It would seem that news that the Brits, French and Germany’s are actually going out past the gates to get their people ‘in’ Kabul has allowed the US military to get the ‘go ahead’, from on high one who think , to do the same….
“Look, without getting predictive here, we have troops in a very dynamic environment, a very perilous mission, and they understand that — and they also understand why they’re there, they’re there to help people,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said, after indicating there had been no U.S. military operations outside the airport perimeter over the past 24 hours. “I’m not going to rule out that if they see a moment, if they see an opportunity to do it, they won’t do it.”
Kirby’s comments followed the disclosure that U.S. troops, traveling aboard Chinook helicopters, left the airport Thursday to retrieve 169 Americans from a nearby hotel. European commandos have conducted such missions for days, leading some U.S. lawmakers and others to suggest the Biden administration should do more to help people reach the airport.
Several thousand American citizens — and likely far more Afghans who have worked on behalf of the United States — remain in Afghanistan as U.S. forces stare down President Biden’s Aug. 31 deadline to complete the American withdrawal, though he indicated in recent days that time frame could stretch if necessary. Since the evacuation began a week ago, the U.S. military has managed to remove about 17,000 people from Kabul, including 2,500 Americans, Pentagon officials said Saturday — a fraction of the 10,000 to 15,000 U.S. citizens the Biden administration estimated last week still remained in Afghanistan.
In the last measured 24-hour period, amid increased violence outside the airport and new threats that the Islamic State might try to stage an attack, the military evacuated about 1,600 people aboard six C-17 transport aircraft, Maj. General William D. “Hank” Taylor told reporters at the Pentagon. Although an additional 2,200 people left Kabul on charter flights, evacuations aboard military aircraft were down from the approximately 2,000 people they were removing in each of the past several days, already well below the Pentagon’s stated capacity of between 5,000 and 9,000 daily….
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Thousands of evacuees were due to arrive in the United Arab Emirates on Saturday night en route to the United States, said a U.S. official familiar with the situation. Like other nations, the small Arab country, though a stanch U.S. ally, does not want to host Afghans indefinitely but is allowing its territory to serve as a way station.
Three planes landed at Dulles Airport on Saturday, the Pentagon said, noting that the Afghans onboard would be transferred to Fort Bliss, an Army post in Texas, for processing. Such changes, Taylor said, means it is likely the military will “get back into numbers we saw the day before.”
Update on this story….
It appears that the rescue evacuation was ordered up by the military commander in Kabul….
Not thru the Pentagon and White House….
On Thursday, three U.S. CH-47 Chinook helicopters were dispatched to rescue Americans who had gathered at the nearby Baron Hotel, near Hamid Karzai International Airport.
The original plan was for those Americans to “gather themselves up and walk through” the gate, said Pentagon spokesman John Kirby. But a large crowd gathered in front of the hotel, and it wasn’t deemed safe.
A local U.S. commander “made the call on the spot” to send the helicopters, which then airlifted the Americans into the airport, part of the nearly 5,800 U.S. forces, including elements of the 82nd Airborne Division and two battalions of Marines from the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit deployed there.
“There was an established landing zone there at the hotel premises. [They] flew in, picked up the 169 Americans and flew right back to HKIA,” Kirby said.
Biden mentioned the rescue Friday, when he said he is “considering every opportunity and every means by which we can get folks to the airport,” and also revealed that the United States had provided “overwatch” for French troops to bring hundreds of French citizens to the airport…
More…