Rhodes: There Was ‘Very Rapid Deterioration’ in Afghanistan after Bagram Was Abandoned, It Caused ‘Lack of Capacity to Evacuate’

On Tuesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports,” Ben Rhodes, who served as Deputy National Security Adviser during the Obama administration, stated that once Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan was closed by the Biden administration, the situation deteriorated rapidly and there was “a kind of lack of capacity to evacuate Afghans in that window of time between President Biden’s announcement and the kind of chaotic withdrawal at the end of August.”

Host Andrea Mitchell asked, “I mean, this goes back, not just…[a] year ago when the last U.S. troops left, but the original agreement made by Donald Trump with the Taliban, the Trump administration, without factoring in that very flawed government in Afghanistan. But there’s a big but. The military did say, leave 2,500 troops. Don’t close Bagram Air Base. And that decision, a lot of the military officials whom I’ve spoken to say, was critical in the chaotic withdrawal. Ben?”

Rhodes responded, “Yeah, I think when you look back at the withdrawal, the two things that stood out were once Bagram was closed, which was such a hub for U.S. military activity, you saw a very rapid deterioration of the circumstance. And you also saw a kind of lack of capacity to evacuate Afghans in that window of time between President Biden’s announcement and the kind of chaotic withdrawal at the end of August. And therefore, they had to kind of get as many people out in that short window as they could.”

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