Former US President Donald Trump slammed the Biden administration on Sunday for delaying withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan.
Biden earlier this week announced that he will withdraw US troops from Afghanistan by September 11. This comes as the US-Taliban agreement signed during Trump era requires the withdrawal to be completed by May 1.
“I wish Joe Biden wouldn’t use September 11th as the date to withdraw our troops from Afghanistan, for two reasons,” Trump said in an email statement as reported by Washington Examiner. “First, we can and should get out earlier. Nineteen years is enough, in fact, far too much and way too long. I made early withdraw possible by already pulling much of our billions of dollars of equipment out and, more importantly, reducing our military presence to less than 2,000 troops from the 16,000 level that was there (likewise in Iraq, and zero troops in Syria except for the area where we KEPT THE OIL).”
“Secondly, September 11th represents a very sad event and period for our Country and should remain a day of reflection and remembrance honoring those great souls we lost,” he continued. “Getting out of Afghanistan is a wonderful and positive thing to do. I planned to withdraw on May 1st, and we should keep as close to that schedule as possible.”
Meanwhile, Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan defended the president’s announcement on Sunday but said he “can’t make any guarantees” on whether the Islamic State will grow in power once US forces withdraw from Afghanistan.
“I can’t make any guarantees about what will happen inside the country. No one can,” Sullivan told Fox News. “All the United States could do is provide the Afghan security forces, the Afghan government, and the Afghan people resources and capabilities, training and equipping their forces, providing assistance to their government. We have done that, and now, it is time for American troops to come home and the Afghan people to step up to defend their own country.”
