Biden, last month: "The Taliban is not the North Vietnamese army. They’re not remotely comparable in terms of capability. There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of the embassy of the United States from Afghanistan." https://t.co/cMx5e2xjtn

— Shashank Joshi (@shashj) August 15, 2021

The Wall Street Journal reports:

Taliban fighters on Sunday took over the Afghan capital and President Ashraf Ghani fled abroad, leaving the government in collapse, as a U.S.-led military operation began to airlift Western diplomats, civilians and Afghans likely to be targeted by the country’s new rulers.

Demoralized Afghan security forces offered no resistance as the insurgents, who seized most of the country in just over a week, appeared Sunday morning on Kabul’s outskirts. While the Taliban initially said they wouldn’t enter the capital while a transitional government is being formed, they reversed their stance by nightfall, saying that someone needed to maintain public order after Afghan police deserted their posts.

“To prevent chaos and looting, the Islamic Emirate has ordered the mujahedeen to get control of the abandoned areas,” a Taliban statement said. The Taliban fighters, it added, wouldn’t bother any civilian or military officials of the former regime.

By evening, the main road to the Kabul airport was packed with Afghans desperately trying to escape and with thousands of American troops protecting the evacuation effort, presented a bizarre scene of Taliban fighters mingling with uniformed Afghan troops.

Mr. Ghani, who fled the presidential palace and spent Sunday morning at the U.S. Embassy, left the Afghan capital in the afternoon.

“God will hold him accountable and the people of Afghanistan will make their judgment,” Kabul’s chief peace negotiator, Abdullah Abdullah, said in a video message. A Tajik news agency said that Mr. Ghani, the head of his administration and his national-security adviser had landed in Tajikistan.

Mr. Ghani, in a message posted on his Facebook page, conceded that the Taliban had won, and said that he was left with no choice but to go. [Continue reading…]