Biden Said This Would Not Happen

Biden And His Team At The White House, Pentagon, And State Department Repeatedly Said The Chaos And Collapse In Afghanistan We Are Now Seeing Would Not Occur

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THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION SAID THERE WAS NO IMMINENT THREAT OF A TALIBAN TAKEOVER 

• On July 8, Biden said “the likelihood there’s going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely” and that a Taliban takeover was “not inevitable.”
• On August 11 – a mere four days before Kabul fell to the Taliban – Biden State Department Spokesman Ned Price said it was still not a “foregone conclusion” that the Taliban would take over. 

THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION SAID THE AFGHAN GOVERNMENT WOULD NOT COLLAPSE

• On July 2, Biden said Afghan leaders had “the capacity to be able to sustain [their] government.” 
• On July 8, Biden said it was “not true” that the intelligence community had assessed that the “Afghan government will likely collapse.”
• On August 11, Press Secretary Jen Psaki said that “no particular outcome, in our view, is inevitable” when asked if “the entire Afghan government could collapse in as little as 90 days.”

THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION REPEATEDLY SAID THAT THE U.S. EMBASSY IN KABUL WOULD BE MAINTAINED

• In May, State Department Spokesman Ned Price said “We certainly plan to remain engaged diplomatically with the people of Afghanistan” and “retain an embassy on the ground of Kabul.”
• In May, Press Secretary Jen Psaki said “We will still have an embassy, at this point, in Afghanistan and a presence there at a diplomatic level.”
• In June, Secretary of State Antony Blinken stated “We are staying, the embassy is staying.”
• Less than 48 hours before the fall of Kabul, Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said “There is no intention right now to close the embassy . . . The situation in Kabul is calm right now.”

THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION SAID THIS WOULD NOT BE LIKE SAIGON

• In June, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley said “I don’t see Saigon 1975 in Afghanistan.” 
• In July, Biden said “There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of a embassy in the — of the United States from Afghanistan.”

THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION SAID THERE WOULD NOT BE A RAPID AND CHAOTIC WITHDRAWAL

• In April, Biden promised “we will not conduct a hasty rush to the exit” and “we’ll do it responsibility, deliberately, and safely.” 
• In June, Secretary of State Antony Blinken stated “I would not necessarily equate the departure of forces in July, August, or by early September with some immediate deterioration in the situation.”
  • Blinken: “And whatever happens in Afghanistan, if there is a significant deterioration in security… I do not think it is going to be something that happens from a Friday to a Monday.”