As we approach the third year of Joe Biden’s failed presidency, Republicans have announced plans to investigate his administration’s botched Afghanistan withdrawal, which resulted in the tragic deaths of American soldiers and the abandonment of about $7 billion in U.S. military equipment.
Now that Republicans have won control of the House of Representatives, they have vowed to kick off 2023 by investigating Biden’s numerous policy failures, starting with his Afghanistan debacle.
In a statement Wednesday, Rep. James Comer of Kentucky — the incoming chairman of the House Oversight Committee — said the president must be held accountable for his administration’s reckless troop withdrawal.
“It has been over a year since the Biden Administration’s botched Afghanistan withdrawal and the American people have not received any answers about this national security and humanitarian catastrophe,” Comer said.
“U.S. servicemen and women lost their lives, thousands of Americans were abandoned, billions of taxpayer dollars are still unaccounted for, military equipment fell into the hands of the Taliban, progress for Afghan women has stalled, and the entire region is under hostile Taliban control,” he said.
Mother of U.S. Marine Rylee McCollum, who died in the Kabul bombing: “all you Democrats… who voted for [Biden], you just killed my son… never would have happened under Trump.” pic.twitter.com/74eZ24jwaE
— Jason Rantz on KTTH Radio (@jasonrantz) August 28, 2021
Comer pledged that “under a Republican majority, the Biden Administration’s obstruction of this investigation will be met with the power of the gavel. We owe it to the American people to provide answers, transparency, and accountability. … We will leave no stone unturned as we seek answers for the American people.”
To this end, the incoming chairman fired off a series of blistering letters to the following administration officials, demanding documents and other information related to the Oversight Committee’s probe:
• Lloyd Austin, secretary of defense.
• Jake Sullivan, national security adviser to Biden.
• Samantha Power, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development.
• Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of homeland security.
• Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
• Antony Blinken, secretary of state.
Comer also demanded information concerning the screening of Afghans who were relocated to the United States as well as the declassification of certain documents so the public can understand why the troop withdrawal was so grossly mismanaged.
The committee chairman pointed out that the Biden administration has repeatedly stonewalled Republicans seeking answers about the Afghanistan disaster.
“Republicans sought information over 10 times from the Biden Administration, but it failed to provide the requested information,” he said.
In a scathing letter to Biden’s defense secretary and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Comer recounted how in August 2021, “Americans watched in horror as the Taliban quickly gained control of Afghanistan, fleeing Afghans clung to and fell from planes departing Hamid Karzai International Airport (HKIA), and a suicide bomber murdered 13 U.S. servicemen and women and hundreds of innocent Afghans.”
Can’t believe my eyes. Men holding lower part of the US aircraft moments before it took off from #Kabul airport. pic.twitter.com/bT97WrNa12
— Sudhir Chaudhary (@sudhirchaudhary) August 16, 2021
Desperate Afghans clinging to a USAF C-17 as it’s taking off fall to their deaths. pic.twitter.com/FYSopteQbg
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) August 16, 2021
Comer also scolded Biden for allowing $7 billion in taxpayer-funded U.S. military equipment to fall into the hands of the Taliban and disdainfully pointed out “the Taliban are using that equipment for their own military training.”
Unbelievable incompetence pic.twitter.com/kXkkGMdJq3
— Mollie (@MZHemingway) August 23, 2021
U.S. troops had been in Afghanistan since 2001 for a foreign war that cost Americans more than $2 trillion and the lives of more than 2,300 brave servicemen and women.
As a reminder, then-President Donald Trump had negotiated a historic peace accord between the Taliban and the Afghan government in February 2020, which included setting a May 1, 2021, deadline for a conditions-based withdrawal of U.S. forces.
Tellingly, between February 2020 and August 25, 2021, the Taliban never attacked U.S. or NATO troops — marking the first time in 20 years that no American soldier died in combat in Afghanistan for a year and a half.
But chaos erupted in 2021 during Biden’s sloppy troop withdrawal because he did not have a strategy to withdraw U.S. forces in a methodical manner that didn’t compromise our service personnel.
The career politician’s inept leadership has sent an alarming message to the world that the United States is compromised in a chilling way that endangers all Americans.
Not only should Biden be investigated for his Afghanistan travesty, but he should be impeached for failing to uphold the best interests of the nation he’s supposed to lead.
In a statement Wednesday following his selection to be the incoming chairman of the Oversight Committee, Comer pledged to hold the Biden administration accountable.
“We will continue our investigations into the national security threat posed by the Biden family’s influence peddling and shady business schemes, President Biden’s border crisis, COVID origins and U.S. taxpayer dollars used to fund dangerous research in Wuhan, the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal, President Biden’s energy crisis, waste and mismanagement of pandemic relief funds, and more,” he said.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
