advantage and it will continue to be as we try to control the terrorist elements that unfortunately now are going to grow. neil: you know, speaking of those terrorist elements, general, i appreciate you are just trying to educate us on what we re looking at here, i have heard explained, you know that isis k, they don t get along with the taliban at all. but i have heard others say, you know, as much as they hate each other, the thing that bonds them is that they hate us more. and that that will be the galvanizing force going forward. as it s lit up extremist social media, across the board. with huge differences between these various terror organizations. should that be our greatest concern right now. yeah. i mean, parsing threats into various degrees is a interesting endeavor for academics and pundits.
around the hamed karzai airport. when he made that decision, it created a vacuum. the taliban could not react quick enough to get in there and fill it so you not only have taliban throughout kabul right now, but you have a lot of terrorist elements that have come in that want to embarrass the taliban. they re not aligned with the taliban. that includes al-quaida, includes isis-k, those elements are there. the hakani network, all of them are vying to get power in that country to do a power-sharing with the taliban, who is the dominant force, but nonetheless, when these vacuums were created by this government, by our government, making a political decision to pull back in the manner that we did, with the rapid pace that we did, it did not serve our national security interests. now we re seeing the consequences of that price. because the intelligence that led up to the attacks today, we
the cia, other western intelligence operatives have been in the area for a long time. afghanistan is a famously chaotic place. there are a great many people with whom one can deal, particularly if one has a platform in the region and. so i don t think that us intelligence said it is entirely blind, but the situation is much more difficult. it the situation is much more difficult. , w the situation is much more difficult. , w ., difficult. it struck me when i read this report difficult. it struck me when i read this report today difficult. it struck me when i read this report today that difficult. it struck me when i read this report today that may - difficult. it struck me when i read this report today that may be - difficult. it struck me when i read i this report today that may be there are some areas in which the agency can work with the taliban because there clearly is no love lost between the taliban and isis, which is that they concern in the country. what the agency co
reporters are asking him are questions that he should be answering more directly than than giving answers about tactical, you know, operations today and what choices they have available to him. that s what you expect to hear from millee. i think right now they are trying to put a brave face on a bad situation and keep situation, keep the military force very focused on the critical and high-risk job that they have on the ground there. absolutely, a stunning moment as well certainly what we re dealing with operationally and that s what i want to talk to you about, general. two points that i thought were very interesting and trying to make sense of it. operationally, how did you make how the military described their capabilities is they want to secure the airfield and want to make sure they are protecting the airfields from the threat that could be posed by not just the taliban but perhaps other elements including terrorist elements that may want to seize on this chaos and attack amer
and finding a place and fighting for n nor honor. and patient. final question, general. what happens if afghanistan becomes a magnet for terrorists around the globe? do we then go back? if we see what s happening in afghanistan going forward that looks like, to your point, a redux of 9/11. al ptaliban was in control before 9/11. they had space that allowed al guide to grow, train, prepare and launch and execute the attacks of 9/11. we have to be able to have very good eyes, good intelligence as best we can now that the government in kabul is about the go away. we have to do our very best. if it looks like that various terrorist elements in