Filenews 27 August 2021
The end of the mission in Afghanistan, with the death of 13 American soldiers, is turning into a disaster scenario for US President Joe Biden, who is facing the most serious crisis of his presidency so far and looks as if he has been paralyzed by a situation he had not seen coming.
In his statements to the cameras yesterday, Thursday, several hours after the double suicide attack that took place near Kabul airport, the 46th U.S. President makes no secret of his emotions pays tribute to the "heroes" who fell dead in the deadliest attack on U.S. forces since August 2011.
Although he is also increasingly criticised for avoiding journalists' questions, he fails to hide his irritation, closes his eyes and lowers his head as he hears a journalist from the conservative Fox News network ask him about his own "responsibilities".
As has often been the case in the last two weeks, Biden has been forced to change his agenda, postponing his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett by one day. "This is a big crisis that is occurring under his presidency," Ian Bremer, president of the expert firm Eurasia Group, told AFP.
"This is a failure of the intelligence services, it is a failure to plan, it is a failure of communications and it is a failure to coordinate with its allies," he noted. By his own admission, the president did not "predict" the speed with which the Afghan army, which was trained, armed and financed by Washington, would collapse and the fall of Kabul into the hands of the Taliban. And as was the case with the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement in May, his government gives the impression that it is failing to adapt to unforeseen circumstances on the international stage.
Moments of vacillation followed each other after the Taliban's victory on August 15, which took him by surprise at Camp David, the country house of U.S. Presidents. The initially silent 78-year-old U.S. Democratic President has since multiplied his statements, but has not been able to stop the criticism he receives. On Tuesday, his speech was delayed by about 5 hours as the world waited to know whether to give in to international demands to extend the deadline set for August 31 for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan -- and de facto also for the removal of foreigners and Afghans threatened with reprisals on the part of the Taliban. Biden finally confirmed that the deadline had been met. Low popularity.
Joe Biden, who was elected showing a unifying profile, confirmed the decision of his Republican predecessor Donald Trump to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan. But today he is being criticised by all sides for managing this withdrawal and for not organising the necessary evacuations earlier, forcing the US military to resend forces to manage in the midst of the chaos a gigantic air bridge, which was plunged into mourning yesterday following the attack by the jihadist group Islamic State.
"This tragedy should never have happened," Donald Trump, who had already called for Biden's resignation last week, said yesterday. "Joe Biden has blood on his hands," Republican Congressman Elise Stephanik added. "He is unfit to be in charge," he continued. Many observers draw a parallel with the Benghazi attack in 2012 that claimed the lives of the American ambassador to Libya and poisoned Barack Obama's administration. "I don't know if Biden will be permanently weakened" by the Afghan crisis, Mark Roma, a political science professor, told AFP.
"But the Republicans will do everything they can to make that happen," he added. The rain of criticism is confusing in the communication policy of the White House, which wants to focus on the advances of the president's gigantic economic plans--which are aimed at allowing the U.S. to "win" the game of competition with China, which is the only real priority of his foreign policy.
Biden's popularity has collapsed for ten days in the polls, although a large majority of Americans, tired of America's "endless wars", believe, like himself, that the US should withdraw from Afghanistan. For Charles Franklin, director of the polling institute at Marquette Law School, "the political issue, once we have completed the retirement, is to know if the majority will be satisfied that we have left." "If that happens, then the polemic can fade."
Joe Biden seems to be making that bet. "Ladies and gentlemen, it is time to put an end to twenty years of war," he said yesterday, closing his press conference.
CNA
