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Lloyd Austin said Afghanistan's fighters are to blame for disappearing when the Taliban took over, saying the Biden administration 'failed to grasp' how quickly the Islamic militant group would overcome the Afghan government and military.
'The fact that the Afghan Army that we and our partners trained simply melted away, in many cases without firing a shot, took all of us by surprise – and it would be dishonest to claim otherwise,' the Defense secretary said during a hearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday.
'Did we have the right strategy? Did we have too many strategies? Did we put too much faith in our ability to build effective Afghan institutions – an army, an air force, a police force and government ministries?' Lloyd questioned in his opening statement.
He added: 'We helped build a state, Mr. Chairman, but we could not forge a nation.'
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Mark Milley and Austin appeared at a hearing before the Senate Armed Service Committee Tuesday focused on the events surrounding the bungled troops withdrawal from Afghanistan last month.
Department of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Tuesday during a Capitol Hill hearing on the Afghanistan withdrawal that the Biden administration 'failed to grasp' how quickly the country would fall to the Taliban
Austin maintained that keeping a presence in Afghanistan into September would have 'greatly imperiled our people and our mission' after Biden
