Tag: Afghanistan

Commentary: Refugee Plans Repeat the Mistakes of the Afghanistan Campaign

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The chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan has produced moving scenes of disorder and desperation. Some see American fecklessness. Others, the rancid fruit of attempting to cultivate Afghanistan in our image. Finally, others see the Biden Administration making a hash of what was fundamentally a good policy of planned withdrawal. Even for those who supported withdrawal—as I did—the events of the last week undeniably were emblematic of the ongoing humiliation of the United States and its military. 

Defending his decisions, Joe Biden gave a surprisingly good speech, which could have just as easily come from Donald Trump or Ron Paul. But considering the circumstances, the tone was off. The speech only justified the withdrawal in general and avoided taking responsibility for its particulars, including the grim scene at the Kabul airport, for which Biden and his administration bear some responsibility. Biden defied credulity when he said, “We planned for every contingency.”

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Trump Administration’s Careful Afghanistan Withdrawal Plans Were Ignored by Biden, Former Trump Aide Says

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Joe Biden’s national security team reportedly ignored the Trump administration’s careful plans for withdrawing from Afghanistan, resulting in the nightmare scenario currently unfolding in the war-torn country.

Former National Security Council Senior Director Kash Patel told Just the News’ John Solomon on Thursday, “I don’t even know that anyone could have made this awful scenario up. It’s literally worse than you could possibly conjure.”

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Biden Administration Continues to Tell Fleeing Americans to Pay Their Way out of Afghanistan, Hours After Telling the Press Otherwise

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Joe Biden

The Biden administration continued to inform American citizens in Afghanistan as of Thursday evening they could have to pay more than $2,000 to board an evacuation flight out of the country, despite the State Department telling the press hours before that it had no intention of levying any such charges.

The U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan has stated in multiple security advisories since Monday that any U.S. citizen seeking to evacuate the country must complete an online form in order to secure their repatriation flight. “This form is the only way to communicate interest in flight options,” the embassy said in a security advisory Wednesday.

State Department spokesman Ned Price told the Daily Caller News Foundation and other news outlets late Thursday afternoon that the Biden administration has “no intention of seeking any reimbursement from those fleeing Afghanistan.”

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Pentagon Does Not Deny That U.S. Military Is Buying Fuel from the Taliban to Evacuate People from Afghanistan

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William Taylor

Army Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor and Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby dodged a reporter’s question about whether the US military is buying aviation fuel from the Taliban as evacuation efforts continue at Hamid Karzai International Airport (HKIA) in Kabul.

During a briefing at the Pentagon Thursday, Kirby also revealed that of the 2,000 people evacuated over the last 24 hours, only 300 of them were Americans.

“How are you fueling your planes… are you now in a position that you have to buy fuel from the Taliban?” asked Fox News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin during a briefing at the Pentagon.

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Fort Bliss in Texas Becomes Ground Zero for Resettling Afghan Refugees During Chaotic Exit

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Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, is best known as home to the Army’s tank division, the revered Old Ironsides military insignia and the country’s largest military-controlled airspace. But the Biden administration’s botched exit from Afghanistan is turning the vast installation into ground zero for the evacuation of Afghans who spent two decades helping the United States fight the war against terror.

Texas Sen. John Cornyn says the fort is preparing to receive 10,000 Afghan refugees, and military officials have hinted that number could reach much higher.

It’s the second major wave of civilian guests to be hosted at the fort, which began this spring helping the Homeland Security and Health and Human Services Departments to house thousands of unaccompanied minor children who were brought across the border.

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Arizona Gov. Ducey Calls for Afghan Refugees Even as Thousands of Americans Still Remain in Afghanistan

Zachery Schmidt

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and state Speaker of the House Rusty Bowers (R-District 25) announced Thursday that Arizona will welcome refugees from Afghanistan.

“The Afghans fleeing the Taliban regime served alongside America’s military forces and fought for freedom,” the press release states. “We’re grateful for their efforts and Arizona wholeheartedly welcomes our fair share of the refugees in our state.”

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Steve Bannon: GOP House Should Pick Donald Trump as Speaker for 100 Days After Sweep of 2022 Midterms

Hayley Feland

Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed political strategist Steve Bannon, who was the White House’s chief strategist during President Donald Trump’s administration, to the newsmaker line to discuss his new idea, announced on The War Room yesterday, regarding Trump being voted in as Speaker of the House.

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Commentary: Thousands Stranded in Afghanistan as Biden Ignored and Generals Disregard Warnings from the Battlefield

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“Our military mission in Afghanistan will conclude on August 31st. The drawdown is proceeding in a secure and orderly way, prioritizing the safety of our troops as they depart… And thanks to the way in which we have managed our withdrawal, no one — no one U.S. forces or any forces have — have been lost.  Conducting our drawdown differently would have certainly come with a increased risk of safety to our personnel.”

That was President Joe Biden as recently as July 8 justifying not just a drawdown, but a rapid drawdown of U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, trying to reach an arbitrary goal of zero troops in the country by the end of this month.

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White House: ‘Certainly a Fair Amount’ of U.S. Weaponry Is in the Hands of the Taliban

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White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said Tuesday that “certainly a fair amount” of U.S. weaponry that was in the possession of Afghan Security Forces has now fallen in the hands of the Taliban.

Sullivan spoke at a White House press briefing two days after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan and was asked whether the Biden administration knows where the billions of dollars in weaponry that the U.S. supplied the Afghan government will ultimately end up.

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Report: Terrorist Released by Obama in Exchange for Bowe Bergdahl Played Key Role in Taliban’s Return to Power

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Taliban insurgents turn themselves in to Afghan National Security Forces at a forward operating base in Puza-i-Eshan

One of the five Taliban commanders who was released from Guantanamo Bay in 2014 by former president Barack Obama in exchange for Army deserter Bowe Bergdahl, is emerging as a key figure who helped the insurgents seize power in Afghanistan.

Khairullah Khairkhwa, along with the other freed detainees, used Qatar as a base to form a Taliban regime in exile, and eventually became an official negotiator for peace talks with the Biden regime, the New York Post reported.

Khairkhwa previously served as Spokesperson of the Taliban regime, Governor of the Kabul Province of the Taliban regime, and Minister of Internal Affairs of the Taliban regime, according to the United Nations National Security Council.

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Twitter Allows Taliban to Remain on Their Platform, Even as Other Tech Giants Ban Them

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On Tuesday, Twitter admitted in a statement that they have no plans to ban the official accounts of the Taliban and its spokesmen, even after the radical Islamist group had seized control of the nation of Afghanistan over the weekend, as reported by the New York Post.

When asked about maintaining such accounts, the statement released by Twitter mostly dodged the issue and deferred to basic platitudes about how the social media giant would “continue to proactively enforce” its rules, and would only ban tweets that include “glorification of violence, platform manipulation, and spam.”

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Democrats May Hand GOP a 2022 Election Gift: Hearings on Biden’s ‘Flawed’ Afghan Exit

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President Joe Biden is facing bipartisan backlash over the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan ahead of the 2022 midterm elections as lawmakers from both parties call for an investigation into his administration’s handling of the U.S. withdrawal.

Democrats vowed “tough questions” Tuesday as they used words like “flawed,” “failures” and “horrifying” to describe the administration’s exit strategy and the scenes unfolding in Kabul.

The president, for his part, is not changing course and vows to complete a full withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Afghanistan. But he now faces the specter of his own party investigating his team’s conduct and competence in the shadows of a 2022 election where control of Congress is up for grabs.

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Arizona Representative Kaiser Says Biden-Harris Administration Responsible for Afghanistan Catastrophe

Hayley Feland

A press release from Arizona State Representative Steve Kaiser (R-Phoenix) says that the Biden Harris Administration is responsible for the Afghanistan catastrophe. Kaiser, a United States Army veteran who served in Afghanistan, condemned the “mishandling of the Afghanistan withdrawal.” Kaiser called the situation the result of “ incompetent leadership and disastrous mishandling.”

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Florida’s Senators Blast Biden over Afghanistan Withdrawal

Grant Holcomb
Marco Rubio and Rick Scott

Florida’s senators went on the offensive in the wake of the Taliban reconquering Afghanistan, heavily criticizing the President Joe Biden administration over the way the withdrawal of American and allied forces were withdrawn from the war-torn country.

Florida’s junior senator, Rick Scott, even floated the idea of invoking the 25th Amendment which deals with presidential succession related to the capability of the current president, and possibly removing Biden from office.

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Commentary: Biden Is Out of Touch, Out of Town, and Soon He May Be Out of Time

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In a hastily called news conference Monday afternoon President Joe Biden and his advisors tried to control the damage of this past weekend. But it may be too late. Biden not only lost Afghanistan, he lost credibility, and with that, the American people.

A defiant Biden said he did not regret his decision to withdraw American forces from Afghanistan, while acknowledging that the country’s collapse to the Taliban came much sooner than U.S. officials had anticipated.

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Democrat Firebrand Senator Sheldon Whitehouse Compares Fall of Kabul to Saigon as Biden Admin Denies Connection

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A Democratic senator compared the scene in Kabul as the U.S. rushed to evacuate embassy personnel and Afghan allies to the fall of Saigon in 1975 on Monday.

“Sad. My father was our next-to-last ambassador in Saigon, and our ambassador when ‘peace deal’ was negotiated in Laos,” tweeted Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. “How that all ended deserved more attention.”

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Virginia Congressional Leaders React to Ongoing Afghanistan Crisis

Matthew Hall

President Biden addressed the nation late Monday afternoon to discuss the ongoing national security and humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan. Some congressional leaders were furious at the Biden Administration’s lack of leadership on the issue. Congressman Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ-02), a former Democrat who switched parties in 2020, lashed out and called for the resignation of President Biden, Vice President Harris, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Senator Rick Scott (R-FL) hinted Monday that the Cabinet should consider invoking the 25th Amendment to remove President Biden.

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Rep. Andy Biggs Joins Former President Trump and Rep. Van Drew’s Calls for Biden to Resign Over Afghanistan Debacle

Rachel Alexander

After listening to President Joe Biden’s speech on Monday defending his decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan, Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ-05) joined former President Donald Trump and Democrat-turned-Republican Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ-02) in calling on Biden to resign due to Afghanistan falling to the Taliban. Biden pulled out most of the U.S. troops from the country after 20 years of fighting the Taliban, a move that Trump had said would only be feasible if the Taliban stuck to the conditional peace agreement he negotiated a year and a half ago. 

Biggs told Newsmax host Chris Saucedo that Trump had a plan to withdraw the troops in a manner that would have worked without leaving the country to the Taliban. “Most Americans didn’t want us to withdraw from Afghanistan, we just wanted to withdraw with honor and with a peaceful process to go ahead to save lives there and to save American lives and have a more secure future for this country after all that we have sacrificed.” He said Biden has been “absolutely incompetent in every way on every policy front whether domestic or foreign.” 

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Minnesota Congressional Delegates Respond to Afghanistan Crisis, Calls for Biden Resignation

Hayley Feland

Congressman Jeff Van Drew issued a statement, calling for President Biden, Vice-President Harris, and Speaker Pelosi to resign following the fall of Afghanistan. Van Drew is a former Democrat who switched parties in 2018. Congressman Van Drew’s official statement reads, “President Biden’s decision to simply hand Afghanistan back to the Taliban after almost twenty years to the day since the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001, will go down as one of the most shocking and embarrassing failures of leadership in American history.”

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Michigan Congressional Delegation Mum on Van Drew’s Call for Biden, Harris, and Pelosi to Resign

Bradley Vasoli

Members of neither party in Michigan’s congressional delegation are yet weighing in on Rep. Jeff Van Drew’s (R-NJ) call for President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA-12) to resign in response to the Taliban’s retaking of Afghanistan.

Appearing on Fox News Sunday night, Van Drew castigated the White House in stark terms.

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Trump Calls on Biden to ‘Resign in Disgrace for What He Has Allowed to Happen to Afghanistan’

Bradley Vasoli

Former President Donald Trump called on President Joe Biden Sunday evening to resign over a number of policy outcomes, foremost among them Afghanistan’s looming fall to the Taliban after the withdrawal of American troops.

The former president also chided the current commander-in-chief over his management of the U.S.-Mexico border where enforcement personnel encounter over 200,000 illegal entrants each month.

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Exclusive: Erik Prince Blames Afghanistan Debacle on ‘Cosplay National Security Apparatus’ that Believes ‘Their Own BS’

Neil W. McCabe

The Founder of the Blackwater private security firm and the author of a comprehensive plan to save Afghanistan by shifting the country’s security to private contractors and away from the American military told the Star News Network he warned U.S. diplomats the government of President Ashraf Ghani would fall before Labor Day.

“I told a number of ambassadors in the region there; they should expect a collapse of Kabul by Labor Day, and I said that back in April, based on when the U.S. air pressure, when the Air Force really stopped bombing, when that threat largely disappears, then the Taliban would be able to group and mass as they have done, and then they start blowing up cities,” said Erik Prince, the Navy SEAL veteran and national security entrepreneur.

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Over 200 Afghan Allies Arrive on First of Many Expected Flights to Bring Thousands to the US

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Over 200 Afghan allies arrived at Fort Lee, in Virginia, on the first of many expected flights bringing thousands of people who assisted the U.S. military to America, Axios reported Friday.

President Joe Biden promised to help Afghan interpreters and other people who aided U.S. forces during the war, according to Axios. Over 700 people and their family members are expected to come to the U.S. on special immigrant visas as American forces withdraw from Afghanistan.

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Newt Gingrich Commentary: Overcoming Defeat and Denial in Afghanistan

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With each passing day in Afghanistan the Taliban grows stronger, and the pro-American government forces grow weaker.  Anecdotally, you can see the momentum building in the news coverage.

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Long War Journal, which has been tracking war in Afghanistan for years, estimates that as of Sunday the Taliban controlled 213 districts. It reports that the government controls 70 districts, and some 115 districts are being contested. Thus, after the United States, NATO, and our Afghan allies spent 20 years fighting to create a post-Taliban country, the evidence is growing that we have lost.

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Biden May Leave Up to 1,000 Troops in Afghanistan After Withdrawal

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After Joe Biden further delayed efforts to withdraw all American military forces from the nation of Afghanistan earlier this year, new reports suggest that the withdrawal will be delayed indefinitely and could leave up to 1,000 troops in the country, according to CNN.

The report comes from an anonymous administration official, who claimed that the residual forces would stay behind to ostensibly secure the U.S. embassy and the airport in the capital city of Kabul. However, another anonymous official with the Department of Defense claimed that the residual forces left behind would not exceed 650.

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Democrats Blast Omar for Comparing America, Israel to Taliban

Peter D'Abrosca

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN-05) caused another rift in the Democrat Party this week when she openly compared the United States and Israel to the Taliban and Hamas in a now-deleted tweet. 

After an exchange with Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, wherein Omar demanded an International Criminal Court investigation into possible war crimes in Afghanistan and Palestine, Omar took to Twitter, saying there have been “unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban.”

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President Biden Gives Memorial Day Weekend Address in Hampton

Eric Burk

President Joe Biden gave a Memorial-Day-weekend speech at Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Hampton on Friday afternoon. He highlighted the humility and sacrifice of the military and their families and emphasized that they defended the American principle that all men and women are equal. He also mentioned the service and death of his son Beau Biden.

“He was like a lot of you. You do your duty. You don’t expect anything for it except people having a general respect,” Biden said.

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At Least 35 Dead, Dozens Wounded in Kabul University Gunman Attack

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Casualties from a Monday shooting at Kabul University in Afghanistan have risen to 35, according to two government officials, Reuters reported.

The majority of the dead were students, and approximately 50 were wounded in the attack, the sources said, Reuters reported. The Taliban has denied responsibility for the attack, but approximately 100 students protested outside the school that Doha Taliban peace negotiations haven’t resulted in lowered violence.

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Top Al-Qaida Leader on FBI Most Wanted List Killed in Afghanistan According to Report

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Afghanistan on Sunday claimed to have killed a top al-Qaida terror leader and propagandist who is on the FBI’s most wanted list.

Husam Abd al-Rauf, who was wanted by the FBI for providing support to terrorist organizations and conspiring to kill U.S. nationals, was reportedly killed in firefight in a Taliban-controlled area, according to the Associated Press. A total of six other suspected Islamic militants were dispatched in the raid and one Afghan authority was killed, the AP reported.

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U.S. State Department Resettles Over 1,000 Afghan Refugees During Coronavirus Pandemic: REPORT

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In the past month, the State Department resettled over a thousand refugees from Afghanistan, even though the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program was temporarily suspended due to the coronavirus pandemic.

COVID-19 cases are on the rise in refugee camps overseas, including in Greece, where a migrant camp had to be quarantined after 23 asylum seekers tested positive for the coronavirus.

The pause on refugee admissions was expected to last from March 19 through April 6, but according to Ann Corcoran of Refugee Resettlement Watch,  1,003 Afghan refugees were resettled during that approximate time period.

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Neil McCabe of OANN Joins the Tennessee Star Report to Talk About Trump’s Pull Out of Taliban Talks

Julie Carr

On Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Michael Patrick Leahy spoke with weekly special guest and former Breitbart colleague, Iraq war veteran and current Army Reserve Sergeant Neil McCabe about the President Trump’s recent pull out of the Taliban meeting.

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Commentary: Merry Christmas – We’re All Gonna Die (Again)!

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by Thaddeaus G. McCotter   One of the less salubrious effects of the anti-social network is how everything and anything is deemed the end of the world and, logically, the end of humanity. True, to the Regressives, the end of humanity does not mean the end of the world but, rather, a reprieve from us for Goddess Gaia. But why quibble and ruin the spirit of the season? Speaking of ruining the spirit of the season, to paraphrase President Ronald Reagan: “Well, here we are again.” Here at home, the Dow is down and the Donald’s ire is up. The government is shut down over the issue of funding for the southern border wall. General Michael Flynn was in court for sentencing and is still not sentenced. Michael Cohen is going to jail and the president has discussed the case with his acting attorney general, causing within the political class an outpouring of narcissistic panic about the fate of our free republic not seen since lunch. Naturally, the hashtag “#TrumpResign” is trending number one, because the onanistic resistance has mystically divined that this is the silver bullet that will make the bane of their existence pick up his money bags…

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Commentary: Trump is Smarter Than the Generals

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by Christopher Roach   A bipartisan consensus among the foreign policy elite holds that America needs to maintain its de facto overseas empire. This includes both preserving stability, as well as fomenting deliberate instability, including regime change in places like Syria. This consensus among elected officials, defense contractors, general officers, talking heads, and various experts is not shared by the vast majority of Americans, who elected Barack Obama and Donald Trump on their promises to end “stupid wars” and put America first. The American people have good instincts on these matters. The Confused Syria Campaign Our Syria campaign has been a confused affair from the beginning. In the waning days of the Arab Spring, Obama supported various rebel factions seeking to oust Bashar al-Assad, as he had earlier in Libya and Egypt. Syrians soon found themselves in the midst of a brutal civil war, and in this vacuum—as in Iraq only a decade earlier—jihad tourists from all over the Middle East soon joined the fray. The various enemies of the Syrian regime included the so-called “moderate” rebels, Kurds, and Sunni extremists, the latter of which were divided between al Nusra and ISIS. There are no obvious good guys here, and…

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Trump to Review Murder Charge Against Former Green Beret

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U.S. President Donald Trump says he will review the case of a decorated Special Forces veteran accused of murder in the 2010 killing of a suspected Taliban bombmaker in Afghanistan. The U.S. leader said that “at the request of many,” he would weigh the murder charge against Major Matthew Golsteyn, a former U.S. Army Green Beret. In Trump’s word’s, Golsteyn “could face the death penalty from our own government after he admitted to killing a Terrorist bombmaker while overseas.” Trump called Golsteyn a “U.S. military hero.” The military has been investigating the circumstances of the death of the suspected bombmaker for several years, dropping its investigation in 2014, then reopening it in 2016 after Golsteyn said in a Fox News interview that he killed the bombmaker, who had been detained, in combat operations in Marjah, Afghanistan. Golsteyn said he killed the man out of fear that if he were let go he would target Afghans assisting U.S. troops. The suspected Taliban bombmaker was accused of killing two U.S. Marines. Trump’s statement could complicate prosecution of the criminal charges against Golsteyn, since Trump is the commander in chief of U.S. forces and anything he says related to the case could influence…

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Tennessee Congressional Delegation Split on Trump’s Afghanistan Decision Along Partisan Lines

Wendy Wilson
Tennessee Star

Republican Sen. Bob Corker and Republican Reps. Marsha Blackburn, Scott DesJarlais and Chuck Fleischmann released statements in support of President Trump’s decision to keep troops in Afghanistan. Trump announced his decision Monday evening in a televised address. His decision is likely to disappoint some conservatives because he campaigned on pulling out of Afghanistan. “My original instinct was to pull out — and, historically, I like following my instincts,” Trump said in his address. “But all my life I’ve heard that decisions are much different when you sit behind the desk in the Oval Office.” Trump said that, as happened with the withdrawal from Iraq in 2011,  “a hasty withdrawal would create a vacuum that terrorists, including ISIS and al Qaeda, would instantly fill.” Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the following in a statement: I had the opportunity to talk with Secretary Tillerson in advance of this evening’s address, and while I look forward to receiving additional details, I support the direction President Trump laid out tonight for the U.S. role in Afghanistan. While there are certainly substantial questions about whether Afghanistan has the capacity over time to provide stable governance to its people, this more focused…

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