Pentagon spokesman insists the Kabul airport chaos was NOT a failure - after US used helicopters to herd away Afghans and stowaways fell to their deaths off planes
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby insisted Monday that the Kabul airport chaos earlier in the day did not constitute a failure.
'I would take issue with your designation of this operation at the airport as a failure,' he told CNN's Barbara Starr during an afternoon press briefing after she pointed out how one A C-17 took off carrying 640 Afghan refugees.
Eight people were also reportedly killed, including three who tried to stowaway on a departing flight and fell from the sky.
The Pentagon refused to confirm those figures.
Instead, Kirby argued that the Defense Department planned for a number of scenarios as the U.S. exited Afghanistan after a 20-year deployment.
'Could we have predicted every single scenario and every single breach around the perimeter of the airport with only a couple of thousand troops on the ground?' Kirby mused. 'Plans are terrific and we take them seriously, but they are not and never have been perfectly predictive.'
Both President Joe Biden and Kirby admitted that the U.S. was surprised by the quick work the Taliban made in taking control of the war-torn country.
'Now as we talked about here many times, it happened very fast,' Kirby said from the Pentagon. 'And one of the things we couldn't anticipate and didn't anticipate was the degree to which Afghan forces capitulated, sometimes without a fight.'
At Hamid Karzai International Airport, there was a stampede of thousands of people - both stranded foreign nationals and Afghan civilians - desperately trying to escape.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby insisted Monday that the chaos at Kabul's airport earlier in the day did not constitute a failure. 'I would take issue with your designation of this operation at the airport as a failure,' Kirby told CNN's Barbara Starr at an afternoon briefing
A C-17 jet carrying 640 Afghan refugees that left Kabul on Sunday night as the Taliban claimed the city. The flight landed in Qatar. The refugees ran up the half-open ramp while US forces were preparing for take-off, according to an unnamed defense official cited by Defense One on Monday. At least one other C-17 has departed the area
The airport is the last place in the city that is being guarded by NATO troops.
Thousands of Afghan nationals have rushed there in the hopes of being saved along with the foreigners being flown out, but the chaotic rescue operation collapsed on Monday as troops struggled to control the crowds.
General Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr, the head of the Pentagon's Central Command, met with Taliban representatives in Qatar on Sunday and convinced them to let the US evacuate its citizens and any interpreters and translators it plans to without interference.
It remains unclear how NATO troops will organize the evacuation of Afghan refugees or even get themselves out given the diabolical situation that unfolded earlier Monday.
The Pentagon said 2,500 troops were moved into Kabul within the last 72 hours.
By the end of Monday, 3,000 to 3,500 were expected to be on the ground.
It's unclear how many American civilians are there, and how many Afghan translators and interpreters are to be flown out.
Embassy officials were moved to the airport with the Pentagon saying they were 'safe' and preparing for departure.
The harrowing scene at the airport on Monday included thousands rushing on to the runway as a US Air Force C-17 cargo jet took off.
Frantic Afghan nationals jumped onto the plane's fuselage in the hope that it would carry them to safety.
Shortly after it took off, three were filmed falling from the aircraft to their deaths.
Three were run over by the jet's wheels on the tarmac.
Kirby couldn't confirm the deaths - or the reporting that there would be an investigation, but added 'it wouldn't surpise me in the least that commanders would be taking a look at what happened this morning in respect to the C-17.'
'On that video footage we've all seen of something falling off the wing. I don't have an update for you in terms of specific validity of that. We're obviously just as interested in you in learning more about what happened there,' Kirby also said.
American troops halted evacuation flights for 90 minutes afterwards while they cleared the airfield, which had become overrun with thousands of Afghan nationals.
They used apache helicopters and fired warning shots into the crowds to try to control them.
Outside the walls of the airport, shots from Taliban fighters rang out.
A US soldier points his gun towards and bellows at an Afghan civilian at the Kabul airport on Monday. Two armed Afghans have been killed by American troops at the airport
Footage from Hamad Karzai airport showed hundreds of people running alongside - and in front of - a US Air Force plane preparing to take off
Desperate Afghan nationals tried to run onto RCH 885 as it took off from the airfield on Monday. Some were crushed by the C-17's wheels and others clung to the fuselage as it took off
An apache helicopter clears the airfield at Kabul on Monday after thousands of Afghan nationals ran onto it in a desperate attempt to get on an evacuation flight
Afghan people climb atop a plane as they wait at the Kabul airport in Kabul on Monday
A little girl is thrown over the wall of the airport on Monday as the Taliban started moving through the city of Kabul. The airport is the last part of the city being defended by US troops - more are expected there later today to try to secure it
An Afghan child walks near abandoned military uniforms at Kabul airport on Monday after the Taliban took control of the city
Desperate Afghan families trying to escape Kabul scale the walls of the airport on Monday
Afghanistan's representative to the UN's security council Ghulam M. Isaczai said 'there are already reports of target killings and looting in the city,' at a meeting of the council on Monday.
'Kabul residents are reported that the Taliban have already started house-to-house searches in some neighborhoods, registering names and looking for people in their target list,' he added.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was 'particularly concerned' by accounts of human rights violations against the women and girls of Afghanistan who fear a return to the darkest days' in the 1990s when the Taliban ruled and barred girls for getting an education and imposed draconian measures on women.
It's unclear now who America will save from the chaos aside from US citizens and anyone who worked alongside them.
Biden's National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan did a series of TV interviews on Monday where he said evacuation flights were ongoing, but he skirted criticism for the disaster and said: 'When push came to shove, [the Afghan forces] decided not to step up and fight for their country.'
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has also come under fire for hightailing out of the country last night, in a helicopter full of cash, according to the Russian embassy. His whereabouts remain unknown.
The Taliban declared victory from the presidential palace on Sunday following a blistering advance across the country. Experts and lawmakers have for months warned the Biden administrations that this was exactly what would happen if they continued with the hasty retreat and entrusted the country to the Afghan National Army.
One of the terror chieftains proclaimed from the palace, 'Praise God, I was in Guantanamo for eight years', as he sat at the president's table surrounded by henchmen strapped with AK-47s.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that the U.S. decision to withdraw had 'accelerated' the crisis that risked creating 'a breeding ground for terror.'
However, the Taliban has been on a charm offensive, pledging that no harm will come to any foreign citizens or embassy staff as it seeks formal recognition from the international community.
Almost all major checkpoints in Kabul were under Taliban control by Monday morning and Afghanistan's Civil Aviation Authority issued an advisory saying the 'civilian side' of the airport had been 'closed until further notice' and that the military controlled the airspace.
Taliban officials said everyone would be allowed to return home from Kabul airport if they decide to stay in the country and promised civilians would not be harmed. The group previously said westerners would be allowed to leave the country but that Afghans would be barred from departing.
US troops are guarding the airport and have taken over air traffic control, but all non-military flights are grounded. Early Monday morning, flight-tracking data showed no immediate commercial flights over the country.
In the capital, a tense calm set in, with most people hiding in their homes as the Taliban deployed fighters at major intersections.
There were scattered reports of looting and armed men knocking on doors and gates, and there was less traffic than usual on eerily quiet streets. Fighters could be seen searching vehicles at one of the city's main squares.
Many fear chaos, after the Taliban freed thousands of prisoners and the police simply melted away, or a return to the kind of brutal rule the Taliban imposed when it was last in power.
They raced to Kabul's international airport, where the 'civilian side' was closed until further notice, according to Afghanistan's Civil Aviation Authority. The military was put in control of the airspace.
Massouma Tajik, a 22-year-old data analyst, described scenes of panic at the airport, where she was hoping to board an evacuation flight.
Satellite images show the number of people on the tarmac at Kabul airport desperately trying to get onto flights out of Afghanistan on Monday
Thousands of Afghan nationals rushed to the airport on foot on Monday to try to get on evacuation flights as the Taliban took over
The US Embassy has been evacuated and the American flag lowered, with diplomats relocating to the airport in scenes reminiscent of the evacuation of the embassy of Saigon in 1975. Other Western countries have also closed their missions and are flying out staff and civilians after the Taliban walked into Kabul's presidential palace
In a stunning rout, the Taliban seized nearly all of Afghanistan in just over a week, despite the billions of dollars spent by the US and NATO over nearly two decades to build up Afghan security forces
Inside one of the US Air Force jets that took off from Kabul on Sunday after the Taliban took control of the city
Those on board the plane appeared to be US nationals. It's unclear how many remain at the airport waiting to be flown out
US soldiers rest as Afghan people (not pictured) wait to leave the Kabul airport in Kabul on August 16, 2021, after a stunningly swift end to Afghanistan's 20-year war, as thousands of people mobbed the city's airport trying to flee the group's feared hardline brand of Islamist rule
Afghan nationals wait on one of the many grounded commercial aircrafts at Kabul airport on Monday in the hope of being flown out
A volunteer carries an injured man on the tarmac at the airport in Kabul on August 16. The chaos unfolded on Monday as thousands rushed to the airport in a desperate attempt to flee the Taliban after the country's 20 year civil war
There are thousands of Afghan nationals at the airport desperately waiting to be put on any flight out of the city
Thousands of Afghans rush to the Hamid Karzai International Airport as they try to flee the Afghan capital of Kabul, Afghanistan, on August 16, 2021
People climb a barbed wire wall to enter the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan August 16, 2021, in this still image taken from a video
US soldiers stand guard as desperate Afghans try to board flights at Hamid Karzai International Airport
Thousands of civilians rush towards one of the last military planes leaving Kabul (left) the airport was teeming with desperate civilians trying to flee the Taliban (right)
Video posted later appeared to show residents collecting the bodies of three stowaways, who reportedly fell from an airborne plane, from a roof in Kabul
Footage showed desperate Afghans trying to climb onto grounded planes at Kabul's Hamid Karzai airport after the Taliban swept the city
Afghans crowd at the tarmac of the Kabul airport on August 16, 2021, to flee the country as the Taliban were in control of Afghanistan after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country and conceded the insurgents had won the 20-year war
Desperate Afghan civilians attempt to clamber over the barbed wire-topped wall into Hamid Karzai International Airport on Monday
Men climb over a wall into Hamid Karzai International Airport in scenes reminiscent of the chaos in Saigon in 1975
US troops are guarding the airport and have taken over air traffic control, but all non-military flights are grounded. Soldiers fired warning shots in the air to prevent hundreds of civilians running onto the tarmac, a US official said
US troops fired shots into the air at Kabul airport today as desperate Afghans climbed up the outside of airbridges trying to flee as the Taliban took control of Afghanistan
Video posted social media showed hundreds of people trying to climb the outside of airbridges to board commercial liners grounded in Hamad Karzai airport
At least five people have been killed at Kabul airport as thousands of people tried desperately to get on flights out of Afghanistan amid increasingly chaotic scenes. Witnesses said it was not clear whether the victims were killed by gunshots or in a stampede
Taliban fighters were seen inside the Afghan parliament on Monday after officials promised civilians would not be harmed and announced everyone would be allowed to return home from Kabul airport if they decided to stay in the country
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