Afghanistan Chaos ‘Just an Example of the Lack of Preparedness’
As the sole member of Congress to oppose the initial US invasion, Rep Barbara Lee's is a unique perspective on the situation in Afghanistan
Rep Barbara Lee's was a lonely voice in September 2001.
The nation had been struck just days earlier by the worst act of terrorism in US history.
Thousands of Americans laid dead.
And with what seemed like the entire nation rallying behind him, President George W Bush was calling for a US invasion of Afghanistan, where the hardline Taliban government had allowed safe haven for Osama bin Laden and the other al-Qaeda masterminds who plotted the terrorism which used fully filled passenger jets as weapons to bring down the World Trade Center towers in New York City and smash the Pentagon outside of Washington DC.
On September 14, 2001, Congress was in the midst of pushing through the authorization of the use of military force (AUMF) necessary to give Bush the legal authority to move ahead with his operation in Afghanistan.
But Lee — a Democratic congresswoman from the East Bay area of the San Francisco region of California who had been in office just a few short years at that point — had something else to say.
“Our country is in a state of mourning. Some of us must say, let’s step back for a moment. Let’s just pause, just for a minute, and think through the implications of our actions today, so that this does not spiral out of control,” Rep Lee said that day on the House floor, her words carried on US television by the House camera. “Now, I have agonized over this vote. But I came to grips with it today, and I came to grips with opposing this resolution during the very painful, yet very beautiful, memorial service. As a member of the clergy so eloquently said, as we act, let us not become the evil that we deplore.”
In the end, hers would be the sole vote against granting Bush the authority he sought for Afghanistan.
So, some 20 years later, Lee's is a unique perspective indeed on the chaos, pandemonium and renewed Taliban brutality which has begun to engulf Afghanistan in recent days since Taliban fighters swept into their country's capital city of 6 million, Kabul.
She's still in office, and her views are free from any past vote for the “forever war,” which the United States is only now extricating itself from.
Room for praise and fault-finding
And though a Democrat, Lee has room to both praise, and find fault with, President Biden's handling of the current situation.
"Well, let me just say I think the president was absolutely correct in his decision to withdraw, because we know and I’ve known, many have known over the years that there is no military solution to Afghanistan. And, in fact, with 2,500 troops remaining and the Taliban on the move, we would have had to send thousands more of our U.S. troops who honorably have done everything we’ve asked them to do for the last 20 years,” she said. “And so I believe that the execution, as all of us have seen, has not gone well. I believe that we should have been better prepared, but I also know that, for instance, with many of the Afghans who have provided the type of assistance that we desperately needed, there were very few lists, if any, of who they were. So, that’s just an example of the lack of preparedness.
“So, right now, I’m really very clear on what we need to do in terms of providing the resources for the safe evacuation of Americans, Afghan allies, women and children, to make sure that they have safe passage on to, you know, into some place, some country where they will be safe and secure,” the congresswoman added.
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