Thirteen more dead US service members

On Thursday, suicide bombers struck at the entrance to Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport, the epicenter of allied operations to evacuate tens of thousands of Western civilians and Afghan allies.  Among the dead are 13 brave U.S. service members sent there only because we have a weak man in the White House.

I don't believe that those service members would be dead today had Mr. Biden continued with President Donald Trump's conditions-based transition plan to get us out of Afghanistan.  But no — Mr. Biden, as with so many of his foreign policy decisions over the past forty years, was on the wrong side of the facts and the truth.  He bungled another national security decision, and our warriors and innocent civilians paid the price in blood.

Evidently, we had some warning these attacks were imminent, which explains Wednesday's terror notice issued by the State Department.  That, though, won't deter desperate people seeking freedom, and it certainly doesn't matter at this point to the dead (13 Americans and at least 169 Afghans) and many others wounded by bomb shrapnel.  Who can blame thousands of frightened people for crowding around the airport's Abbey Gate hoping to gain a seat in a flight to freedom?  That mass of humanity became the perfect target for terrorists determined to create massive chaos and fear in war-torn Kabul.

Who was behind the attacks?  Reports indicate that jihadists from the Islamic State in Khorasan Province (IS-K) claimed credit, the most extreme of all the jihadist groups in Afghanistan, according to Pentagon spokesman John Kirby.  These Afghan-based proxies of the group the U.S. military destroyed in Syria and Iraq under the leadership of President Trump are also the Taliban's sworn enemies.

The attack's timing is key.  America and its allies are literally scrambling to meet Mr. Biden's irrational deadline to evacuate all American citizens and green card–holders, those who worked with our armed forces over the past two decades and will certainly face death if left at the mercy of Taliban savages.  A more thoughtful, deliberate American president would have done things quite differently and avoided the chaos and the bloody mess.

The attack's impact should be obvious.  Fewer people will now leave Afghanistan before Mr. Biden's August 31 deadline because of the escalated terrorist threat.  Why fewer?  It's simple math and risk aversion.

The entire effort to process evacuees has slowed to a crawl.  U.S. general Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, explained, "We have to check people before they get onto the airfield.  We have to ensure they're not carrying a bomb or any other kind of weapon that could ultimately make its way onto an aircraft."

Inevitably, the slowed evacuee processing will result in another tragedy.  Some Americans will be left behind as well as tens of thousands of Afghans who supported us over the past decades.  Further, and this is a pregnant question from the warrior class in America who left blood on Afghan soil: will Mr. Biden retaliate for these attacks that claimed at least 13 American service member lives, or will the fragile man in the Oval Office insist on leaving as if defeated without a response?

Yes, a response to this savage attack is necessary and America's military is ready.  And yes, that retaliatory response must kill as many IS-K jihadists as possible.  No doubt, killing these jihadists will prompt further attacks and possibly endanger Mr. Biden's tenuous relationship with the savage Taliban.  Folks, that's the nature of war.  Get over it.

Now a warning to Washington decision-makers in air-conditioned offices, especially the cowards in three-piece suits and star-bedecked uniforms at the Pentagon, State Department, and National Security Council: You had better get this mess right, or things are about to get much worse.

IS-K is related to the broader Islamic State movement, which has tentacles across the globe, and yes, thanks to Mr. Biden, some of their jihadist partners likely already came across our porous southern border and are here in the homeland, ready to strike.  They might conduct follow-on attacks using whatever weapons are available: knives, bombs, and even cars rammed into crowds.

America's best option is to kill these savages and announce no mercy for their kind elsewhere in Afghanistan or across the world, and especially here at home.

Unfortunately, I already know Mr. Biden's response to this bloody mess.  On Thursday, he read empty words on his teleprompter: "We will not forgive.  We will not forget.  We will hunt you down and make you pay."  Don't believe him!

Mr. Biden hasn't the courage of a President Ronald Reagan, who boldly faced down our Soviet enemy in a time of crisis.  Reagan understood what was at stake.  Biden and his puppet masters haven't a clue!

No, Mr. Biden is weak, and, by association so are those who back up such a pitiful man.  He should resign in disgrace before he kills any more good Americans and further ruins this country!

God help us!

Mr. Maginnis is a retired U.S. Army officer and the author of eight books including his most recent, Give Me Liberty, Not Marxism.

Image: Kabul airport bombing.  YouTube screen grab.

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