OPINION | This article contains the author's opinion.
Many Hollywood elites have notoriously sided with Democrats on a wide spectrum of issues, especially with respect to Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
However, it appears the failure and incompetency of Joe Biden has begun too much to bear.
In Angelina Jolie’s first-ever post to Instagram, Jolie shared a letter she said she received from a teenage girl in Afghanistan.
“Right now, the people of Afghanistan are losing their ability to communicate on social media and to express themselves freely,” Jolie said to more than 3 million followers.
“So I’ve come on Instagram to share their stories and the voices of those across the globe who are fighting for their basic human rights.”
“It is sickening to watch Afghans being displaced yet again out of the fear and uncertainty that has gripped their country,” she wrote. “To spend so much time and money, to have blood shed and lives lost only to come to this, is a failure almost impossible to understand.”
“Watching for decades how Afghan refugees — some of the most capable people in the world — are treated like a burden is also sickening. Knowing that if they had the tools and respect, how much they would do for themselves.”
“And meeting so many women and girls who not only wanted an education, but fought for it. Like others who are committed, I will not turn away. I will continue to look for ways to help. And I hope you’ll join me.”
“Whatever your views on the war in Afghanistan, we probably agree on one thing: it should not have ended this way.”
“I think of injured American servicemen and women I met at Ramstein Air Base—some who’d lost limbs fighting the Taliban— who told me how proud they felt to be a part of helping the Afghan people gain basic rights and freedoms,” she wrote before turning her pen to “every Afghan girl who picked up her bookbag and went to school in the last twenty years even though she risked being killed for it—as so many were.”
Jolie wrote that as an American she is “ashamed by the manner of our leaving.”
“It diminishes us. We have lost leverage to influence what now happens in Afghanistan,” she added. “We lack a strategy to monitor and support women and civil society in Afghanistan, who the Taliban have a history of targeting—banning girls from school, confining women to the home, and inflicting brutal physical punishments, including public lashing, on any woman perceived to have stepped out of line.”
From Fox News:
Jolie said she was on the border of Afghanistan two weeks before the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and during her time abroad, she met Afghan refugees who had fled the Taliban nearly 20 years ago…
Jolie also echoed similar sentiments in an op-ed she penned for Time magazine on Friday, writing, “whatever your views on the war in Afghanistan, we probably agree on one thing: it should not have ended this way.”
The Taliban seized power two weeks before the U.S. was set to complete its troop withdrawal following a costly two-decade war.
In her statement, Jolie called the manner in which the U.S. appeared to “cut and run” while “abandoning our allies and supporters in the most chaotic way imaginable, after so many years of effort and sacrifice” a “betrayal and a failure impossible to fully understand.”
“It’s clear the Taliban is now in charge,” reported CNN’s Clarissa Ward on the ground in Kabul, Afghanistan.
“Taliban fighters have flooded the capital. Smiling and victorious,” CNN’s Ward said. “They took this city of 6 million people in a matter of hours — barely firing a shot.”
“This is a sight I honestly thought I would never see: scores of Taliban fighters, and just behind us, the U.S. embassy compound,” Ward said. “Some carry American weapons. They tell us they’re here to maintain law and order.”
A Taliban commander is seen telling CNN that “everything is under control” and “will be fine.” Footage has surfaced of fighters waving their weapons and chanting “Death to America.”
The Biden administration’s failure to understand the movement of the Taliban and provide effective preparation with the Afghan government has had horrifying consequences.
U.S. troops have been under fire, at least twice, while at Kabul’s Karzai International Airport, the NY Post reports.
At least 12 people were killed at the Hamid Karzai International Airport since the Taliban takeover began, Reuters reported.
Startling footage and images showed Afghans storming Kabul’s Karzai International Airport and attempting to cling to departing planes. “Thousands of Afghans have been filmed desperately chasing after and clinging to a US Air Force plane as it taxied down the runway — with multiple people plunging to their deaths after the aircraft took off in the frantic attempt to flee the country after the Taliban takeover,” the report adds.
Trump has called on Biden to resign from office “in disgrace.” Trump said, “What Joe Biden has done with Afghanistan is legendary. It will go down as one of the greatest defeats in American history!”
One young man, identified as “Reza,” died at just 17 years old by clinging to a departing plane. His body was recovered without legs or arms, but his family was able to identify him, according to VICE news.
An estimated 10,000 to 15,000 American citizens remained trapped in Afghanistan. Sec. of Defense Lloyd Austin reportedly told members of the House of Representatives that Americans are in fact being beaten by the Taliban in Kabul.
An additional 6,000 Britons are also trapped inside the country. The UK’s Parlament has held Biden in contempt over the botched withdrawal of troops in Afghanistan, calling it “catastropic” and “shameful.”
A new 98-page report from the Inspector General reveals alarming information about the Biden administration and events leading up to the catastrophe in Afghanistan.
With the released of the Department of Defense’s quarterly Sentinel report on Operation Freedom, we’ve learned 4 key facts:
1. The Biden administration knew that the Afghan forces were unlikely to succeed in slowing or stopping the Taliban’s advance.
2. The report shows that the Biden administration also knew the Taliban had its sights set on Kabul.
3. The Biden administration knew the Taliban was only engaged in political negotiations to seek legitimacy, but planned to increase its military offensive to take the country by force.
4. The report also warned that plans for Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport were likely insufficient due to a complicated agreement with Turkish forces.