President Joe Biden has "bet the security of the United States" on whether the country can fight terrorism from "over the horizon" after the pullout from Afghanistan, Rep. Michael Waltz told Newsmax Wednesday, and he wants to learn from the generals testifying in the House how that could be expected to work.
"I think the overall takeaway from the Senate [testimony] is that we have a gulf between the Pentagon and the advice of the generals the size of the Grand Canyon," the Florida Republican said on Newsmax's "National Report."
"As a Green Beret who had to do this on the on the ground, I know it doesn't work the way the White House is trying to sell the American people on it."
Meanwhile, the testimony from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, and Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, revealed that all three had advised Biden to leave 2,500 troops in Afghanistan. The president, however, has said he does not recall that advice.
Waltz said the testimony reveals that "Biden is clearly not listening to the best military; he's ignoring it, and now we have this absolute debacle."
"They also advised President [Donald] Trump to leave troops, and he did," said Waltz.
Biden has also said there is no problem with the U.S. allies over Afghanistan, but Milley said the country's credibility is damaged, he added.
Meanwhile, Biden has been warned that al-Qaida will reconstitute and attack the United States if given a chance, said Waltz, but he thinks the president is operating under preconceived notions.
"All of this looks like the pull out of Iraq that led that happened under [Barack] Obama and led to the rise of the ISIS caliphate, and you know who was in charge of that...is Susan Rice, and she is still in the White House," said Waltz. "She's the one giving this advice because it's clearly not something from our military or our intelligence views."
Waltz also said he does see some bipartisanship with the line of questions to the generals, as the evacuation from Afghanistan was a disaster.
"We knew that if you pull out your military equipment and your airlift before you get our civilians and our allies out that you're handing those people a death sentence and that's exactly what happened," he said. "Where you're going to see divergence is you're going to see the Democrats say, well, this wasn't all Biden in terms of the overall policy and that you know this was four administrations and they're going to try to focus on Trump."
Trump indeed wanted to get down to zero troops in Afghanistan, he added, but still, he listened to his advisers and left a counterterrorism force in Afghanistan.
Milley also testified on Tuesday that the Taliban only lived up to one of seven parts of its agreement reached under Trump, who left the Afghan government and army intact "and he left the counterterrorism force to keep kicking the snot out of Al Qaeda and anybody else who would do us harm?" said Waltz. "That's what Biden inherited, and now he's flushed it all down."
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Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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