Afghanistan’s second largest city falls to Taliban

CNN’s chief international correspondent Clarissa Ward reported a sense of desperate calm in Kabul tonight following the Taliban’s capture of Kandahar and its rapid advance towards the capital city. 

She also described a “desperation many people are feeling… on the ground as the US really starts to pull the rip cord.”

“I spoke to one official earlier who said to me, ‘do you hear the sound of that silence? It’s the sound of people packing, packing to go because there is such desperate uncertainty,’” said Ward, reporting from Kabul.

The Taliban has taken control of 17 provincial capitals since last Friday, making large territorial gains in the north of the country, which has traditionally been an anti-Taliban stronghold. 

These are the territories now under their control:

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby on Friday said the Defense Department does not believe that Kabul is “in an imminent threat environment,” but Kirby acknowledged that the Taliban appears to be trying to isolate Kabul.

CNN reported earlier that according to one diplomatic source, one intelligence assessment indicates that Kabul could be isolated by the Taliban within the week, possibly within the next 72 hours.

CNN’s Fareed Zakaria said Afghanistan’s military’s collapse on the battlefield is due to a lack of will to fight rather than a shortage of personnel, training or military resources.

“The Afghan army is not actually fighting… It’s melting away,” Zakaria said today, pointing to a relatively low number of casualties among government forces as the Taliban captures cities across the region.

The Taliban, by contrast, has “tenacity, passion and will,” fueling their rapid advance, despite being vastly outnumbered and outgunned, Zakaria continued.

“Do they really want to do this?” he asked. “Does the Afghan government have a plan?”

Sweden will reduce the number of staff at its embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, due to safety concerns, the Minister for Foreign Affairs Ann Linde announced on Friday.

“The safety of the staff at the embassy is a top priority,” Linde said in a series of tweets.

While Sweden has decided not to evacuate all staff at this stage, Linde said, “there are well-developed preparations for the evacuation of the embassy staff, which may become relevant at short notice.

Sweden’s announcement follows a spate of withdrawals of staff from embassies in Kabul this week. Earlier on Friday, Norway announced the temporary closure of its embassy, and Switzerland and Denmark announced the evacuation of embassy staff.

Pentagon spokesman John Kirby speaks during a press briefing in the Pentagon Briefing Room in Washington, DC, on August 13.

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby was directly asked if the war in Afghanistan could conclude with a Taliban takeover done with US-made weapons:

“What’s it going to say for a 20-year war in Afghanistan if it ends with the Taliban rolling into Kabul in US-made MRAPs and Humvees and carrying weapons that our allies turned over to them?” a reporter asked him during a press briefing on the security situation in Afghanistan.  

“I can’t see the future,” Kirby said. “And what I can tell you is our troops who deployed to Afghanistan after 9/11 did what they were sent there to do, which is to prevent Afghanistan from being a safe haven for terrorist attacks upon the homeland and to severely degrade the capabilities of groups like al Qaeda.”

He was then asked if the Taliban is actually interested in any sort of negotiations.

“I think that’s a question for Taliban leaders to speak to. They have a team in Doha. They have participated in the past in negotiations. Now, whether they’re still interested in that or not, I think it’s for them to speak to. We are still interested in seeing that outcome, and so should the rest of the international community,” Kirby said.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres speaks during a press conference on August 13.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has called on the Taliban to halt their offensive in Afghanistan.

“I hope that discussions in Doha, Qatar between representatives of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and Taliban — supported by the region and the wider international community — will restore the pathway to a negotiated settlement to the conflict. Only an Afghan-led negotiated political settlement can ensure peace,” he added.

At least 241,000 people have been forced to leave their homes due to the Afghan conflict, and in the last month alone, more than 1,000 people have “been killed or injured from indiscriminate attacks against civilians, notably in Helmand, Kandahar and Herat provinces,” he said.

The US visa center is seen within the US Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, on July. 30.

The US Embassy in Kabul is instructing personnel to destroy sensitive materials as well as items “which could be misused in propaganda efforts,” according to a management notice sent Friday and seen by CNN and described by another source familiar. 

The notice comes as the embassy prepares to withdraw a significant number of diplomats and as the security situation on the ground in Afghanistan continues to deteriorate, with one diplomatic source telling CNN that one intelligence assessment indicates that Kabul could be isolated by the Taliban within the week, possibly within the next 72 hours.

The notice said facilities would provide “destruction support” daily and called on personnel to “please take advantage and reduce the amount of sensitive material on the property,” including papers and electronics.

The notice said there would be a variety of means to destroy these materials, including burn bins, disintegrator, incinerator and compacter and heavy duty equipment.

The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

The situation on the ground is incredibly challenging for US diplomats who say that plans are changing by the minute, one diplomat explained to CNN. 

CNN reported on Thursday that the administration is considering relocating the US Embassy from its current location in the capital to the Kabul airport. 

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said that while Kabul is not currently in an “imminent threat environment,” it is clear the Taliban is looking to isolate the city.

When further pressed by a reporter on whether or not the Taliban had already isolated Afghanistan’s capital city, Kirby said he would not “get into intelligence assessment on the battlefield.” 

“Clearly from their actions, clearly they are trying to get Kabul isolated,” he said. “It certainly appears the Taliban is trying to isolate the city.”

Asked whether he believes support to Afghan forces will need to be cut off to keep it from going into Taliban hands, Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby stressed that the US is focused on “supporting the Afghans in the field where and when we can” to prevent future threats.

“We’re still working on contract support for over the horizon. We’re still making sure we have robust over the horizon counterterrorism capabilities in the region so that we can’t suffer a threat from Afghanistan again,” the official continued.

Kirby decline to speculate on whether the Aug. 31 drawdown of troops would need be be pushed back.

Taliban fighters patrol inside Ghazni, Afghanistan, on August 12.

As the Taliban has taken control of more than half of provincial capitals in Afghanistan, Pentagon press secretary Adm. John Kirby said “we are certainly concerned by the speed with which the Taliban has been moving.”

When asked if the drawdown of forces would be able to be completed by Aug. 31, Kirby said “we’re going to be watching the security situation day by day.”

“What I can tell you is where we are now. Where we are today. And the mission that we’ve been assigned is to support the State Department’s reduction in personnel by the end of the month. And so that’s what we’re focused on. That’s the timeline we’re focused on, and if we need to adjust, either way, left or right, we’ll do that. But we’re going to always be looking at the security conditions in the ground,” Kirby said.

Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby briefs the media in the Pentagon Briefing Room in Washington, DC, on August 13.

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby provided further details today on the emergency deployment of US troops to Kabul, saying three battalions are en route to the region and most should arrive by the end of the weekend.

The group headed to Afghanistan is composed of of a Marine battalion that was already pre-staged in the region, another Marine infantry battalion from a Marine expeditionary unit and a US Army infantry battalion, he said.

Kirby went on to say the military operation in the area had already started.

“The operation has begun,” he added. “The movement of forces to Kabul has begun.”

Switzerland will withdraw its three remaining staff in Kabul “as soon as possible” due to the worsening security situation in Afghanistan, a spokesperson for the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA) told CNN on Friday.

The evacuation was announced earlier on Friday by Deputy Foreign Minister Livia Leu during a news conference in Bern, Switzerland. 

The Taliban says the governor of the province of Logar “has joined the Mujahideen with all his staff.”

It posted an image of the governor, Abdul Qayyum Rahimi, in the provincial capital, Pul-e-Alam, surrounded by Taliban fighters. 

A Taliban spokesperson said the provincial headquarters and police headquarters had been taken over while attacks on other government installations were continuing. Images from the city also showed prisoners leaving its main jail. 

The Afghan Ministry of Interior tweeted that at least seven Taliban insurgents had been killed in a series of airstrikes in central Logar province on Friday.

Logar is within 100 kilometers (62 miles) of the Afghan capital. Pul-e-Alam was the 17th provincial capital to fall to the Taliban. 

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres is expected to deliver an on-camera statement regarding the situation in Afghanistan at 2:30 p.m. ET Friday. 

Rosemary DiCarlo, the UN under-secretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, expressed she’s “deeply concerned” over the situation in Afghanistan.

President Joe Biden speaks in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC, on August 12.

President Biden will be briefed regularly this weekend by his national security team on the situation in Afghanistan while he is at Camp David, a White House official said. 

As CNN has already reported, Biden is having no second thoughts about his decision to withdraw from Afghanistan even as the Taliban have taken ground more rapidly than the US expected.

While the Biden administration was caught off guard by the speed of the Taliban advance, the official insisted that the presence of sufficient US troops at nearby bases to deploy to Afghanistan this week shows that the administration had planned for all contingencies — including a rapid Taliban advance.

The official also stands by the administration’s rapid drawdown of forces this summer, noting that “military planners told us that speed equals safety.”

The official said the administration stands by its view that “if we had combat forces in Afghanistan after May 1 without a plan to leave then we would be back in a shooting war with the Taliban.”

Norway will temporarily close its embassy in Kabul and evacuate staff from Afghanistan, including both posted diplomats and locally employed Afghans with immediate family who want to leave for Norway, according to a statement from Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Søreide.

“We know that it is a demanding situation for Norwegian citizens staying in Afghanistan and that we will not be able to support them like usual, as long as the embassy is closed,” Eriksen Søreide said in the statement. 

The move follows calls made by the British, German, French, Danish and US embassies this week urging citizens inside Afghanistan to leave the country immediately in light of threats to security.

Norway has encouraged its citizens to leave Afghanistan since Aug. 4 and has been advising against all travel to and all stays in Afghanistan since March 2018.

Colorado Democratic Rep. Jason Crow, a former Army Ranger who served in Afghanistan, said that “clearly this is not going well” as the Taliban takes over half of the country’s provincial capitals.  

“There is a disaster unfolding on ground here that we have to make sure that we’re getting our arms around,” he told CNN’s Dana Bash.

 Crow outlined three things he thinks need to happen in Afghanistan:

Crow said that while special operations are fighting against the Taliban, “it is true overall that the rank-and-file is not holding in Afghanistan.”

He said there is a difference between arming, equipping, training and giving resources to an army and that actual army’s will to fight. He also brought up the issue of identity. “Afghanistan is a largely tribal country; it always has been so,” he said. 

President Biden last month said that it’s “highly unlikely” that the Taliban would take over the whole country. 

But he reiterated that the immediate focus should be on protecting US citizens and allies in Afghanistan. 

Crow also said that his fellow veterans should be proud of themselves as the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks approaches. 

“You stood up and when your country needed you. You answered the call. Be proud of your service and what you did for our country. And we’ll have the policy debates later,” he said.

Watch:

The allies of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization met in the North Atlantic Council on Friday to continue to assess developments on the ground in Afghanistan, and it will continue to maintain its diplomatic presence in Kabul, according to a statement from NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg.

“NATO Allies are deeply concerned about the high levels of violence caused by the Taliban’s offensive, including attacks on civilians, targeted killings, and reports of other serious human rights abuses. The Taliban need to understand that they will not be recognised by the international community if they take the country by force,” Stoltenberg added. “We remain committed to supporting a political solution to the conflict.”

Denmark's Foreign Minister Jeppe Kofod addresses the press in Copenhagen on Friday, August 13, to inform that the Danish embassy in Kabul will evacuate its staff.

Denmark will evacuate staff from its embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, as the Taliban’s advance continues, according to a Friday news release from the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Danish government has “reached an agreement with parties in the Parliament regarding a new support initiative for locally employed Afghan staff with ties to Denmark,” according to the ministry. 

The initiative will offer local embassy staff the opportunity to be evacuated to Denmark. Previous embassy staff and people who have worked for the Danish Defense Service during the past two years may also request to be evacuated. Through the initiative, locally employed staff may bring their spouse or partner, as well as children under the age of 18 with them to Denmark.

This follows calls made by the UK, German, French, and US embassies earlier this week urging citizens inside Afghanistan to leave the country immediately in light of threats to security.

Denmark said its evacuations will take place “as soon as possible,” albeit in a gradual manner “so that the embassy in Kabul can continue to function.”

“The grounds for residency will be temporary, with a time restriction of two years without a possibility of extension,” the news release said. “The right to a two-year residence permit in Denmark is conditional on the persons being evacuated are not deemed to constitute a danger to Denmark’s security”.

Staff members who meet the specific and temporary grounds for residency will be allowed to apply for a residency permit under the Danish Aliens Act once safely arrived in the country.

President Joe Biden speaks about troop withdrawal from Afghanistan in the East Room of the White House on July 8, in Washington, DC.

President Biden convened a meeting of his senior national security team Wednesday night based on the rapid gains of the Taliban over the last several days, according to a senior US official.

The President was briefed on the battlefield situation and the plan that had been drafted to draw down Embassy personnel and send in US forces to facilitate that effort. 

At 7:30 a.m. ET Thursday, the national security principals met to go over the latest plan and their response to Biden. They unanimously signed off on the plan that would be presented as final, the official said. 

As CNN reported earlier, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin then briefed Biden on the full recommendation. Biden signed off and ordered Austin to carry it out.   

Biden spoke to Secretary of State Antony Blinken about diplomatic engagement with allies and partners, which US officials have been conducting throughout the day, the source said.

That included the call between Blinken and Austin with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, as well as US engagement with officials from partners on the ground, those with a diplomatic presence in the country and the NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. 

There is a senior US team in Doha that will engage on the issue, including directly with the Taliban negotiators that are currently there.

The official said overall effort is already underway to reduce the number of personnel at the embassy, though the precise number of personnel slated to leave the embassy has not been finalized.  

The official made clear that the Taliban gains are more rapid than the US assessed when they made the decision to draw down troops. But both the possibility of significant Taliban gains and concerns about the capability of the Afghan National Security Forces were always elements the administration knew they would have to contend with. 

Some more context: The current deterioration has done nothing to shift Biden’s thinking on his decision and in many ways, it has bolstered it, with the performance of the Afghan security forces underscoring that no amount of additional time was going to dramatically change the dynamics on the ground. There also remains the view inside the White House that there wasn’t any option to simply leave 2,500 troops on the ground and expect a similar posture from the Taliban after May 1. 

The administration assessed the Taliban’s military capability as its strongest since 2001, and after May 1, there was every reason to believe it would be directed at US troops had a drawdown timeline not been laid out. The only options, according to this official, was drawdown or add thousands more US troops. 

US officials have communicated directly to the Taliban that if US personnel are put at risk, the US will defend them. No commitments or agreements were made about US forces on the ground with the Taliban prior to Biden’s decision. 

As of now the plan is to keep the Embassy operating with its core diplomatic presence. But there is a recognition that it could change in the coming days, weeks or months.

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said the Defense Department is “aiming to facilitate the reduction of these civilian personnel by August 31,” to line up with the end of August US troop withdrawal deadline set by President Biden, but added he could not “speculate about what the footprint’s going to look like post August 31,” during a news conference at the Pentagon on Thursday.