President Joe Biden claimed ‘no one is being killed’ and said he can’t ‘recall’ if he was told by advisers to keep troops in Afghanistan.
In an interview with ABC that aired Thursday morning, Biden said his advisers did not warn him to delay the troop withdrawal.
Despite reports of Taliban beating people rushing to the airport at least seven deaths during the chaos at Kabul’s airport, he claimed ‘no one’s being killed.’
ABC’s George Stephanopoulos said to Biden: “Your top military advisers warned against withdrawing on this timeline – they wanted you to keep about 2,500 troops.”
The president replied: “No, they didn’t. It was split. That wasn’t true. That wasn’t true.”
Stephanopoulos then asked: “They didn’t tell you they wanted troops to stay?”
“No, not in terms of whether we were going to get out in a time frame – all troops, they didn’t argue against that,” Biden said.
When asked about ‘pandemonium’ near the airport, Biden said: “Oh, there is. But, look – but no one’s being killed right now. God forgive me if I’m wrong about that, but no one’s being killed right now.”
There are at least 12 confirmed deaths since the Taliban took over the city on Sunday.
“We’ve all seen the pictures. We’ve seen those hundreds of people packed into a C-17. You’ve seen Afghans falling –“ Stephanopoulos said before being interrupted by the president.
“That was four days ago, five days ago,” Biden said.
“What did you think when you first saw those pictures: “Stephanopoulos asked.
“What I thought was we have to gain control of this,” Biden said. “We have to move this more quickly. We have to move in a way in which we can take control of that airport. And we did.”
According to reports, there were multiple warnings from officials who cautioned against a total troop pull out from Afghanistan.
On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Biden was aware of the risks of the withdrawal but went forward with it despite warnings and objections from his team.
Biden vowed to get Americans, allies, and interpreters out of Afghanistan.
“We got 1,000-somewhat, 1,200 out, yesterday, a couple of thousand today. And it’s increasing,” he said. “We’re gonna get those people out.”
EXCLUSIVE: Asked about July comment that a Taliban takeover was “highly unlikely,” Pres. @JoeBiden tells @GStephanopoulos, “there was no consensus” in the intelligence. “They said it was more likely to be by the end of the year.” https://t.co/NmBEmVRw8M pic.twitter.com/LSXSC51ox8
ADVERTISEMENT — Good Morning America (@GMA) August 19, 2021
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