Various outlets reported on the challenges facing would-be evacuees who tried to get to Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport through a gauntlet of Taliban checkpoints.
Now, the messages acquired by the Washington Examiner show how fraught the situation became in the last days before the last flight left on Aug. 30.
One Afghan-American who worked with the office of Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) announced that the Islamic fundamentalist organization's fighters “were creating as much problem as they could.”
The man recalled being told by the State Department to go to the Interior Ministry in Kabul, where he was confronted by a Taliban guard. After the man explained the case, the Taliban fighter replied: “Go and tell the State Department to f— themselves.”
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The evacuee announced he made it into the airport by making a break for it throughout a firefight at a checkpoint on Aug. 27, the day after an ISIS-K suicide bomber killed at least 13 US service members and no less than 169 Afghans at the airport’s Abbey Gate.
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“I know it was stupid, but I took just my chance,” he stated. “I ran towards the soldiers. I had my passport in my hand — shouting that I’m an American citizen.” The man is back in the US, along with his wife and their four children.
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The Examiner reports that lawmakers, staffers, and would-be evacuees discovered that the Taliban did not want to let Afghan-Americans through the checkpoints, even when people brandished their dark-blue US passports.
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One Afghan-American woman sent the office of Rep. Mike Garcia (R-Calif.) a clip of her sitting in a car at a checkpoint, holding her children’s passports and asking what she can do.
“This is why you don’t rely on the Taliban to be the ones monitoring the checkpoints,” Garcia explained.
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The Biden administration has repeatedly described the Taliban as an equal partner in the evacuation operation. State Department officials announced that the Taliban had guaranteed safe passage to anyone who wanted to leave Afghanistan, notwithstanding widespread reporting that people who attempted to cross the checkpoints were being assaulted and beaten.
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On Monday, US Central Command commander Gen. Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie — who reportedly turned down an offer from the Taliban that would have enabled the US military to secure Kabul in the final weeks before the withdrawal deadline — described the Taliban’s conduct as “very pragmatic and very businesslike” in helping to secure the facility.
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