President Joe Biden's "arrogance" eventually led to the fall of Afghanistan, former Rep. Pete King said on Newsmax Monday.
"Somehow he was willing to take the chance that this might happen," said the New York Republican, now a Newsmax contributor, on "John Bachman Now." "It collapsed just to satisfy his goal, his drive to make sure we got out by Sept. 11."
He also slammed the administration for allowing people who served as military interpreters to remain behind as the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, without making sure there would be enough military there to protect them until the withdrawal of troops was completed.
"This is indefensible," said King, speaking out before Biden was to address the nation Monday afternoon. "This is all on Joe Biden. It's a sad day for America."
Further, King said that the weekend's fall of Kabul is worse, as "far as a president's responsibility" than was the fall of Saigon in 1975 because back then, it was Congress that made the call to shut off military troops, not then-President Gerald Ford.
"In 1975, President Ford wanted to have the military force to defend the Americans in South Vietnam, and it was Congress who shut it off," King said, responding to a video clip from earlier this summer of Trump denying the similarities to how the wars in Vietnam and Afghanistan, both of which were controversial and long-lasting, ended. "In this case, it was the president who was driving us, and it's total ineptitude."
King added that he hasn't been in Congress in eight months or on its Intelligence Committee in over two years, "but from whatever I knew, this was almost bound to happen, if it was done this way now."
He pointed out that he didn't fully agree with former President Donald Trump's call to withdraw troops either, but at least with Trump, the move was condition-based.
"If you are going to withdraw, you have to do it under strict conditions," said King of Trump's plans. "If Taliban violates anything at all, all bets are off and we use that power and whatever military power we have, and that is make sure that our people are protected."
That was "precisely what happened" once the Trump administration reached its agreement with the Taliban, said King, because the insurgents "stepped out of line and they were met with swift airstrikes."
Ken Timmerman, a member of Trump's foreign policy advisory board in 2016, pointed out that Biden had denied the similarities between Biden's comments on Kabul, including saying there would be no helicopters landing at the embassy there as they did in Saigon.
"He said no helicopters would be taking off of the roof of our embassy," said Timmerman. "Well guess what, helicopters took off from the roof of our embassy in Kabul yesterday. He said the Afghan army was 300,000 strong versus the Taliban, which is 75,000 strong, so of course, they weren't going to collapse ... Biden has shown consistently that he knows zero about foreign policy, but he knows a lot about his own ego."
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