Biden's legacy in Afghanistan, two years later
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Biden's legacy in Afghanistan, two years later
Afghan who worked for the U.S. Embassy begs for help from a refugee camp in Pakistan; Gold Star families find the ISIS bombing was preventable
Pres. Joe Biden released a statement Wednesday night to take an undeserved victory lap on the two-year anniversary of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. He doesn’t mention that in the rush to get the last plane out of the chaos, American citizens and Afghans who worked for our government were stranded at the airport.
Biden has surely forgotten who was left behind, but I stay in contact. The situation has gotten worse for most people, so it’s not safe for them for me to write more than I did at the one-year update.
U.S. Embassy employee left behind
One man, however, asked me to share his desperate efforts with you. You’ll remember Arash* as the USAID employee who went from a financial analyst in the U.S. Embassy in Kabul to squalor in a refugee camp in Pakistan with two small children.
Arash has recently been able to get some remote work as an accountant, but he’s desperate to get his family to a healthy, safe place.
Message from a refugee camp
Arash’s written English is beautiful, so I’m sharing his email directly in the block quotes.
My recent path revealed a heartrending truth: My escape from Afghanistan was not a triumphant journey to safety but a transition into another realm of challenges.
Our days in a refugee camp have been harsh; my children's health has deteriorated, and medical care remains elusive.
In this desolate place, our vulnerability is stark, our plea for safety resounding through the emptiness. Every day is a battle against despair, against fading dreams.
Refugees abandoned
Arash got his hopes up in March when he got an email below from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) that he believed would lead to an interview to process a visa for his priority refugee status.
His former USAID employers sponsored his visa because he couldn’t stay in Afghanistan after the Taliban member who had captured and beaten him was released from Bagram prison after the U.S. withdrew. Unfortunately, the email didn’t lead to anything more.
Our future hangs on a distant thread, the priority refugee program, and the specter of a P-1 visa application. Yet, silence persists.
Abandoning our allies
He emails me constantly, as well as others who he thinks can help him. He is determined to survive and give a better life to his sons. He wrote me last week:
It's as though the U.S. has forgotten us, abandoning us in a twilight zone of uncertainty. Amid the intricacies of diplomacy, the promise of rescue remains a distant glimmer.
We yearn for the moment when someone will break the silence, when the U.S. will remember us, when the warmth of human compassion will overpower the complexities.
Arash points out that my stories over the past two years about his plight are not because he’s unique. He’s one of thousands who worked for the U.S. and have been abandoned.
My journey reflects the struggles of thousands. Amid diplomatic complexities, rescue lingers, but hope endures. Let's unite for compassion, advocating for those left behind.
Biden’s legacy for Gold Star families
It was revealed in a new book that the criticism of the withdrawal “felt overheated” to Biden. He thought the chaos was “the inevitable consequence of a difficult decision.” He told this to an aide:
Either the press is losing its mind, or I am.
In more ways than one, Biden is losing his mind. Leland Vittert on the TV show “The Hill” on NewsNation asked me yesterday what I thought about Biden blaming the press for too much coverage. I said it was disgusting.
You can watch my take on Biden’s callousness compared to the Gold Star Families who testified on Capitol Hill this week in the video above.
ISIS bombing preventable?
Also, new documents acquired by NewsNation show that the ISIS-K suicide bomber who killed 13 young service members could have been stopped:
The documents also show U.S. officials knew an attack was imminent. Additionally, servicemembers described at least one request from intel officers for American forces to strike the ISIS-K cell before the attack, but the request was denied.
The Pentagon denied this. I will continue to track the developments.
A gift comes closer
Finally a bit of good news. I told you a year ago how honored I was to receive the award below from the group of over 150 Afghan allies I’ve been working with for two years. They wanted to send it to me, but I pleaded not to spend more money on shipping.
Well, the stone gift is now in the United States. As soon as I get it, I’ll tell you the whole amazing story of how it got here.
I just wish I could you about getting a valued human being to America instead of the lovely stone, but I am deeply grateful for all their efforts. (They still won’t let me pay for the shipping.)
Biden's legacy in Afghanistan, two years later
It's evident the regime merde is more considerate of their own political priorities than over the lives of the peoples who serve for the cause of America. The bureaucracy of this country is thick with slow gears which do not turn unless properly greased. Currently, I personally am undergoing the slow process of correcting my US Army records via the Army Board For Correction of Military Records. The Board decided my case 22 May 2023, in my favor. I am awaiting the Fort Drum MEDDAC Physical Evaluation Board to process my case to get the correct decision made. They already have the evidence, and the PEB Liaison Officer has informed me that the MD in the case has already determined I should have been properly med boarded before I was discharged from the Army in 1991. I just need two interviews via telephone with the Fort Drum MEDDAC personnel. MEDDAC means US Army Medical Department Activity. I tell my own tale only to illustrate the grind of bureaucracy to correct a more than 30 year injustice. This same damned bureaucracy is partly to blame for the plight of your friend Arash and others. The so called fog of war? As for Bidens mental competence, he barely is compis mentis. Biden prefers to have his ice cream and his naps and have the titular benefits of the US Presidency over doing the actual labor. Seems Obama also might have had a similar mindset, though Barrack has better mental acuity and is more deliberate in the disagree and commit management paradigm used by Amazon and the determinism of the totalitarian regimes.
After the Viet Nam bugout, one of the barriers to refugees coming to the US was the need for sponsors. Is that a problem now?