How Biden’s team overrode the brass on Afghanistan
The military spent more than a decade urging three different American presidents to stay in Afghanistan. With President Joe Biden’s decision this week to withdraw all U.S. forces by Sept. 11, they finally lost the battle.
“We cannot continue this cycle of extending or expanding our military presence in Afghanistan, hoping to create ideal conditions for the withdrawal and expecting a different result,” Biden said Wednesday in a speech announcing the decision. “I’m now the fourth United States president to preside over American troop presence in Afghanistan. Two Republicans, two Democrats. I will not pass this responsibility on to a fifth.”
As Biden weighed a full exit from the country this spring, top military leaders advocated for keeping a small U.S. presence on the ground made up primarily of special operations forces and paramilitary advisers, arguing that a force of a few thousand troops was needed to keep the Taliban in check and prevent Afghanistan from once again becoming a haven for terrorists, according to nine former and current U.S. officials familiar with the discussions.
Gen. Mark Milley, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as well as the four-star commanders of U.S. Forces-Afghanistan, Central Command and Special Operations Command, were emphatic proponents of this strategy, the current and former officials said, some of whom spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive planning.
“President Biden has made a judgment that those are manageable concerns and not as important as drawing American participation to an end, and so everybody shut up and did it,” said Kori Schake, the director of foreign and defense policy at the American Enterprise Institute.
Asked during a visit to NATO on Wednesday whether the military supported the decision to withdraw, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the decision-making process was “inclusive.”
“Their voices were heard and their concerns taken into consideration as the president made his decision,” Austin said. “But now the decision has been made, I call upon them to lead their forces … through this transition.”
Col. Dave Butler, a spokesperson for Milley, said “senior officers were afforded ample opportunity to give advice.”
“Their advice was listened to and closely considered as part of a rigorous national security decision making process,” he said.
But behind the scenes, it is Secretary of State Antony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan who are truly “running the Pentagon,” according to two former officials familiar with the discussions.
“The Pentagon is not making these decisions,” one of the people said.
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“Politico did not reach out to the White House or the National Security Council for comment for this story despite having four reporters on the byline. Had they done so, we would have said that this was a completely inaccurate and poorly-informed storyline coming from former officials who were not even part of the policy process the Biden Administration ran on Afghanistan. President Biden and National Security Advisor Sullivan placed enormous importance on running an inclusive, rigorous, and thorough policy review of our options in Afghanistan, seeking the informed expertise of military, diplomatic and humanitarian government experts at every step of the way. The President, as the Commander in Chief, made the final decision based on the advice of his national security team.”
Lawmakers and congressional aides who have been briefed on the rationale for Biden’s decision also said military officials were pushing for a residual force rather than a complete withdrawal.
“The civilian leaders essentially overruled the generals on this,” said a lawmaker who has been briefed on the deliberations.
Sullivan frequently played devil’s advocate as all options were explored but did not clash overtly with Blinken or Biden on the substance of the decision, one current official said. As for Austin, his role was primarily to implement the president’s goal and keep the Joint Staff from “going rogue,” one former official said.
Another person familiar with the deliberations noted that Austin is still somewhat of an outsider compared to Biden’s close circle of longtime advisers, which includes Blinken and Sullivan, and therefore was never going to play an outsized role in the decision.
