Rep. Roy Statement on the Situation in Kabul, Afghanistan

To the courageous men and women in uniform – and their families – who answered the call to defend our nation in the wake of 9/11 and took the fight to radical Islamic forces of evil in Afghanistan, we say thank you.   
 
You kept your promise, and you did your job.  When allowed by politicians, you killed the enemy – and you took out the worst of their leaders – from Osama bin Laden to Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi and Qasem Soleimani.  Your sacrifice will never be forgotten and we are a better and stronger nation for your service. 
 
The disaster unfolding in Kabul, Afghanistan – as American Humvees, drones, and other assets fall into the hands of the Taliban radicals– is the direct, and predictable, consequence of the incompetence and failed leadership of American politicians. 
 
The imagery of American retreat is made only more disgraceful by President Biden’s retreat to Camp David – symbolic of a Democrat Party more interested in chief diversity officers than in killing and destroying the enemy. 
 
But Biden is not alone. 
 
For almost two decades – while our men and women in uniform set out on 4th, 5th, 6th, or even 12th deployments to Afghanistan – politicians on both sides of the aisle and at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue provided no clear mission or strategic objectives for consolidating victory.  They poured over $2 trillion trying to turn Afghanistan into a liberal democracy, all while refusing to treat the Taliban as the terrorist-harboring enemy that it is. 
 
This fall marks 20-year anniversaries of both the 9/11 attacks and of the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) under which we continue to operate – now for a full generation.  Today it is well past time for Congress to revise or replace that authorization.  It’s time to provide strategic clarity as we necessarily re-align our national security strategy to combat the growing threats posed by China, Iran, dangerous cartels, and yes, now a militarized Taliban inspired by the very sharia supremacism that led to 9/11 in the first place.   
 
American leadership must acknowledge these threats and face them with moral clarity.  We owe our men and women in uniform the courtesy of doing our job by ensuring they have the proper authorization and backing to do theirs.