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Secretary of State Antony Blinken listens during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Capitol Hill, in Washington, D.C., September 14, 2021. (Drew Angerer/Pool via Reuters)
Secretary of State Antony Blinken finally appeared before Congress on Wednesday to address the botched U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, insisting under questioning from lawmakers that the pull out actually strengthened America’s position on the world stage, pushing back against committee members who pointed out that the display of weakness likely emboldened adversaries like Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
Blinken testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee after refusing to appear for months and even going so far as to defy a Congressional subpoena to appear, prompting the panel to vote to hold him in contempt. The committee demanded that Blinken appear after investigating the Biden administration’s chaotic August, 2021 exit from Afghanistan. The committee’s report largely blamed the State Department for the failure, accusing Blinken and his subordinates of refusing to concede — and prepare for — the possibility that the U.S. backed Afghan government would crumble as American troops pulled out, despite repeated warnings from military brass and intelligence agencies.
Consequently, American forces rushed to pull out of Kabul as the Taliban advanced, leaving behind American citizens, U.S. allies, and billions in equipment, and handing the Taliban a massive propaganda win as images of U.S. incompetence spread around the world.
Asked whether that display of American fecklessness emboldened U.S. adversaries, Blinken insisted that the withdrawal had actually strengthened America’s position on the world stage by freeing up bandwidth to focus on other arenas.
“Do you see any connection between Putin’s re-invasion of Ukraine and the United States withdrawal from Afghanistan?” asked ranking Democrat Gregory Meeks of NewYork.
“No. On the contrary, I think our adversaries, including Russia, would have been delighted if we had doubled down and remained stuck in Afghanistan for another 20 years,” Blinken responded.
The outgoing secretary of state went on to point out that Putin initially invaded Ukraine in 2014, when the U.S. still had forces committed in Afghanistan and argued that the U.S. was successful in coordinating the allied response to Putin’s invasion this time around precisely because the administration was no longer tied down in Afghanistan.
Representative Andy Barr (R., Ky.) told Blinken that he had the causation backward, arguing that U.S. weakness invited Putin’s aggression, which then forced NATO members to come together in response.
“Your weakness invited Putin to move against Ukraine,” Representative Andy Barr (R., Ky.). “It signaled weakness and Put took advantage of it.”
“The reason NATO is stronger today is because of President Biden’s leadership. This alliance is bigger, it’s better resourced, it’s got more members, because of his leadership,” Blinken shot back.
While he spent most of the hearing playing defense, Blinken did strike a conciliatory note in addressing the families of the U.S. troops who were killed in a suicide bombing at Abbey Gate at the Hamid Kharzai airport in Kabul during the withdrawal.
“I think today, especially of the 13 heroes that we lost at Abbey Gate. And I deeply regret we did not do more and could not do more to protect them,” Blinken said. “And to those families who are here with us today, you’re in my thoughts and my prayers.”
One Gold Star family member attended the hearing, sitting right behind Blinken.
Outgoing House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Michael McCaul (R., Texas) did not mince words in addressing Blinken during his opening statement, accusing the secretary of state of prioritizing the Biden administration’s political agenda over the security of the nation.
“My only goal has been to work together to help prevent another such catastrophe from everhappening again. Instead, you prioritized this administration’s political agenda, touting thefailed withdrawal as a success,” McCaul said.
“This catastrophic event was the beginning of a failed foreign policy that lit the world on fire,” McCaul concluded, while asserting that peace can only come through strength.
The Foreign Affairs Committee report found that the State Department disregarded warnings that the Taliban was not living up to the terms of the Doha Agreement, which set the terms of the withdrawal, and ignored advice from high-ranking military officials to reconsider withdrawing.
The investigation also demonstrated that State Department officials did little contingency planning and called an emergency evacuation much too late given the circumstances. Keeping the U.S. embassy open and rapidly withdrawing troops were additional miscues highlighted by the committee’s report.
Amid the chaos of the withdrawal, the U.S. left weapons systems and classified documents behind that the Taliban later obtained, the State Department’s inspector general concluded. Blinken testified that officials began the process of destroying the classified documents at the beginning of August and carried out emergency destructions from August 12-14, 2021.
House Democrats largely pinned the blame for the Afghanistan withdrawal on the Trump administration’s negotiations with the Taliban that resulted in the Doha agreement. They similarly criticized Trump for releasing 5,000 Afghan prisoners and devising the Doha Agreement without a specific plan to carry out America’s exit from the country.
The hearing took place after months of obstruction from the State Department and a committee vote to hold Blinken in contempt of congress for refusing to comply with two subpoenas and testify. The committee also accused the State Department of obstructing its investigation by withholding relevant information and documents from the congressional panel, necessitating multiple subpoenas for documents needed during the investigation.
However, Blinken claimed the State Department cooperated extensively with the investigation through thousands of pages of documents, briefings, and over a dozen interviews from top officials.
A group of Anti-Israel protesters were gathered outside the hearing beforehand, and a few of them briefly disrupted proceedings before Capitol Police officers removed them from the hearing room. The protesters painted their hands red to represent blood and accused Blinken of killing children for supporting Israel’s war effort.
James Lynch is a news writer for National Review. He previously was a reporter for the Daily Caller. He is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and based in the Washington, D.C. area.