McMaster: Afghanistan War ‘ended in self-defeat’

by Caroline Vakil - 08/29/21 11:07 AM ET

Former national security adviser H.R. McMaster said on Sunday that the war in Afghanistan “ended in self-defeat” as the Biden administration withdraws the last remaining U.S. troops from the country before an Aug. 31 deadline.

During an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” McMaster, who served in the Trump administration, acknowledged that “we all share responsibility” for what he dubbed a “one-year war fought 20 times over,” adding that the decision to withdraw troops was a costly one.

“And, of course, what’s sad about it is this war ended in self-defeat, Chuck. I mean, we had a sustainable effort in place several years ago that if we had sustained it, we could have prevented what’s happening now,” McMaster told host Chuck Todd. “Instead, what we did, Chuck, is actually we surrendered to a jihadist organization and assumed that there would be no consequences for that. And we’re seeing the consequences today.”

WATCH: “We all share responsibility” for the Afghanistan war which “ended in self-defeat,” says former NSA H.R. McMaster on #MTP @LTGHRMcMaster: The Afghanistan war has been “a one-year war fought 20 times over with ineffective strategies based on flawed assumptions.” pic.twitter.com/a9yzWb5nxB

— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) August 29, 2021

President Biden has repeatedly defended his decision to withdraw U.S. troops after 20 years in Afghanistan.

“I have never been of the view that we should be sacrificing American lives to try to establish a democratic government in Afghanistan, a country that has never once in its entire history been a united country, and is made up — and I don’t mean this in a derogatory — made up of different tribes who have never, ever, ever gotten along with one another,” Biden told reporters on Thursday after a suicide bomber killed 13 U.S. service members and dozens of Afghans at the airport in Kabul.

U.S. officials had warned that the airport, which was crowded with Afghans and others desperate to evacuate the country amid newly minted Taliban rule, could be a prime spot for an attack.