On the anniversary of 9/11, John Kirby, a spokesman for the White House National Security Council, dismissed concerns from veterans criticizing the failure to withdraw from Afghanistan, writing in a press inquiry from Fox News Digital that there was “no point” in weighing in on veterans' opinions.
“Obviously, there's no point in replying; there is indeed a 'handful' of veterans who all feel the same way,” Kirby said in a “reply all” email Wednesday afternoon that appeared to be addressed to White House staff, including Fox News Digital.
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House early Wednesday afternoon about critical comments from four veterans, including Rep. Corey Mills (R-Fla.), who slammed Kirby's Monday press conference for allegedly “covering up” the Biden administration's 2021 withdrawal.
The initial correspondence also included statements from the four veterans, and Fox News Digital asked the White House if it had anything to comment on Kirby and the veterans' scathing criticism of the White House's response to the Afghanistan withdrawal. The email chain was forwarded to White House staff on the National Security Council, and Kirby responded to all recipients by saying, “There's no point in replying.”
Kirby's message was sent in error, and he added to a Fox News Digital reporter, “Obviously, I didn't know you were in that chain.” Kirby sent the email while traveling with President Biden on the anniversary of 9/11.
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White House National Security Council Public Affairs Adviser John Kirby made the remarks at a regular press conference in Washington, DC on July 31. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Veterans quoted in the email slammed Kirby for “turning a blind eye” to the Biden administration's disastrous 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan after House Republicans released a scathing report this week on the one-year anniversary of the failed withdrawal.
“At the end of the day, the Biden-Harris Administration has chosen politics over strategy, and Kirby, who can no longer be trusted to manage their shopping list, is now trying to take their place,” Mills, an Army veteran, said in comments to Fox News Digital.
Rep. Mike McCaul of Texas, the Republican chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, released a report this week disputing President Biden's assertion that he is bound by an agreement made under former Trump's administration to withdraw from Afghanistan by 2021. The report added that there are no plans to support Americans and allies as long as there are still troops in the region.
McCaul's report argued that the administration failed to adequately respond to the terrorist threat in the wake of the Abbey Gate bombing at Kabul airport that killed 13 U.S. troops and more than 150 Afghan civilians, and that after the withdrawal, the Taliban likely had access to $7 billion worth of abandoned U.S. military weapons and up to $57 million in U.S. military funds initially provided to the Afghan government.
Kirby appeared at a White House press conference on Monday to defend the Biden-Harris administration's withdrawal, while arguing that the new report “says little or nothing new.”
Kirby listed the “actual facts” surrounding the withdrawal and argued that the Trump administration had struck a deal with the Taliban “that mandates a complete U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.”
“President Biden faced a stark choice when he took office: stick to the flawed agreement and end the longest war in American history, or abandon the agreement and extend the war, with far fewer U.S. troops returning to fight the Taliban,” Kirby said. “He chose the former, buying himself time until the summer to prepare for a withdrawal that has made us a safer nation.”
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Mills said Kirby was “taking a blind eye” to the White House's “failed foreign policy,” noting that the House Foreign Affairs Committee last year threatened to subpoena Secretary of State Antony Blinken over a July 2021 dissenting cable from 23 diplomats that proposed disaster mitigation measures as the Taliban gained power ahead of a U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
“John Kirby is once again distracting from the Biden-Harris Administration's failed foreign policy. If there was true transparency, why did HFAC threaten contempt for Secretary of State Blinken's deliberate concealment of State Department cables of opposition from 23 U.S. embassy diplomats who warned that the Administration's strategy would allow the Taliban to advance, leading to the collapse of the Afghan government and the loss of American lives? They knew this and tried to cover it up. This is not ignorance, but deliberate, complete lack of transparency, prioritizing political perspective over strategy and security. This Administration knew exactly what they were doing, tried to hide it, and was found out. Worse yet, their actions cost the lives of 13 American soldiers and severely undermined our confidence in our allies. They welcomed aggression from a hostile nation and showed geopolitical weakness,” Mills said.
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Rep. Corey Mills, Republican of Florida, addressed reporters on behalf of former President Trump outside Manhattan Criminal Court in New York on May 14. (David Dee Delgado/Getty Images)
Mark Geist, a former Marine and member of the security team at the Benghazi annex who helped rescue more than 100 Americans from the Taliban in 2021, told Fox News Digital that Kirby offered a “one-sided presentation of the facts” and claimed the U.S. wanted to end the war in Afghanistan in order to “start and fund the war in Ukraine.”
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“At a press conference, John Kirby provided a one-sided presentation of facts and falsehoods regarding the recent House report on Afghanistan. Let me start with the last part Kirby said, which was probably entirely true: we pulled out of Afghanistan because we wanted to start and fund the war in Ukraine, knowing full well that the American people would not tolerate being drawn into two wars again,” Geist said.
A U.S. Marine lifts an infant over a barbed wire fence during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, August 19, 2021. (Omar Haidiri/AFP via Getty Images)
The deaths of 13 U.S. soldiers prompted critics of the Biden-Harris administration, including Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), to say the withdrawal paved the way for hostile countries, such as Russia, to invade Ukraine. The war in Ukraine is ongoing, as is Israel's war with Hamas.
Stuart Scherer, another veteran and author of “Crisis of Command,” told Fox News Digital that the botched withdrawal “will be studied for generations as a classic example of failure at the National Security Council level.”
Scheller argued that President Biden's announcement that the US would withdraw completely from Afghanistan by September 11, the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, was a “propaganda stunt.”
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Taliban fighters celebrated the third anniversary of the U.S.-led withdrawal from Afghanistan in Kabul on August 14. (AP Photo/Sidiqullah Alizai)
“Biden picked the arbitrary date of September 11th as a PR stunt that forced U.S. troops to withdraw at the peak of Taliban fighting. He decided to abandon Bagram Air Base, even though Trump's plan outlined the need to preserve this critical area. He left 7,000 prisoners in Bagram prison, but the Taliban later released them. Biden allowed the Taliban to use them as external guards. He authorized an attack on the 'enemy' after a suicide bombing that killed only women and children. He put billions of dollars of equipment in the hands of the Taliban and needlessly allowed the murder of thousands of our Afghan partners,” he said.
Scherrer was arrested and eventually discharged from the Marines after a series of videos in which he lambasted military brass for the failed withdrawal.
“I am proud of my ability to identify mistakes and planning flaws in real time, and it still pains me that I lost my career because of it. Retired Navy Admiral John Kirby represents a morally weak military class that will repeat a story verbatim for personal advancement. These politicians in uniform have shown time and time again that they fear an honest assessment of failure,” he said.
Chad Robichaux, a former Marine reconnaissance officer and Afghanistan veteran, added in comments to Fox Digital that Kirby had traded “his oath to the Constitution and the American people” for “loyalty to Washington elites and partisan politics.”
Harris conspicuously skipped a public memorial for soldiers killed in the Afghanistan withdrawal she supports.
Vice President Kamala Harris embraced President Biden during a campaign event at IBEW Local 5 in Pittsburgh on September 2. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
“The facts are that Biden and Harris went against the advice of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, military and intelligence advisors and chose to abandon Afghanistan and abandon Bagram Air Base, the most strategic military location globally, located between Iraq, Iran, Russia and China. Worse, they did it before evacuating Americans or our allies. We left behind 20 million women and girls in sex slavery. We left behind billions of dollars worth of sensitive equipment and technology. We left behind biometric systems to identify our allies. And since then, we have paid the Taliban up to $87 million per week, mostly in cash, to jihadists who are sanctioned by the U.S. government, four of whom are in the top 10 on the FBI's most wanted list,” he said.
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National Security Council spokesman John Kirby made the remarks at a regular White House press briefing on May 28. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
“It is shameful to lie to the American people who served in uniform in order to cover up the atrocities of politicians,” he added.
After Kirby accidentally replied to everyone, his office released a public statement about Monday's press conference, saying he stood by what he “said in the briefing room.”
“I know not all veterans agree with them, but I stand by what I said in the briefing room — it was the report itself that was cherry-picked. And most importantly, with the longest war in American history over, those who still serve in uniform are better positioned to address the threats we face today,” Kirby said.
House Democrats on the Foreign Relations Committee released their own memo shortly after the Republican report this week, accusing Republicans of criticizing the Biden administration's withdrawal for political purposes.
“When former President Trump took office, there were approximately 14,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan,” wrote Rep. Greg Meeks, D-New York. “Days before leaving office, he ordered a further reduction to 2,500. President Trump has begun an irreversible withdrawal without sending significantly more U.S. troops to Afghanistan to prepare for renewed combat with the Taliban.”
Veterans critical of the withdrawal lamented that Afghanistan had fallen back into the hands of terrorists.
“Al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan have grown from four to 52, and the Biden-Harris Administration is funding this with American taxpayer dollars,” Robichaux said in comments to Fox Digital.
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“So tell me, John Kirby,” Robichaux added, saying he would never call his spokesman an “admiral,” asking, “How is this in the best interest of American national security or the world?”
Fox News Digital's Greg Wehner and Landon Mion contributed to this report.
