Kirby: ISIS-K ‘Trying to Re-Constitute’ ‘Particularly in Afghanistan’ and Counterterrorism There Will Be ‘Harder’ Post-Withdrawal

On Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Your World,” Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said that ISIS-K, “particularly in Afghanistan, is trying to re-constitute. They are trying to grow their capability.” And that while America does have over-the-horizon counterterrorism capabilities in the region, “we don’t have boots on the ground in Afghanistan, certainly, that’s going to make the job harder.”

Kirby stated, [relevant remarks begin around 5:00] “[W]e’ve talked about the fact that, even though we don’t have boots on the ground in Afghanistan, certainly, that’s going to make the job harder. We’ve been very honest about that. But we do have over-the-horizon capabilities available to us in the Central Command region. Again, we showed a little bit of that last night and we’re going to keep an eye on Afghanistan. … ISIS-K, particularly in Afghanistan, is trying to re-constitute. They are trying to grow their capability. They do have — they have suggested intent to attack the west and to attack our homeland. So, we’re very mindful of that threat. We’re watching it very, very closely. And again, we’re going to continue to look for all kinds of different ranges of capabilities available to us in the region and outside the region to prevent that from happening.”

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