As a service to our NatZero readers, we listened to Trump’s rant on Hannity so you don’t have to. In this rant, which was done without a break–and please note were not transcribing Trump’s most inane passages–Trump says he really, really wanted to get out of Afghanistan, and that he would’ve done a great withdrawal–like no one has ever seen before!–and the withdrawal would have been one for historians. And he would have withdrawn all the troops… but yet somehow kept Bagram Air Base under US control even though there would be no troops there. So… enjoy (?).
“We went into the Middle East [Trump is referring to Afghanistan as “the Middle East.” It’s not.] and we shouldn’t have been there and we blew it to pieces and now we’re leaving and because of what they’re doing we’re leaving in disgrace. We could’ve left with great dignity. We could’ve left with safety,” Trump says, apparently unaware that he occupied the Oval Office at one time, where he could’ve overseen a withdrawal with “dignity” and “safety.”
“We could’ve taken everybody with us that we wanted, all of the great American citizens and people that helped us, whether it’s interpreters or others. But we could’ve taken ’em out very easily and we wouldn’t have had a rush because the Taliban was not going anywhere,” Trump claims, although his administration limited the number of Significant Interest Visas (SIVs) to an average of just 50 per month in the last ten months of his administration.
“We had them totally under control,” Trump claims. “Everytime we saw movement, we hit ’em with an F-18, and the movement stopped. But we had very little of that, because Abdul, who I spoke to, who turns out to be the leader [Abdul Ghani Baradar is the political leader of the Taliban. Trump demanded that he be released from a Pakistani prison in 2019. Trump negotiated a secret deal with Ghani in 2020 to withdraw all US troops.], Abdul, who was the leader, would not let anyone do anything, and I can tell you what happened, in my opinion. [So, not what happened, just what Trump wants people to believe happened.] [… Trump’s story cut… ]”
“It’s about the withdrawal. It’s not about getting out, because getting out is something I wanted to do for a LONG time,” Trump claim, again unaware that he knows someone who could’ve done that between 2017 and 2020. “And they’re right when they say a lot of generals di–we have, by the way, we have great generals in our military, but not the television generals, not the guys you see on television. You look at what I did with ISIS and how we beat ’em [ISIS has claimed responsibility for today’s attacks at Kabul airport.], we beat them with great generals. We had great, great leadership. We have the greatest military in the world, but we look at a bunch of fools.” [… editing …]
“But I wanted to get out, but we had to get out with dignity,” Trump continues. “We had to take out 80 billion dollars’ worth of equipment. We had to do all of the things that you know we had to do. [Just a reminder: Trump didn’t do any of it.] And then I would’ve blowed up [sic] all the air bases but I would’ve kept Bagram because Bagram’s located right next to China, right near China [It’s not.], and Iran [Bagram is on the other side of Afghanistan from Iran.], and it’s in Afghanistan [Wow, he got that right.] so we had the whole group covered. They spent ten billion dollars building it [Bagram Air Base has been around since the 1950s.] and we handed out the keys. It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever seen.”