\u201cThis disaster, the catastrophe that we’re watching unfold right now across Afghanistan did not have to happen,\u00a0\u00bb she said.<\/b>
\nRep. Liz Cheney said Sunday that the Taliban\u2019s rapid-fire military triumph in Afghanistan was a disaster that \u201cdid not have to happen.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s inexcusable,\u201d said Cheney (R-Wyo.) on ABC\u2019s \u201cThis Week.\u201d Cheney, for whom the war in Afghanistan is part of her family\u2019s political legacy, said the United States had failed the people of Afghanistan \u2014 and that its recent actions would make the nation’s allies doubt whether they can trust the United States. \u201cThis disaster, the catastrophe that we’re watching unfold right now across Afghanistan did not have to happen,\u00a0\u00bb she said. \u00ab\u00a0It’s not just that people predicted this would happen; everyone was warned that this would happen. We\u2019ve now created a situation where as we get to the 20th anniversary of 9\/11, we are surrendering Afghanistan to the terrorist organization that housed al Qaeda when they plotted and planned the attacks against us.\u00a0\u00bb On Saturday, Cheney blamed both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump for the current crisis in Afghanistan. \u00ab\u00a0The Trump\/Biden calamity unfolding in Afghanistan began with the Trump administration negotiating with terrorists and pretending they were partners for peace, and is ending with American surrender as Biden abandons the country to our terrorist enemies,\u00a0\u00bb she tweeted. She reiterated in the interview with ABC host Jonathan Karl that both presidents deserved blame for the debacle. \u201cPresident Biden bears responsibility for making the decision,\u00a0\u00bb she said. \u00ab\u00a0There’s no question that President Trump, his administration, Secretary [of State Mike] Pompeo, they also bear very significant responsibility for this. They walked down this path of legitimizing the Taliban, of perpetuating this fantasy, telling the American people that the Taliban were a partner for peace. President Trump told us the Taliban was going to fight terror. Secretary Pompeo told us the Taliban was going to renounce al Qaeda. None of that has happened.\u201d Cheney\u2019s father, Dick Cheney, was vice president in 2001 when the U.S. launched an invasion of Afghanistan in response to the Sept.11 attacks on the United States. That invasion ousted the Taliban and drove Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda into the mountains of Pakistan, though the Taliban was able to regroup and extend fighting over the next two decades. Bin Laden was assassinated by U.S. forces in Pakistan in 2011. Twenty years of U.S. support had failed to provide stability or prosperity to the Asian nation, nor extinguished the threat from the Taliban. But Cheney said that those who claim the U.S. departure from this war was overdue because total victory was never going to be attainable didn\u2019t see the situation correctly. \u201cThis is not ending the war. What this is doing actually is perpetuating it,\u201d she argued.<\/p>\n