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Evacuating 124,000 people. the war was a strategic failure. reporter: jengeneral mark miy making clear after donald trump lost the election he ordered an accelerated withdraw of u.s. troops before president joe biden took office. having already agreed with the taliban to fully withdraw. it was a decision milley said he was cut out of. that s why i went over to the white house with acting secretary miller and white house chief of staff kash patel to discuss that order. so i wasn t consulted on it. reporter: republican lawmakers went after the apparent contradiction between the jgeneral wanting 2,500 troos to stay and the president telling abc news he didn t get that advice. in january of this year, were you of the opinion in your professional military judgment we should have maintained 2,500 troops, u.s. troops? yeah, my assessment that i read in the opening statement remained consistent. did that professional military opinion change over the ....
let me put it this way. talking about the neo? let me go back further. in january of this year were you of the opinion in your professional military judgment we should have maintained 2500 u.s. troops and support coalition effort and contractors in afghanistan? my assessment that i read in the opening statement remained consistent and did that professional military opinion change over the course of the next few months? not until presidential decision and i rendered my opinions and it was a full debate on all of that. once decisions are made i m expected to execute lawful orders. you ve made that very clear. when the troop levels were ordered to be drawn down to zero first stopping 650 as general mckenzie outlined was that your decision or the general s decision to draw down ....
Chief of staff cash patel to discuss that order. so i wasn t consulted on it. republican lawmakers went after the apparent contradiction between the general s wanting 2500 u.s. troops to stay and president biden telling abc news he didn t get that advice. in january of this year, were you of the opinion in your professional military judgment that we should have maintained 2,500 troops, u.s. troops? yeah, my assessment that i read in the opening statement remained consistent. did that professional military opinion change over the course of the next few months? not until the presidential decision, and i rendered my opinions, and it was a fulsome debate on all of that, and once decisions are made, then i m expected to execute lawful orders. milley was again attacked by republicans for calls he made to his chinese counterpart in october and january. milley said intelligence showed the chinese were worried about an american attack, so worried ....
To change the plan. if you re going to go to zero and you re going to keep enough forces to hold your embassy in the airfield, it is incompatible to hold another base anywhere in the country. that s a policy decision to hold bagram under that base. i did not see any tactical utility to bagram. general, isn t it true that the president rejected your best military opinion and advice as to how quickly to withdraw american troops from afghanistan? well, i will say this. it has been my view that we should that i recommended a level of 2500. it would have allowed us to hold bagram and other airfields. once you make a decision to go to zero, it is no longer possible to hold bagram. that remains my view now as it was then. thank you. and you said it would have taken ....
Miller as related to the end of 2021 troop levels in afghanistan? ranking member, i did. what was that advice? the advice, his view and my view were essentially the same. that we needed to maintain about 2,500 and we needed to work with our coalition partner. we had about 6,000 troops in there, nato and other core countries that would remain there. did your professional military opinion change over the course of the spring? it did not. did you well, i know you communicate to the president. you said you did. were you present in the room when general miller s recommendations were relayed to the president? general miller was president in executive sessions that involved myself, the secretary here, the chairman, and the president. and those recommendations of the parties, as secretary austin said, were debated fully? they were debated fully. i felt that my opinion was heard with great thoughtfulness by the president. well, you know, secretary austin just made the point ....