DETROIT — Former President Donald Trump said Monday at a National Guard Association conference that he would fire all senior military and diplomatic officials involved in the 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal fiasco, hours after offering condolences to the 13 service members killed in an ISIS attack during the failed withdrawal.
The 78-year-old Trump, speaking to an audience of part-time soldiers on a day when he slammed the Biden-Harris administration over the withdrawal of U.S. troops and the subsequent Taliban reoccupation of Afghanistan, told them that voters “are going to fire Kamala and Joe on November 5th.”
“Once I take office, I will call for the resignation of every senior administration official,” the Republican candidate added. “I intend to have the resignation letters of every senior administration official involved in the disaster in Afghanistan on my desk by noon on Inauguration Day.”
“You know, people have to be fired. People have to be fired if they’re not good at their jobs,” Trump added. “They have to be fired like on ‘The Apprentice’… They’ve done a terrible job. They’ve done a terrible disservice to our country. When that happens, they get fired.”
On Aug. 26, 2021, ISIS-K suicide bomber Abdul Rahman al-Logari detonated an explosive vest outside the Abiy Gate of Hamid Karzai International Airport, killing service members and about 200 Afghans, the most devastating incident in a hasty evacuation that has left hundreds of U.S. citizens and Afghan allies facing a brutal Islamic fundamentalist regime.
A House Republican-led committee heard testimony that Biden ignored the advice of diplomats and insisted on completing the withdrawal before the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, even though no military or other government officials lost their jobs because of the disaster.
A State Department report from June last year said officials were not prepared to handle more than 125,000 evacuees at once because diplomats had been instructed to “continue embassy operations based on the belief that the security situation in Kabul would not deteriorate significantly for several months at the earliest.”
In fact, the Taliban recaptured Afghanistan just over two weeks after the withdrawal was announced.
“Nobody gets fired in this administration,” Trump complained. “It’s amazing how much bad stuff is going on. Nobody gets fired. The problem is, whenever you fire somebody, they write a book about you. There are more books written about me. I fire a lot of people who don’t do a good job.”
Just before Trump spoke, a video message featuring his one-time rival, Biden, drew muted applause from conference attendees.
“You guys stood up and you were always there,” Biden said in the video, mentioning his late son, Beau, who served in the Delaware Army National Guard.
Trump stressed that he would have withdrawn from Afghanistan with “dignity and strength” and maintained that he “never” “abandoned” Bagram Air Base, which he claims is now occupied by China.
“We will never forget the brave warriors who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country,” the former president said, adding that he will “honor their memory by rebuilding a government that puts the American people first.”
“The humiliation of Afghanistan has caused the collapse of America’s credibility and respect around the world,” Trump added. “Our country will never be safe until we fire those responsible for this disaster.”
