targets in afghanistan with that action is under way. missile explosions light up the nighttime skies. anti-aircraft tracers streak over the capital city kabul. the first wave, 50 tomahawk cruise missiles like these. 25 warplanes off the carl vincent and enterprise launched strikes from the indian ocean, and long-range bombers dropping precision-guided weapons, b firefighter 52s, b-1s, and these two b-2 stealth bombers seen here early this morning at whiteman air force base in missouri, flying more than 10,000 miles in 14 hours to drop their bombs. at the pentagon, defense secretary donald rumsfeld announces the shooting war against terrorism is on. the only way to deal with these terrorist threats is to go at them where they exist. the targets? the taliban military, air defense systems commanding bunker, air fields and bunkers
giving to the taliban. that is a decision 100 years from now will be studied at war colleges, as a colossal strategic mistake giving up two secure air fields, necessitated evacuation from a dense urban environment, a commercial airport, which led tragically to the suicide bombings and murders that killed 13 american servicemen and women. had we been investigating from bagram with secure perimeter, odds are high that attack wouldn t have happened or would have been far less sekeer in its consequences. secondly, the biden administration, giving the taliban a list of americans and of afghans we wanted out. third, the decision to leave americans behind. hundreds of americans, perhaps more, perhaps thousands.
that. but sadly that ideological extremism was combined with manifest incompetence. there were four decisions this admin stragsz made that was indefensible. abandoning the bagram airfield, giving it to the taliban. a decision 100 years from now will be studied at war colleges as a colossal strategic mistake giving up two secure air fields, necessitating evacuation from a dense environment, commercial airport, which led traj cally to the suicide bombings and murders that killed 13 american servicemen and women. had we been evacuated from bagram, odds are quite high that attack wouldn t have happened or would have been far less sekeer sekeer severe in its consekwens. secondly, biden administration giving the taliban list of
that we do not have personnel on the ground, we do not have air assets in the country, we do not control the airspace, whether over afghanistan or anywhere else in the region. does that work for you? i mean, the first call-out here, chris, is the fact that if they had fulfilled their promise for the evacuation and got everybody out by august 31st this wouldn t be a conversation we were having. in terms of security, there are plenty of u.s. air fields in the region where these aircraft can land and the passengers can be screened safely, get their first night s sleep without fear, and then come home back where they belong in the u.s. i understand why the security is a concern. flights out of any region which has an active isis presence or any other localized terrorist group, that is a threat we see across this region. but that is not in itself reason
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