Vice President Kamala Harris swatted away soul-searching Monday over the chaotic effort to evacuate Americans and select Afghans from Kabul, using a press conference in Singapore to focus on the ongoing mission instead of what went wrong in the swift drawdown after two decades of war.
“I think there’s going to be plenty of time to analyze what has happened and what has taken place in the context of the withdrawal from Afghanistan. But right now, we are singularly focused on evacuating American citizens, Afghans who worked with us, and Afghans who are vulnerable, including women and children. And that is our singular focus at this time,” she told reporters while standing alongside Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. “This is a difficult mission. There’s no question about that. But our focus has to be on the task at hand.”
President Biden said Sunday the evacuation mission had turned the corner after a rocky start, calling it “an incredible operation,” while continuing to insist that there was “no way” to pull U.S. troops out of Afghanistan without turmoil.
He addressed the situation after a series of rocky days in which his comments about the pull-out conflicted with messy scenes on television of the Taliban whipping and beating Afghans trying to get to the airport. His approval ratings plunged as he contends with the Kabul chaos and resurgence of COVID-19.
“The president has, I think, shown great emotion in expressing sadness about some of the images we have seen,” Ms. Harris said as she tours Southeast Asia to shore up ties in the region. “But we cannot be, in any way, distracted in any way from what must be our primary mission right now, which is evacuating people from that region who deserve to be evacuated.”
Mr. Lee said the administration “inherited an extremely difficult situation,” but he is concerned about what happens next.
“The U.S. had invested considerable blood and treasure in Afghanistan. But it was an intractable task given the complex history, geography, and tribal rivalries of the place. Successive U.S. presidents have declared their resolve to withdraw from Afghanistan. So I told the vice president that we understand President Biden’s reasons for his decision. The U.S. intervention has stopped terrorist groups from using Afghanistan as a safe base for 20 years. For this, Singapore is grateful,” he said.
“We hope Afghanistan does not become an epicenter for terrorism again,” he said. “And post-Afghanistan, in the longer term, what matters is how the U.S. repositions itself in the Asia Pacific, engages the broader region, and continues the fight against terrorism — because that will determine the perceptions of the countries of the U.S. global priorities and of its strategic intentions.”