After nearly 20 years, on August 31, 2021, President Joe Biden pulled all American troops out of Afghanistan. The final push for his actions was the take-over of the Afghan Government by the Taliban. The United States first entered Afghanistan after the terror attack of 9/11. The Atlantic Council states, “The final US troops departed Afghanistan on Monday shortly before midnight local time, ceding the country to Taliban control ahead of US President Joe Biden’s August 31 deadline—and nearly twenty years after the United States first invaded the country.” The troops began evacuating weeks before the deadline leaving the people of Afghanistan defenseless against the Taliban. The Hill reports, “The Taliban’s takeover prompted the U.S. to evacuate hundreds of thousands of people from the area with an increased troop presence. Amid the commotion, a suicide bomber believed to be affiliated with ISIS detonated an explosive near the airport that killed 13 U.S service members.” These explosions killed dozens of Afghans along with the 13 US service members. They came at a time when thousands of people were gathered near the airport in an effort to secure safe passage out of Afghanistan. 

Many articles from both republican and democratic news outlets have been published, and opinions are scattered A common theme among the Republican articles was that the people of the Republican party were mainly focusing on the fact that President Joe Biden (a democratic president) did it rather than if they support the action. Fox News features an article titled “Biden defends Afghanistan withdrawal on 9/11 anniversary: ‘How else could you get out?’”. It seems that they are not too fond of the retreat but not because they feel it is against their morals but because the president that made the decision was of a different party. Most of the Democratic party supports the action but are enraged by the slow speed at which we are removing the Afghan people that aided the American soldiers. A quote from CNN: “The party is in a “political firestorm” over the decision”. 

Many people are enraged and confused by these recent events. They wonder “Was this needed?” “Could we have continued protecting the people of Afghanistan from the Taliban?” Though our president has made many statements about his reasoning for doing this, it all adds up to one thing (in his opinion); we have been there for too long, we should have left years ago. Some people agree with this statement. Originally the US troops were supposed to enter the country, kill the man responsible for the attacks on 9/11, and get out. Instead, we completed that mission and sent more troops. Was that the right decision? Would all of this have been avoided if we stuck to the original plan? So close to the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks president Joe Biden made the decision to remove all American troops from Afghanistan as the Taliban officially took over the country. Was this ethical? Was the timing purposeful? We may never know. How do you feel about it?