in. more military vehicles are on display and there are fighter jets above and all day we ve been watching groups of afghans escorted on to base, taken to processing centers and planes taking off in a somewhat regular schedule. a much smoother evacuation process than the absolute bedlam that we saw here a couple of days ago. but this is an island just outside of this space, the taliban controls and around the perimeter of the base itself there are afghans who are desperate to get out. afghans do not want to live under taliban rule who are trying to get in, pushing to get in. the taliban is continuing to promise people, continuing to say that everything will be all right and once again today they said that women can work, that there will be free expression saying that it has to be in accordance with islamic law, but many don t believe the taliban which is why they want to leave and yesterday we saw the first tiny protest, a few very brave
afghan women going out on the streets holding placards saying women s rights must be defended and today in the city of jalalabad, some afghans went out and they were carrying the old afghan flag, the multi-colored afghan flag saying that s their flag, the national flag and not the taliban flag. according to witnesses, taliban opened fire and killed at least three of them. so far on this base today things seem to be moving more smoothly. richard engel with the situation on the ground in kabul and general mccaffrey, i ll go right to you picking up from what we heard from richard that the taliban leaders seem to be saying all of the right things rid now, but in less than two weeks, this air light of and extraction operation is supposed to be over. i guess my question is is this over when we decide it s over or when the taliban decides it s over and do we have the military and logistics capacity to get everyone we need to get out before that happens?
good day. this is andrea mitchell reports. i m garrett haake in washington where president biden is feeling intense political pressure two critical fronts. first, on afghanistan the president getting a briefing from defense secretary lloyd austin and joint chiefs chairman mark milley this morning as the mass exodus of americans, foreign nationals and afghan citizens with visas continues. with some people arriving at dulles airport in northern virginia. and new from the u.s. embassy in afghanistan, a message from kabul that they cannot ensure safe passage to karzai international airport for flights departing the country. there are serious concerns over whether taliban forces will allow thousands of u.s. citizens and afghans outside of the country before the august 31st withdrawal deadline. on the coronavirus we will hear from the president this afternoon as the delta variant is fueling the largest seven-day average in cases in six months, spurring the nation s top health
hours there have been 19 u.s. military transport aircraft that have come in carrying troops and some equipment and 19 that have gone out. they ve carried about 2,000 passengers out. the numbers are confusing, garrett. so i m not going to go too much into them and we know that it includes hundreds of american citizens and it includes afghans and nato ally partners. so the efforts to get people out of the country are flowing now. the ultimate goal here or the ultimate capacity that the u.s. military has is they could fly one plane in and out every single hour within a capacity of upwards of 9,000 people every day out of kabul international airport. it s not an airlift issue that they have to get these people out. it s the other issues and the other logistical problems that we ve been hearing about and one of the biggest ones is getting people to the airport safely so they can get on these aircraft and get out. once they get to the airport, if
their military counterparts in the taliban and talking about safe passage to get to the airport and potentially have safe passage to afghans and that opens up an entirely new set of problems with having the afghans move through as general mccaffrey was explaining can they move through the taliban check points and it doesn t appear to be the case yet. i m glad you mentioned those conversations in theater and that was one of the most fascinating things we saw in the briefing. peter, the biden administration is trying to send the right messages responding to the circumstances on the ground including a joint statement today calling on afghanistan s new leaders, the taliban to protect women and girls. you know how it is, the politics of this when you are responding you re shally losing and the president is trying to respond to pretty rough politics at home and take us through what the white house is reviewing these developments and what they ll do next. the white house has said that pol