On Sunday, the Pentagon initiated the Civil Reserve Air Fleet, an emergency program that has only been evoked now three times since its creation after World War II. A total of 18 civilian wide-bodied, long-haul aircraft from five airlines have been activated. The planes will not fly into Afghanistan, but rather will transports Afghan refugees that have already escaped the country and are waiting at US bases in Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. The airliners will then help “augment military flights carrying Afghans to Germany, Italy, Spain and other stops in Europe, and then ultimately to the United States.”
But the problem isn’t so much the number of aircraft needed to rescue the 15,000 Americans and 80,000 Afghans currently attempting to leave the country. The problem is getting these people past multiple Taliban checkpoints and safely to the Kabul airport.
Last Thursday, the US Embassy in Kabul was encouraging American citizens in Afghanistan to come to the Hamid Karzai International Airport “as soon as possible” while also warning that a secure route to the airport could not be guaranteed.
But by Saturday the embassy had put out a security alert warning Americans in Afghanistan not to come to the Kabul airport, citing “potential security threats.” They are instead to wait for embassy officials to contact them.
Earlier on Friday President Biden had said that he “had no indication that they haven’t been able to get in Kabul through the airport.” He further asserted, “We’ve made an agreement with the Taliban. Thus far, they’ve allowed them to go through.” He also claimed that, “to the best of our knowledge at the Taliban checkpoints, they are letting through people showing American passports.”
However on the same day, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was more forthcoming in his call with lawmakers. He admitted he was fully “aware” that both Americans and Afghans attempting to reach the Kabul airport had “been harassed or even beaten by the Taliban.”
Even earlier in the week, on Wednesday, Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman acknowledged that they had indeed been made aware of reports that the Taliban were blocking access to the airport.
“We have seen reports that the Taliban, contrary to their public statements and their commitments to our government, are blocking Afghans who wish to leave the country from reaching the airport,” she told reporters. “Our team in Doha, and our military partners on the ground in Kabul, are engaging directly with the Taliban to make clear that we expect them to allow all American citizens, all third country nationals and all Afghans who wish to leave, to do so safely and without harassment.”
American media organizations too are scrambling to get hundreds of their own Afghan colleagues out of the country. On Wednesday, the New York Times announced that they had evacuated 128 Afghan colleagues and their families.
Earlier last week, the publishers of the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post wrote an open letter to the Biden Administration asking the government to take steps to provide protected access to the airport and safe passage out of the country.
“For the past twenty years, brave Afghan colleagues have worked tirelessly to help The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal share news and information from the region with the global public,” the letter reads. “Now, those colleagues and their families are trapped in Kabul, their lives in peril.” A similar request was issued by the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Since the Taliban took power, there have been reports of journalists being harassed and the homes of news agency employees being raided. Last week, two public protests in the cities of Jalalabad and Khost were met with gunfire as the Taliban attempted to disperse the crowds. At least two people were killed with a dozen injured. In early August, before the Taliban had taken Kabul, militants killed a manager of privately owned radio station and kidnapped a journalist for a privately owned news channel.
To date, President Biden has been reluctant to extend his August 31 deadline for a complete US departure. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, in a call to lawmakers on Friday, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley explained that they were still operating with the August 31 deadline, but that if they had more time, they would use it, and that talks with the Taliban were ongoing. The following passage was in the print edition of that Saturday Wall Street Journal article, but it is not in the online article, nor is it in the digital copy of the print edition: “One person on the call interpreted that as a statement that Mr. Biden hadn’t authorized officials to say they would stay beyond that deadline if the Taliban weren’t amenable to that.”
This begs the question: Is the President of the United States waiting on permission from the Taliban before even mentioning the potential of using American military forces after August 31 to rescue American citizens and Afghan compatriots who are essentially being held hostage? Or is he saying nothing now to give the Pentagon more time? More time to plan and practice for an operation to be executed a bit closer to a time of our choosing?