Transcripts For FOXNEWSW America Reports With John Roberts Sandra Smith 20210928

0 about 100 americans and that figure doesn't change. we need a real accounting for how many people, big difference between 100 and 4000. my biggest takeaway, we have no counter terrorism strategy and milley and mckenzie testifyod this, mckenzie said he is not confident we can prevent al qaeda or isis. >> harris: i am rushing, it is top of the hour, kayleigh and emily, everybody on "outnumbered," quick one for us as we ark wait the panel to reconvene. thanks for watching fox news. our coverage continues on "america reports." >> sandra: the senate armed services adjourning for a break, set to resume 30 minutes from now. the nation's top military leaders facing tough questioning on capitol hill for the first time since the chaotic exit from afghanistan. hello and welcome, everyone, i'm sandra smith in new york. >> john: i'm john robert necessary washington. lloyd austin, and general mark milley and general frank mckenzie all testifying today before the senate armed everybodies iss committee, lawmakers questioning the generals on everything from plans leading to withdrawal to the drone strike in kabul that led to multiple civilian casualties, including seven children. >> sandra: fox team coverage and we'll speak with former national security advisor keith kellogg. martha maccallum is standing by. start with jennifer griffin live from the pentagon, hi, jen fer. >> jennifer: hi, sandra, the president's military advisors did not advise pulling all u.s. troops out of afghanistan, suggesting that the president made the decision to withdraw in spite of recommendation of his top military advisors. >> also recommended earlier in the fall of 2020, maintain 4500 at that time, my personal views. i have a view withdrawal of the forces would lead to collapse of the afghan military forces and eventually the afghan government. >> jennifer: general mckenzie said he recommended 4500 troops stay in afghanistan, that is not what president biden told four days after kabul fell. >> no one told your military advisors, no, keep 2500 troops, been a stable situation for the lasts 16r8 years we can do that and continue to do that. >> no one said that to me that i can recall. >> jennifer: all three withins said their recommendations and those of general scott miller in afghanistan, made it to president biden. >> just because we're generals and it would be incredible act of political defiance for commissioned officer to resign because my advice is not taken. this country doesn't want generals figuring out what orders we accept and do or not, that is not our job. >> jennifer: in unooshl detour general milley addressed criticism that resulted from reportss in the woodward costa book about actions in the final months of trump administration, including two phone calls to chinese counter part to reassure china the u.s. was nots preparing to attack. >> the calls on 30 october and 8 january coordinated before and after with secretary esper and acting secretary miller's staffs and the interagency. i know, i am certain that president trump did not intend to attack the chinese and it is my direct responsibility and it was my directed responsibility by the secretary to convey that intent to the chinese. my task at that time was to deescalate. >> jennifer: he says personally informed then secretary of state mike pompeo and chief of staff meadows about the calls, as well as acting defense secretary chris miller. milley pushed back on suggestions he went rogue inserting himself into the nuclear chain of command following a phone call from house speaker nancy pelosi. >> i am in the chain of communication issue at no time attempting to change or influence the process, usurp authority or insert myself in the chain of command, but i am expected, i am required to give my advice and ensure that the president is fully informed on military matters. >> jennifer: there were admissions today the way the war ended was strategic failure. frustration by lawmakers was palpable when it came to afghanistan, demands for accountability and sense they had been lied to for decades about progress being made in afghanistan, progress which evaporated august 15 when kabul fell to taliban without a shot being fired. sandra. >> sandra: live at the pent gob, jennifer, thank you. john. >> john: to capitol hill. >> any family watching this hearing, we didn't learn much, we heard frustration from democrats and republicans when asked how many americans are still stuck in that country, all three withins defer to the state department and defense secretary lloyd austin admitted that the evacuation was not perfect. thousands of afghans were evacuated during a botched pull-out. shockingly dhs secretary said sid holders, and hearing from families in u.s. complaining only having one side of communication with the government as they try to get their relatives out. house foreign affairs ranking more michael mccall subject a letter to the president asking for detailed call and a month later, hasn't gotten response. he's telling us he's been contacted by several active u.s. service members, texas service members who have family and friends stuck in the country and still nothing has been done about that. members of congress say following early briefings, they were confident of contingency plan, but we're not hearing about that plan today and democrats expressing concern about what the state department is doing as republicans press on the president's actions. watch this. >> did it bother you when the president went on national television and said he would not leave until all american citizens were taken out? it bother you? it clearly is not truthful. >> senator, you heard me say several times that we're going to work as hard as we can for as long as we can to get every american citizen out that wants to come out and we continue to do that to this day. >> senator josh hawley had a tense back and forth with secretary austin, as well. this will be brought back up again as soon as lunch is over. senator tillis will ask for questions about the sid applicants in round two. john. >> john: looking forward to round two in 25 minutes. thanks. sandra. >> sandra: bring in anchor of the story, martha maccallum, we have been watching every minute throughout the day. so far your take on the first believe accounting of that afghanistan withdrawal watching the top military brass? >> all these gentlemen and top military advisors advised president biden to leave 2500 troops on the ground. they did not get their wish. general milley said i will not resign because my advice is not listened to, giving advice is what i'm here to do. my father didn't resign at iwo jima and he stuck to carrying out his mission as he saw it. on three significant points, it is clear all this top military brass disagreed with president biden and things he's on the record for having said. one he said he didn't recall ever being told he should leave 2500 troops. he could have said, yes, that was advice i was given, that is not the decision i decided to make. he said, i don't recall anyone telling me that. he said al qaeda was gone. we heard today from the individuals close to the situation, they said al qaeda is not gone and presents a growing threat. they also took i think issue with the extraordinary success definition by president biden in saying it was a logistical success and strategic failure. there is a lot of daylight between the top military officials and president biden as much as they tried to carefully tread that ground. >> sandra: including change between cotton and austin on the input military leaders were giving the president. listen. >> president biden last month in an interview with george stephanopoulos said no military leader advised him to leave a small troop presence in afghanistan. is that true? >> i believe that first of all, i know the president to be an honest and forthright man. >> is that true or not? >> their input was received by the president and considered by the presidency for sure. >> exchange to that. >> that is contradiction. did tell him and he did listen to us. there is consekwens to the decision of not leaving people in. we have not gotten 4000 americans and sid's out of the country, accelerated threat with isis-k. they had argued could be contained or managed to greater extent if we left 2500 troops on the ground. the consekwens are ever changing. general milley said i was taught and raised to believe as military man for 42 plus years, you never set a date certain. president biden owns those decisions and can stand up for them. we learned today in more sharp clarity how deep the divisions were. >> sandra: here is chairman milley saying the enemy controls kabul. watch. >> outcomes like this are not determined in the last five days, last 20 days or last year for that matter. how comes like this, outcome that is a strategic failure issue the enemy is in charge in kabul. >> sandra: that we know today, martha, right? >> strategic failure, the enemy is in charge in kabul and we watchd that play out with great frustration. it was interesting, i think tommy tuberville said can the military defeat any force on the face of the earth essentially? the answer was yes. that puts you in situation where you say we had an option to not leave in charge of afghanistan, how we brought in more troops or secured maintained our presence at the airport, bagram air base, a lot of obvious questions you can go back and look at. bottom line, most americans feel if we wanted to, we could have defeated the taliban, decisions along the way, it is 20 years and four presidencys brought us where we are today. >> sandra: lots of notes from members of congress talking about the world stage as result of this botched withdrawal. joint chief chairman said because of withdrawal we have damaged our credibility here for america. as we ark wait this to continue, martha, stand by with us. john, to you. >> john: more on this now, general keith kelon, former national security advisor to vice president pence. general, good to have you today. let me go back and play something, this is sound clip number two from the hearing on the number of troops the chairman of the joint chiefs recommended to the president be left in afghanistan. listen here. >> i recommended we maintained 2500 troops in afghanistan. >> understand that. general milley, i assume you agree with that in terms of the recommendation of 2500? >> what i said in my opening statement and memoranda back in fall of 2020, remain consistent and i agree with that. >> john: talking to george stephanopoulos, the presidented none of my military advisors recommended leaving troops in afghanistan, he did give himself an out saying not that i can recall. there is constra diction there, general, who is telling the truth here? >> thanks for having me. president biden's comments don't age well. the military commanders, when we were in the white house, that was the agreement. the agreement all military commanders say we can hold the line at 2500, plus military support, well over 3000 and 5000 nato allys and bagram and air support, we could maintain the position we had, strateic stalemate while peace negotiations going on. they said that and holding that line. when they talked about the doha agreement, john, that agreements was conditions based and agreed there were conditions on that. if not met, the agreement was not fulfilled, meaning he would not leave the country. third of march, after signed on the 20th of february, president trump picked up the phone and called and told them that day if he violated the agreement, the agreement was not complete, we were not leaving and one may date put in there was not a date certain. we would keep moving to the right until conditions were made. we never intended to go below 2500 troops, recommended agreement by everybody in the intelligence community. they had it right. >> john: we heard general milley say there should never be a date certain for military withdrawal, it should be conditions based. general off theip did agree with milley and mckenzie the president did get the message from them about leaving troops in the country. when it came to american credibility damaged there was disconnect between what the civilian leadership and the military leadership thought. let's listen here. >> i think that our credibility with allys and partners around the world and adveraies is being intensely reviewed by the embassy which way this will go. i think the damage is one word that could be used. >> i think our credibility remains solid. >> general, you, like secretary austin had benefit of serving this nation militarily and as civilian, who is right? >> who is right is general milley, mark milley is correct. look, when the president of the united states does not pick up the phone when this is going on and call his allies like he didn't call boris johnson or macron in france, what kind of political credibility do you have when you don't talk to your nato alliance, you have a problem there and he didn't do it. problem on political side, sure milley was talking to counter parts, nato alliance counter parts. >> john: one other point here, that is general milleys involvement in reaching out to general li, chinese counterpart, he said he informed pompeo and mark meadows about the phone calls. were you ever in that loop? >> no, john, i was not, i was not told that. national security advisor was not told that. he made the comment, two associates of acting secretary of defense. what mark milley should have done, if he called me, pick up the phone and call the president of the united states before you make a phone call to adversary and the chinese, make no mistake are adversary of ours. look at the timeframe, 8 january, we know what was happening in the united states at the time. critical time. he should have picked up the phone issue not talked to mark meadows, talked directly to the president, that is his job, principal military advisor to president of the united states not the chief staff of the white house. >> john: good to have you, thank you for joining us, appreciate it. >> sandra: bring in marsha blackburn, joins us now straight out of today's hearing. senator, we heard you actually a few moments ago, line of questioning that involved yes or no requests for yes or no answers. one of the questions, you asked the general if bagram air base had stayed open, would our support to the afghanistan air force been more effective in your view? i was wondering if you were surprised by his answer, frankly i'm not sure on that. >> i think that what they're trying to do is give non-answers, which is terribly disappointing and what we need are some specific answers and sandra, big part of what we're trying to do is figure out where is the breakdown, what is guidance given, we know from the command team what they were telling mckenzie, who at sitcom, milley, austin, jake sullivan, susan rice, the president and we know the president was not abiding by this. now, we know, had we had those assets at bagram air field, that we would have been able to facilitate a more expedient withdrawal of our u.s. citizens, but our siv applicants and we would have been able to keep surveillance on the ground as the taliban, which was being encouraged by the chinese and iranians, they were moving very quickly around the country. but we need austin, milley and mckenzie to to say look, this is what we said, this is what they said, here is what they did and how they arrived at that decision. the men and women who have served there, who have sacrificed these families that have given their lives, they need these answers. >> john: senator, i want to play exchange between you and senator milley, cut number 13. you say that you thought they were giving not answers, this was a question that was surprising question that he gave fairly direct answers to. >> yes. >> john: here. >> general milley, yes or no to this, did you talk to bob woodard or robert costa for their book "peril," and -- >> woodward yes, costa, no. >> did you talk to michael bender for the book is frankly we did win this election the inside story of how trump lost yes or no? >> yes. >> were you accurately represented in these books? >> i haven't read any of the books, i don't know. >> john: interesting line of questioning, senator. did he surprise you with his candor? he surprised me with his candor? >> i think it surprised people he went to yes or no, had been batting around questions all day. i think this is mark milley being proud of his political aggressiveness he's displayed. i talked to a lot of people who knew him throughout his career, he is aggressive politically throughout his career. we'll have more questions for general milley when i step back in the hearing room. but here is the thing, he chose to put that time on talking to reporters, helping them write books, providing information when he should have been working on withdrawal plan to get our citizens, our troops, our allies out of afghanistan. he should have been watching the taliban advancement and paying attention to that, rather than trying to polish his resume and image. >> sandra: it's been clear from listening to this, advice by the military leaders was to leave troops on the ground in kabul to ark void a taliban takeover. milley said he will not resign over biden not taking his or their advice. what sort of consequences at this point, after listening to this hearing, what sort of consequences should there be and for whom? >> sandra, i'm one of those, i feel like yes, indeed, he should resign, so should general austin. there are ways to administratively separate individuals from the u.s. military. i am certain that after we are going through the hearings that you will see some shifting of leadership at dod. the white house can't be pleased with some of the candor we have heard today likewise, probably not pleased they are being given cover by the military generals, even though the generals are not giving straight answers. jake sullivan, susan rice, they can't be happy with this. can't be happy with this hearing and how it presented itself today. it looks like you have commanders on the ground saying one thing. joe biden saying isn't going to happen, no way, how ooh i'm out of there and a real cur if you havel in the middle with how they present information, nuance this information and because of that, people lost their lives, the taliban is in charge of afghanistan, terrorists have a safe haven and the world is less safe today than it was when joe biden took office and all of this responsibility, all of this blood is on their hands. >> john: on the issue senator, of accountability, senator sullivan was getting into it when the senator from hawaii reminded him his time was up. he may go back to it here. the theory is nobody will be held accountable for what happened in afghanistan because if they were, that would be acknowledgment by this white house things went badly. >> and that is one of the concerns. i hear this a good bit from our military and john, as you know, the 101 rs airborne, the fifth division special ops guys that is out of fort campbell in tennessee. we are hearing a lot about this. there is a lot of disgust with the command team at the pentagon and disgust that you have got a commander on navy ship that goes out and talks to the press about a covid outbreak and he gets separated. you have a lieutenant colonel with an issue how things are being happened, he gets separated, but you have got the chairman of the joint chiefs, you have the def, sitcomcommander and they are giving nuanced answers and not giving detail we need. there is inconsistency there. the u.s. military is a well trained military. they need strong definitive leadership, they deserve that, they are the best in the world. the guys at the top are messing this up. >> sandra: senator, you need to run back into the hearing room, we appreciate you joining us. senator, thank you. john. >> john: national security correspondent jennifer griffin joins us with the later on all of this, we are struck with the idea the president said nobody recommended leaving troops there and while generals milley and mckenzie and secretary austin would not say we did advise the president, they all issue but said it. >> jennifer: that is what we've been reporting for several months now, it is clear military gave best military advice, that advice included keeping troops on the ground in afghanistan. that is not the advice the president took and we see what happened. draw attention to a couple points maybe have gotten lost in the discussions. first of all, it is notable that all three of the military commanders under oath talked about deficiency of the doha agreement, the agreement signed with taliban by the trump administration. all of them said that basically the taliban only agreed to one of the seven, only adhered to one of the seven parts of that agreement. that was not to attack u.s. troops in the year and a half time frame, but the other parts of that agreement in terms of separating relationships with the al qaeda, those were not kept, you heard general milley talk about a order that was given to him in the december 15th time frame, he gave quite a bit of detail that we haven't heard before publicly about how after mark esper gave his recommendation to president trump not to pull troops out and to keep 3500 troops, mark esper was fired shortly therefore and two or three days later, general milley given order from the president via the white house to go to zero by january 15th. there was pushback on that and several days later, that order was rescinded. that is really important. when general milley was pressed by senators about that order, they were asked was there interagency discussion about going to zero in that january time frame before the inauguration and he said there was not. it is also important, they were asked about bagram air base and this has come up a lot. part of the explanation why they pulled out of bagram air base, u.s. military did not want to leave bagram air base, they wanted to keep 2500 to 3500 on the ground, keep the air base, that was important in terms of moral support, rey-supply and other issues for the afghan military. once the president and this was underlying what we heard today in the hours of testimony, one the president capped troop numbers, the u.s. military was told they could have six to 70 tltd00 troops to guard the embassy, there was no possibility of keeping bagram open as retro-grade was occurring. general scott miller oversaw that, they pulled out of bagram and low and behold, 11 days later kabul fell and the u.s. military had to then execute what is known as neo, the noncombatant evacuation, secretary austin said there were three battalions placed in doha qatar, they would go back in and carry out that noncombatant operation. those 2500 troops at bagram were advisors and that is what general milley pointed out today, they would not be the troops to use for noncombatant evacuation. it is important to understand the series of events and events dictated by the white house, white house gave them troop, date and deadline and u.s. military had to comply. it is important to go back 18months to doha agreement and why nobody stood up and said the taliban are not complying with their side of the agreement and why didn't they stop the pull-out along the way and president biden came in on january 20th and decided after listening to his military commanders to go ahead with the pull-out. that started until president trump and general milley said it started in 2011, 10 years ago, we went from 100,000 u.s. troops in afghanistan to 25-3500 in december. >> sandra: looks like the hearing is set to resume in a moment. you can see members of congress, the joint chiefs chairman taking a seat there. real quickly, you heard from mark milley, the chairman said and i'm going to quote directly. the evacuation efforts was called logistical success but strategic failure. he said that just minutes before dan sullivan, senator from arkansas went after them for zero accountability from the biden administration on military withdrawal from afghanistan. i wonder what you thought about tha moment? >> jennifer: that's a key moment, talking about logistical success, talking about the afghans evacuated, unbelievable efforts by the 82nd airborne and others to secure the airport under difficult conditions. in terms of admission this was a strateic failure, he was saying logistically, the retrograde under general scott miller was a success, it is not success if kabul falls 11 days later. they need to look at that. you heard senator tammy duckworths call for inquiry, you need accountability for the last 20 years, this did not start in january of this year, this goes back to decisions made by the military and by success of presidents for the last 20 years. >> john: jennifer, thank you. we are waiting for senators reed to start off. we have general kellogg with us. getting back into round two, what haven't we heard you think we need to hear? >> john, thanks again. they are asking right questions, hitting on accountability, what happened at the year with evacuation, the biggest thing that was said is mark milley admitted this is strategic failure of the united states of america and we need to learn from this and get lessons learned from this, from the last not 20 years, first 22 years going after al qaeda, last 18 years, because of that, strategic decisions were made, that were failures, didn't recognize emergent china and create mega-terrorist state in the middle east. all three nations, iran, afghanistan and pakistan, worse than 20 years ago is more extreme and nuclear pakistan. >> john: there is universal applause at job of getting people out, question is how we got to that point. >> it was interesting general milley talked about his participation in these books, he contradicts what woodard and costa said, they said milley was concerned there was going to be attack in china, milley said i know trump did not plan to attack china. >> sandra: back to the hearing room, they gavelled in. >> the testimony now. and who now literally have targets on their backs, along with their families. i ask you who at the department of defense is in charge of our efforts to evacuate them and with all due respect, you didn't give me the name of the person at dod leading the efforts, but you pointed me instead to the department of state and interagency efforts. i've been involved in working on this evacuation and on refugee question for sometime, along with this coalition of veterans, ngo's and certain citizens and government officials. and the frustration, i have been directed repeatedly and constantly from one agency to another dod sent me to state, who sent me to national security council, would send me back to the department of defense. it was a cofgus with no clear lines of authority while lives were on the line and this private network or coalition was doing the work that the united states government would have done if it had maintained a presence there. it had none and that is why at mizor, and kabul it was doing that work. i'm concerned despite the looming crisis in the evacuation, we were unprepared and number of members of this committee went to the white house in the spring, asked for a plan, a strategy and none was forthcoming. i'm concerned we'll repeat that mistake as we work to ark void a humanitarian crisis during refugee and that will be a huge undertaking with hundreds of thousands of afghan refugees, who are literally escaping torture and murder, coming to this country, many with nothing more than the clothes they had when they left. we currently have tens of thousands of individuals on your basis, department of defense basis, germany, and domestically, as you well know, virginia, wisconsin, and tex texas. these people risk their lives for us, as you know on this panel better than any of us. it will be shared with the state department, department of homeland federal agencies and we owe it, we own it, it is our responsibility on the united states senator and i continue to have difficulty ascertaining who is in charge. we need a evacuation czar, point person on refugee resettlement, whose mission is public and known to the american people to be in charge here. so i would like to ask you, how do you ensure that there is a official in charge, a point person, someone to ensure that afghan children receive schooling, that their learn services, they receive medical care and can you give us an update on what the status is? >> well, again, senator, thanks for all your sustained interest and for all that you have done to continue to help get people out. there is a process. there is a mechanism. state has responsibility, as you know, for the continuing, for being the lead, to continue to evacuate american citizens and siv applicants out of afghanistan. that process is run by ambassador bass, it is interagency effort and we contribute to that with a dedicated general officer as part of that. in terms of the evacuations, the department of defense has responsibility for housing them and for their care and feeding, in terms of integrating them into our society, dhs and state are leading the process. it is important we do this the right way and important we do this carefully, but rapidly as possible. we do have, you know, children that need education and all those kinds of things. in the meantime, dod will remain on making sure they receive the best care and we provide for their safety, as well. >> thank you. senator fischer, please? >> thank you, mr. chairman. general mckenzie, at the beginning of this hearing, chairman reed made a comment about the goal and mission that we're going to be looking at now in the future is to ensure afghanistan can never again be used as base for terrorists. as we look at that goal, as we look at that mission, i think we need to be honest with the american people how that will be accomplished. i don't think the american people should be misled about capabilities that are needed to make sure that we can conduct over the horizon counter terrorism operations. president biden has pointed out we conduct over the horizon ct operation to go after terrorists and other places in the world issue including isis and syria, al qaeda and yemen and somalia. we have either a u.s. presence or reliable partners on the ground, is that correct? >> senator, that is correct. >> in those three locations, do we have strike assets or agreements in nearby countries? >> global this briefing, yes, we do. general mckenzie, when the democrat developed initial plans for over the horizon approach to counter terrorism in afghanistan, did those plans assume that the afghan security forces would serve as our partner on the ground? >> we develop plans neutral on that, we develop spectrum of options ranging from we would have robust help from future government in afghanistan to situation which is what we have now, where we would have no help from the government of afghanistan, we developed options across the span of future possibilities. >> but as we develop the options, you developed the options and now we didn't see this collapse coming so quickly and we don't have partners on the ground, is that correct? >> we always had a, one of the options for ct and afghanistan, would be we would be at state where there would be no diplomatic presence there and no help from the government of afghanistan. from the beginning we saw that as one of the possible futures. that is the situation we are in right now? >> that is correct. >> you stated during the evacuation we developed pragmatic relationship with the taliban. but you're not saying we should consider the taliban to be reliable partner by any means, are you? >> i do not trust the taliban, i do not consider the taliban to be reliable partner. have you to look at what they do and not what they say. >> general mckenzie, yemen, syria, and somalia all border ocean or sea, we can use carriers or other sea-based assets to so our strike assets are significantly further for potential targets than they are for other locations. is it fair to say it's more difficult to hit targets that are further away from where the strike assets is based? >> senator, in general, that is a factor. but i would tell you because of our ability to position, for example, during the withdrawal, we were off the coast of pakistan and there are ways to get to that finished solution. sir, if i could just add, it's not a finished part of the problem that's most difficult, it's the finding and fixing the target, with great difficulties and as you noted, its location is a great range from our bases. while we do have platforms that can fly in there, that's why said from the beginning that it's hard to do, very hard to do but not impossible to do. >> right, and it's hard because of the lack of partners on the ground? >> that's a significant factor. >> to even reach afghanistan, without an agreement from central asian nations north of afghanistan, is it accurate that we are reliant on the continued use of the pakistani airspace with the "over the horizon" strategy? >> senator, you are correct. >> that's not a sure thing for the future, correct? >> i know we are now talking to them at various levels about how we might maintain the ability to do that in the future. but for the department and secretary -- >> they also have a strong relationship with the taliban, would you consider that that's going to grow? >> i would assume that they are going to be very conflicted about this, as they have been for the last 20 years. >> senator kaine, please. >> i will direct this to secretary austin. what is the best estimate for the number of americans that are in afghanistan? >> senator, according to the state, there are fewer than 100 americans that are wanting to depart and leave. we got out 20 citizens today along with their family members and we will continue to work on this as you heard me say earlier. the numbers fluctuate daily and because more people come to light as time goes by and they see opportunities to safely leave, this has been a dynamic process. again, we will stay focused on this. >> i am aware that you had success in getting americans out because you've advocated on behalf of some of them, i have seen those efforts and i know you will continue that. if i remember correctly, there is starting to be communications to americans in afghanistan that they might consider possibly returning to the u.s. as early as march, is that correct? >> i do not have knowledge of those communications. >> that might be from a foreign relations state department standpoint. obviously, you cannot bring folks home who do not want to come home but the number you are currently looking at, i understand that it changes, it's now less than 100. i trust that you will continue to be diligent about that. to the question i posed in my first round of questions and general mckenzie, i would like to start with you, all of you are leaders but you also have on the ground experience. i know you have a deep connection to afghanistan and the people you fought together with, your partners and colleagues there, as well as the americans who sacrificed so greatly. for the purpose of the committee, we want to dig into this question about why the security force into government failed so quickly, because it bears upon future humanitarian efforts, and with you, general mckenzie, what are your own thoughts about the speed of the collapse of the military and civilian government? senator, i believe the collapse of the military government is completely linked. i believe probably the primary accelerant, i will take the military side first, lowering morale and efficiency of the afghan military is what they saw coming on the heels of the dell hall agreement with what they believe was forced upon them so i think that had a negative effect. plus, we get closer to the date that we are leaving, and we are going to apply a system of the best port will make partial remedies from their perspective to continue the maintenance of not only the main force, the conventional force on the ground but really the high priority, and as i've noted before we had an over and horizon solution to that. it wasn't our cryptic solution but it was our best attempt to do that. i will tell you, the dna of those soldiers are the same dna the taliban had. so i think it comes down to will to combat and fighting spirit and that's where i think you get the link to the government of afghanistan. when your president leave suddenly in the middle of a campaign for the capital, i think that finishes any chance at all you might have had untold making a stand there. there were signals before hand up disinfection and fractures in the afghan government, you know, probably better people than me to talk about that but i think all those came together and had a very powerful negative synergy towards the end. this is not new, we've been able to see it for years. but you know, senator, at one point i would make is that this is not inherently a military problem. and what they didn't do, to the last point you made to, you could have the best fighting force in the world but if they don't have confidence in their military or political leadership it's hard for them to put it all on the line for the leadership if they lack confidence in the leadership. >> secretary, general milley, and additional thoughts? >> the three choices that you laid out for us were, your questions were, was it because of insufficient training or was it because the troops were demoralized or was it because they wanted things for them more than they wanted for themselves? i would agree with general mckenzie, the delhi agreement had a significant impact on the morale of the troops but i would say that's compounded by weak leadership, corruption in the government and the fact that the taliban made a concerted effort to really reach out to provisional leaders and convince them that the taliban was going to be in charge so they might as well sign up with them early on. >> my time is expired, i yelled back. >> thank you senator. >> general milley, in the final two pages of the written statement, and they would be happy to make available various documents. if we could get three sets of documents, i think the first who should be fairly straightforward. one, could we get the list of people who joined on those calls by name and by titles. >> if yes, u.s. officials. >> yes. could you list similar to carl's that you've made military counterparts around the world from say september 1, 2020, to january 20th, 2021. and it that should not be any classified information. and that's inside any interagency partners that you have. secretary austin, can i get your commitment they will work with general milley and his team to get that to us both as quickly as possible and without unnecessary classification? >> yes, senator. >> thank you. terry austin, on may 8th you conducted with the pentagon what is known as a rehearsal of concept drill, also called a rock drill. is that correct? >> correct. and that's a significant drawing from afghanistan. and it's been reported that you attended and general milley attended, jake sullivan attended, bill burns attended, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> did tony blinken attend? >> his senate mike deputy attended. >> number two sermon? >> mckeon. his number three deck pd. brian mccann. do you know where tony blinken was on september 8th? >> i don't. >> deacon opn used any dod resources to travel between may 7 and may 10? >> i can certainly found out but that's not something i would worry about. >> i would like to know if he used any dod assets, aircraft, bases, air personnel or ground crews to travel between may 7, 2021 and may 10, 2021. thank you for that. secretary austin, who chose september 11 is the date by which we would withdraw from afghanistan. >> i'm not sure that was a military recommendation. they provide an estimate of how long it would take to retrograde our people and equipment. that number fell in the range of possibly up to 120 days but certainly come a shorter than that if we were uncontested. and as it turned out we were uncontested. that takes you to the end of august. >> i'm sorry secretary come of my time is limited. so can you tell me who it was that directed you, the secretary of defense, that september 11 was the date that you complete the withdrawal. >> nobody directed us that september 11 was the date that you would complete. that was an objective that was laid out that the administration. >> i believe the president announced that in mid-april when he announced the decision, someone had to come up with that and can't recall who it was. that was not a military recommendation. >> and that's the significance of general 11. if they took kabul, we would bomb them. they optically took kabul on august 15 and we didn't bomb them, is there a report that you told them that? >> that report is incorrect. >> the french data, the british did come up the germans data. we stepped outside the gate some >> i don't believe any of those nations predicted ground controls, i believe the british went out to what they call the baron hotel which is a facility located about 150 meters off the compound and they did business they are but one conducted ground patrols, and i'm very confident of that, and i'm quite confident when i make that assertion. >> thank you. secretary austin, one final question. obviously this is an issue on which many of our troops and our veterans feel very passionately on both sides of the issue. one of those service members, marine colonel stuart scheller posted a very critical video on social media last month and he was relieved of his command for that posting. your reports today indicate he's being held in pretrial confinement, and why is that? >> i don't have any specifics of what caused him to be held in pretrial confinement and i would certainly ask the marines to provide that insight. >> thank you senator cotton. senator king please. do you need a moment? >> discussion that we had thus far today is a peculiar one about decisions and the assumptions seem to be that you could make a different decision. for example, on august 31st, and everything would have been okay and we have would have gotten more people out. it would have had consequences that you and your colleagues judge's would be more damaging and dangerous to american lives in the decision to leave on august 31st. including being back at work with the taliban, subject to terrorist attacks and subjects to -- am i right about this, where the risk calculus was? beginning one september if we stay past the 31st using military sources. >> you use that term, that's a descriptive phrase but we are talking about potentially hundreds of american lives, are we not? >> well, when we -- for us we were specifically talking casualties killed and wounded and our estimate, my estimate of the time, this is 25 august we are talking about, is if we go to war with the taliban on the 1st of september -- there were 56 check points and 6,000 held in kabul at that time, who would have to clear kabul and receives it by graham, the 36 miles of road between bagram in kabul that would have taken a significant amount of force, looking up like a core operation. we would have had significant amounts of killed and wounded. exact numbers are always imprecise when you are doing this type estimates but the remaining american citizens would've been a greater risk. >> you mentioned we would have had to have retaken couple, they had 6,000 troops. in this committee when we were talking about retaking muzzle, the generally accepted rule of thumb is that it takes ten troops to dislodge a one and a city. dislodging troops in a city is very difficult and takes a large number of attacking troops. >> muzzle was a prepared defense, they were dug in and the taliban had just moved in so it would have been not that level of fight that you saw but it would have still been significant, 6,006,000, and you are in an urban area of about 5 million people so it would have been significant effort and resulted in significant casualties. >> thank you. do you know, and i want to be clear on this. they lived was a deadline and the doha agreement on march 10 at the beginning of the negotiations, to the former administration make any objections or raise problems with the taliban because of their failure to meet that deadline or indeed to ever meet that deadline in terms of negotiations of the afghan government. >> i don't have personal knowledge of that. -- or the former the former circuitry of state but i don't personally know. >> general mike enzi, i don't want to go over the same ground but do you agree with general milley that had we gone beyond august 31st, the decision wasn't just, oh, we are going to abandon americans. it was if we leave -- if we stay until september 1st, we would have to make an additional troop agreement. >> and, thank you senator king. >> thank you mr. chairman. in listening to your testimony today and i appreciate the amount of effort that you put into being very clear with us, it seems to me that we have left a power void in central asia that it has already increased of the threat of terrorism and has provided significant opportunities to our adversaries. secretary austin, a little while ago you indicated, and i believe that your term was, if we had made an earlier withdrawal perhaps in april or may it would have been very difficult to have had that completed in an orderly manner. it is not correct sir? >> that is correct. i think also, you would probably agree that the withdrawal on august 30th or august 31 deadline was probably not an orderly -- done in an orderly manner, either, was it? >> there are two issues here senator. first of all you recall that joe miller planned for an orderly evacuation and people in retrograde of equipment, and it was rehearsed and extricated that by early july, all the equipment that we wanted to retrograde has been retrograde and most of the people are out except for a small element that was in and around the embassy and on h kia. >> mr. secretary, the american people watched with horror on tv during the last days in august in which our men and women in uniform not only died but they were in the middle of huge throngs of individuals desperately trying to get out. i don't believe that you would suggest that that would be completed in an orderly manner. >> the second operation was a noncombatant evacuation which, i think you heard me say early on, we had some challenging times early on. we recovered from that and we were able to -- >> you would not have consider that to be done in a narrow orderly manner? >> i would say overall we endure challenges but we had an inward and immense amount of people. >> the men and women who wear the uniform in this country on that particular very challenging time. it did everything they could, but clearly it was not an orderly manner it was a very disastrous, i think we will all agree, a very deadly situation. would you agree sir? >> and you heard me say senator that it was a very dangerous situation that we were in and despite that they were able to fight through the challenges, and because of their heroic effort, we were able to do what we did. >> the reason why i asked this is because i think not only american citizens all this but i think our allies saw this as well. first of all, because of the date certain and conditions based withdrawal, the decision was made by our president. we left american citizens behind and we did leave at afghans behind who had served directly with our u.s. sources. and it appears that many of them believe that we did not appropriately consult with them about our activities in a timely fashion. finally, to look at and certainly in the hands of the taliban did not help our position with our allies. let me just move on very quickly. general milley, i've got less than a minute left on this and i just wanted to comment. i think your second statement in which you shared with the american people and with us today, an expression of how in a very unclassified way, how the nuclear chain of command works. part of this, some of this has the opportunity to observe in a table top exercise of the process of working for the president on down and responses that are asked. and there is specific exercise requirements of the white house and other members are required to follow through. do you know if either president trump or president biden had the opportunity to do a tabletop exercise, should there ever be a possibility of the use of nuclear weapons? >> i don't know if president trump or president biden has come through that table talk exercise. >> thank you. >> thank you mr. chairman. senator austin, my colleague senator duckworth mentioned the idea of the independent commission to evaluate what happened before or after the war in afghanistan. >> senator i would always as you expect, i would always cooperate with my oversight committee. >> i would much agree that this is a 20 year war and there are four presidents involved and i would like to make sure that there are some lessons learned from our 20 year forever war. at the same time, i feel the of republicans have made it a total about-face. and they were very supportive of president trump when he makes a deal with the taliban to get up. so there is that. clearly, there are lessons to be learned in terms of an evacuation but i think the decision to get us out of this forever war was a good one. secretary austin, the president -- i want to move to a different topic. the president sees as necessary to free up time and money to compare with competitors like russia and china but the state of rationale is somewhat i think at odds with the administration's budget, funding priorities with the lines of effort identified in the deterrent initiatives. senator austin i brought this up before when we had a posture hearing. you don't have to get into it now but i would very much appreciate the efforts and where we are in terms of -- >> i spent a fair amount of time with our combatant commander, and he he has laid out his plans and his intent and that you know, i'm fully behind the effort that he wants to undertake. so we look forward to discussing that with you. >> thank you. and along those same lines, nuclear disarmament talks with north korea remained stalled and i'm concerned as steps taken by the dod including -- hawaii hdr and a objecting just last week to congressional action to reauthorize funds to keep that program on track put hawaii at risk in the near future. and what is dod's credible alternatives to the hoe going forward. that's the same time that congress has had to put back money for that radar. what will the details have to be to protect hawaii? >> the capability that we currently have, hawaii is protected and this is an issue that we continue to look at. you can rest assured that hawaii will not be unprotected. >> i know that we are unprotected as of today but i'm looking at the future. a lot of us have concerns about what will happen to the afghan he women and girls with the taliban coming back, and we will be interested to hear your perspective about concrete steps of the u.s. can take to influence a future for afghan women and girls that honors their human rights and freedoms? >> i certainly share your concern senator, the taliban's track record on this is absolutely horrible. we will have to continue -- we will have to work to use economic levers and also international pressure to hold the taliban accountable for some of the things that they said they were going to do. again, i think this will have to be an international effort to maintain pressure on the taliban. >> at some point i think we would like to know specifically what kind of international efforts are bearing fruit with regard to what the taliban is doing with the women and girls of their country. regarding our relationship with pakistan, and i know we are trying to keep to 5 minutes but with regard to the taliban. >> lets go on to senator ernst. >> general milley, in a previous round we establish that the withdrawal achieved no security conditions other than an unconditional withdrawal. we had to withdrawal by a time certain and a date certain. and these are yes or no questions, please, general milley. at the military's task to defeat terror threats from afghanistan out and harder? >> yes. >> does the taliban and its other terror partners have more ability to train and prepare in afghanistan now that we have left? >> more ability, yes. >> has president biden or is policy staff provided any updated guidance or direction for countering terror from afghanistan? >> yes. >> are we at a greater or lesser risk of terror attacks from afghanistan as a result of our withdrawal? >> it's too early to tell. i think we got about, to elaborate, i think we've probably got about six months to really sort this out to see which direction things are going to go. it is not much time, but that's my personal estimate. it could be out to 12. then we will have some indicators and warnings of what direction that's going to go. but that's where i would put it. >> in the previous round, and this isn't a comment, but in the previous round each of you had admitted that your best recommendation was to leave a residual force in afghanistan, clearly the president disregarded that opinion, that recommendation and that advice and i do believe that this has left us less safe. a number of my colleagues have mentioned over the horizon, general mckenzie, you referenced the fact that we don't know yet how effective that will be. we don't have partners on the ground. we talked about the airspace that would have to be used for capabilities. there is still a terrorist threat in afghanistan. now on august 20th, president biden had stated, what interest do we have in afghanistan at this point? with al qaeda gone? first, i didn't recognize that al qaeda was gone. general mckenzie, is al qaeda gone? >> senator, al qaeda still maintains a presence in afghanistan. >> and secretary blinken had set on august 22nd that the threat of terrorism metastasized out of get afghanistan a long time ago. at general mckenzie, is there any terrorist threat in afghanistan now? >> what we see is isis merely rejuvenated with the prisoners that came out of the prison. they are gathering their strength, but we know for a certainty that they do aspire to attack us in our homeland. so that's right, it has metastasized and it is present in other parts of the world but in my part of the world though it certainly is afghanistan. >> it has been reported that the top 20 to officials of the new taliban government are known associates of al qaeda including five terrorists who were once in prison at guantanamo bay in 13 more who were sanctioned by the u.n., the united nations, as terrorists post 9/11. and i'm very alarmed, secretary austin, that you're under secretary of defense for policy: cole calls -- at the terror from afghanistan and significant. he is wrong. i think all of you would admit that he is wrong of the fbi director even said he was wrong last week. he's in denial. or, he's lying. i would hope that his testimony and comments are not i just truly hope they are, let's leave it at that. if the department of defense can't get their lead policy official off the couch, which is where he told me he was during closed testimony last week, that he was sitting on the couch. he didn't really care what general miller's opinion was. if that is the type of thought process that we put into decisions that are made at the department of defense with this lead policy official, maybe he needs to go back to the couch. i do think that there is still a threat in afghanistan, i think we all need to acknowledge that, recognize it, al qaeda is not gone. i hope we all make that very clear to the president and we will have to have additional discussions about over the horizon as things develop in the upcoming months. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator, let me recommend senator gillibrand, please. >> are you aware of any internal audits within the department of defense over the execution of the war over the last 20 years? >> i am not, other than the aar activity that we will conduct within the department. >> what's that? >> after action review. >> what will that -- what will make up that review? >> we'll focus on, you know, the things that have occurred as part of this latest operation, but i think your initial question, was there review over the last 20 years. >> correct. >> the answer is no. >> do you think review of broad scope would be useful to dod and to policy makers in the future, particularly this committee? >> i do, senator. i also think, as i mentioned, should have interagency flavor, as well. >> do you have any recommendations for external independent review of the war in afghanistan? for example, what do you think congress' role should be and how would such an audit be conduct? ed what u.s. agencies, countrys and organizations should be included in the review of america's longest war? >> i don't have any recommendations at this point. i can take that for the record, senator. >> i would be grateful. secretary austin and general milley, this is something that hits closer to home, number of diplomats, intelligence officers and service members who assisted with evacuation from fort drum new york were subjected to chronic stress, a problem we are not unfamiliar with after the last 20 years of war in afghanistan and iraq. families at fort drum told my office it felt like full deployment compressed into the time of a few weeks. further, so many service members lost their lives to suicide, which has been devastated. what is did sheing od doing to ensure we are getting adequate mental health assessment and resources they need? >> thanks, senator, i'll make a comment and let general milley comment, as well, i think you asked him, as well. you heard me say before, my belief is that mental health is health, period. there should be no sigma associated with seeking help if you're dealing with issues. and i've encouraged entire force, all of our leadership to make sure number one, we have adequate resources available for troops and our families and number two, they destigmatize the issue of assisting help with mental health issues. >> senator, as you know, i commanded tenth mountain division and secretary austin at one point. that is one of the most deployed divisions out of senator blackburn's state. and there is significant mental health capability there to help the soldiers that were on this noncombatant evacuation and they will get immediate assessment and those that need counseling, it is there. the key we have to do, nonstigmatizing mental health issues a sailor or marine have, they feel free to seek counsel we have available. >> thank you. i'd like to follow-up on the line of questioning that senator ernst started. can you describe the al qaeda threat, where it is located, where it will be going, what it is strength is compared to the strength of the last 20 years and please answer for isis, isis-k and other variations of isis across the world? >> you're asking me, senator? >> yes, general milley first and then secretary austin. >> so first i think it would be good to handle in some detail in the classified session issue but in nonclassified session, the al qaeda threat globally is still there. there is opportunity to reconstitute, it has been ripped ark part steadily over 20 years. al qaeda displaced other parts of the world with ark filliates, in east africa or down in yemen and madrid, etcetera. several ark filliates, some are capable and definitely can affect the united states. with respect to isis, we saw isis core in iraq and iraq, they still exist up there, by the way. isis found a new home in parts of afghanistan, although right now they are at war with the taliban. but isis has affiliates in other parts of the world because of the brutality. there other regions that are lethal terrorist organizations that have aspiration to conduct operations against the united states and we have operations and intelligence in other parts to continue to watch that. it has moved in various parts and we can cover that in the classified session, if that is okay. >> thank you, thank you, mr. chairman, i will pursue in the classified setting. >> senator tillis, please. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general milley and general mckenzie, i ran out of time before i could thank you for the work your staff did in august. we were working several cases, if i was involved, i remember a conversation with one of your staff, general milley at 3:00 in the morning while trying to shepherd someone out and we did get them out, along with american citizens. unfortunately, we have a much longer list of people that we were not successful with getting out between siv holders and family members, my office alone has 900 people still on a list of people who are still in afghanistan. we communicate with these people through what'sapp and try to shepherd them to h-kia and operations were shut down and they were stranded and left behind. what role and secretary austin, start with you, what role, if any, and actually before i answer that, on the mental health issue, we were working with a marine trying to get an interpreter out, had been maintaining contact for years, we had all the authenticating documentation, we were not successful. that moo ma rein committed suicide three weeks ago, retired marine. this is real-life consekwens in afghanistan and in the united states. secretary austin, what role, if any, does dod play in drawing down this list of people, we believe we have documentation that suggest they should somehow get shepherded out of afghanistan? >> senator, my deepest condolences of the loss of our marine, saddened to hear that. thoughts and prayers to his family. dod continues to work as a part of the cell that you heard me answered earlier that is run or headed up by the state department and ambassador john bass is running that. we're trying to pull in as much information from every corner that we can and refine lists and refine contact information so that we can reach out and make sure that people have the right credentials to be able to leave the country and so we continue to work as part of the state effort on this issue. >> i think it would be helpful to find out our point of contact. it was me reaching somebody to see if they could help me or moving up the chain of command to where i was able to intervene in several cases. general milley and general mckenzie, some people said we're glad we've ended this war. is the war on terror over? general milley? >> absolutely not. >> yeah. general mckenzie? >> the war on terror is not over and the war in afghanistan is not over either. >> has the exit from afghanistan made the war more challenging for us or less challenging? with respect to continuing to try and protect the home land and u.s. interest broad. >> maez it more challenging. >> you agree? >> absolutely. >> related note, "wall street journal" article published august 31 said u.s. official acknowledge the military lost 90% of intelligence collection capabilities using drones before the draw down, do you agree with that? >> i didn't see the report, say again what it said. >> we have lost 90% of intelligence collection capabilities it had using drones before the draw down. >> i would have to look at my information, i am determining the level of irs in statistics. it is significant, i don't know about 90%. >> on the sids and folks in afghanistan, is it fair to say human intelligence network, given the current status and the fact many left behind, fair to say that has been stressed more than drone capabilities do we have much in afghanistan today? >> we can explain that, i 99ing good detail in a classified session, there is still, yes. >> do we also, back to secretary austin, i think it is so important for us to show we will move heaven and earth to get the others out of afghanistan, it is not only having impact in afghanistan, it has impact anywhere. siv's are not unique to afghanistan, people working with us keeping forces safe is something that is standard and in a lot of dangerous areas. i hope we recognize we owe the people of afghanistan and our men and women in uniform to get this right. thank you. >> thank you, senator tillis. let me recognize senator warren. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general milley, our military executed a massive operation during the month of august. as i understand it, larger than the berlin air lift. for the record, can you tell us how many americans you evacuated? >> almost 6000. i can get resighs number. >> let's get the right number for the record, that is helpful. how many people in total did u.s. and coalition forces evacuate? >> 124,000 total 44,000 nonu.s. aircraft and the rest on u.s. aircraft. >> extraordinary effort, still hard to get everyone out. >> largest air lift in history. >> right. hard to get everyone out, one problem is that there were so many afghan sid applicants and kabul waiting to be evacuated because trump administration had essentially shut the program down. withdrawal was a massive operation, conducted in a chaotic, unpredictable environment and some people criticized you for leaving on august 31st. i want to explore that for a minute. general milley, once the afghan government collapsed in august, would you say that staying past the date of their collapse would have exposed the force on the ground to substantial additional risk? >> yes, that is what we assessed, if we stayed past the 31st, risk of force, risk to mission and execute neo, and most importantly risk to american citizens that are still there, was going to go to high levels and we thought that was level of risk that was unacceptable. >> so i'm sure and everybody has this on the record, if we stayed another week, two or three, it is likely there would have been another attack that killed american service members, is that what you're saying? >> i would say that is a near certainty. >> all right. for years we poured money into the afghan government, trained their army, outfitted them with equipment and provided them with overwhelming air power, even so the afghan government and the army collapsed almost instant anuously. so general milley, let me ask you, given how quickly the afghan government and the afghan army collapsed, do you think that either or both would have been able to stand on their own with just another few months or another few years of american assistance in training? >> i think at this point, that is unknowable. -- -- force staying indefinitely and many of the service members would have been exposed to unnecessary risk and harm. >> exactly right. >> we agree. and i also want to say, this week we will have our fifth hearing on afghanistan in the eight months since president biden took office. during the trump years, as the afghan government and the afghan army racked up one failure after another, the republicans seem far less interested in this topic, holding one public hearing a year. the republican's sudden interest in afghanistan is plain old politics, not the kind of oversight we should have been exercising in years past. thank you, mr. chairman, for calling this hearing. >> thank you very much, senator warren. senator sullivan. >> thank you, mr. chairman, to my colleague's statement, it is rich coming from one of my colleagues on this committee who wants to gut the military and its readiness, that is a whole other issue. back to my line of questioning from this morning and i will tell you again, gentlemen, never seen so much anger, at least from my constituents who witnessed fiasco, a president who is consistently telling falsehoods to the american people and the issue there is no accountability and you gentlemen have spent decades serving your country honorably in combat. i have utmost respect for your service, fidelity to america and you dedicated your lives to institution that has culture of strict accountability and responsibility up and down the ranks. i mentioned a few examples this morning, collision of the uss mccain, the recent tragic accident, everybody up and down the ranks, including the commanding general of the first marine division was relieved f. you're a marine or army second lieutenant plaining platoon on patrol and one soldier losing nvg or rifle that lieutenant is going to get relieved. on this issue, one of the biggest national security fiascos in a generation, no one is accountable and the american people are livid because they saw it. they see it. they know. it is a debacle. general milley, this morning you called afghan retrograde logistical success, strategic failure. i appreciate your honest assessment, i believe the president of the united states is solely responsible for this. mr. secretary, do you know if anyone, the national security advisor, secretary of state or under secretary for policy of dod offered resignation to take responsibility for this fiasco? >> i do not. i do not, i don't believe they have. >> okay, thank you. given the military culture of accountability you gentlemen come from and again, i respect that more than almost anybody. have any of you offered your resignation to the president at any time dins his decision to withdraw? general milley, i understand your earlier answer to this question, that senior military advisors and officers can't resign every time they disagree with the president. i actually agree with that. but after the president's decision, when the american people see such a strategic failure, as you called it, that is undermining our national security, they expect accountability in their has-been none. so have any of you accepted that accountability or responsibility? >> i'm accountable for my actions. >> talking about resignation. >> i have not submitted letter of resignation. >> mr. secretary? is >> no. >> general? >> i have not submitted letter of resignation. >> mr. secretary, what will it take for someone, anyone, in the biden administration, to take responsibility or accountability for this national security fiasco? anyone? >> from a dod perspective, you heard me say we'll continue to review our actions and we won't hesitate to be critical of ourselves and if there is someone who should be held accountable, we will certainly do that. >> i want to switch topics general milley if you think the chinese communist party decided to invade taiwan, would there military leadership call and give you a heads up? >> i think there would be a period of increased tension, indicators and warnings and an exchange of various communications at all levels. >> do you really think -- >> and i think -- >> you think the chinese communist party, head of the pla would call and say, general issue fyi, we're getting ready to invade taiwan, heads up, you think you hongestly think that? >> i would call him and ask him. >> you think he would give you heads up? >> i think i would -- on invasion of taiwan? >> i think an invasion of taiwan would be obvious thing to pick up on and there would be communication back and forth. >> let me and related question. >> i think the answer to that is no. if the head of the pla called and said we're getting ready to invade taiwan and they found out, they would be shocked. you are certain president trump did not intend on attacking china. >> correct. >> you are quoted in the woodward book as telling the top commander, "if we're going to attack, i'm going to call you ahead of time." is that true, general milley? >> let me tell you what i actually said. >> so that is not true? i hope that is not. >> let me tell you what i said, senator, if there is going to be a war, an ark tack, there will be a lot of calls and tension ahead of time. you will get calls -- >> president trump would not attack, that is your testimony this morning. >> that is true, absolutely true. and i was communicating to my chinese counterpart on instructions, by the way, to deescalate the situation and i told him that we are not going to attack. president trump has no intent to attack and i told him that repeatedly and i told him if there was going to be an attack, there will be plenty of communication going back and forth, your intel system will pick it up. we will not attack you issue-- settle down, it is not going to happen, i did it twice, in october and january. >> you are giving heads up. >> i didn't give them a heads up -- >> president of the united states intent. >> time expired. >> faithful to his intent, senator. >> thank you, senator peters, please. >> thank you, mr. chairman. secretary austin, in your confirmation hearing, you spoke of focusing on our shared interest with pakistan. read out from your august call with pakistan's chief of army staff contained some similar language that you expressed. question to you, could you please elaborate for this committee what you view as our shared interest with pakistan today? i'm particularly interested in how this relates with the pakistani government's relationship with the taliban now that the taliban are in power in afghanistan? >> thanks, senator. i think one key shared interest is prevention of humanitarian disaster in afghanistan or in the region. so i think we'll continue to share that interest. i do think there is intersection in certain types of terrorist activity that i think we can both remain focused on and again, in-depth conversation about pakistan probably would be better suited in a closed hearing there. >> very well. i understand that there were certain airplanes, helicopters and ground vehicles that were disabled as forces left and as the afghan forces were overrun. right now i don't want to talk about operatability of humvee or pictures of taliban sitting on grounded c-130s, what concerns me is potential for strategic adversaries to have some time and space to examine the technology inside those vehicles, to find vulnerabilities. if a system has been disabled, some ways destroyed, reverse engineering can be used on those systems and can provide information to sophisticated adversaries that may get ark hold of this. we harden our supply chain to protect, it is matter of national security. secretary austin, is the department conducting extensive counter intelligence assessment of equipment to get sense of what might be reversed engineered and how to protect against any use of that information against our forces? >> we will continue to assess what is exploitable, senator. i would supply for you that all of this equipment is not high-end equipment. again, equipment that we had for our use was retrograded as general miller drew down the retrograded equipment and drew down or forces. i would flag for you, sir, number $84 billion has been bounced about quite a bit, that is a number we invested in afghan security forces over a 20-year period of time. and less than 20% of that was dedicated toward afghan equipment, most of that money was focused on sustainment and salaries and those types of things, so -- >> general mckenzie, if you could go back in time and change one thing about the strategy in the last six months of operations in afghanistan, which could have alleviated chaos at the end, what would it be? >> in the last six months, decisions made were going to zero. i think i go back to could we have gotten more people out earlier in the process. by that, i mean u.s. citizens and i know the embassy put out a dozen notices to u.s. citizens to leave. the ambassador was aggressive on that, i would like to see more done in that regard and get more sid population out. senator, we need to recognize if you are asking the afghans to fight and same time bringing out the best and the brightest, that is clearly a conflicting message you are sending them. i don't ridiculous niez there wouldn't be inherent risk. >> would have been risk doing those thing? >> yes. we could have been more forceful with our own citizens. there are strict limitationss on what you can do to an american abroad for good reason. >> great, thank you, thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator peters. >> thank you, mr. chairman. secretary austin, why did the committee not get the testimony for today until 10:35 last night? were you guys not prepared? >> we were prepared. again, i don't know the specifics of what last-minute adjustments were being made at what level. we were prepared. >> must not have been a level below you or you would be aware of it. was it above you? did the white house withhold your testimony? did you have it done before 10:35 last night? >> i did. the white house was not withholding my testimony, no. >> who was? >> nobody. you have to submit written documents, submit them to omb, they review them in the afternoon. we got them back 18 or 19:00, something like that and made changes and submitted them. yes, we were late. >> it wasn't you? >> no, it was -- >> no intent to block. >> yeah, it was somebody's strategy, is my guess, might not have been yours. general mckenzie, half-hour ago you said we know for certain isis intends to attack at home, something like that, is that correct? is >> that is correct. >> 20 years ago, on september 11th, when the terrorist hijackers took over four aircraft and attacked the homeland, all of them came here on a visa; correct? now in the last 20 years, al qaeda, isis, taliban, they haven't acquired icbm or navy or air force as far as we know. if they are going to carry out that intent, they will have to get here themselves. that means either through visa program or as refugees across the southern border. my question to all of you, isn't national security tied to good immigration security? do you feel like we're adequately prepared to protect the homeland from visa and refugee? >> in the case of isis, done remarkable job over two decades hardening the entry process and making it very difficult for them to get agents into the united states. that is a matter of record based on performance. with aq, larger discussion about immigration, i defer to the secretary and the department. >> i submit assad work has been done, the work has been degraded, i would say. others, immigration policy important to national security. >> it absolutely is, senator and again, i wouldn't want to, that is domain of secretary myorkis, and they continue to work that very hard. >> according to press release, general, pulse strike, this is a quote, post-strike reflections indicate a connection to isis-k leaders that coordinated august twikth attack at the airport. way i read that, actual isis-k leaders are still out there, is that true? >> i prefer to talk about it in the private sector. >> i thought you might, i look forward to that and yield back. >> thank you, senator. mr. cramer, let me recognize senator duckworth, please. >> thank you, mr. chairman. mr. secretary, i want to say thank you, i just received a letter this morning in response to a letter i had written to you and secretary blinken asking about the process of certifying that somebody did work for the dod as a contractor and i want to say that a response is a good one. i think you made with regard to project rabbit, which i'll give you a couple minutes to talk about, seems you reviewed 7800 employment records and matched 3400 of those applicants. would you like to talk about operation rabbit a little bit? >> only to say, i mentioned earlier, senator, when this question came up, this is important to us. we think we have to do everything we can to shorten the amount of time that it takes for somebody who worked with us before to be able to verify they have worked with us. we're going to continue to work on this and again, one of my major directates focused on this and will work with the committee on this. if you have further requirements. thanks for your support in this regard. >> thank you. i know each of us probably have folks who contacted our office seeking help and verifying employer as contractor issue not just under dod, but with state. talk about mark feariks. military operations have ended, mr. mark is being held hostage in afghanistan. he was abducted in kabul, january 31st of last year, and been held captive too long, it is indicated taliban willingness to engage on his release. and taliban official confirmed u.s. and taliban negotiators discussed my constituent and talked about a deal for his freedom. "there are attempts between political bureau and united states envoy we hope will be success envelope this regard, we must continue to press for his swift and safe return, this must be priority for our government," and in august, pentagon spokesperson stated dod is laser-focused on returning him home safe to his family. i know from our numerous conversations issue including yesterday about my constituents, have you been personally involved in attempting to secure his return in engagement with your counterparts in the region and with the national security council. can you update the discussions regarding him with your counter parts and i know his family is probably watching this testimony today. >> this is -- i want him back and will continue to do everything to get him back. you and i have talked in other sessions, i've engaged chief of the pakistani army on multiple occasions to solicit his help. engaged other senior leadership to use their influence to -- to see if they can help us there. we will remain focused on this. i hope to see movement in the future. i don't have anything to offer in terms of specific read-out from the interagency process and i defer to mr. sullivan to provide commentary there. >> thank you, mr. secretary. and i appreciate your commitment to getting him home. when it comes to everyone trying to get allies out of afghanistan, general milley, i understand from public reporting you have been working with veteran groups and other ngo's voluntarily offering their help in continued effort to evacuate americans and at-risk afghans, from afghanistan, can you share any detail with us in the public today about that effort? >> yes, what we did, senator, we did a little outreach to groups that are probably well known to folks in this room. had them in for sessions in the defense department to have a picture of what siv's, what p1v2s are still there and tried to get information in single database from various groups. in addition, get them linked to ambassador bass, he is single focal point with the department of state, we've done that now and we have joint staff gentlemen of the jury officer involved in that working fwrup with them and he's our liaison and brings them all together to get information and develop course of action help bring out additional american citizens and others. >> thank you. will you commit to communicating with me and congress about this partnership so we can help facilitate connection with people who still remain at risk and contacting us throughout various offices? >> i will. it is being run by the department of state, i will work with the department of state to make sure, yes. >> thank you. mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator duckworth. senator scott, please. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general milley, why would you as sitting chairman of the joint chief of staff, talk to a reporter writing a book about a prior administration? why would that be part of your job description? >> as senator blackburn said earlier, i deal with the media routinely, two, three, four times a week and media, whether books, tv news, reporters, it is very important to make sure senior officials talk to media in various forms to explain what we're doing. >> that is -- you're talking about what happened in the past. >> sure -- >> why would you do that? what is upside to the american public of you talking to sensitive information, you have a full-time job and you go talk about the prior administration, i don't get it, it doesn't make sense to me. if the media asks you about right now, i get it, prior administration, why would you do that? >> it is important to make sure the american people are transparent with what our government does, nothing more complicated than that. >> you discussed sensitive information, private conversations you had with reporters. how is that consistent with your testimony today you won't talk about conversations you had with the president, only what your president is. it is reported by these reporters you have told them exactly the conversations you had with the prior president. >> i'm not so sure about what they are reporting about what i said and private conversations, i don't share private conversations with the president, this president, former president, period. >> what the reporters are saying are -- >> i don't know what they have written, i haven't read the books. i don't share personal conversations with the president. period. >> so senator sullivan asking about the conversation, whether you would give prior notice to the military communist china that america is going to attack. is it your testimony you will not ever give heads up to the communist chinese military if president of the united states, doesn't matter who the president is, you are reporting to, is ready to attack? >> of course i wouldn't. >> you don't feel like you did that at all? >> the context we were talking about, senator, there was a significant degree of intelligence and i think i put the unclassified version in that timeline. it is not insignificant, like one report or two, entire body of intelligence that led us to believe the chinese were misinterpreting our action and misinterpreting what was happening inside our own country and they were assessing a situation that was leading to escalation, possibly incident and would have been quite dangerous. secretary esper and i met and met with other members of the team and we developed an engagement plan to ensure we engaged at various levels. secretary esper had him do it and we asked me to do it and i did it. the theme was to deescalate and lower tension and i believe that is faithful and loyal meaning of my intent of the president of the united states at the time. i knew with srnlt that president trump was not going to attack the chinese, just out of the blue, it wasn't going to happen f. things did happen, it would be periods of tension, calls going back and forth. >> one more question. it is reported that you had concerns about the prior president's fitness for office. do you have criteria for presidents and do you have -- have you reviewed existing president biden for his fitness for office? do you think that way? do you have, think you have the ability to have a right to make those decisions and have you been doing that? >> i am not qualified to evaluate health or physical of anybody in this room, that is not what i did. there was a lot of speculation going on, i don't evaluate people's health and fitness issue not my job. >> okay. how did you feel when president biden attacked willingness of the afghan military to fight? how did that make you feel? >> how did i feel? >> when he attacked, he said he didn't think the afghan military had willingness to fight. how does that make you, as military officer, make you feel? somebody you put your life on the line -- >> 60 or 70,000 afghans killed in action over fwent years defending their country. i personally witness units that fought well and bravely and gave their life for their country. over the summer and 11 days, vast majority of afghans put their weapon down. kabul was taken with a couple hundred guys on motorcycles and wasn't a shot fired. my question to myself, how did we miss that, how did that happen? that is what we have to figure out, how did army of that size, how is it that the factors of will and leadership and moral collapse like that and we have to answer to ourselves. afghan army fought for 20 years and lost people. >> thank you. >> thank you, senator scott. senator rosen, please. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for being here throughout this long day. i want to speak about how as americans we are frustrated, all of us, about the way we withdrew from afghanistan, but we understand the difficult position that you and our men and women in uniform on the ground were. position you were in last month. what the american people fail to understand and what i, too, have difficulty accepting is the idea that the circumstances we found ourselves in were inevitable. i would like to ask about a few areas where perhaps we might have taken a different approach that could have given us more time to accomplish the mission. general mckenzie, why was it the responsibility of the u.s. and coalition forces or contractors to maintain afghan aircraft and equipment and why were the afghan forces either not trained or not given this responsibility over the last 20 years? >> i think you begin with the basic technological literacy of the country, which began when we first had dealings with them in 2001. you were talking to people coming out of rule by the taliban in position of shiria law. that is why it took a long time and we were not finished with the afghan air force. a lot of contract maintenance done for air forces around the world. the afghan air force is not in that regard. it was telling because they were dependent on it. >> so understanding tha would it have been helpful to keep bagram airport open to help with any of this going on, any of the evacuation, anybody else coming through the country, another place for citizens, people from other countries or special siv holders? >> ma'am, i was intimately involved in all with bagram, no way would bagram contribute to use of afghan air force, continued maintenance or bringing people out. very briefly, ki tell you once we went below 2500 peep nel afghan, we lost the ability to hold bagram air base. it was inevitable we would have to come out of bagram, late june, early july with 650 marines and soldiers in the country. it was not feasible to hold bagram under those circumstances. we were driven by the plan,

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