We stand by our commitments
to both countries.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. And we will do whatever it takes to defend
them.
Secretary Blinken. We will stand by our commitments. We
will stand by our commitments to Taiwan under the Taiwan
Relations Act. We will stand by the commitments we have to
Ukraine, including, by the way, commitments that the President
and President Zelensky discussed and put out just about a week,
maybe 2 weeks ago, during----
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Sir, I can tell you. I just left there.
They are scared to death, and they question the commitment of
this country. So I will take you at your word that we will do
whatever it takes to defend Taiwan and Ukraine.
Next question. Not talking about the arms and munitions; I
am talking about the heavy equipment, the tanks, the Humvees,
the Blackhawk helicopters, the aircraft. Sir, all of this is
GPS tracked. We can identify this, where it is at. Why did we
not destroy it or do not we destroy it now?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you. So let me say this: I know my
colleagues from the Defense Department, the Joint Chiefs, et
cetera, will have an opportunity to speak to you, to speak to
Congress in the weeks ahead. They are the experts on this.
Since 2004, roughly, something like $80 billion in defense
articles was provided to Afghanistan, so that goes back over
the last roughly 16 years.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Sir, I am only asking about the GPS
tracking. We know the location of this equipment that we have
now seen fall into the hands of terrorists. Are we going to
destroy it or not?
Secretary Blinken. So much of this--much of this equipment
is either inoperable or will soon be inoperable because it
cannot be maintained. As I've seen it, based on what I have
heard from my colleagues, there is nothing of strategic value
that would threaten us or threaten Afghanistan's neighbors.
Having said that, I am not the expert on this, and I would
really defer to my colleagues at the Pentagon.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Mr. Secretary, do you believe that America
should ever in any way capitulate to terrorists?
Secretary Blinken. Absolutely not.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Do you believe, sir, that allowing the
Taliban to run perimeter HKIA with American troops on the
inside of that perimeter relying on the Taliban to keep ISIS
out and American citizens, passport holders on the outside the
perimeter relying on the Taliban to get in, that that is
capitulating to terrorists?
Secretary Blinken. The reality is that the government and
Afghan national security forces collapsed. The reality is that
the Taliban took over Kabul as well as much of the country.
That was the reality we were dealing with. And the judgment of
all of us, starting with our military commanders, including the
people on the ground, was that our job was to work to get as
many people out as possible, American citizens, Afghans at
risk.
And because the Taliban controlled the city, that required
some coordination with them to get people through and to the
airport.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Sir, to an 18-year-old Afghani girl who
may be watching this hearing today, who was born after 9/11,
who knows nothing of what it is like to live under Taliban
rule, who had hopes and dreams, who is in school, who wanted to
be a female journalist, to help women and young girls rise up
in Afghanistan, who now feels betrayed by the actions of this
administration, what is your message to her?
Secretary Blinken. I spoke to a number of young Afghan
women including 18, 19, 21-year-olds just about a week ago in
Doha. Actually in Ramstein, Germany----
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Do you believe their lives----
Secretary Blinken [continuing]. Where many were relocated.
And we talked about their futures. We talked about the futures
of Afghan women and girls who were living in Afghanistan.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Under the Taliban.
Secretary Blinken. And we talked about the ongoing
commitment that the United States has and countries around the
world have to do everything we can to support those women and
girls going forward.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize representative Ted Lieu of California for 5
minutes.
Mr. Lieu. Thank you, Chairman Meeks, and thank you,
Secretary Blinken, for your public service.
When I served on active duty in the United States Air
Force, I participated in Operation Pacific Haven where we
airlifted thousands and thousands of Kurds out of northern Iraq
because Saddam Hussein was going to go in and kill them. We
worked with the State Department, other U.S. agencies, and it
was a very difficult mission.
So I want to commend you and the State Department and all
the U.S. personnel who executed an evacuation of over 120,000
people under immense danger. That was a remarkable feat that
all of you did, and I also want to honor the 13 Marines that
gave their lives and service to our country.
What I would like to ask you about is the document that
started all of this, the February 29 document, 2020. That
document was negotiated by the Trump administration with the
Taliban, correct?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Lieu. The Trump administration signed that document,
correct?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Lieu. And under that document, it had a very specific
date for withdrawal of all U.S. forces. Isn't that right?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Lieu. I am going to read you what the document says
because I think my Republican colleagues need to hear this and
the American people.
On the very first page of the February 29, 2020, agreement
that the Trump administration signed with the Taliban, it
states, the United States is committed to withdraw from
Afghanistan all military forces of the United States, its
allies and coalition partners, including all non diplomatic
civilian personnel, private security contractors, trainers and
advisors, and supporting services personnel within 14 months
following announcement of this agreement.
That is a very specific timeline, isn't it?
Secretary Blinken. It is.
Mr. Lieu. In fact, it gets even more specific. It says that
in the first 135 days, the United States, its allies, and the
coalition will withdraw all their forces from five military
bases.
Did Donald Trump do that?
Secretary Blinken. He did.
Mr. Lieu. In fact, when you read this document, let's just
be clear. This is a surrender document. Donald Trump
surrendered to the Taliban, and he said we are leaving
Afghanistan. We are not coming back, and we are not going to
fight you any more.
Now, our Republican colleagues want to say that somehow it
is conditions based, and did you notice that earlier, they did
not want you to talk about the conditions because the main
condition is that the Taliban was going to stop attacking U.S.
forces. Isn't that correct.
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Lieu. Do you know how many U.S. forces died in the
first year of the Trump presidency in 2017, Secretary Blinken?
Approximately 14. Do you know how many died in 2018, the second
year of the Trump presidency, how many U.S. forces died in
Afghanistan? Approximately 14. In 2019, the third year of the
Trump presidency, do you know many U.S. forces died in
Afghanistan? Approximately 21. And the Republican colleagues
say hey, for a whole year and a half, U.S. forces did not die.
That is because the Taliban stopped attacking U.S. forces
because of this agreement. Isn't that right?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Lieu. And if the Biden Administration has somehow said,
hey, just kidding, we are not leaving Afghanistan. We are going
to renege on this agreement, the Taliban would have started
attacking U.S. forces again. Isn't that correct?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Lieu. And, in fact, Donald Trump withdrew over 15,000
U.S. troops at the height in Afghanistan during his presidency
down to 2,500 by the time President Biden inherited office.
Isn't that right?
Secretary Blinken. Yes, that is about right. I think he had
about 13,500 when the administration started down to 2,500 when
the administration ended.
Mr. Lieu. So Donald Trump executed not only the surrender
agreement but also 70 to 80 percent of the surrender of the
withdrawal, and he left you all with merely 2,500 U.S. troops.
And the Taliban was still meeting their condition of not
attacking U.S. forces. Isn't that right?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Lieu. They literally put in a box that you had to
withdraw all U.S. forces, or else they essentially would start
attacking our forces again. Isn't that right?
Secretary Blinken. Attacking our forces and engaging in an
offensive against Afghanistan cities which they had refrained
from.
Mr. Lieu. And the reason we know intelligence wasn't
manipulated is because the Trump administration, in fact, would
not have agreed to a specific date certain of the withdrawal of
all U.S. forces if they knew the Afghan government would
collapse in 11 days after that. Isn't that right?
Secretary Blinken. That is certainly--it stands to reason.
Mr. Lieu. In fact, it was a bipartisan, you can call it not
understanding what is happening in Afghanistan, but it was
happening over 20 years, isn't that right? That we were gets
rosy assessments on a bipartisan basis that turned out not to
be all that accurate.
Secretary Blinken. I believe that is correct, and certainly
I saw that from my previous service in government.
Mr. Lieu. Right. So let's just be clear here. It was Donald
Trump who signed and negotiated the surrender agreement that,
by the way, released 5,000 Taliban prisoners. Isn't that right?
Secretary Blinken. It did release 5,000 prisoners, yes.
Mr. Lieu. But Donald Trump, the administration signed this
agreement, negotiated it, executed it, and then President Biden
completed the withdrawal. That is what happened.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired. The
gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Tim Burchett of Tennessee
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Burchett. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is a picture of
Staff Sergeant Ryan Knauss in my local paper, the Knoxville
Focus. I want to read you something that his mama said this
weekend at the funeral. He was a God loving man. He died
helping people. He died doing what he loved to do.
My constituent, Staff Sergeant Ryan Knauss, he was one of
the 13 souls lost while allowing over 100,000 people to escape
the Taliban. Sadly, the death of Sergeant Knauss and his fellow
heroes I feel like was entirely preventable. If your department
and this administration had a plan and had not been caught flat
footed in Afghanistan, there would have been no need to surge
6,000 additional soldiers into the country to secure that
airport.
You have repeatedly stated that every contingency was
planned for, but clearly, the rapid collapse of the Afghan
government was something that you had not planned for. Their
blood is on your hands and this administration, sir. I call on
you to resign.
And I yield the remainder of my time to Mark Green.
Secretary Blinken. Congressman--may I respond, Mr.
Chairman. May I respond, Mr. Chairman?
Mr. Green. Mr. Chairman, he yielded to me. Can I go ahead?
Mr. Burchett. I yielded to Mark Green, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Green. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman did yield his time back.
I now recognize Representative Susan Wild of Pennsylvania.
Mr. Burchett. No. I yielded----
Mr. Green. He yielded to me, Mr. Chairman. He yielded his
time to me.
Chairman Meeks. Yes. You may proceed.
Mr. Green. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, yes or no, and I do mean yes or no. Is the
Taliban a terrorist organization?
Secretary Blinken. The Taliban has been designated as a
terrorist organization. That is correct.
Mr. Green. And are you aware that the news reports last
week show that the Taliban has already set up a school to teach
suicide bombers? Are you aware of that reporting?
Secretary Blinken. I have not seen that report, but I would
be welcoming--if you would like it share it, please do.
Mr. Green. I will absolutely do that. Thank you very much.
You guys keep talking about, insinuating that you are going to
make an agreement with the Taliban. If they are a terrorist
organization, if they have people in their leadership that are
on the FBI's terrorist watch list, if they have leadership that
is known to be terrorists, and you here have said they are a
terrorist organization, what makes it right to even negotiate
with these people?
Secretary Blinken. Anything we do, Congressman, will be for
purposes of advancing the interests of the national security of
the United States. And those interests, among other things,
involve ensuring that people can continue to travel freely out
of Afghanistan, including any remaining American citizens who
want to leave----
Mr. Green. And on that note, if I could----
Secretary Blinken [continuing]. Counterterrorism
commitment, engage the government, we will do so in a way that
is fully consistent with our laws.
Mr. Green. Mr. Secretary, I am reclaiming my time. On that
note, you have said, and we have said, and your Department has
said, and the DoD has said to people who are sitting over
there, now that we are all gone, they should destroy their
documents because the Taliban are searching them and killing
them with those documents.
Now, you say you have got a plan to get those people out of
there, but they cannot get on an airplane without documents.
You have nobody over there to print them documents. How are
they going to get out of there? What is your plan if they have
no documents? Your people told them to destroy the documents.
DoD said destroy the documents. We have told them--because
we are talking to hundreds of them on the phone, U.S. citizens,
SIVs. What is the plan?
Secretary Blinken. We did not tell people to destroy
documents, although I understood--I understand that some people
did for understandable reasons in many cases.
Mr. Green. We can
[inaudible] Bodies. I mean, I can show you the videos that
friends of mine, former interpreters that I know are videoing
and sending to me, I can send those to you. They are destroying
those documents because they do not want to wind up on a dirt
road bleeding to death.
So what is the plan to get those individuals who have no
documents now out of that country.
Secretary Blinken. The plan is this: First, the Taliban-led
government has made commitments to recognize documents to exit
the country to include U.S. passports, to include green cards,
to include visas. For those who have those documents, we are
working with other partners, including Qatar and Turkey----
Mr. Green. I mean for the people who do not have documents,
Mr. Secretary, that we have--you just said it was
understandable that they would destroy those documents. So what
are we doing for the people who do not have documents?
Secretary Blinken. And we are--we are putting in place
exactly that, a mechanism to make sure that we can get people
the documents they need in order to leave the country. And I am
happy to take that up in a different--in a different setting to
go into more detail, but the bottom line is that is exactly
what we are doing.
Mr. Green. You are insinuating they might be classified.
Okay. Fine. We can do that.
Considering that the agreement between the Taliban and
Afghan governments that the President keeps talking about,
everybody keeps talking about this, you know, agreement between
the Taliban and the Afghan governments, and they are just
following it, we are following the agreement. It looks like my
time is about to expire. I will see you in a few minutes when
it is my turn. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Susan Wild
of Pennsylvania for 5 minutes.
Ms. Wild. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Secretary Blinken, we just received word in my office this
past weekend that one of my constituents here in Pennsylvania
7, an American citizen, has been successfully evacuated from
Afghanistan and is now safely in Qatar. She is a wife and
mother, and I want to thank you and the State Department
officials who worked so hard with my team to ensure the
successful outcome, and I hope for----
Secretary Blinken. Glad to hear that.
Ms. Wild. I hope for many more.
Mr. Secretary, like all of my colleagues here, I have been
working with my team to assist vulnerable Afghan allies who
work shoulder to shoulder with servicemembers from our
communities. And I have to say that over the course of the
evacuation, it was beyond heartbreaking to see that in the vast
majority of cases, the Afghan allies we were trying to assist
were simply not getting out or receiving any useful information
even with Members of Congress getting involved.
Although I will also say parenthetically there may have
been situations where Members of Congress were not particularly
helpful or were getting in the way, and I apologize for that on
behalf of this body. But at the same time, I want to recognize
the extraordinary efforts behind what was the largest airlift
in American history. It is a testament to our servicemembers,
first and foremost, as well as the administration.
What I want to ask you is what concrete steps is the State
Department taking now to accelerate processing time for SIV, P-
2, and other applications for vulnerable Afghan allies? And
what steps is the department taking to improve communication
with offices here in Congress when it comes to time-sensitive
cases involving our Afghan allies?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you. First, let me just again
thank you personally but also thank so many members of this
committee who have been working with us on SIVs and other
Afghans at risk, getting information to us, working to
followup. We are deeply, deeply grateful for that, and we want
to make sure that we continue to do that and work on these
cases.
As, you know, we have discussed before, in the first
instance, of course, we inherited a program that was in a deep
freeze. We got it back up into second and third gear and well
before the collapse of the government. We went from issuing
about a hundred visas a week to a thousand. And we were working
with Congress to try to streamline and make more efficient this
program.
As you know, there are 14 steps involving half a dozen
agencies that are required by law or by the different
implementing rules that came into place as a result of that
law.
However, having said all of that, going forward, a few
things. We have about 20,000 people in the SIV pipeline. That
has basically been the number for a long time. It has
accumulated over many years, and it has stayed more or less in
that area because more people, even today, continue to start
the application process.
But as you know, the most critical moment in the
application process is what is called chief of mission
approval. That is the point at which people are found to be, in
fact, eligible for the program, they meet the requirements. And
of all the people applying to the program, 40 percent do not
make it through chief of mission approval because it turns out
that they do not qualify. Now, some of that is because they do
not have the necessary documentation required, again, by law,
to demonstrate their eligibility.
Much of that is because of the many people applying for
SIVs, the majority, well over the majority, worked for DoD
contractors primarily. These are not the interpreters and
translators. These are folks who worked for contractors or
subcontractors. Getting a letter demonstrating that they
provided faithful service can be very, very difficult
especially if the contractor or the sub went out of business.
We need to find a way to deal with that and also to work
with all the other agencies to make sure they have the
appropriate records.
But let me just quickly fast-forward to your question. We
have about 4,000 or so people who are at the chief of mission
approval stage right now, and we are going to work to get them
through that in the coming weeks. And then we have another
roughly 4,000 who already have chief of mission approval. There
is still a number of other steps mandated by law that go into
this, including interviews, fingerprinting, et cetera. We are
looking to see with you how we can expedite all of that, while
keeping security foremost in our minds, move people to third
countries to finish whatever processing is necessary and then
bring them to the United States.
But we need to come to you, I think, to work on ways that
we can make this program even more efficient and more
streamlined beyond even what we were able to do over the last 9
months.
Ms. Wild. Thank you so much.
Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Mark Green of Tennessee, who
is the ranking member of the Subcommittee on the Western
Hemisphere, Civilian Security, Migration, and International
Economic Policy, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Green. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And, Secretary Blinken, your credibility, I think, would be
a lot greater if you would at least own something. Something.
X, Y, Z. Something. Yet you follow the lead of your President
and you blame everybody else. It is not your problem, it is
Trump, it is somebody else.
You would have credibility--let me give you an example.
HKIA, you had no plan, or a horrible plan, to get people into
the gate, just get them through the gate. My colleagues and I
had hundreds of people on the phone that were U.S. citizens
sitting at the gates and they couldn't get in. That is a
failure on you, either to plan or--you had a horrible plan, but
those U.S. citizens couldn't get through the gate. Just own it.
Get some credibility. Own it.
You keep telling us that the DoD and President Biden had no
idea that the Taliban would be so successful, the collapse of
the Afghan forces. And then you want us to believe you when you
say the Russians and the Chinese aren't empowered by this. That
kills your credibility by saying, hey, we failed to predict
that this would happen. Nobody had an idea that they would
collapse like that. And then you say, oh, but I assure you, the
Russians and the Chinese aren't empowered by this, and we are
supposed to believe you.
I have already talked about the documents.
The United Kingdom. I am sure you are familiar--it went
viral--a member of Parliament in the United Kingdom on the
floor of the House of Commons, Tom Tugendhat, basically called
the withdrawal--President Biden's withdrawal shameful, and said
that the U.K., our greatest ally, should reconsider how
dependent they are on the United States.
Yet you sit here today and tell us that NATO was completely
fine with everything, you all coordinated everything with NATO,
and it was all good. That is what you have communicated to me
at least--or here today. And yet a member of Parliament is
saying it was a shameful withdrawal on the floor of the House
of Commons, our greatest ally.
The headline of The Economist a few weeks ago, I do not
know if you saw it, but it said, ``Biden's debacle.'' I am not
so sure NATO will agree with you that they were all in on this
together.
Now, I will say this, it is against the law, the United
States law, to give material aid to a terrorist organization.
You said earlier when I asked you before if the Taliban was a
terrorist organization, you said yes. $85 billion, I would
consider that material aid to a terrorist organization, Mr.
Secretary.
And yet, here we are, oh, well, but wait, you admitted we
had no idea that the Taliban would be so successful. We had no
idea that, you know, the Afghans would fail like this. Well,
that is your fault. That is your administration's fault. I
guess maybe it is the intel community's fault. That is what you
are really saying. Hey, CIA, and all you other guys, you failed
to give us good intel here, we had no idea this was going to
happen.
But we are supposed to trust you when you tell us other
things about the Chinese and the Russians.
Considering rumors of ISIS' support for the--I am sorry--
ISI's support for the Taliban, have you guys reached out to
India as a possible staging area for the Over the Horizon
Forces? And I am talking northwest India as a potential.
Because we all know Qatar--or Doha, the other places, are just
a little bit too far, Kuwait, all that.
What about northwest India, and have you reached out? Have
you thought about that?
Secretary Blinken. Let me just say generally, Congressman,
we are deeply engaged with India across the board. With regard,
though, to any specifics about Over the Horizon capabilities
and the plans that we have put in place and will continue to
put in place, I would rather take that up in a different
setting, and I think the chairman referenced that at the start
of the hearing.
Mr. Green. I think that is very fair, and I appreciate you
saying that. And I am glad to at least know that there is an
opportunity to talk about that, because I think that, from my
standpoint, is an opportunity we should seize.
I would like to go back to the documents and give you a few
seconds to talk about that, because I do want to hear your plan
for those individuals, if you can today. And if you cannot,
then fine, we will talk about it behind closed doors. But I am
very concerned about people who destroyed documents. Can you
elaborate at all on that?
Secretary Blinken. And I really appreciate that. And I just
want to assure you, but I would rather have this conversation
in a different setting, that we are putting in place plans to
make sure that people can get documents that they need and
documents that the Taliban says it will recognize to allow them
to leave the country. I would be happy to pursue that
conversation.
Mr. Green. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Dean Phillips of Minnesota
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Phillips. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, I am one of 20,000 Gold Star Children from
the Vietnam war and now joined by 5,000 more Gold Star Children
from both Iraq and Afghanistan. And I just want to acknowledge
all of my brothers and sisters who have had to watch the events
of the last month that so sadly look so strangely familiar as
it relates to the fall of Saigon, of course, 50 years ago.
And I also want to honor the service of many of my
colleagues, many of whom serve on this very committee,
including my friend Brian Mast, who just about gave his entire
life to our country, and I honor all of you. I want to start
with that.
And let me assure you, it has been difficult,
heartbreaking, and disappointing to watch the last number of
years, and, of course, the last month, but I also have to say I
am terribly disappointed in my colleagues, some of them, on
this committee today.
I think it is embarrassing, I think it is
counterproductive, and I think it is shameful, frankly, because
I do not hold Republicans accountable for my father's death,
even though he died in a Republican administration. I hold John
Kennedy, I hold Lyndon Johnson, I hold Richard Nixon, I hold
Congress accountable as well and many other individuals. And I
just ask that the spirit of this committee return to our core
job.
With that, Mr. Secretary, you have spoken about lessons
learned for both our country, not terribly specifically. I
would welcome you to cover that again. What specifically did we
learn? What should we have learned collectively and also
personally? What have you learned? What might you do
differently as you look back over the last number of months in
preparation for this exit?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you very much. Thank you for what
you said, and thank you for the question.
I think we all have to take stock of the last 9 months--and
the last 20 years--because to reach the point that we have
reached today, it is an accumulation of decisions, strategies,
plans over 20 years, as well as over the last 9 months, and all
of that has to factor in.
Look, my biggest takeaway is that when it comes to using
force, we are very good and very effective at doing that to
deal with the terrorist threat to this country, as we have
demonstrated time and again and as we demonstrated after 9/11.
And we need to make sure that we always have the capacity to be
the most effective country on Earth when it comes to that.
At the same time, I think one of the hard lessons, at least
to me, of Afghanistan is, even the best intentions--and these
were really good intentions--to try to remake a society, remake
a country in an image that looks a little bit more like what we
believe is right, may be beyond our capacity. And inserting
ourselves into the middle of a civil war and staying there,
with no prospect of actually creating a decisive effect, also
is something we need to think really, really hard about.
I think we got to a point in Afghanistan not when it comes
to counterterrorism, where, thanks to the extraordinary
courage, bravery, and success of generations now of men and
women in uniform, as well as the diplomats and intelligence
officials who worked with them, they did a remarkable job in
dealing with the people who attacked us on 9/11.
But when it came to this much more expansive effort to
defeat the Taliban and to remake Afghanistan, that was a
different story. And I think we got to the point where,
arguably, we knew how not to lose, but we were not capable, in
that frame, of winning. And the reason was----
Secretary Blinken. Mr. Secretary, I have got about a minute
left. I just want to reclaim a little bit of time. I am sorry.
Secretary Blinken. Please, go ahead. Thank you.
Mr. Phillips. I also want to salute our staffers, staffers
in Democratic offices, Republican offices, many of them very
early career staffers who have done yeomen's work to help
people evacuate from Afghanistan. I want to celebrate them.
Secretary Blinken. Yes.
Mr. Phillips. But what I have heard from many, Mr.
Secretary, is that the coordination of this effort was very
challenging.
Very quickly, what grade would you give the United States
of America for its whole-of-government planning and execution
of the withdrawal plan, what grade?
Secretary Blinken. I cannot give it a grade, but here is
what I can say. I think that you are right. We, you know, in
this extraordinary situation, had to do a tremendous amount of
work to get to a better place, especially when it comes to
coordination. And there is a lot of work yet to be done,
learning from what we did and what we did not do, going forward
to put us in a better place.
And so I think--I think, from my perspective at least, it
definitely improved, but it did not start from a great place,
largely because of the exigency of the situation that we were
in.
But here is the question that I think--I hope we can work
on together. Knowing that, how do we put ourselves in a better
position going forward so that we can get that kind of
coordination, cooperation, stood up much more quickly.
Mr. Phillips. I appreciate your candor.
And I yield back. Thank you, sir.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Andy Barr of Kentucky for 5
minutes.
Mr. Barr. Mr. Secretary, let me return to the dissent
cable. You said you read the July 13 dissent cable prepared by
the career diplomats at the Kabul Embassy. You said you were
very proud of that. Is that, again, correct?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct, yes.
Mr. Barr. And that warning came over 1 month before the
fall of Kabul, right?
Secretary Blinken. The cable was, I believe----
Mr. Barr. July 13.
Secretary Blinken [continuing]. On July 13, yes.
Mr. Barr. July 13. So over a month. And the cable warned
that the Afghan Government was at risk of collapse. And your
response was, quote, the thoughts of the drafters reflected
much of the thinking of the Department, unquote.
And you still maintain that to be the case?
Secretary Blinken. The cable did not predict that the
government or security forces would collapse before we
departed----
Mr. Barr. But the cable did say the Afghan Government was
at risk of collapse, and you said that the thoughts of the
drafters reflected much of the thinking of the Department.
By the way, at the exact same time, the Bureau of
Intelligence and Research in the Department was briefing this
committee that the Taliban was moving quickly toward a takeover
of the country. You presumably had access to that same
intelligence from I&R, which corroborated the dissent cable and
was alarming to many members of this committee.
Do you dispute that?
Secretary Blinken. As we have had an opportunity to discuss
throughout these many months, there were ongoing intelligence
assessments about the durability and resilience of the Afghan
Government----
Mr. Barr. Well, look, I mean, let's just be honest, Mr.
Secretary. These were alarming cables. They were warnings. They
were warnings to you. You say they reflected the majority
position of the Department.
Did you share this intelligence with the President of the
United States?
Secretary Blinken. Two things on the cable, Congressman.
First, the main focus of the cable was on taking steps to
expedite the efforts we were making to bring out the SIV
applicants and others from Afghanistan----
Mr. Barr. [Inaudible] The collapse was imminent. Did you
share that intelligence with the President?
Secretary Blinken. It did not say that the collapse was
imminent. It expressed----
Mr. Barr. Well, why did you accelerate the process?
Secretary Blinken. Because it expressed real concerns about
two things.
Mr. Barr. Because we got it too. We saw it too. We knew
this was totally avoidable.
Did you share that intelligence with the President? Did you
advise him for a shift in strategy as a result of this
intelligence?
Secretary Blinken. Again, this is not--first of all, it is
not intelligence. It is information analysis assessment that is
very important----
Mr. Barr. Okay.
Secretary Blinken [continuing]. Coming from our embassy.
Mr. Barr. I know it is intelligence. And the cable was
analysis. Did you share it with the President?
Secretary Blinken. The Dissent Channel, which is an
important--very important tradition in the State Department,
under its regulations, is shared only with the senior
leadership of----
Mr. Barr. You are not answering the question. You are not
answering the question. But I want to know if you had a shift
in policy; and if not, why not.
I want to know if the President contemplated shifting any
part of this strategy when it was very apparent that this
strategy of unconditional retreat was failing. And it was
failing over a month before the fall of Kabul.
Let me move on to Bagram, real quick. In April, I warned
you not to abandon Bagram. Little did I know the Biden
Administration would abandon it even before evacuating all
Americans, our allies, and advance military equipment, leaving
the world's most dangerous airport, HKIA, as the exclusive
point of extraction.
Who made the decision to abandon Bagram at that time?
Secretary Blinken. Congressman, as you know, the military
was engaged in a drawdown from Afghanistan, and part of that
drawdown was moving out of different positions, to include
Bagram Airbase, which was given to the Afghan security and
defense forces.
Mr. Barr. You are telling me that the military--the
military--advised evacuating Bagram before you extracted all
Americans and the equipment, or was that a State Department
decision?
Secretary Blinken. We certainly did not make a decision
about Bagram. The military is charged with doing the planning
and the work in any drawdown, and they make decisions--they
make decisions based on force protection and the security of
our men and women in uniform
[inaudible].
Mr. Barr. Okay. You say that there is nothing the Chinese
would have wanted us more than to stay in Afghanistan. Is it
your testimony that the Chinese wanted the United States to
remain in the only airbase in the country with a physical
border with China? You think that that is the Chinese position,
that they wanted us to keep Bagram?
Secretary Blinken. I think the Chinese would have liked to
have seen us remain in a re-upped war in which----
Mr. Barr. Oh, so----
Secretary Blinken [continuing]. Under attack in which we
were putting more and more forces into Afghanistan and which
were----
Mr. Barr. You think the Chinese are celebrating us--you
think the Chinese are celebrating us abandoning an airbase, the
largest airbase on their border? Come on.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Barr. Just be honest. Just be honest.
I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, who
is the vice chair of the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health,
and Global Human Rights, for 5 minutes.
Ms. Omar. Thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, I know it is harder to end a war than start
one in this town, so I thank you and the President for ending
our longest war.
Over the weekend, both The New York Times and Washington
Post reported the August 29 drone strike that supposedly
prevented a car bomb attack at the airport in Kabul, instead
killed Zemari Ahmadi, an aid worker, and his family.
The strike happened when there was a lot of eyes on Kabul,
but it is not unusual for U.S. drone strikes to kill civilians.
It is not unusual for the U.S. Government to claim it killed
terrorists instead.
And this is coming on the heels of reporting that DoD
failed to spend a single dollar of the redress payments that
Congress has provided for civilian casualties.
As Congress considers the continuing utility of the 2001
AUMF, how can you possibly ensure us that our drone strikes and
Over the Horizon capabilities will actually reach their
targets?
Secretary Blinken. First, when it comes to moving forward,
I hope that we can, again, take this up in a different setting
and different session.
I know with regard to the drone strike that you are
referring to, that is being looked at very, very, very
carefully by others in the administration so that we understand
exactly what happened or what did not happen.
And no country on Earth, no government takes more effort,
takes more precautions to try to ensure that anyone other than
the intended terrorist target is struck using a drone or by any
other means. But certainly we know that in the past, civilians
have been hurt and have been killed in these strikes. And we
have to make sure that we have in place every possible measure
to allow us to continue to use the tool to defend and protect
ourselves while avoiding anyone on the civilian side from being
hit.
And we also need to look, as you have rightly said, at the
authorizations going back to 2001 and 2002. We strongly support
that. Those need to be updated to reflect present realities,
not reality as it was in 2001 or 2002.
Ms. Omar. And, Mr. Secretary, from the State Department's
point of view, what is the impact of the unaccountable--
uncountable and accountable civilian harm on our
counterterrorism goals?
Secretary Blinken. It certainly runs counter to those
goals, whenever there are civilian casualties, whenever there
are unintended injuries or deaths. It does not advance what we
are trying to do. And so that is besides the moral obligation
we have to do everything we possibly can to make sure that
civilians are not harmed or killed.
It is also true that in terms of the mission itself, we
want to make sure that that does not happen, because if people
lose faith and confidence in it, if they--and particularly in
the countries in question, if people see it as a tool to do
harm to innocent civilians as opposed to terrorists who are a
threat to everyone, that will undermine support for what we are
doing.
Ms. Omar. And in your role and previous roles in other
administrations, how much of an analysis is being done to look
at whether our counterterrorism efforts are actually being
counter to the work that we are trying to do in ending
terrorism around the world?
Secretary Blinken. I would call it very, very significant.
Certainly in the Obama Administration we spent a tremendous
amount of time looking at, reviewing, and modifying all of
these procedures, all of the safeguards, all of the criteria
that went along with using these tools. And we have been in the
midst of conducting just such a review in this administration,
to make sure, to the best of our ability, that when we take a
strike, we get the intended person and no one else.
Ms. Omar. Thank you, and I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Greg Steube of Florida, who
is the ranking member of the Subcommittee on the Middle East,
North Africa, and Global Counterterrorism, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Steube. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Blinken, even in your opening statement, you cannot be
honest with the American people. You stated, and I quote, that
by January 2021, the Taliban was in its strongest military
position since 9/11.
I am pretty sure their strongest military position has been
during your entire administration, not prior to it.
In fact, their strongest military position since the towers
were hit in 2001 was this past September 11th, the 20th
anniversary, all of which happened on your watch, not your
predecessor's.
In fact, on April 27 of this year, days before the original
deadline negotiated by the Trump administration, that you and
the Biden Administration violated, the Taliban controlled 77
districts in Afghanistan, the Afghan Government controlled 129,
and there were 194 contested districts.
By August 15, while you and Biden were on vacation, the
Taliban had taken and controlled 304 districts, and the
government only controlled 37.
From May to August of this year, while you, the Department
of Defense, and the President did absolutely nothing, the
Taliban gained 227 districts in Afghanistan in just 4 months.
You cannot claim ignorance to what was going on there, and
you cannot blame the Trump administration for your failure.
I served in Iraq and I am well aware of our capabilities.
Your administration and the White House was seeing in real time
what was happening in Afghanistan, and you did absolutely
nothing to stop it.
In fact, you did what you could to conceal the facts.
Biden, himself, tried to get President Ghani to lie about what
was happening on the ground. Biden told Ghani that, quote, the
perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan I
believe, is that things aren't going well in terms of the fight
against the Taliban, and there is a need, whether it is true or
not, there is a need to project a different picture.
That was on July 23, before all of you went on vacation. So
you knew exactly what was going on there and did nothing to
start moving our people out or our SIVs out until it was too
late and the Taliban controlled the entire nation.
You earlier stated under questioning today, and I quote, we
inherited a deadline, not a plan. Yet you did not even follow
the deadline that you cascade as something you couldn't do
anything about. This whole blaming the Trump administration for
everything that has happened in Afghanistan is a disgrace.
You are the Secretary of State, and Biden has been the
Commander in Chief since January. Not Trump. You and the
administration saw what was happening in Afghanistan, and you
had the ability to deal with it. Not Trump. You were
responsible for the assets on the ground, and you were
responsible for getting our people out.
So I know how you, Biden, and other Democrats want nothing
more than to blame Trump for all of the problems that you have
created, but the responsibility for all of this lies squarely
on your shoulders and in the lap of President Biden.
Then after Kabul fell, your leadership completely and
utterly failed, not only our citizens on the ground, but our
allies that we have worked with for 20 years.
First your direction was shelter in place. Then it was,
make your way to the airport, but we cannot guarantee your
safety on the way there. Then it was, shelter in place. Then it
was, come to the gates. Then it was, leave the gates.
While all of this was happening, you are handing our list
of citizens and Afghan SIVs to the Taliban, a globally
recognized terrorist organization because you were unwilling to
go in and get the citizens and SIVs stuck behind enemy lines
out.
And as we sit here today, we still have citizens and SIVs
stuck in Taliban hands, despite Biden promising to stay and get
them all out. And thanks to you, our enemy knows exactly who
they are and how to find them.
And you describe this, and I quote, as an extraordinary
effort. I would certainly not describe the deaths of 13 U.S.
servicemembers, the deaths of hundreds of Afghans, and the fact
that we still have citizens and SIVs stuck behind enemy lines
while the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and ISIS-K go door to door hunting
them down, as an extraordinary effort.
And if all that wasn't bad enough, you spit in the eye of
every single servicemember who served on the war on terror for
the last 20 years, by even considering recognizing the Taliban
who we have fought against for 20 years, as a legitimate
government, and not only recognize them but do absolutely
nothing while the Taliban takes control of $90 billion worth of
military aircraft, Humvees, weapons, night vision goggles,
uniforms, ammunitions, and Blackhawks.
And after we have rolled over and handed all that to them,
you announce today, with great fanfare and great pride, that
you are providing $64 million in humanitarian assistance to the
people of Afghanistan.
You cannot even get our people out of the country, but we
and the American people are to believe that $64 million of our
tax dollars that is to be sent to Afghanistan will not fall in
the hands of the Taliban or other terrorist organizations who
you were relying upon to get our people out of the airport.
Your legacy will be the Taliban flying our Blackhawk over
Kabul while someone, maybe a U.S. citizen, hangs from a rope by
his neck. And while this is happening, you are saying that you
are working diplomatically with the Taliban to get our people
out.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Colin Allred of Texas for 5
minutes.
Mr. Allred. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I respect my colleague who was just speaking's service. I
think much of what he said was not accurate.
Mr. Secretary, would you like to respond to--I will give
you any time you would like to have to respond to him.
Secretary Blinken. It would take too long. And I very much
respect his service as well. I respect the service of everyone
on this committee, Republican, Democrat, whether they agree
with what we did or vehemently disagree with it.
Regardless of any of that, I deeply respect the service. I
deeply respect the loss of those extraordinary men and women,
the 13 Marines and others who lost their lives so that others
could live their's in the terrorist attack by ISIS-K. And I
also deeply respect the loss of the 2,641 servicemembers who
gave their lives in Afghanistan over the last 20 years.
And I would simply say--and I apologize for taking your
time--but I would simply say that I believe the most important
legacy we can leave is to have ended America's longest war, to
make sure that a third generation of Americans does not have to
go fight and die in Afghanistan, as well as having brought
125,000 people to safety under the most extraordinary
circumstances, made good by our commitments to work to get
every American out and to continue to do that with the few that
remain in Afghanistan, as well as to deal with the ongoing
challenges that it poses. So I believe that will be the legacy
that we are talking about.
I apologize, Congressman, for taking your time. Thank you.
Mr. Allred. No, thank you, Mr. Secretary. I mean, it is
extremely difficult to end a 20-year conflict, and I think we
are seeing that and, of course, you know, tempers are running
high, and I know it has been a long day.
But I want to thank you and the State Department personnel
for helping my office evacuate the Afzali family from Kabul to
be reunited with his brother who actually lives here in my
district.
Mr. Afzali worked with our embassy, and not only did he
evacuate his wife and two kids, he got four unaccompanied
children, whose mother was already in New York, out of Kabul as
well. And so I want to thank your team for that success story.
And as a member of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, as well
as this committee, I want to speak to the many veterans of the
Afghan war and their families who live in my district. And just
to quote, President George W. Bush, who is actually my
constituent, this weekend said that the causes you pursued at
the call of duty is the noblest America has to offer. You have
shielded your fellow citizens from danger. You have defended
the beliefs of your country and advanced the rights of the
downtrodden. You have been the face of hope and mercy in dark
places. You have been a force for good in the world. End quote.
And I want to thank all those who have served as well.
You know, Mr. Secretary, in the time I have remaining, I
want to say, 2-1/2 years ago, your predecessor, Secretary
Pompeo, appeared before this committee. And I know it is not
very satisfying to look to the past and sometimes maybe even
think that you are pointing fingers, but at that time, I
questioned him about the conditions of our withdrawal from
Afghanistan that he was negotiating in real time with the
Taliban.
I asked Secretary Pompeo why he had abandoned previous U.S.
policy regarding negotiations with the Taliban, such as
insisting that they agree to respect the Afghan Constitution,
including its protections for women and minorities, and of
course as my other colleagues have said, most egregiously,
excluding the Afghan Government from those negotiations almost
entirely, undermining that very government in its own country.
At the time, Secretary Pompeo was fairly dismissive, I
think it is fair to say, of my concerns.
But, Mr. Secretary, I want to draw your attention to the
screen here showing an excerpt of the Trump administration's
deal. It notes that the deal did not require the Taliban to
disavow al-Qaeda and did not include a commitment to not attack
Afghan security forces, which has also been discussed today.
And I want to ask you, Mr. Secretary, based on your
experience, what aspects of the deal that you inherited would
you have handled differently based on past U.S. policy and the
best diplomatic tools that at our disposal?
Secretary Blinken. Well, look, hindsight is always 20/20,
whether it is for us, whether it is for the previous
administration, or the ones before.
But I would say that to the extent there was conditionality
in that agreement imposed on the Taliban, ideally, it should
have gone further. Yes, very good to make sure that our forces
were not being attacked during the pendency of the agreement
until we withdrew all of our forces, but there was very little
in that agreement that really compelled the Taliban to
negotiate and get to an agreement with the Afghan Government
about the future of Afghanistan, a future in which these basic
rights and principles were upheld. That wasn't there, and I
think that is unfortunate.
Similarly, we can talk about the forces that we withdrew,
you know, in the last few months, but in reducing, to the
extent that we did, the leverage that we had by going from
roughly 13,500 forces down to 2,500 forces by the end of the
last administration, that made it very, very challenging to
leverage the Taliban to even make good on what little there was
in the agreement to begin with, never mind doing more.
So, again, in fairness, you know, all of this is 20/20, and
I hope we engage in that 20/20 hindsight, not just for the last
9 months, but for the last 20 years, because there is a lot
that we need to look at.
Mr. Allred. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time is expired.
I now recognize Representative Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Meuser. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, you are a long-standing, experienced
American diplomat. Your service is to be commended to our
country. Past hearings, you have been fair and informative.
I, however, must State that I am very disappointed in your
written testimony, your opening comments, and answers today,
which really seem to me, sir, as a series of rationalizations.
You are, in fact, blaming everyone but yourselves and the
Taliban, which is interesting, for this disaster, and yet you
seem to continue to be victimized by wishful thinking.
Blaming the Trump administration, frankly, is equivalent to
me planning a fishing trip months in advance, the day comes to
leave, a hurricane comes in, you go anyway, and blame me for
things going badly.
The fact is, these epic mistakes and the ignoring of intel
has left a country--OK, these are the facts, this is the
reality of today--under a brutal terrorist regime, and the
world is a more dangerous place. Massacres, murders continue.
I just informed a newspaper of a horrific scene I heard of
this morning, somebody being pulled out, an interpreter,
murdered, in front of their children, the children taken. Okay?
This are results of these incredible mistakes.
Thirteen Americans tragically--tragically killed. 124,000
Afghanistanians desperately fleeing for their lives, some
falling off of airplanes as they leave, as they desperately try
to get out.
We have billions in American military equipment and pallets
of cash, I understand, left behind in Taliban hands. Yet, sir,
you sit and tell us that you did the right thing. Okay. That,
frankly, makes us--kind of scares the hell out of us as to what
decisions might be made next.
So I will start with my first question. Are there any
conditions where we provide pallets of cash to the Taliban?
Secretary Blinken. None that I am aware of.
Mr. Meuser. All right. Thank you.
Intel said Taliban would likely overrun Afghanistan and all
the cities, as it did. Of course, you mentioned General Milley
a number of times, stating how, no, there was no intel stating
11 days.
What was the likely scenario that you all, your department
and the Biden Administration, believed was going to occur after
our retreat?
Secretary Blinken. So, Congressman, throughout the spring
and into the summer, if you look back at the intelligence
assessments and collective assessments that were made--and
typically you would have a worst case scenario, a best case
scenario, some scenarios in between--it went from in the winter
and spring to worst case scenario, the Taliban takes over the
country in 18 months to 2 years after our withdrawal, to in
July, the end of the year, the end of this calendar year.
And even right up to the very end, as I have said before,
to my knowledge at least, no one was predicting the collapse of
the government and the security forces in 11 days. So, yes, it
got narrower, the worst case scenarios, but it went from 18
months to 2 years, to the end of this year.
Mr. Meuser. Okay. That is getting it very wrong, regardless
of the information available.
Will the Biden Administration secure our southern border
now that we have this serious additional crisis and terrorists
on the loose worldwide?
Secretary Blinken. We have been working assiduously to
secure that border from day one. And we have also, as we talked
about a little bit earlier, with regard to Afghans coming in to
the United States, as you know, there are very significant,
rigorous vetting procedures in place with Customs and Border
Patrol, NCTC, FBI, CIA, et cetera, that are done initially in
these transit countries before anyone comes to the United
States and then continue on military bases here, which is
usually the first point of landing after Dulles Airport for
people coming from Afghanistan.
Mr. Meuser. Thank you, Secretary.
Just last, do you believe, and the Biden Administration
believe, terrorists respond to strength and the willingness to
use it?
Secretary Blinken. Terrorists respond to effective
counterterrorism, absolutely.
Mr. Meuser. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman yields back.
I now recognize Representative Andy Levin of Michigan, who
is the vice chair of the Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific,
Central Asia, and Nonproliferation, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Levin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you, Mr. Secretary, for helping the President end
our longest ever war, which was the right thing to do; for your
Department's efforts to airlift out so many tens of thousands
of Americans and Afghans when the Afghan Government and Armed
Forces fell so precipitously; and for your patience and
steadfastness here today.
Obviously, you have heard a lot about our concerns today
regarding Afghans seeking refuge in the United States and
elsewhere, and I want to start there. What commitments has the
administration secured from third countries to host Afghans for
a sufficient duration to allow the administration to process
their SIV P1 and P2 visas or humanitarian parole requests?
Where are we at with that.
Secretary Blinken. So we have secured a number of
agreements that would allow us to, as Afghans come out of the
country, and these would be SIV applicants, these would be
potential refugees, with several countries where they could go
to those countries. We could engage in the processing,
especially with regard to SIVs, as you know, with a 14-step
process, very hard to complete that. There are parts that we
could not possibly complete remotely in Afghanistan. So we do
need to get them to third countries where we can complete that.
And we have----
Mr. Levin. Do we have enough? I mean, is the capacity
enough, basically, I guess that is the question. Or do we need
more?
Secretary Blinken. I am sorry?
Mr. Levin. Is the capacity enough or do we need more, I
guess----
Secretary Blinken. I think the current capacity is enough,
but that is something we are going to look very carefully at.
And, of course, much depends on the ongoing ability of people
to leave Afghanistan and to get to these countries.
Mr. Levin. Okay. All right. Well, let's stay on the topic
of Afghans who need protection right now. U.S. officials stated
our commitment to Afghans at risk, such as civil society
workers, human rights defenders, women's rights activists,
journalists, and others, and that that commitment did not end
with the withdrawal of U.S. personnel. Deciding where to draw
these lines is super difficult.
Who else specifically is the Biden Administration defining
as at risk, and how does the State Department intend to support
them?
Secretary Blinken. Yes, you are right, it is very
challenging. In the summer, we put in place, besides the SIV
program, we put in place the so-called P2 category for people--
for Afghans who did not meet the requirements of the SIV
program but who would nonetheless work, for example, for NGO's,
for American news organizations, other institutions but not
directly for the U.S. Government so that they could qualify for
the SIV.
Of course, the general refugee program is available to
people. So if they can get out of Afghanistan, which is
obviously--which is what we are working on, they can go to a
third country and apply for refugee status.
But we are particularly focused on Afghans at risk, and the
ones most at risk are people who, by what they have done or
what they have said or who they are, could be at real threat
from the new government.
Mr. Levin. All right. Finally, let me return to the
question of the drone strike, the U.S. drone strike in Kabul on
August 29, which reportedly killed at least 10 civilians,
including 7 kids. Just going from media reports.
What I want to ask is, what role is the State Department
playing in helping to investigate any civilian harm caused in
this strike? Does the State Department have a role in this or
is it purely military or intelligence officials?
Secretary Blinken. Well, without going into too much detail
here, in the first instance, military intelligence is focused
on reviewing everything that we did. They do that as a matter
of course, and of course they are doing that in this instance.
To the extent that we have any information that comes to us
that is relevant to this, of course, we would feed it into that
review process.
Mr. Levin. All right. Well, I hope we can take this up when
we have a classified discussion because, you know, it is just--
it happens a lot and we have to do everything we can to stop
it.
With that, Mr. Chairman, thank you so much, and I yield
back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman yields back.
I now recognize Representative Claudia Tenney of New York,
who is the vice ranking member for the Subcommittee on
International Development, International Organizations, and
Global Corporate Social Impact, for 5 minutes.
Ms. Tenney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to get
right to it.
My son served in the Marine Corps for 8 years. I spent the
weekend with marines and Gold Star families. There is nothing
worse than having someone show up at your door to tell you that
your son or daughter was killed in action. I know you know
that.
I just want to say to some of our colleagues on this call
who do not understand the anger and the anguish that many feel,
you know, referring to this as histrionics and--by this side. I
feel the pain of these people. I spent the weekend with them. I
have been with my Gold Star families for many, many years, and
I know you understand that.
But my question to you is--and I want to reference back to
something that Representative Issa had referred to. He referred
to communications that our American citizens and others had
received that said, make contingency plans to leave when it is
safe to do so that do not rely on the U.S. Government for
assistance, notify a trusted person of your travel and movement
plans.
This communication was given by the State Department to
U.S. citizens, along with legal permanent residents and SIV
applicants and holders. My question to you is, can you tell us
that these people who--and I appreciate those who have been
able to get out successfully--who have not been assisted, who
are there in harm's way, will you give us a commitment that our
American citizens and our legal permanent residents and others
will be out safely?
Secretary Blinken. Absolutely. But just to clarify--and,
again, I invited Congressman Issa to share that with me.
Here is my understanding. Starting in March, we issued 19
separate----
Ms. Tenney. Let me just----
Secretary Blinken. No, no. But it is important--no, no, it
is important. I do not want to take your time, but it is
important to talk to this, if I could. No, no----
Ms. Tenney. [inaudible] Briefly.
Secretary Blinken. Yes, no, no. So here is the--just to be
clear, and I believe this is what this refers to, but if it is
not, we will take that up. In the----
Ms. Tenney. The question is, can you just make the
assurance that these people will be out safely? Because I how
have an American citizen, a family of seven, a 2-year-old is an
American citizen, and they are still stranded in Afghanistan.
They were told by the State Department in a letter, only one
parent can accompany the family home--or this 2-year-old home,
which means the other five are going to be left in Afghanistan.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. That----
Ms. Tenney. I would like your assurance that all of that
family will be kept intact and be brought home and will not be
separated at the Afghan border.
Secretary Blinken. First of all, Congresswoman, we are
committed to bringing any remaining--any remaining----
Ms. Tenney. Can I just----
Secretary Blinken. I would be happy to address the question
if I could, please.
We are committed to bringing any remaining American
citizens in Afghanistan out who wish to leave, and we are
working on that every single day. Under the law----
Ms. Tenney. Let me just--this is the question, though. We
have an American citizen who has six family members who are
legal permanent residents. We were told by the State Department
only one gets to accompany the American citizen.
These aren't people that do not want to leave Afghanistan.
These are people that aren't going to abandon their children.
So I just want to be sure that----
Secretary Blinken. Under--let me be clear. Could I please
answer the question? Because it is an important one and it
deserves----
Ms. Tenney. I just want a yes or no answer. It is really
simple, because you are taking up my time, and I have a couple
issues I want to get to.
Secretary Blinken. Well, look, I am really happy to address
because you raise a very important question. Just to be very
clear, any American citizen, their spouse and their minor
children, we are committed to bringing out. That is what the
law provides under the Immigration and Naturalization Act. It
is also what the other laws provide for.
If we want to be more expansive than that, we invite
Congress to change the law.
Ms. Tenney. [Inaudible] Question. Thank you. I appreciate
that.
Mr. Secretary, would you agree that it would have been
safer to evacuate these people had the U.S. and allied troops
remained in Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. Had we remained in Afghanistan?
Ms. Tenney. No. The question is, do you think it would have
been safer to evacuate the----
Secretary Blinken. No. No. I highly doubt that, because had
we remained in Afghanistan beyond May 1, we would have been
back at war with the Taliban not only firing on our forces but
also
[inaudible] Cities.
Ms. Tenney. [Inaudible] Would it have been safer if U.S.
servicemembers, allied troops were in Afghanistan while we were
evacuating these people? Do you agree that that would have
been--it would have been safer?
Secretary Blinken. I apologize, I missed the last part.
Could you repeat it, please?
Ms. Tenney. Yes. I said, do you agree that it would have
been safer to evacuate the people that I described--American
citizens, green card holders, and others--had we kept the U.S.
troops and allied troops there first and evacuated them later?
Secretary Blinken. Oh, I see. Again, if the Defense
Department, the government as a whole engaged in the drawdown
from Afghanistan. But the single most important factor was the
collapse of the Afghan security forces and the Afghan
Government in 11 days. That is what radically changed the
situation.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Abigail Spanberger of
Virginia, who is the vice chair of the Subcommittee on Europe,
Energy, and Environment, and Cyber, for 5 minutes.
Ms. Spanberger. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
And, Mr. Secretary, thank you for being with us today. My
first question is specific to Afghan allies. And for those of
us who have been working directly with people on the ground
trying to get folks out, as I know you have, it has been a
really challenging time.
And I think one of the lessons here, one of the takeaways
for me is that we must always plan for the worst case scenario,
because I think we saw a confluence of worst case scenarios
come to fruition.
So, on that end, I would note that in your opening remarks,
you stated that we expect the Taliban to ensure freedom of
travel, make good on its CT commitments, uphold the basic
rights of the Afghan people, including women, girls,
minorities, and name a broadly representative permanent
government.
But I have also seen videos of women and girls being beaten
by the Taliban. I know there have been night letters that have
been posted on doors, marking people for interrogation or
assassination. I have received photos and written testimoneys
of some of the beatings and targetings that have occurred, and
murders and beatings have been documented against those who
have helped the United States.
And so, sir, I would begin by asking, have you seen any of
these videos? Have they made their way to you as well?
Secretary Blinken. Yes, I have seen videos. I have seen
reports. I have read news accounts. Yes. And these incidents
are deeply, deeply disturbing.
Ms. Spanberger. So looking toward the future, recognizing
that perhaps we should hear your plan for the absolute worst
case scenario, is the Department talking through what the
contingencies are in the scenario in which the Taliban does not
do the things that you stated are our expectations and hopes?
Secretary Blinken. In short, yes.
Ms. Spanberger. Okay. And thank you for that. And I also
just want to thank every person on the ground, every person who
has been so helpful.
I represent many, many in the veterans community who have
focused exclusively on ensuring that those who helped keep them
alive and those who worked side by side with them would have a
chance at a better life in the future. And so I am grateful for
their service and their work.
I recently sent a letter to you, sir, focused on border
crossings. And I know there has been some progress toward
working with border nations about the possibility of them
opening the borders. Could you just briefly comment on what the
status is related to the ability to exfiltrate people or allow
people to cross at borders?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Thank you. And I saw the letter,
and I thank you for it.
We have been working with a number of countries, including
Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, to ensure that, ideally,
their borders will remain open overall, but certainly that they
would remain open to American citizens, green card holders,
visa holders, who seek to leave and who are assisting in
leaving. And we have basic agreements with all three countries
that that will be the case.
And so the work now is to be able to see people start, as
we saw last week with the flights that left Qatar--left, excuse
me, Kabul for Qatar, that started to happen.
Ms. Spanberger. Thank you so very much, Mr. Secretary. And,
please, if any of that changes, I ask that you keep us apprised
so that we can be helpful as possible.
And last week I visited Fort Pickett, which is in my
district, to see Operations Allies Welcome firsthand, and I saw
thousands of Afghan children, women, and men who made it out of
Afghanistan. It is a testament to a whole-of-government
approach--public servants, U.S. servicemembers, NGO workers and
volunteers standing up an incredible effort on very, very short
notice.
On behalf of the community that I represent, I would just
want to reiterate the importance of really ensuring that the
interagency team engages and communicates with local
government.
I was very happy to learn about the health screenings on
the ground and the initiation of English language classes that
have begun onsite. I hope that continues.
But I am curious, how long do you anticipate Operations
Allies Welcome will continue to utilize military installations
across the United States, including the one that is in my
district?
Secretary Blinken. Well, thank you. And I am really
grateful for that support, the engagement of the community. It
makes all the difference. And I want to make sure too, like
you, that we have the right, you know, connectivity, that we
are talking and coordinating with the local community.
We have to make sure that we have the ability to put people
into the resettlement process with resettlement agencies across
the United States. We are determined to move them as
expeditiously as possible. Let me come back to you with a
better timeframe, because we also have to do it mindful of
making sure we complete any security checks that are necessary.
Ms. Spanberger. And I do appreciate the robust security
provisions that I witnessed when I was visiting.
And I have run out of time, though I have many more
questions. I appreciate your time, Mr. Secretary.
I yield back.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time is expired.
I now recognize Representative August Pfluger of Texas, who
is the vice ranking member for the Subcommittee on Europe,
Energy, the Environment and Cyber, for 5 minutes.
You are muted, Mr. Pfluger. Please unmute.
We will come back to Mr. Pfluger.
I now recognize Representative Nicole Malliotakis of New
York, who is the ranking member for the Subcommittee on
International Development, International Organization, and
Global Corporate Social Impact, for 5 minutes.
Ms. Malliotakis. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you, Secretary, for being with us today and
answering our questions and concerns.
You said that the Afghanistan mission was, quote,
successful. You know, I speak for millions of Americans when I
say that it was a kick in the gut to see our American military
vehicles parading in the streets with the Taliban flags.
You know, this has been a real hasty withdrawal; U.S.
citizens unable to get through the gates, the SIV process was a
mess. Our offices had to work with veterans on the ground
because you couldn't get responses in some cases from the State
Department. And we still have a hundred American citizens still
behind enemy lines, which is the same number that it was 2
weeks ago. And, of course, the 13 soldiers who were killed. So
I do not know how anyone can call that a success. But then
again, it is coming from an administration who has misled the
American people throughout this entire withdrawal.
Today you said the Taliban is committed to not allowing
Afghanistan to be used as a base for terrorism. You know, the
Taliban, as you said, is a designated terrorist organization
itself. It harbored al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden leading up to
9/11.
And the U.S. Government has also designated the Haqqani
Network a foreign terrorist organization. Mr. Haqqani, as you
know, is now one of the Taliban's new cabinet members. He is on
the FBI Most Wanted list. We have a $10 million reward for
information leading to his arrest.
I fear that this is a type of weakness, incredulity that
has gotten us in the situation that we are currently in.
The FBI still has even questions for the Haqqani Network,
the January 8, 2008 attack at a Kabul hotel that killed 1
American and 5 others, a 2011 suicide truck bomb in Wardak
province that wounded 77 American soldiers.
You know, now that we have no presence on the ground in
Afghanistan, how is the administration working to ensure that
these same terrorists do not attack Americans again just as
they did at the Kabul Airport? And you know, how can we trust,
how can you trust the Taliban to say that they are going to do
this and actually work to prevent terrorism when they are a
terrorist network themselves? And what have they told you about
rooting out ISIS-K, who is responsible for those 13 soldiers'
deaths?
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, Congresswoman. First of all,
it is not about trusting the Taliban at all. It is about
holding them to the commitments they made not just to us but to
the international community when it comes to not allowing
Afghanistan to become a haven for outwardly directed terrorism.
There are two groups that you pointed to that are very
important in this. One is ISIS-K, the group that killed our
servicemen and women just a couple of weeks ago in Afghanistan.
As it happens, one thing one could say about the Taliban is
that they and ISIS-K are sworn enemies, and the Taliban has
spent the last 5 years, even as it has relentlessly been moving
to take more territory, to also take territory away from ISIS-K
as it sought to implant itself in Afghanistan, and they remain
very much at odds.
And I think the greater question with regard to ISIS-K is
less whether the Taliban has the intent and more whether it has
the capacity to effectively deal with it. But over the last 5
or 6 years, it took away virtually all of the territory that it
held.
Then you rightly point to al-Qaeda, the ability of that
group to engage in outwardly directed, homeland-focused
terrorist attacks has been dramatically degraded. And the
assessment of the community right now is that they do not
currently have that capacity. Having said that, we will remain
extremely vigilant to detect any reemergence of that
capability, and of course, take action against it if it
reemerges.
And as we were talking a bit earlier, we would welcome the
opportunity to go into more detail about that in a different
setting.
Ms. Malliotakis. I would appreciate that because I am very
concerned that, you know, the government is relying on the
Taliban for counterterrorism, and that should not be something
that we should even be flirting with.
But in addition to that, you know, just while we were in
this hearing, $64 million is being reported in additional aid
to Afghanistan. And how do we know and how can you guarantee
the American people that this isn't going to end up in the
hands of the Taliban just like our military equipment and
vehicles and weapons did?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. It is an important question,
Congresswoman, and here is what I would say. That money and any
other assistance we provide, humanitarian assistance we
provide, will not be provided to the government of Afghanistan.
It is provided to NGO's that we have worked with for many, many
years and to U.N. agencies that we have worked for many, many
years. And they have tried and true mechanisms in place to make
sure that the assistance gets to the people who need it, not to
the government.
Ms. Malliotakis. Well, I mean, I still question that. I
think that we have to be--you know, I do not agree with this
decision at this time. I do believe that we need to be
concerned even about NGO's that are doing work on the ground
and making----
Chairman Meeks. The gentlewoman's time has expired.
Ms. Malliotakis. And child brides. If you could touch on
that, just where the status----
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Chrissy Houlahan of
Pennsylvania for 5 minutes.
Ms. Houlahan. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Mr.
Secretary. I know that most Americans are still supportive of
the withdrawal from Afghanistan, and I also know that the
airlift was remarkable and historic in its scale, but I do
think that this process was not without its missteps, and now
we do have some opportunities from which to draw on these
lessons and hopefully have the ability to together steer
ourselves more positively into the future.
So I do have some questions, and I think it is important to
point out that it is appropriate within Congress'
constitutional role and responsibility of oversight to ask
these questions. I really do this in the spirit of my
responsibility, not in the spirit of whether a D or an R is in
the White House. In the 20 years that this war has happened,
there has been ample opportunity to spread blame all around.
And I can also say that both Rs and Ds on this committee
have personally served themselves, and I can personally
understand the pain and anxiety that many of us are feeling
during this very important and contentious discussion. Our pain
and anxiety knows no party, and no party owns patriotism.
That said, here is my first question, Mr. Secretary. In
July, the U.S. military left Bagram Air Field, and on August
15, the State Department made the decision to close the embassy
chancery and evacuate to the airport. What drove that decision
to withdraw from Bagram and a few weeks later to close the
embassy? Sir, I know that you reflected that it was largely the
DoD's decision to vacate Bagram, but it certainly was your
decision and responsibility with the embassy.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, and I very much appreciate
the spirit with which you are asking these very important
questions as well as the oversight role that the Congress
plays. It is central to our system.
With regard to Bagram, this was part of the drawdown plan
for the military. Again, the base was handed over to the Afghan
national security and defense forces I believe on July 2. I
leave it to my colleagues to get into the details of that. But,
in essence, as we were drawing down, force protection is job
one. It would have taken very significant forces remaining in
place to defend Bagram.
And in terms of departures from Afghanistan, and this was
before the collapse of the government and the security forces,
the airport in Kabul was a much better place to do that from.
Bagram, as you know, is about 40 miles outside of the city. So
getting there is a challenge, and at the end of the day, any--I
am sorry. Go ahead.
Ms. Houlahan. If it is okay, I would like to kind of lead
into my question because I think it relates to that. I do want
to understand something that many of us remain unclear on which
is the timelines that were laid out both publicly and privately
for withdrawal. It may have something to do with the decision
to vacant Bagram and the embassy.
I empathize that you were given an agenda and not
necessarily a plan from the prior administration, but as far as
I can tell, September 11 was announced publicly as a date
certain by which we needed to be gone as was August 31 later
on. And I was always led to believe that that telegraphing, let
alone speaking out loud the dates that you were planning on
doing things was something you should not signal to your enemy.
Why did we do that? Can you help me understand that? And was
that somehow--did that somehow drive the Bagram decision and
the embassy decision.
Secretary Blinken. Sure. No. This all goes to the fact that
as we have been discussing earlier, we inherited an agreement
that required us to leave Afghanistan by May 1. And had we not
made good on that agreement, then we would have seen a
resumption of the war with Taliban forces firing once again on
us and our partners and seeking over to take over the cities
which would have required us to put in more forces and restart
the work. But having said that----
Ms. Houlahan. There was some magic to September 11 that I
just do not understand, so----
Secretary Blinken. So we--so in doing our work on how to
deal with May 1, the military told us that in order to, as they
put it, retrograde in an orderly and safe manner, they needed 3
to 4 months to do it the right way. And so the President took a
risk in pushing past the May 1 deadline in terms of actually
getting everyone out but making it clear that we were doing
that to meet the commitment that his predecessor had made.
And the--you get to September by those 3 to 4 months that
the military said it needed to retrograde in a safe and orderly
manner.
Ms. Houlahan. Sir, with my remaining time, once September
11 had been decided, it was also clear that we were on a very
much more rapid path than September 11 which left us--we pulled
out troops that could been around longer, and then we ended up
having to bring back troops. Was that--why did we decide a date
and then escalate the date and make it even more rapid?
And I am sorry. I only have 7 seconds of my time, so I will
have to take it for the record.
Secretary Blinken. Sure, I am happy to come back to you,
but in essence, everything changed when the government and the
Afghan national security forces collapsed over 11 days in
August. And then we moved into an emergency evacuation
situation. And what was critical in order to do that, to get
American citizens out, to get Afghans at risk out, was to make
sure that we had control of the airport.
And to do that as effectively as possible, the President
had forces on standby for exactly this kind of emergency or
contingency to make sure that we could go in, secure the
airport which we did in 72 hours, and get flights moving out of
the airport.
So that is why those forces on standby went back in to
secure the airport so we could do the evacuation.
Ms. Houlahan. Sure. I have run out of time. I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time has expired.
And I will again reach out to Representative August Pfluger
of Texas for 5 minutes.
Mr. Pfluger. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Can you hear me?
Chairman Meeks. Yes, we hear you. You are breaking up, Mr.
Pfluger. You are breaking up.
Secretary Blinken. I am sorry, Mr. Chairman. I could not
hear the Congressman.
Chairman Meeks. I could not hear either.
Mr. Plfuger, we could not hear you. You broke up.
Mr. Pfluger. Okay. Can you hear me now.
Chairman Meeks. We can hear you better.
Mr. Pfluger. Okay. I would like to start by saying thank
you to Ambassador Rosenblum and also to Deputy Secretary
Viguerie for their help in getting the Afghan pilots out of
Uzbekistan and to their onward destination.
I now want to ask a very pointed question, Mr. Secretary.
Are there any American hostages being held in Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. Mark Frerichs who is of great concern to
me and to the entire administration who has been hostage there
going back a couple of years and who we work on every single
day to bring back home.
Mr. Pfluger. Are there any other American hostages being
held?
Secretary Blinken. To the best of my knowledge, no.
Mr. Pfluger. Are we going to bring Mark Frerichs home now
that we have left Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. We are doing everything in our power as
we have been and as the previous administration was doing.
Mr. Pfluger. Who is holding Mark Frerichs right now?
Secretary Blinken. I would be happy to take that up in a
different setting.
Mr. Pfluger. So would it be fair to say that this is going
to be very difficult to bring him home now that we have left
Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. It was obviously extremely difficult
since it did not happen over the last couple of years, and we
are determined to see that through.
Mr. Pfluger. Have you received any classified briefings on
the situation as it relates to the terror threat inside
Afghanistan, classified briefings recently?
Secretary Blinken. We get briefings, yes, on a regular
basis on----
Mr. Pfluger. Would you character those as positive, like
the world is a safer place, or negative, like the threat is
rising?
Secretary Blinken. Well, needless to say, I do not want to
get into any details in this setting. Again, happy to come back
to you, but it very much depends on what you are looking at. If
you are looking at outwardly directed threats against the
homeland and against others outside of Afghanistan, the basic
assessment is the groups in question currently do not have that
capacity. But that could change, and that is why we are being
extremely vigilant to see if it reemerges and to do something
about it if it does.
Mr. Pfluger. At the 9/11 museum in New York City, and I
will read, in the Bin Laden museum, the al-Qaeda, with
Taliban's permission to operate in Afghanistan, pursued its
campaign against the U.S. and its allies. The Taliban provided
al-Qaeda members with passports and stamps, allowing them to
travel freely, and import vehicles, weapons, and money.
I find it hard to believe that so much has changed in the
20-year period that now that threat has been mitigated. How
many evacuees have met criterias of known or suspected
terrorists at this point in time at our lily pad locations?
Secretary Blinken. Known or suspected? I do not--I do not
have that information. We are engaged in a--in an extremely
vigorous verification process involving multiple agencies, law
enforcement, intelligence, security. No one--no one will get to
the United States who----
Mr. Pfluger. Where are they going when they pop on either
KST or some other similar list? Where are they going? What are
we doing with them?
Secretary Blinken. So we have a number of countries I
think, as you know, where we are transiting anyone coming out
of Afghanistan. That is where the initial checks are done.
And if we need more time on those checks to verify
something, they stay in place, or they move to another location
where we have arrangements to make sure that we have the time
we need to go through all of the checks before they get to the
United States.
Mr. Pfluger. Thank you. And we have requested in a
bipartisan manner to conduct oversight and have been denied
that ability at the lily pads. We will continue to press. It is
not right to be denied that oversight.
Mr. Secretary, did the President follow military, best
military advice to the letter, on the execution of the
withdrawal as he stated in a speech recently?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. And when it comes to, for example,
the question of August 31, it was the unanimous recommendation
of the military, starting with the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs, the Secretary of Defense, all of the commanders on the
ground to move forward with getting out by the 31st because as
they said, if we did not do that the risk to force and the risk
to mission would be exponentially high.
Mr. Pfluger. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Do you feel that the
United States of America has abandoned our citizens?
Secretary Blinken. No. Absolutely not. On the contrary. On
the contrary.
Mr. Pfluger. Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. I
appreciate your responses. And with that, I yield back.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you, Congressman.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Tom
Malinowski of New Jersey who is the Vice Chair of the full
committee for 5 minutes.
Mr. Malinowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, as someone who was screaming about this from
the rooftops at the time, I can count on one hand the number of
my colleagues from the other side who joined in expressing any
concern about the former President inviting the Taliban to Camp
David or the shameful surrender agreement that undoubtedly set
us on the path to this tragedy.
And if anybody believes that the previous administration
would have evacuated any Afghans to the United States, much
less tens of thousands as President Biden did, I would suggest
that they ask the Kurds their opinion of that.
That said, those of us who have been consistent about this
I think are entitled to say that it was also a mistake for this
administration to pick up where President Trump left off. It is
certainly true that we were never going to be able to fix what
was wrong with Afghanistan. That does not mean that we were
obliged to sacrifice everything that was right with
Afghanistan. And the sacrifice, I think, is profound.
An extremely important counterterrorism partnership was
lost, and a terrorist State is now upon us. Enormous gains for
women, for the rule of law, for democracy, for human rights,
mass displacement. The Afghans remade their society. We did not
do it. They did it. It was our withdrawal, I am afraid, that
has unmade their society.
And what have we gained for this? Our troops are not coming
home. We need to be honest about that. They are merely moving
to other bases in the same region to conduct the same
counterterrorism missions, including in Afghanistan, but from a
longer distance with no partners on the ground, no NATO allies
on the ground, presumably more civilian casualties. That drone
strike in Kabul was not the last act of our war. It was
unfortunately the first act of the next stage of our war.
Now, I do not want to ask you to respond to all of that. I
think this is just a philosophical difference that will have to
rest. I do want to ask you, Mr. Secretary, about the next stage
of this evacuation to which I know you are committed.
There was one Afghan woman in particular that I worked to
get out, one of many, an activist. I will not name her. She was
on social media, interviewed by the international media a lot,
tremendously at risk. Tried to get to the airport several
times. Once got on a bus that a third country had organized,
was taken off that bus. And, again, to be honest, in the very
short time we had before August 31, we were never able to make
the evacuation of those Afghans at risk a priority.
The message that we got from the State Department was if
they got to HKIA, we would try to evacuate them, but they were,
in effect, on their own to get there or dependent comment on
private groups to get there.
My question for you today, very practically, is whether
with this new phase with most Americans out, with the airport
restarting operations, whether the State Department will
proactively prioritize trying to get individuals like that
women's rights activist out.
And let me say what I mean by that specifically. Will the
State Department, for example, reach out to all the private
groups and NGO's that have been working on this to try to
consolidate and rationalize these lists that they have and that
you have?
Will you work to try to proactively contact these people to
get them visas either to the United States or visas that we can
encourage third countries to give them? And would we work,
then, proactively with countries like Qatar that are still in
place to try to arrange for safe rides to the airport?
Secretary Blinken. Congressman, in short, yes, and I think
we do have to do everything we can to bring some of these lists
together to the extent that has not happened and ultimately to
prioritize those who are most at risk.
Our priorities going forward are, of course, on any
remaining American citizens who wish to leave as well as on the
special immigrant visa applicants who worked side by side with
us over the years and Afghans at risk.
And I think we do need to make sure that we are looking at
everything that different organizations are providing, Members
of Congress are providing so that we can identify those who we
believe to be at the highest risk and we can focus on that
population.
Mr. Malinowski. Thank you. What I am hoping is that you are
very proactive about this rather than putting the burden on
them to find a way out of the country first.
And then finally, very quickly, I know you have served all
kinds of personnel to Germany and to other places where people
we evacuated on our planes came out. Are you willing to do the
same for Afghans who were brought by private groups to
countries like Albania?
Secretary Blinken. We want to make sure that we have in
place, wherever necessary, the personnel required to help
process people and to make sure that we can do what checks are
necessary and also to support their efforts to move from their
initial landing place to an ultimate destination.
Mr. Malinowski. Thank you. I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Peter Meijer of Michigan for
5 minutes.
Mr. Meijer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Mr.
Secretary, for coming before us today. I just want to do two
quick clarifications on some of the questions that my
colleagues asked.
No. 1. Congressman Green asked whether or not the Taliban
was a terrorist organization. You said yes. I am assuming you
are referring to their listing as a specially designated global
terrorist?
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Meijer. They are not on the foreign terrorist
organization list.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Thank you for clarifying that. That
is correct.
Mr. Meijer. And then Congresswoman Houlahan had asked
earlier, and you had answered part of this question, but you
did not get to one component of it. She was asking about why
the deadline had been changed from September 11 which it
appears the Taliban had consented to and had acknowledged to
August 31, and I did not hear a response from you on that
front.
Secretary Blinken. The deadline that the Taliban repeatedly
made clear that they were looking to was August 31, and we got
that in various ways, in various communications. And so one
risk, and you have to assess it, is had we pushed beyond that,
what actions might they take.
Mr. Meijer. Mr. Secretary, I certainly understand the risks
of pushing for that August 31 deadline. I had initially
believed that that was necessary and understood that the
position we were in would not allow for that.
But I want to also get at something that we had discussed
earlier. You had mentioned several times these emails that the
State Department had sent to Americans who were in
Afghanistan----
Secretary Blinken. Yes.
Mr. Meijer [continuing]. Warning them to leave. As somebody
who was a civilian in Afghanistan, I remember getting alarmist
emails from the State Department all the time, so I can also
understand if they had a little bit of fatigue in being told
the sky was falling. And I am also sure there was maybe some
changes to verbiage that maybe did not come across as much. But
I guess I am a little bit challenged to square that with the
delay that we saw.
As a member of the Honoring our Promises Working Group on
special immigrant visa applicants, you know, we had reached out
to the administration on April 21, you know, imploring, urging
to clear the backlog, and I understand some logistical hurdles
there. We worked to expedite and streamline the processes.
But still, if we were so concerned that we are sending
these grim emails that Americans should have received and left
the country immediately, how come we weren't moving more
quickly? Why did it take 99 days before the first charter
flight took special immigrant visa applicants out.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. So two things. Of course, as you
know Congressman, because you know this so well, it is a
complicated process, but two things very quickly.
First of all, with regard to the Americans citizens that
were there. The warnings were increasingly explicit, and we
wanted to make sure to the best of our ability because we were
in a very volatile security situation, and we had an
obligation, first and foremost, to any American citizens who
were there to put them on notice and to strongly urge them to
leave while, you know, there were clearly commercial means to
do so.
With regard to the special immigrant visas, and I know your
commitment to this which I deeply, deeply appreciate. Again, we
were in a massive acceleration of the program starting from
February, not from, you know, when things--when the government
and the security forces imploded.
And we had a program, as we discussed, that was pretty much
in a dead stall. We had an executive order from the President
on February 4 ordering us to improve it. We went from 100
visas, 100 visas a week to 1,000 a week from March to late
July, so we were in the process of doing that.
And then, of course, we put in place something that is not
even called for which was Operation Allies Refuge which
actually flew people out which, as you know, is not part of
the----
Mr. Meijer. My deep regret is that it just--it took so long
because obviously, we had that concern, expressing it to
citizens. But, you know, talking with folks behind the scenes
and still understanding some of the procedural and logistical
impediments, I just--I wish we would have had that task force
appointee earlier.
Secretary Blinken. This is something I hope we can keep
working on together going forward.
Mr. Meijer. Mr. Secretary, I want to touch upon something
that you mentioned multiple times, that some of the folks who
were left behind are dual nationals. Do you make a distinction
for prioritization between native born American citizens by
birth and those who are naturalized citizens?
Secretary Blinken. We do not. It is really by means of
explanation of why this decision is so hard for so many--for
some people, which is to say that especially in the case of
dual nationals, often, it is people whose entire life has been
in Afghanistan. That is really what they know as home. And that
just explains why literally people have been going back and
forth; do we want to leave, do we not want to leave.
Mr. Meijer. Well, and Mr. Secretary, in some of these
cases, some of those individuals have maybe not a direct
dependent, maybe not a wife or husband, maybe not a son or
daughter, but they might have a brother or sister who is an SIV
eligible or has had that approved, and those flights are being
delayed. So please work to free the planes in Mazar-e-Sharif,
and I yield back my time.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Andy Kim of
New Jersey for 5 minutes.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And, Mr. Secretary, I wanted to drill down on some elements
that you talked about. You talked about the challenge that we
faced a month ago as the collapse of the Afghan security forces
as well as the Afghan government, and I want to unpack that a
little bit.
From your assessment now that we have a month behind us,
was this a situation where the Afghan security forces did not
fight, or was this a situation that they were not given the
orders to fight or given a strategy to actually implement? I
wanted to see if there was a greater sense of granularity that
you have on that.
Secretary Blinken. So I think it was a combination of both
factors, and you are right to point to them. But I think that
to some large extent, those security forces were ill served by
the leadership that they had in giving them a coherent plan.
We--throughout the summer, we were pressing, and obviously,
the experts were pressing, our military leaders and other
experts. But also me, in conversations that I had with then
President Ghani and others to put in place an effective plan,
and in particular, to make sure that they were consolidating
their forces to most--to more effectively defend the major
cities, Kabul, and the large provincial capitols.
And so in the absence, despite extensive efforts to get
them to adopt those plans, I think that made it a lot harder on
the security forces that wanted to fight.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. Yes. No, I think so. And I think,
look, this is going to be one of the most important questions,
you know, when we look back at this and try to understand and
diagnose where the problem was.
A related element to this is a question I have actually
asked to some State Department staff and senior staff before,
but I wanted to get your take on it.
Mr. Secretary, did former President Ashraf Ghani secure
anything for his people with his departure, or did he flee as a
coward?
Secretary Blinken. Look. I do not want to characterize his
departure other than to say that that combined with as an
institution, the Afghan security forces, not putting up
resistance, and all of this taking place in the space of 11
days obviously is what put us into this emergency evacuation
situation.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. Did you have any prior knowledge
that he was going to flee, or did you hear about it when he
announced it on social media?
Secretary Blinken. I spoke to President Ghani on Saturday
night, and this was when we were in the process of working in
Doha to try to organize a transfer of power and to have a--
toward a representative government and to see that he would
participate in that, and what he told me in that conversation
was that he would.
He would go along with that effort but if the Taliban
wouldn't, he would, and I paraphrase, fight to the death. That
was Saturday night. He left the next day. I had no advance
warning of that.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. Mr. Secretary, I wanted to ask you.
Have you personally spoken to any Taliban leadership?
Secretary Blinken. I have not.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. I guess the question is are you
actively choosing not to speak to them? Is this a point of
leverage and legitimacy in your mind? And if that is the case,
who is the most senior person in U.S. Government right now
talking directly to the Taliban? And who is their counterpart
on the other side?
Secretary Blinken. We have made very clear to the Taliban,
as have countries around the world with our leadership and
organization, that any legitimacy that they may seek from the
international community, any support that they may be looking
for is going to be contingent on their actions, and basically
the nature of the relationship that they might have with us or
anyone else will be defined by what they do.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. So just--just in terms it of what is
happening right now----
Secretary Blinken. So we have had--yes. We have had a--we
have had a political channel with them going back to the
previous administration with a team that does engage them
politically, and Ambassador Khalilzad has been leading that
effort but with other members of the team. They are ones as
well our mission in Doha.
The Afghanistan affairs mission, once the embassy shut
down, was moved to Doha. Ian McCary who runs that is also
engaging with their political commission members in Doha.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. Yes. And just a final question here,
you know. There is a lot that we need to unpack over the course
of 20 years, and certainly, these different committees we are
on in Congress will see different elements. We have the
political side, the diplomatic side, the military intelligence,
et cetera, but I wanted to ask you.
Would the administration support a 9/11-like independent
commission that would look across all of these different
pillars to try to assess an analysis of what happened?
Secretary Blinken. I cannot speak for the administration on
that. All I can say is that as others have said, we are all
going to do our hot washes, to use the vernacular, on the last
9 months since we have been in office. And I hope and expect
that all of us will engage in a review of the last 20 years.
Mr. Kim of New Jersey. Great. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Ronny Jackson of Texas as
the Vice Ranking Member for the subcommittee on Africa, Global
Health, and Global Human Rights for 5 minutes.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, how many members of the State Department
were killed in the recent evacuation efforts in Kabul?
Secretary Blinken. Members of the State Department killed?
None.
Mr. Jackson. Okay. Mr. Secretary, in your earlier
testimony, you stated that members of the State Department ran
into the airport and were serving side by side with the Marines
at that gate. Although I deeply appreciate any and all efforts
of the State Department personnel on the ground to rescue
American citizens, for you to try and ride the coattails of the
13 brave servicemembers that gave their lives in this effort is
absolutely shameful in my mind, and it really shows the
American people how out of touch you continue to be.
Secretary Blinken. I am not riding anyone's coattails,
Congressman. For your information, the men and women of my
department----
Mr. Jackson. It was a statement, not a question. It was a
statement, not a question.
Secretary Blinken, exactly 1 week ago, four of my
constituents escaped Afghanistan, the first known to leave the
country since your administration abandoned American citizens
in Kabul on the 30th of August. Your officials left this young
mother and her three children behind. The youngest was 2 years
old. The family remained hidden and terrified for 12 long days
until my team and a group of brave patriots on the ground
facilitated their evacuation.
During this time, the State Department did nothing to help
this family. Instead, you directed them to go to the Taliban
checkpoints repeatedly where the mother eventually had a pistol
placed to her head and then told them to stay in their homes as
the Taliban went door to door searching for American citizens
and Afghan allies, all while you were vacationing in The
Hamptons and your diplomats were safe in Doha.
Then miraculously, after their safe arrival, the State
Department jumped in to claim full responsibility for what had
happened. The response from your team is revolting. It takes
credit from the brave patriots who risked their lives to
actually bring my constituents home safely.
Mr. Secretary, did you even know of this family's existence
until you wanted to take credit for their harrowing journey?
Also, can you explain to what your team--exactly what your team
did to help them escape Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. My team has been working 24/7 around the
clock and around the world to get every American citizen who
wishes to leave Afghanistan and their families out. They have
been putting themselves on the line. They have been putting
everything on the line to do that.
I very much applaud the efforts that people, including
yourself, have engaged in to do the same thing, to help bring
people out. And I am glad that we are able to work together to
do that including in this case, where to the best of my
knowledge, we facilitated their departure from Afghanistan,
including making sure that we worked to get the Taliban to
allow them to leave as well as working at the border with
consular officials to make sure that they could be received
when they got to Uzbekistan and cared for. So I am glad that we
were able to do that together.
This is not about taking credit. I applaud the work that
has been done, including by you, and I hope going forward we
can continue to do even more of that in closer cooperation and
coordination to get any remaining American citizens who wish to
leave out.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Secretary, while I do thank you--I do
thank you for coming to this committee meeting today. I do
thank you for staying the extra time so that you could actually
hear my statement and my question, I do have to say that I am
deeply disappointed in your administration's action and what I
consider to be your gross incompetence.
Not only did you risk countless American lives by
prematurely and haphazardly withdrawing from Afghanistan, but
in the aftermath, you have tried to act as if you have made
zero mistakes, and there has been a continuous effort in the
State Department to pat yourselves on the back which most
Americans at this particular point do not appreciate.
Your tone deaf approach and your attempts to spin the truth
and claim victory from this clear blunder is deeply disturbing.
This includes your disgusting attempts to seize credit for this
evacuation of my constituents.
We will find out later which I think you had very little,
if anything to do with. You and the rest of Biden
Administration owe the American people an apology. You have
ruined any trust we have with our allies and any credibility we
have on the world stage.
With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman yields back.
I now recognize Representative Sara Jacobs of California
who is the vice chair of the Subcommittee on International
Development, International Organizations, and Global Corporate
Social Impact for 5 minutes.
Ms. Jacobs. Well, thank you so much, Mr. Chair, and thank
you, Mr. Secretary, for answering our questions and for staying
so that some of us more junior members get a chance to ask you
questions as well.
I first wanted to say that while I have been publicly
critical of many of the positions made around the evacuation as
a member of the working group that, as you know, I used to work
at the State Department, and I have talked to so many former
colleagues and friends who were on the ground in Kabul who were
working tirelessly, night and day, no sleep for weeks on end,
trying to get people out.
And I think it is an incredible disservice to our
diplomatic corps and to the brave people who work there every
single day to say that they are not deserving of praise. I
disagree with some of the things that were made, but the people
doing the work around the clock deserve to be praised.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Ms. Jacobs. Now I want to raise a letter I sent with
Senator Merkley and many of my colleagues. While I remain
committed to working to get people out of Afghanistan with my
colleagues, I also want to make sure that we are doing
everything we can to deliver humanitarian assistance and, you
know, urging the Treasury Department to issue an OFAC general
license.
So I look forward to working with you and the
administration to make sure that the 18 million Afghans that
are in need are provided support. I think we heard just today
from the U.N. how dire that that need is.
I also think, you know, we talked a lot about policy
failures in the last few months, in the last 20 years. And I
know you are still observing the lessons of the past 2 decades,
and I look forward to working with you on that and on the
lessons learned, especially as someone who has done a lot of
work on--and complex stabilization.
I wanted to followup on something you addressed with my
colleague, Mr. Phillips, on a very specific failure we
encountered over and over again in Afghanistan, and that is on
corruption. Why was the State Department unable to address this
issue over 20 years? And what can we do to make sure that as we
work with other countries and promote good governance around
the globe that we are not continuing to have those same
problems?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. That is a great question and one
that I do not have a good answer to because it is manifestly a
failure of our policy over the last 20 years and one that we
need to address because ultimately, that corruption, I think,
among other things, undermined any trust or confidence in the
government as well as allegiance to the government.
And so when you are asking, you know, Afghan security
forces to fight for their country and to fight for a
government, when there is that much corruption that is endemic,
it is awfully hard to get that allegiance. So you are a hundred
percent right to point to that problem.
We are putting a special emphasis in the department at
large on trying to more effectively combat corruption around
the world, and I think we need to understand very much the
lessons of Afghanistan as part of that effort. We certainly
welcome working with you and others on that because we see this
around the world as a source of profound instability.
Ms. Jacobs. Well, I appreciate that. I will look forward to
working with you on that and especially looking at how the way
we do our assistance and security assistance feeds into the
incentives around corruption.
I know you have been busy, so I am not sure if you have had
a chance to read the recently released cigar lessons learned
report, but I was wondering specifically what the
administration plans on applying going forward on how we are
conducting peace building and development in all of the
countries we are working in.
Because I think what we saw in Afghanistan was obviously a
failure of some of our military strategy, but also that in 20
years, we could not do the development and peace building
programs that would have made the rest of the engagement more
durable.
So, you know, how do we plan our foreign engagements going
forward with realistic goals, space to course correct, and how
do we make sure we are actually peace building and helping
countries develop and not just, you know, doing the same thing
that we just saw did not work in Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. Well, first, I hope that I can actually
get my senior team in place to work on just that. But as we
were talking about a little bit earlier, the most senior
officials, unfortunately, are stuck in the Senate right now but
we do need to--I have seen summaries of the report.
I have not yet read the whole thing, but I have seen the
summaries of it. This is going to be an important, very
important document in informing what we do going forward and
how we do it better. So, again, this is something we welcome
working with Congress on in the weeks ahead.
Ms. Jacobs. Well, thank you.
And, Mr. Chair, I yield back.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady yields back.
I now recognize Young Kim of California who is the vice
ranking member of the Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific,
Central Asia, and Nonproliferation for 5 minutes.
Ms. Kim of California. Thank you, Chairman.
Secretary Blinken. I appreciate your patience. It has been
a long day. I will get right to the point, and I would
appreciate if you could keep your answers brief too.
The withdrawal from Afghanistan continues to be a disaster
that has been worsened by this administration's response, and I
want to be clear the issue is not whether we should have
withdrawn but how we withdrew and the complete lack of
accountability from this administration.
We left hundreds of Americans stranded behind enemy lines,
abandoned our Afghan partners who fought by our side, left
behind 500 journalists from the U.S. Agency for Global Media in
Afghanistan, and left the fates of women and children in the
hands of Taliban.
Let's recognize that many State Departments and their
employees risk their lives and work tirelessly over the last
months, so I want to thank them for their service. However, due
to a vacuum in the leadership from this administration the
veterans, ordinary citizens, and congressional offices were
forced to step up, and in many cases, take the lead in helping
Americans and allies flee the country through independent
rescue operations.
Unfortunately, many of these operations, especially charter
flights, have met resistance from the State Department every
turn. And one of the Afghan SIVs we work with with the Marine
veterans to try to evacuate was Sayed Obaidullah Amin. He
served heroically and risked his life as a translator for the
U.S. forces.
Despite having a pending SIV, P-1, P-2 application, he was
abandoned by this administration during the evacuation process.
He and his wife were killed at Abbey Gate during the Kabul
airport attack, fighting to get to safety, leaving their two
infant sons orphans.
There are still P-1 and P-2 applicants and need the State
Department's help. It is too late to save his life, but we
still have time to save others. My office and other
congressional offices have been working with a third party to
evacuate civilians, people that this administration left
behind.
This group includes Americans, Afghan partners, and
civilians of allied Nations. This operation, without the help
of the State Department, has secured routes into a neighboring
country and has the approval of officials to stage people there
for transfer to a safe third country where NGO's stand ready to
feed, treat, and process those people.
Without basic support from the State Department, this
country has made it very clear that everyone in this group will
be sent back to Afghanistan to die at the hands of the Taliban.
Secretary Blinken, they have started moving as we speak,
and the first group has 60 people in it, and 40 of them are
children. Your team already has all the necessary information
that we provided but has been repeatedly refused to provide any
assistance. I have called your office two times and talked to
your officials. These people are all doomed if State does not
approve and provide transfer to a safe third country.
Secretary Blinken, I need your commitment now that your
department will approve and provide transport for these people.
Do I have your word that you will make this happen?
Secretary Blinken. We are committed, Congresswoman, to
working with you and to working with every other member on
securing the safe transport for people that you identified and
that seek to leave Afghanistan, so we will work directly with
you on that, but I remind you that we do not control who leaves
the country.
Ms. Kim of California. That is why--Secretary Blinken, you
do not understand. If we do not do anything right now, even for
another day, these people are in grave danger. I need your
commitment now.
You are a Department. Your office have all these
information. We just need your commitment right now that you
will work with them.
Secretary Blinken. I have here,--it may be hard to see on
the screen. These are all the cases, and I am--no, from the--
from members of this committee that we are working on. We have
had 26,000. We have responded to 21,000 of them and we are
working on every single case to the best of our ability.
But what we are trying to do right now is to put in place a
system that recognizes people who can leave, making good on
commitments that have been made to us in the international
community by the Taliban, and to get that system moving. That
involves the airport, it involves land crossings in three
different countries, and it involves working with different
groups and organizations so that we can get this and get this
moving, and we are committed to doing that wherever we possibly
can.
Chairman Meeks. The gentlelady's time has expired.
I now recognize Representative Kathy Manning of North
Carolina who is the vice chair of the Subcommittee on the
Middle East, North Africa, and Global Counterterrorism for 5
minutes.
Ms. Manning. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Mr.
Secretary, for your patience and for your service on behalf of
our country and the American people.
Mr. Secretary, prior to this hearing, I read the agreement
reached between the Taliban and the Trump administration, and I
was shocked. Basically, President Trump agreed to withdraw all
troops, all coalition partners, all civilian personnel by May
1. He agreed to release 5,000 prisoners to work with the U.N.
to lift the sanctions against the Taliban, to seek economic
cooperation for the reconstruction of Afghanistan, and to
refrain from the threat or use of force against Afghanistan or
intervene in its domestic affairs.
In exchange, the Taliban agreed to release up to a thousand
prisoners. It agreed not to allow its members to attack our
personnel on the way out and not to allow Afghanistan to be a
base for the training or fostering of terrorists against the
U.S. in the future.
I did not see any demand for the protection of Afghan women
and girls. I did not see any guarantees that the Taliban will
prosecute anyone who commits atrocities against women or girls
or Afghan men, for that matter. I did not see any commitment by
the Taliban to prosecute people who take steps to attack the
United States or any of our citizens. The Trump administration
did not leave you with much to work with, did they?
Secretary Blinken. Not much.
Ms. Manning. Nevertheless, Mr. Secretary, you have stated a
commitment to the safety and well being of Afghan women and
girls, and I am proud that this committee passed a bipartisan
resolution that I authored to support these women at risk.
Unfortunately, the Taliban recently announced that they
have abolished the Ministry of Women's Affairs, replacing it
with a Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of
Vice. Certainly this is a very worrisome sign, as is the lack
of any women in the Taliban's interim government.
Representative Spanberger has detailed videos and news
reports of atrocities that are already taking place.
Do you plan to assemble an international coalition to hold
the Taliban accountable for the treatment of women and girls in
Afghanistan? And can you tell us how you plan to monitor their
safety, and how can the coalition be effective in ensuring
those protections?
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Thank you, Congresswoman, and in
short, the answer is yes. And, in fact, we have already been
doing that. We put together a group of leading countries. I led
a meeting with about 22 of them, as well as NATO, the European
Union, and the United Nations on the expectations of the
international community when it comes to the Taliban-led
government's conduct to include upholding the rights of women
and girls and minorities.
And so there is a clear understanding. It is also enshrined
in a U.N. Security Council resolution that we initiated and got
passed, and that has some real meaning to it beyond the fact
that it is a resolution because there are significant U.N.
sanctions on the Taliban.
There are travel bans and other things that if the Taliban
is in violation of this U.N. Security Council resolution, to
the extent it wants to see those sanctions lifted or travel
bans lifted, that is not going to happen.
There are many other points of influence and leverage, and
overall, we have made very clear, not just us, countries around
the world, including many leading countries have made very
clear that the Taliban's conduct will dictate whether they get
any support or any legitimacy whatsoever from the international
community. And that conduct goes among, other things,
critically to how it treats women and girls.
Ms. Manning. Mr. Secretary, this committee met over Zoom
with brave and highly intelligent Afghan women who told us they
were determined to stay in Afghanistan and fight for the soul
of their country. These extraordinary women who held important
professional, educational, and governmental positions in
Afghanistan, should they find themselves targeted by the
Taliban, will we have their backs? Will our country be willing
to help these women and their families escape to safety?
Secretary Blinken. We would do everything within our means
to have their backs, and so would many other countries around
the world with whom we are working. And we look forward also to
working with you in Congress to make sure that we have every
possible tool to support these women.
Ms. Manning. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I know my time is
almost up, so I just want to encourage you to please do
everything you can to speed up the SIV processing and to
provide assistance to those whose documents, whose passports,
documents, applications were destroyed in the embassy in the
tumult of the evacuation.
And, again, thank you for your service.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Jim Costa of
California for 5 minutes.
Mr. Costa. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank
you, Mr. Secretary, for staying the entire length of time so
all of us could answer our questions and for your service to
our country.
In listening to the hearing today, I am reminded that the
old adage that we try in America to limit politics at the
water's edge. With all the finger pointing that has been taking
place, this maybe a thing of the past. But I would like to
focus on the current situation with the P-2 process and the P-
1s. We have been trying to work with the State Department, and
we have, frankly, been frustrated. What is the extent that the
administration is exploring options for in country or virtual
processing for P-2 humanitarian patrol applicants?
Secretary Blinken. We are looking at all of that,
Congressman, and I would very much appreciate working with you,
working with your office, and if that is not happening, we will
make sure that we fix it. But we are looking at everything to
figure out how can we--whether it is an SIV or whether it is a
P-1 or P-2 streamline, expedite, consistent, of course, with
our security.
Mr. Costa. Like a lot of my colleagues, I have a lot of
constituents, and we have a hospital that an NGO group here in
the California valley has sponsored for women and children over
the last 13 years. Seventy-five percent of the physicians and
nurses are women. Excuse me, 40 percent of them are women and
children. They are in great fear. They are minorities in the
country, and they have been trying to find a way out.
Are you considering fast tracking the P-2 applicants? And
what is the process date the department is looking at scaling
up on the high volume of these applicants, and what sort of
infrastructure? I mean, it is not equipped to handle, and will
the department's--will the State work--will you expedite any
humanitarian patrol petitions, parole petitions, and how long
is that process for State to finish.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. We are looking at all of that. I
want to come back to you and come back to Congress on some of
the ideas that we have for doing that as well as looking at
what resources would be needed to do that because I think we
are going to need more support, and this goes across the SIV
program to P-1, P-2.
Mr. Costa. Who would be the key person that our office
would work with you folks at State?
Secretary Blinken. I am going to have the head of
Legislative Affairs in the first instance, her office followup
with you and your office, and we can take it from there.
Mr. Costa. It has been very frustrating. There are about,
you know, almost 200 individuals with their families that are
kind of in just great frustration and fear of their lives,
frankly----
Secretary Blinken. Yes.
Mr. Costa [continuing]. Notwithstanding all the good work
that they have done. And so, you know, I am just reminded of
the fact that it seems like with what the State Department
maybe has not been able to do, and I know you have made a great
effort, a humanitarian effort in the evacuation.
But I am working with other folks, and it seems like a
modern underground railroad of some kind is taking place with a
lot of third parties trying to get people by any means to the
Uzbekistan border or to Tajikistan. How do you see that
continuing, and with great risk, I might add.
Secretary Blinken. Yes. Look. I think that there are people
who are doing extraordinary things to try to help get people
out of Afghanistan who want to leave, whether it is NGO's,
individuals, veterans groups, and others. Wherever possible, we
want to make sure that we are coordinated. We want to make sure
that we are doing whatever we can to support these efforts.
But we are also working, Congressman, to make sure to the
best of our ability that we have in place an overall process,
and an overall understanding that will allow people to leave
openly and freely with the necessary documents. That would be
the best way to do this.
Mr. Costa. Right. But you are processing these P-2
applicants, and getting some understanding by the Taliban is
obviously key to that happening.
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Costa. And so let me just close on this, on the bigger
picture at 20,000 feet. You have been asked this question, and
please get back to us because these brave people are in great
fear of their lives.
Last night I do not know if you saw it, but CNN did a great
presentation, 2 hours of 20 years of Afghanistan, was it worth
it, under four different administrations. And I remember
meeting with Malakey the third time in 2010. I made the same
comment that was made earlier. How do you expect to create
Democratic institutions where corruption in this part of the
world is endemic, it is a way of life, and he gave me a BS
answer. What is the lessons to learn here that you have gotten,
and you cannot answer that in 10 seconds, but----
Secretary Blinken. Well, I think one of them is exactly the
one you just cited, Congressman, which is when you have got
corruption corroding everything that you are trying to do, it
makes it a lot harder, if not impossible, but that is certainly
something we need to followup on.
Mr. Costa. Look forward to working with you. Thank you.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Juan Vargas
of California who is the vice chair of the Subcommittee for the
Western Hemisphere, Civilian Security, Migration, and
International Economic Policy for 5 minutes.
Mr. Vargas. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I want
to thank the Secretary. Mr. Secretary, I appreciate the words
that you said that you were working with the veterans groups in
particular. We stood up--not we. The veterans stood up an
incredible group here in San Diego and did heroic work as they
did when they were serving.
I hope you continue to work with them and the State
Department as a whole. They know the interpreters. They know
the people that helped them. And, again, they did magnificent
work obviously as soldiers, as airmen, as Marines, and they are
doing magnificent work now as citizens trying to help those
that helped us.
Secretary Blinken. Sure. I agree with you. Yes. Thank you
for underscoring that. I very much agree, and we are doing
everything we can do work closely with them. As I mentioned, I
met with about 75 veterans groups about 10 days ago, and our
leadership has been engaged with them across the board as well
as the Pentagon and others, so thank you.
Mr. Vargas. Well, good. The one thing that we have kind of
talked around a little bit but haven't really hit square on is
the issue of intelligence, and obviously, this is not a
classified briefing.
But you did bring up the notion that while the briefing had
stated that we thought that it would be 2 years, potentially, I
think you said, 18 months to 2 years before the collapse. Then
you said the shortest time was maybe by the end of this year.
How many months would that have been? So what is the shortest
period?
Secretary Blinken. That, I believe, was an assessment that
was made in July, so 4 or 5 months, 6 months.
Mr. Vargas. I have to say I read all the classified
information. I went to all the briefings. I do not remember
anything shorter than that.
Secretary Blinken. I do not either, but look. I want to be
clear and be fair. You know, there are going to be individuals'
voices who may point to something different. As you know, you
try to do this with worst case scenarios as well as best case
scenarios and other scenarios, and you have to look across the
board at all of this. The question is, where does the kind of
weight of it land, and that is what I was referring to.
Mr. Vargas. What I remember and how I remember this, is all
the information that I read--and obviously some we cannot
discuss in this setting--but nobody said that they would
collapse in a month.
Secretary Blinken. That is correct.
Mr. Vargas. Nobody said they would collapse in 2 months.
There were some people that were saying that, you know, it
might go quicker than 6 months. But this was a real failure of
intelligence.
And my concern is this, that I believe that we could have
that same failure of intelligence with Iran and its nuclear
program. Again, I do not think that we are looking at this
wide-eyed and open-minded. I think that Iran, we are going to
wake up one of these mornings and find out that our
intelligence is very wrong there.
I think we have a very difficult time understanding these
religious fanatics and what they would do to either liberate
their country as they see it or to create the weapon of choice
as they see it. I do not think we have good intelligence on
them. I do not think we understand what they would be willing
to do, and it very much concerns me.
We can look at blame, and certainly I agree with Mr.
Malinowski. I was very upset when President Trump announced
that he had secretly invited the Taliban to come to Camp David,
and then the smiling pictures that we saw--and I hope you do
not do this--the smiling pictures that we saw with Pompeo and
the Taliban, saying that he looked into their eyes and he could
see that they were telling the truth and all that kind of crap.
I hope you do not do that. I hope you have wide eyes open and
not those starry eyes of Mr. Pompeo, looking into the eyes of
Taliban and saying, oh, yes, they are going to be good boys
this time. They are not.
But, again, I think our intelligence is lacking, and I do
not know how we can correct that.
Secretary Blinken. Let me just say, this is--look, this is
a collective responsibility, and I think all of us, whether it
is the intelligence community, whether it is the military,
whether it is the State Department, need to make sure that we
are doing everything we can to provide the best possible
assessments and feeding all of the information in and coming to
conclusions. So I think this is a collective responsibility,
and that is very important.
You know, Iran, there is lots that goes into that,
different things, but when it comes to what we put in place
through the agreement that is now no longer being adhered to,
the JCPOA, we actually had on the ground, eyes-on intelligence
inspections monitoring unlike any we have ever had, and that is
different than, you know, assessing someone's intent.
Mr. Vargas. Well, again, my time is almost up. I do thank
you for all the work that you have done, but, again, I do think
we got it all wrong with our intelligence. And I think we are
going to get it all wrong with Iran, and I think we are going
to pay a big price. But, again, I thank you for your hard work.
I appreciate it.
I yield back.
Chairman Meeks. I now recognize Representative Brad
Schneider of Illinois, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Schneider. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you
for hosting this critically important hearing.
And before I go any further, I want to remember and honor
the service and sacrifice of our military, as well as our
diplomats and others, who have served our Nation in Afghanistan
over the last 20 years.
As you, Chairman Meeks, noted at the top of this hearing,
800,000 people have served in our military operations in
Afghanistan. 2,461 U.S. personnel have given their life,
including, tragically, 11 Marines, one Army soldier, and one
member of the Navy who died at Hamid Karzai International
Airport last month.
I also want to acknowledge the tremendous effort expended
last month to coordinate the evacuation of more than 124,000
people from Afghanistan. Nevertheless, I know we are all
concerned to know that Americans and Afghani allies remain in
Afghanistan after our last troops left on August 31.
Mr. Secretary, as you have previously affirmed, our Nation
remains committed to help any American, as well as citizens of
allied nations and Afghans wanting to leave. I know this body
is counting on your commitment there, and please know that we
are prepared to assist in any way.
Mr. Secretary, I also want to thank you for staying for a
very long hearing to allow all of us to have a chance to speak
and ask questions. We have covered a lot of ground today, some
of it addressing very difficult issues.
Let's be clear. The current situation in Afghanistan and
the tragic events of this August were the consequence of
policies taking place over 20 years, not the policies or even
the events of the previous 20 weeks or even 20 months.
I can just touch on some of those, going back to the very
beginning, as was noted earlier, in December 2001, less than 3
months after the 9/11 attacks, the Taliban leader, Mohammad--
Mullah Mohammad Omar, reportedly offered to recognize the new
government and surrender their arms, but U.S. Secretary of
Defense Donald Rumsfeld rejected that.
We can go on into 2010 when we surged to 100,000 troops,
but in that, President Obama said that he would begin
withdrawing those troops within 18 months, which he did.
By 2010, the Obama Administration came to a sense that
there was no political--or no military solution and began low-
level negotiations with the Taliban in 2010.
Then jump ahead to last year in 2020, when the U.S. signed
an agreement with the Taliban after Donald Trump's
administration initiated the first high-level direct U.S. talks
with the Taliban.
In November of last year, President Trump ordered the
drawdown of our troops.
On January 15 of 2021, the number of U.S. Forces was at
2,500 troops, the lowest level since 2001.
And on April 14 of this year, President Biden announced
that though he would not have negotiated the deal that the
previous administration did with the Taliban, he would follow
through. And we know Kabul fell on August 14, and the last
troops left on August 31.
Mr. Secretary, I would like to focus a little bit on the
agreement that was struck in 2020. According to the agreement,
the Taliban was supposed to prevent terrorists from threatening
the U.S. and our allies which, of course, was a farce, given
the attack that we saw take place over the course of many
months.
My question is, under that agreement, how many prisoners
were released as a condition of the negotiations with the
Taliban?
Secretary Blinken. We prevailed upon--the previous
administration prevailed upon the Afghan Government to release
about 5,000 prisoners. The Taliban released about 1,000
prisoners.
Mr. Schneider. Did any of these prisoners play a leadership
role in the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan?
Secretary Blinken. It appears to be the case that some of
them played a significant role in leading military operations
in various parts of the country, yes.
Mr. Schneider. So, you know, jumping forward from the
agreement, as you said, it left an agenda without a plan--the
previous administration left an agenda without a plan.
Based on the 2020 agreement, what would have been the
implications of keeping U.S. troops in Afghanistan beyond the
deadline set?
Secretary Blinken. The implications were very clear,
Congressman. Had the President not made good on the agreement
reached by the previous administration, the attacks on our
forces and partner forces would have resumed, and the offensive
to take over Afghanistan's cities would have commenced.
And the result of that would have been that in order to
protect ourselves and to prevent the takeover of the country,
we would have had to have reintroduced a substantial number of
forces into Afghanistan, in effect, restarting and re-upping
the war, not ending it.
Mr. Schneider. So with the last couple of seconds, just to
quickly summarize, had we stayed beyond the deadline, we would
have had more troops than the 2,500 that started at the
beginning of this year. Those troops would have been at risk
and engaged in active conflict with the Taliban, likely
resulting in casualties to American forces, costs of both blood
and treasure for our country. Is that a fair statement?
Secretary Blinken. It is.
Mr. Schneider. My time has expired, but, again, I just
implore you, we must do everything we can to bring every
American home that wants to come home, all of those special
immigrant visa applicants seeking to come to the United States
after vetting----
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Schneider [continuing]. Anything we can do to help you,
please let us know.
Secretary Blinken. Thank you.
Chairman Meeks. The gentleman's time is expired.
Member questions are now concluded.
I want to first thank Secretary Blinken for his testimony,
his patience, and his time here today. He has been accessible
to this committee, and we look forward to continuing the
relationship that we have as we utilize our oversight
responsibilities.
And as I close, I think it is important to recognize that
our actions have consequences, and many times these actions are
not easily reversible.
The Trump administration's excluding the Ghani government,
while legitimizing the Taliban through direct negotiations,
fundamentally altered the power of the country. The deal the
Trump administration struck with the Taliban forced the Afghan
Government to release 5,000 prisoners. It was a deal they
failed to obtain a commitment for a cease-fire or a commitment
to not attack the Afghan Government, and that failed to obtain
a commitment from the Taliban to separate from al-Qaeda.
In exchange, the Trump administration agreed to withdraw
all of our troops, to include all nondiplomatic personnel, by
May 2021. There was a consequence to this agreement and
consequences of the policy decisions that were made throughout
the 20 years our military was deployed in Afghanistan.
When I first became chair of this committee, I said that
the American foreign policy is in desperate need of humility,
and that includes understanding the limits of U.S. military
intervention.
And at the start of this hearing, I cited how many
Americans were killed over 20 years of war in Afghanistan. But
that alone does not capture all the full human cost.
Those numbers do not capture the family members and friends
forever changed by this conflict. It does not capture the
suffering endured by Afghan civilians trapped in the middle of
a civil war.
The costs of war are immeasurable, and not just the human
toll. Last year alone resulted in 17 veteran suicides a day, on
average. We could not ask our servicemembers to fight overseas
without a clear, winnable objective.
As Members of Congress, this is our responsibility. In the
weeks and months to come, we will continue our oversight of
Afghanistan and take a sober look on how we got here for over
20 years of war and how we can prevent making the same
mistakes.
I also would be remiss if I did not say thank you, after 20
years, to all of our military and all of DoD. Thank you to the
State Department and all of our diplomats there. Thank you to
USAID, USAGM, the Department of Homeland Security, the DEA, the
CIA, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Justice,
the Department of Commerce, and of course, our Afghan allies
who stood side by side with us for 20 years. I want to thank
each and every one of them.
This is not the end. We will conduct, as I have stated
earlier, continue our oversight responsibilities, bringing in
individuals from the past administrations as we completely
oversee and look back and forward to what has been and should
be and will be in the future.
And, with that, this hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 7:22 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
APPENDIX
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STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD FROM REPRESENTATIVE CONNOLLY
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RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
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