Recording of LIVE Broadcast: President Biden Speaks After Taliban Claims Victory in Afghanistan

good afternoon thank you for joining us i'm victoria idoni joining you live this afternoon the president is at the white house giving an unexpected press conference this following this weekend's taking of kabul the afghanistan capital by the taliban on friday the president planned to send in 3 000 troops as of today that number is 6 000. we're waiting to hear what the latest is let's take it over to the white house terrorist attack on american homeland i've argued for many years that our mission should be narrowly focused on counter-terrorism not counterinsurgency or nation-building that's why i opposed the surge when it was proposed in 2009 when i was vice president and that's why as president i'm adamant we focus on the threats we face today in 2021 not yesterday's threats today the terrorist threat has metastasized well beyond afghanistan al-shabaab in somalia al-qaeda in the arabian peninsula al-nusra in syria isis attempting to create a caliphate in syria and iraq and establishing affiliates in multiple countries in africa and asia these threats warrant our attention and our resources we conduct effective counterterrorism missions against terrorist groups and multiple countries where we don't have permanent military presence if necessary we'll do the same in afghanistan we've developed counterterrorism over the horizon capability that will allow us to keep our eyes firmly fixed on the direct threats to the united states and the region and act quickly and decisively if needed when i came into office i inherited a deal that president trump negotiated with the taliban under his agreement u.s forces would be out of afghanistan by may 1 2021 just a little over three months after i took office u.s forces had already drawn down during the trump administration from roughly 15 hundred american forces to two thousand five hundred troops in country and the taliban was at its strongest militarily since two thousand and one the choice i had to make as your president was either to follow through on that agreement or be prepared to go back to fighting the taliban in the middle of the spring fighting season there would have been no ceasefire after may one there was no agreement protecting our forces after may one there was no status quo of stability without american casualties after may one it was only a whole reality of either following through on the agreement to withdraw our forces or escalating the conflict and sending thousands more american troops back into combat in afghanistan lurching into the third decade of conflict i stand squarely behind my decision after 20 years i've learned the hard way that there was never a good time to withdraw u.s forces that's why we're still there we were clear-eyed about the risk we planned for every contingency but i always promise the american people that i will be straight with you the truth is this did unfold more quickly than we had anticipated so what's happened afghanistan political leaders gave up and fled the country the afghan military collapsed sometime without trying to fight if anything the developments of the past week reinforced that ending us military involvement afghanistan now was the right decision american troops cannot and should not be fighting in a war and dying in a war that afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves we spent over a trillion dollars we trained and equipped an afghan military force of some 300 000 strong incredibly well equipped a force larger in size than the militaries of many of our nato allies we gave them every tool they could need we paid their salaries provided for the maintenance of their air force something that taliban doesn't have taliban does not have an air force we provided close air support we gave them every chance to determine their own future we could not provide them it was the will to fight for that future there's some very brave and capable afghan special forces units and soldiers but if afghanistan is unable to mount any real resistance of the taliban now there is no chance that one year one more year five more years or 20 more years u.s military boots on the ground would have made any difference here's what i believe to my core it is wrong to order american troops to step up when afghanistan's own armed forces would not the political leaders of afghanistan were unable to come together for the good of their people unable to negotiate for the future of their country when the chips were down they would never have done so while u.s troops remained in afghanistan carrying the brunt of the fighting for them and our true strategic competitors china and russia would love nothing more than the united states to continue to funnel billions of dollars in resources and attention and destabilized in afghanistan indefinitely when i hosted president ghani and chairman abdullah at the white house in june and again when i spoke by phone to gani in july we had very frank conversations we talked about how afghanistan should prepare to fight their civil wars after the u.s military departed to clean up the corruption in government so the government could function for the afghan people we talked extensively about the need for afghan leaders to unite politically they fail to do any of that i also urge them to engage in diplomacy to seek a political settlement with the taliban this advice was flatly refused mr ghani insisted the afghan forces would fight but obviously he was wrong fine left again to ask of those who argue that we should stay how many more generations of america's daughters and sons would you have me send to fight afghan afghanistan civil war when afghan troops will not how many more lives american lives is it worth how many endless rows of headstones is arlington national cemetery i'm clear of my answer i will not repeat the mistakes we've made in the past mistake of staying and fighting indefinitely in a conflict that is not in the national interest of the united states of doubling down on a civil war in a foreign country of attempting to remake a country through the endless military deployments of u.s forces those are the mistakes we cannot continue to repeat because we have significant vital interest in the world that we cannot afford to ignore i also want to acknowledge how painful this is to so many of us the scenes were seen in afghanistan their gut wrenching particularly for our veterans our diplomats humanitarian workers for anyone who has spent time on the ground working to support the afghan people for those who have lost loved ones in afghanistan and for americans have fought and served in the country serve our country in afghanistan this is deeply deeply personal it is for me as well i've worked on these issues as long as anyone i've been throughout afghanistan during this war while the war was going on from kabul to kandahar to the kunar valley i've traveled there on four different occasions i met with the people i spoken to the leaders i spent time with our troops and i came to understand firsthand what was and was not possible in afghanistan so now we're first focused on what is possible we will continue to support the afghan people we will lead with our diplomacy our international influence and our humanitarian aid we'll continue to push for regional diplomacy and engagement to prevent violence and instability we'll continue to speak out for the basic rights of the afghan people of women and girls just as we speak out all over the world i've been clear the human rights must be the center of our foreign policy not the periphery but the way to do it is not through endless military deployments it's with our diplomacy our economic tools and rallying the world to join us let me lay out the current mission in afghanistan i was asked to authorize when i did 6 000 u.s troops to deploy to afghanistan for the purpose of assisting the departure of u.s and allied civilian personnel from afghanistan and to evacuate our afghan allies and vulnerable afghans to safety outside of afghanistan our troops are working to secure the airfield and ensure continued operation of both the civilian and military flights we're taking over air traffic control we have safely shut down our embassy and transferred our diplomats our diplomatic presence is now consolidated at the airport as well over the coming days we intend to transport out thousands of american citizens who've been living and working in afghanistan we'll also continue to support the safe departure of civilian personnel the civilian personnel of our allies who are still serving in afghanistan operation allies refugee which i announced back in july has already moved 2 000 afghans who are eligible for special immigration visas and their families to the united states in the coming days the u.s military will provide assistance to move to move more siv eligible afghans and their families out of afghanistan we're also expanding refugee access to cover other vulnerable afghans who worked for our embassy u.s non-government agencies or u.s non-governmental organizations and afghans who otherwise are at great risk in u.s news agencies i know there are concerns about why we did not begin evacuating afghans civilians sooner part of the answer is some of the afghans did not want to leave earlier still hopeful for their country and part of it because the afghan government and its supporters discourage us from organizing the mass exodus to avoid triggering as they said a crisis of confidence american troops are performing this mission as professionally and as effectively as they always do but it is not without risks as we carry out this departure we have made it clear to the taliban if they attack our personnel or disrupt our operation the u.s presence will be swift and the response will be swift and forceful we will defend our people with devastating force if necessary our current military mission we shorten time limited scope and focused in its objectives get our people and our allies as safely as quickly as possible and once we have completed this mission we will conclude our military withdrawal will end america's longest war after 20 long years of bloodshed the events we're seeing now are sadly proof that no amount of military force would ever deliver a stable united secure afghanistan as known in history as the graveyard of empires what's happening now could just as easily happen five years ago or 15 years in the future we have to be honest our mission in afghanistan has taken many missteps made many missteps over the past two decades i'm now the fourth american president to preside over war in afghanistan two democrats and two republicans i will not pass this responsibly on responsibility onto a fifth president i will not mislead the american people by claiming that just a little more time in afghanistan will make all the difference nor will i shrink from my share of responsibility for where we are today and how we must move forward from here i am president of the united states of america and the buck stops with me i'm deeply saddened by the facts we now face but i do not regret my decision to end america's war fighting in afghanistan and maintain a laser focus on our counter-terrorism missions there and other parts of the world our mission to degrade the terrorist threat of al qaeda in afghanistan and kill osama bin laden was a success a decades-long effort to overcome centuries of history and permanently change and remake afghanistan was not and i wrote and believed it never could be i cannot and will not ask our troops to fight on endlessly another in another country's civil war taking casualties suffering life life-shattering injuries leaving families broken by grief and loss this is not in our national security interest it is not what the american people want it is not what our troops who have sacrificed so much over the past two decades deserve i made a commitment to the american people when i ran for president that i would bring america's military involvement in afghanistan to an end while it's been hard and messy and yes far from perfect i've honored that commitment more importantly i made a commitment to the brave men and women who served this nation that i wasn't going to ask them to continue to risk their lives in a military action that should have ended long ago our leaders did that in vietnam when i got here as a young man i will not do it in afghanistan i know my decision will be criticized but i would rather take all that criticism and pass this decision on to another president of the united states yet another one a fifth one because it's the right one it's the right decision for our people the right one for our brave service members to risk their lives serving our nation that's the right one for america thank you may god protect our troops our diplomats and all brave americans serving in harm's way [Applause] what we just saw was president biden leaving the white house he is speaking in response to the taliban taking over kabul and speaking from the palace in the afghanistan capital the taliban taliban has claimed victory over the country the president has sent more of our troops in he does claim that we will get out swiftly he said he takes responsibility for us having been there so long and shares that responsibility with his predecessors there is no timeline for an exit at this point but the president promised he will not pass this on to a fifth president we will continue to cover this throughout the evening and the day tomorrow stay with us here i'm victoria idoni thank you for joining us we now join the following program already in progress keep up with newsnet while on the go download our iphone or android app to watch newsnet live