“It’s time to bring our people back home.” “...to end America’s longest war.” “The US will soon complete its withdrawal of forces from Afghanistan.” “Taliban fighters have flooded the capital.” “There are American-made weapons in the hands of Taliban fighters.” “Many of the Afghans trying to escape actually helped American armed forces.” “It was quite clear that it was going to come to this.” BIDEN: I stand squarely behind my decision. After 20 years, there was never a good time to withdraw US forces. AZMAT KHAN: People are glued to their TV screens. It's chaotic. It is a mess. But to really understand how we got here, we have to go back to the beginning. So, for many Americans, Afghanistan is the “good war.” My name is Azmat Khan. I’m an investigative reporter. They see the war in Iraq as the one that was unjustified, going after something that didn't exist, these weapons of mass destruction. And they see Afghanistan as the place that was shortchanged because of Iraq. Michael McKinley. I was ambassador in Afghanistan. The decision to invade Afghanistan was directly related to the attacks on 9/11. “Osama bin Laden publicly declared war on the US.” “He openly bragged about his direct involvement in planning 9/11.” AZMAT KHAN: Osama bin Laden was in Afghanistan. BUSH: On my orders, the United States military has begun strikes. AZMAT KHAN: But once the bombing began, and in the lead-up to it, it was no longer just about, we want to have bin Laden. It was about the Taliban state. LAURA BUSH: The plight of women and children in Afghanistan is a matter of deliberate human cruelty. The fight against terrorism is also a fight for the rights and dignity of women. AZMAT KHAN: There were actually offers to turn over bin Laden by the Taliban. And the United States refused. They wanted a surrender directly to the United States. Now, shortly after the bombing campaign started, the Taliban fell fairly quickly. And by April of 2002, it was very apparent to the Americans that they couldn't just sweep in, overthrow a regime, and walk away. You needed to build a new government. This nation-building program that really prioritized counterterrorism. BUSH: We expect cells of trained killers to try to regroup, and try to undermine Afghanistan's efforts to build a lasting peace. AZMAT KHAN: This idea that, listen, we're going to take the gloves off, and we're really going to eradicate al-Qaeda. OBAMA: Good evening. Tonight, I can report to the American people, and to the world, that the United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of al Qaeda and a terrorist who’s responsible for the murder of thousands of innocent men, women, and children. MICHAEL MCKINLEY: The decrease in troop presence really dates from 2011. There was a sense that, overall, the threat of a terrorist attack against the United States from Afghanistan was greatly diminished. Part of what American forces in Afghanistan were doing became providing more formalized training, building up equipment, providing intelligence support, eventually providing air support... AZMAT KHAN: Afghan soldiers were supported by US aircraft that would fire on insurgents. Really, it was just air power that allowed the Afghan government to retain this tenuous hold in places where they weren't necessarily very popular. MICHAEL MCKINLEY: The Afghan security forces weren't evolving quite in the manner that was anticipated. AZMAT KHAN: At the same time, you also saw billions of dollars in reconstruction money pouring into a country without the kind of infrastructure to really handle that kind of money. That means building health clinics. It means building schools, bridges, roads. And more than that, that kind of reconstruction money, coupled with America's counterterrorism goals, was really a toxic mix. Partnering with very corrupt warlords, or local strongmen, who, in exchange for allowing you to build a school on this land, you would give us the contract for the health clinic right next door. I had US soldiers tell me things like, yeah, he was a warlord, but he was our warlord. Most media coverage from Afghanistan that Americans might hear often comes from urban cities, particularly Kabul. “From Kabul, Afghanistan.” “In the Afghan capital, Kabul.” But across the rural countryside, support for the Taliban gained ground, because of this massive campaign of airstrikes, of bombings, much of which have had high civilian death tolls. The Taliban had been defeated. And yet the American presence in Afghanistan brought them back from the dead. MICHAEL MCKINLEY: In the 2013-2014 period, the Taliban began to regain its footing. It was clear that every year they were making some advances, and they were operating primarily in rural and depopulated areas. AZMAT KHAN: US intelligence was either incredibly misrepresented or incredibly flawed. MICHAEL MCKINLEY: There was this growing concern, for example, with what is commonly called “ghost soldiers.” How many soldiers were actually on the rolls? Was it 330,000? Or was it several tens of thousands lower than that? And the real issue related to whether soldiers felt they were fighting for a government that represented them. AZMAT KHAN: It's talked about often that the Afghan government, and the particularly the president, was not coming to the negotiating table with the Taliban. “President Trump ordering a drawdown of troops.” “All US troops should leave Afghanistan by the end of the year.” “A very unpopular war here in the United States.” “President Joe Biden has decided the United States has seen enough of the war in Afghanistan.” AZMAT KHAN: So when the Biden administration announced that they would be continuing Trump's plan to withdraw, many Afghanistan watchers were poised for the Taliban to gain ground. The United States, which has been providing air power to Afghan forces, now, all of a sudden, that's no longer going to be something that Afghan forces can rely on. We saw them sweep through districts in places that were more rural and we saw an escalation of that in May of 2021. But I don't think anyone expected it to gain ground as quickly as it did. “It’s clear who is now in charge.” “The Taliban is sweeping the country.” “Here in Kabul, the city has collapsed. There’s no real security.” “As the Taliban solidify their control of the city and the country...” “...the Afghans who went above and beyond to help American servicemembers are stuck in limbo.” AZMAT KHAN: A large reason that many Afghans worked with the Americans, or other foreigners, was that many of them wanted a better life for their families, and hoped that it would one day lead to their being able to leave. And so, watching the Taliban come as suddenly as it did, knowing what their futures might be, it is a failure on the part of the US government.