yamiche: terror in afghanistan and a race against time. pres. biden: we will not forgive. we will not forget. we will hunt you down and make you pay. yamiche: a suicide bomber kills more than 150 people, iluding at least 13 u.s. troops, outside kabul's airport. president biden vows to go after the terrorists but he is sticking to his august 31 deadline to withdraw u.s. service members. plus -- >> there's no one in the world outside of joe biden who thinks we can get everybody out by august 31. >> the end of the month, will be on us before we know it and i think we need to maintain our military presence long enough to get everyone out.

yamiche: the president faces mounting bipartisan criticism and key questions. will there be more attacks? what's next for the people of afghanistan? and what may be the political cost of the biden doctrine. next. announcer: this is "washington week." corporate funding is provided by -- consumer cellular. additional funding provided by the estate of arnold adams, koo and patriciauen through the yuen foundation, committed to bridging cultural differences in our communities. and sandra and carl delay-magnuson. the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. once again, from washington, moderator yamiche alcindor.

yamiche:good evening. welcome to "washington week." the crisis on the ground in afghanistan has turned into a catastrophe. this week it entered a terrifying new phase. thursday we saw the deadliest day for the u.s. military in afghanistan in more than a decade. at least 13 u.s. service members and more than 150 afghans are now dead and today the president's national security team warned that another terrorist attack is likely. there are just a few days left before president biden's deadline to pull out troops. on thursday, the president addressed the nation. pres. biden: i bear responsibility for fundamentally all that's happened of late. ladies and gentlemen, it was time to end a 20-ye war. thank you so much. yamiche: we'll dig into what's happening on the ground and how the president and top leaders are dealing with this divarges situation -- dangerous situation.

joining us tonight, jane ferguson, special correspondent for the "pbs newshour" joining us from qatar. and joining me in studio, sahil kapur, national political reporter with nbc news, ayesha rascoe, white house correspondent for npr and yance, national security correspondent for "the wall street journal." jane, you did incredible reporting in afghanistan over the last few days and weeks. what are your sources telling you about what led to the attacks and how the situation got so dire? jane: if we start with the second part of the question, it's important to remember how vulnerable this spot was. i've never really seen anything like it in all my years covering conflict. you had thousands of civilians essentially in the street. it's an open street around the perimeter of the airport. you had them initially filtered through by taliban checkpoints. they weren't really searching

people, they weren't carefully monitoring people or anything like that. they were trying to keep the crowds from crushing in and basically causing a stampede towards the gates. then they would get to american, british and other allied soldiers who were trying to sort of sort through the crowds, trying to decipher between those with the right paperwork to come in and who could board flights and those who couldn't. it was enormously difficult but they were exposed, standing out in the street, surrounded by these people. it's worth remembering that isis have been menacing kabul for several ars, sworn enemies of the taliban. they compete with the group for personnel, resources, territory, and have for a while now but whenever they strike the capital, it's very much a signature move to hit as many civilians as they can. they've hit wedding halls and schools, very much in keeping with them. for them to hit american forces and kill american soldiers as well as so many afghan civilians

is a win-win for that group from their perspective. yamiche: what's changed when you think about the vulnerable spot you described there. what's changed in terms of people's ability to get out? how is that impacting this desperate journey people are trying to take? jane: even before the explosion took place, it was increasingly impossible for people to get into the airport. that was one of the reasons you had huge buildups of people because it was becoming more chaotic. trying to get into and on flights was becoming more difficult in terms of the crecialts and paperwork you needed -- credentials and paperwork. by the time i left, the the day before the bombing, almost everyone was saying you needed a u.s. passport or green card or something similar from other nations to get in so it was already difficult. then the taliban said, before the explosion, that they were going to stop afghanistan --

afghans going to the airport. they started holding people back. know people continued to go. they're still waiting there and hopeful, desperate to get out of the country. crossing the borders on land is becoming increasingly difficult. some are getting across with smugglers. it's believed that thousands of people havbeen gathering every day on crossings towards pakistan trying to get out of the country because it's a forboding sense. initially people were afraid of reprisal attacks by the taliban against them, if they were members of security forces or associated with the government or with the u.s. military. yamiche: reprisal attacks is a concerning issue here, of course. nancy, what are you hearing from your reporting about future attacks, about the dangers ahead as this mission, the u.s. mission, enters its most dangerous phase? nancy: it's an important question because as jane has described in such important detail, the taliban cannot secure the area leading up to the airport. there are security lapses and in

this case, leading to catastrophic consequences earlier this week. on top of that, you have a u.s. force that will start to move out. there were more than 5,000 u.s. troops based at the airport. they didn't get there in one day and they won't leave in one day. now you have a tenuous security situation leading up to the airport. afghans who know there are only days left to get out and the u.s. will try to move out so they will be, u.s. forces, at the most vulnerable point at a time when you could see really challenges on them from a security perspective. moreover, you've seen the terror group successfully launch an attack so there might be an incentive for them to try again, feeling there's an opportunity. there's a lot of concern throughout washington about what attacks could look like. could there be attacks on airplanesoing out? could there be hostages taken? what we saw this week was an unimaginable attack and that's really sort of raising concerns

about what else could we see in these long four days between n and the deadline. yamiche: unimaginable is such a good way to put it because it was so tragic. our hearts were so heavy as a world. president biden and military officials have said they're going after who's responsible but what's the feasibility of that as u.s. troops are withdrawing and resources are leaving afghanistan? nancy: the key part of the u.s. plan to watch terror groups in afghanistan was that they had a u.s.-backed government with a s.-trained army and intelligence service in the country. that's all dissipated. that disappeared on august 15 when the taliban took over so they don't have eyes and ears on the ground to tell them what targets they should hit in retaliation for this. the question becomes, would they then depend on the taliban to tell them the strikes they should be doing? moreover, they don't have troops on the ground, they don't have the assets to launch such

attacks so how do you come up with a strike list when you don't have partners on the ground? when the only partners you could use, you have a relationship that is not built on trust, and you don't have the assets that you had in the ground or even nearby to launch an attack? it makes a retaliatory attack, an effective one, i think, very challenging. yamiche: ayesha, what are you hearing from the white house officials about president biden's resolve to stick to this deadline? everyone i talk to says this is the right thing to do. what are you hearing, especially as the president is taking responsibility for this and also blaming former president trump. ayesha: he's trying to say, i take responsibility, the buck stops with me but he's trying to offer an explanation and has taken hits for that for saying, look, the former president made this deal, i had to stick to it, or, basically, laying it out as it was a choice between surging troops to afghanistan for a war that's been going on for 20 years or to bring them home and

with the risks that have been faced but they're going to stick to this timeline. they're saying they're getting out august 31. they had been saying over and over again that the risks to u.s. troops grew each day that they were there. that has obviously been borne out. i don't think they'll keep them longer than august 31 because they see the risk and they don't want more u.s. troops to be killed. but this is a rare time in washington where you see someone making a decision, president biden, that's clearly not politically motivated. he's not doing it because this is helping his poll numbers. it is not. but he clearly fundamentally believes the u.s. should be out of afghanistan and that's what he's doing. yamiche: he doe fundamentally believe that and this definitely is not polling tested because while a lot of americans and the white house says this over and over again, want to see the u.s. get out of afghanistan but polling numbers are showing people are not liking how this

is being done. sahil, what's this week revealed about the president's decision making? sahil: i think we're seeing a biden doctrine come into focus on foreign policy with an phatic rejection of the post-9/11 consensus that the united states should use force to invade other countries in pursuit of exporting american democracy there. this is a joe biden who once believed in that when he voted to authorize the afghanistan war, when he voted to authorize the iraq war and he's come to the opposite conclusion that it cannot and shouldn't be done and i think that's why his resolve has been so steely to condition the withdrawal plan in the face of criticism. the biden doctrine also includes the idea of what foreign policy experts call soft power, using diplomatic tools, using things like economic tools, and conditioning of foreign aid as a way to promote human rights and democracy in otherarts of the world and finally this

administration is much more focused on the rise of china than the issue of terrorism. they believe the rise of china presents a bigger, more long-term threat on the united states, and also focused on russia, disinformation campaigns to meddle in democracy. that's where his focus is. yamiche: the criticism is also tied to the coordination with the taliban. white house press secretary jen psaki said we have to coordinate with the taliban. what do we know about the risks there? nancy: the u.s. fought a 20-year war against the taliban and now we're talking about working with them. that's a jarring thing to hear for many. the approach was contingent on the idea that for some period of time certainly on the u.s. withdrawal from afghanistan, it would have a u.s.-backed government to support them and that hasn't happened. the only force left is the taliban. the taliban is in charge of every part of the country now. they control the capital.

they are in the presidential palace. there aren't enough forces to secure the city. it would take tens of thousands. so they're using taliban elements. these are not elements they have trained or can tell what to do or can manage how they do the security checkpoints. u.s. is communicating with the taliban every day in an effort to navigate that but it doesn't mean they're working side by side or that they have a shared interest. the taliban objective is to get the united states out and by august 31. the u.s. objective is to do it as safely as possible with the troops they he. but when those interests collide, we could see a real security risk to u.s. troops and to american citizens in country. yamiche: it's a real security risk and u.s. forces have also focused on securing the airport but outside, people have largely had to fend for themselves. jane uspoke to an afghan civilian trying to leave the country. >> the taliban thinks my father is working with nato and is a

foreign spy. we need help. we don't have time. my family is hiding. yamiche: this is a humanitarian crisis playing out with so many vulnerable people. what is your reporting on the ground revealing? nancy: so many desperate people trying to figure out what the system was. most people we talked to on the ground want america to withdraw from afghanistan. there are exceptions. but most people want this war to end and see foreign forces out so there isn't really push-back from the doctrine that has been discussed about wanting america out of the war. what people are shocked about and frustrated with on the ground in afghanistan is the chaotic nature, the fact that they waited for months after president biden came into the white house to find out what's the strategy of leaving. there have been campaigns for these special immigrant visas

and that's what the man in the video was talking about and what many, many people have discussed with us, have been desperate to figure out, is how do we apply for these visas, why are they taking so long? can we get applications to take less time than three to four years, whenever america's draw-down is so rapid. that's the frustration, what was the strategy, how do we, as afghans who have worked wit the u.s. military, navigate that endless bureaucratic paperwork to get out of the country and get the visas that we are entitled to. yamiche: i want to ask a quick follow-up. you did this story about children who have gone missing in afghanistan, children who have been left behind. tell us a little bit about that because that's such a critical part of this crisis. jane: it speaks to the kind of chaos that has played outt the airport. because you have -- it's

important to remember that these are people coming with their families. there's so many women and children. we've seen so many babies, pregnant women. but to get to the gates is simply a massive, dangerous, physical and arduous task because you have to push through panicked crowds. many people are beaten by taliban fighters as they walk past. many are having to push through the crush, deal with sometimes momentary stampedes. last weekend, seven people died in the crush. so essentially it's very easy to see when you're standing on the ground there how someone could lose a small child and once they've been separated, it's extremely difficult to find everody. there's no cell phone service. it's chaotic. and so for the soldiers, american soldiers trying to finh soldiers, as well -- finding children at the gate alone and just trying to take care of them but there's a language difference. these are upset children, tiny

tots sometimes. it's something that i'm sure very few soldiers have had to deal with before. yamiche: nancy, we're also -- when we're talking about what soldiers are having to deal with, there was a new generation of soldiers who have died, people who were 1 or 2 years old at the time of 91. what toll is this taking on the military when they see this humanitarian crisis and what one person, afghan security official said, afghanistan turning into the las vegas of terrorists, given all the lives lost in afghanistan? nancy: we haven't officially gotten names but we're hearing stories of 20, 21-year-olds who died at that gate. even before thursday's horrific events, you would talk to service members who were traumatized by the withdrawal, asking themselves, what did i go to battle for? what's did my comrades die for? why did my family make the sacrifices?

why did i miss so many life events to see the country come apart so quickly? i think you can have debates about whether the u.s. should have stayed or left and those bates happen with veterans but there is a connective thread in their frustration with how quickly things fell apart. i don't think people could have imagined that in a matter of days the very government they spent 20 years to build up would disappear and then the scale of the tragedy on thursday, i think has made this an already tough period, really hard for military families, veterans, gold star families, because the undercurrent is what was this for? yamiche: a critical question that so many are asking. what was this for? on july 8, i questioned president biden specifically about comparing vietnam to afghanistan.

did you see any parallels between this withdrawal and what happened in vietnam with some people feeling -- pres. biden: none whatsoever, zero. 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 lifted off the roof of an embassy of the united states from afghanistan. it's not at all comparable. yamiche: not at all comparable. now, ayesha, how worried is the white house about this being a stain on president biden's legacy and these comparisons some are making? ayesha: right now they're trying to brush it off by using really an old-school, what i would call, this is a 20-year war, an old-school argument basically saying the troops are fighting right now, it's not time to be critical. it's time to focus on the troops. this is for the troops and when they get home, we'll figure out all this other stuff. which is kind of what you heard going into this war, just focus

on the troops. but i think there's no way in the world that they can't be concerned about this being a stain. this is a huge crisis. lives were lost. and they will have to answer for what happened. i do think this is an american tragedy, though. this is 20 years, this is four administrations. this is not just on the biden administration. yamiche: that's a key point to make because i think in all of these conversations over the last 20 days, we have to remember about the afghanistan papers and the fact that this spanned multiple presidents. republicans and some democrats have criticized the biden administration's decisions in afghanistan. on friday, house minority leader kevin mccarthy smmed president biden. >> to be commander-in-chief, you need the faith, the trust, and the confidence of the american public. president biden lost all three of those yesterday. yamiche: the senate foreign relations committee chairman bob menendez released a statement

saying "i am disappointed that the prition clearly did not accurately assess the implications of a rapid u.s. withdrawal." she'll, how expected is -- sahil, how expected is the g.o.p. response to this and how concerned are democrats about the political fallout? sahil: the g.o.p. response was expected. the white house was caught off guard by how forceful some of the democrats were, including gregory meeks who promised an investigation. as far as mccarthy's comments, there is -- there's a bifurcated dynamic where in the short term, they smell blood in the water politically. they sense this is a moment of possible weakness for president biden and they want to use that to weaken the president politically but then there's the more complicated question of what mccarthy and his allies would do instead and that's where we saw him tripped up friday when he was asked questions about, for instance, the troop presence. does he want a longer, more

permanent troop presence? he didn't have a clear issue. the issue of negotiating with the taliban which experts think is inevitable. they are a powerful force in afghanistan. he faulted president biden for that in the negotiation but didn't fault president trump for initiating that negotiation to begin with. complicated dynamics. yamiche: the g.o.p. is doing back flips in some ways, supporting president trump when he said he wanted out by may 1 but criticizing president biden. i also see this going on with the g.o.p. when it comes to immigration. sahil, there's an issue about immigration, i can almost feel it around the corner, about where are the referee -- refugees being put? how do you see this connecting to the immigration debate? sahil: this will be a big debate

in congress absolutely tied to the larger debate of immigration because right now everyone is focused on the withdrawal of these peopl and the unanimous feeling that this is what the administration needs to focus on but once they're out, what happens next? where do they go? there's a limit, 62,000 that the president has pursued of refugees. that is several days worth of evackees at this point. not enough for all the people who want to come here. there are 70 house democrats who have signed a letter calling on the president to more than triple the cap to more than 200,000, and that won't go well with a lot of conservatives. this is a big debate coming around the bend tied to immigration. yamiche: jane, what are the biggest questions around the corner when you think about august 31 and september 1? jane: pushing forward we're going to need to see if afghanistan can be secured, if the capital can be secured by the taliban. it's hard to believe we're having this conversation but are the taliban going to form a

government? there's meetings about that right now. will they be able to provide any semblance of security? and will any of the other people who have been hoping to get out, including american citizens, be able to get out of the country at this point? yamiche: nancy, what are your biggest questions as we look at what's next? nancy: just to pick up on what jane said, i think some think august 31 is the end but it's a new beginning. not only for afghanistan but for how the u.s. combats terrorist groups around the world and what are the lasting effects of the withdrawal, leaving people behind, of working with e taliban and groups like the islamic state able to launch attacks so soon after the taliban took over. yamiche: last point to you -- can you talk about what's around the corner, in the briefing room at the white house? ayesha: they didn't have a good answer. they said they can't guarantee people will be able to get out

after august 31 and they're trying to set up a process. yamiche: it's a complicated situation that of course took 20 years to get here so there's a lot of things we'll continue to talk about on this program and of course we'll continue to report on it. we have to leave it there tonight. thank you so much to jane, sahil, ayesha and nancy for your rerting. tune in mondays to the pbs "pbs newshour" as jane ferguson offers a behind-the-scenes look at the chaotic withdrawal from afghanistan. our coverage will continue on the "washington week extra" on social media and our website. this week's topic, the latest on the covid-19 surge. i'm yamiche alcindor, good night from washington. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org.]

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