0 you don't have to take care of all of kabul to get a bigger perimeter. that should have been another option. thanks, general. we know you'll be part of the continuing coverage as we move forward. the president said it was time to end this war. that is the story. stay tuned for continuing coverage here on fox of the end of the war in afghanistan. >> neil: all right. martha just said it. i was not going to extend this forever war. the president of the united states explaining why after 20 years we're out of afghanistan and our longest war is now in the rear view mirror. but growing questions that might not be the case. growing concerns for the tens of thousands left behind as to their safety and whether anyone, anywhere is going to help them and get them out of that country. welcome, everybody. i'm neil cavuto, this is "your world." growing confusion as to the message of the commander-in-chief about our now completed role in afghanistan and whether we actual ply completed the role, whether all americans that wanted out got out. that's not the case. they didn't. and those that are left could be targets of the taliban. fast-moving developments. let's go to jennifer griffin on the implications of this huge day. jennifer? >> neil, the last plane carrying u.s. troops took off from kabul at 3:29 p.m. eastern yesterday. a minute before midnight local. president biden's august 31 deadline. the top general overseeing the operation admitted some americans and afghans were left behind. >> look, there's a lot of heart break associated with this departure. we did not get everybody out that we wanted out. i think if we stayed another ten days, we wouldn't have gotten everybody out that we wanted out and still would have been people disappointed with that. >> here's a bit of background on the major general chris donahue, commanding general of the 82nd airborne division in this iconic almost ghostly photo, the last american soldier to leave afghanistan after nearly 20 years. general donahue was working in the pentagon on 9-11. his fourth deployment to afghanistan. he led the delta force in office a decade ago and was head of special operations forces last year. last night secretary of state an tony blinken explained who some of these american citizens are that were left behind. >> they're long-time residents of afghanistan that have american passports and who were trying to determine whether or not they wanted to leave. >> many of the americans left behind are babies that gave birth here in the u.s. they were dependent on parents to get them to the airport and many green card holders wanted to bring a dozen or more non-american family members with them and thele that plan blocked them. 20 years ago, the u.s. military defeated the taliban. today the taliban rule afghanistan again. neil? >> neil: jennifer, there's been a battle back and forth. first, some in the administration said it's and semantics more than anything else. we left americans stranded in the country or not. now the pentagon's argument yeah, technically they are stranded from the white house, that's not how they see it. they're not on the same page here. >> what i would say, neil, the from the pentagon and the white house and now the state department in the lead working with networks on the ground with other countries like the qataris to establish flights out of afghanistan, civilian flights. they'll have to get the airport up and running. they have committed, the president has committed to getting those 100 to 200 americans out if they still want to leave. many do. a dozen reached out to us that i'm aware of that still want to leave. so they are going to have to work very dangerous over land routes, very risky situations at the airport because right now there's nobody to operate that airport. so every men that these people are on the ground dangerous, but it's also more important to look at not just the americans to level there but how about the afghan partners that worked with the u.s. government for years that didn't get out? many had applied for siv visas. many are really -- their lives are at risk because they helped with the water effort and they're considered collaborators. then you have the women and girls that made up the civil society that the u.s. spent 20 years building. they're at risk tonight. >> neil: you know, jennifer, maybe you can help me with the numbers that we're talking about here. angela merkel said there could be 40,000 of the afghan nationals that should be evacuated. i don't know if she was talking about those working with nato or germany or the united states or all of the above. but that many. that number surprising. some would say it's small. the numbers are larger than that. what have you heard on the numbers still there that want to get out of there? >> i think that the u.s. government was always working under the assumption that there would be about 50,000 people that wanted to get out. every afghan translator that gets and siv visa and wants to leave is -- the u.s. government estimates that they want seven family members with them. they have children, wives, sometimes parents. so that number balloons quickly. that's where 40,000 is a fair estimate from the government of germany. >> neil: got it. thank you. i want to go to don mann. we're waiting for the white house briefing that maybe the questions that we were waiting on will be answered. don, let's talk about these individuals including 100 to 200 americans that are still there and want out of there. we don't know precisely. the tens of thousands of afghan nationals that want the same thing. what is your gut tell you about the likelihood of that happening right now? >> well, we do know the background of the taliban. we know what they do. we know what they do to people like us, americans. they behead people and torture people. now our hand are severely tied. we lost our bases, we lost our military on the ground and our intel assets. i have a really sickened feeling in my gut the future of the americans and our friends that we left behind. >> neil: don, the president said i was not extending a forever exit. yet a little more than two weeks ago he was climbing we wouldn't leave until every american had left that wanted to leave. so something changed. now, talk is and certainly the president hinted of it that things were escalating quickly and it was a danger to our troops. i don't really know what the skinny is. what do you make of the mixed messages he has been sending on this? refusing to get out until all americans got out and then leaving what struck americans earlier than a deadline? >> i believe the president has been telling us initially what we wanted to hear. as we get closer to the deadline that he established, the truth was coming out and he couldn't hide from it anymore. the truth was all along, we could not get everybody out on time and that was not going to happen. president biden knew that and he lied to the american people. >> neil: so when he was fingering the prior administration for kind of setting this up and that, you know -- if trump had his way, this would have been exploding in may. as you know, the former president said many times this wouldn't have happened. there were stipulations in that agreement with the taliban. probably doesn't do any good going back with what ifs. but bottom line, this was a horrendous departure from the country and collapse unlike any we've seen. we were there for it. we were there when it started and there with our tail between our legs when we left. i can not imagine the damage that this does and furthermore even in working with countries in the region like qatar to try to, you know, ease some of the issues that we haven't addressed. what do you think? >> well, we have one of the biggest disasters in my lifetime, in the united states history. one of the biggest disasters we're facing right now. president biden did this on his own. he could have followed what president trump put in place with the contingencies, the well-methodical plan that he put together. if he followed the president's plan, we wouldn't be in this mess right now. wouldn't have gone perfectly. but it certainly wouldn't have been as bad as this is. >> neil: all right. don, i want to thank you. we are waiting to hear from jen psaki leading the white house briefing. meantime, martha maccallum joins us right now. martha, i want you to react to this. obviously happened during your show when the president made a comment about forever wars and trying to end them. this is from the president a short while ago. >> we were left with a simply decision, either follow-through on the commitment made by the last administration and leave afghanistan or say we weren't leaving and commit another tens of thousands more troops going back to war. that was the choice, the real choice between leaving or escalating. i was not going to extend this forever war. >> neil: what did you think of that, martha? >> martha: one of the things that struck me was sort of a tandem comment that he made, neil. he said if you're 20 years old, you've never known america at peace. now, you know, i think that there's a question as to whether or not we were in an active war in the past several years or whether or not we were stabilizing the situation and sort of holding the peace. we have several situations around the globe where we have a presence in japan, in south korea, in germany in order to be peacekeepers and in order to hold the peace in a number of regions. so there's a lot of folks that look at this situation and say, we have had relative peace. we've lost people over those years. we have created a situation where we were keeping things in check in afghanistan. so that was the argument that a lot of people put forward. we needed to keep that small presence to keep the peace that was happening. we hadn't lost anyone in 18 months in place. so i think there's -- he really puts it as a black and white choice. either he was going to have this massive escalation or he was going to get out. he said he wanted to get out, committed to getting out and then he said it's because of president trump and his fault. so which is it? that's the question here. it's pretty clear that he wanted to get out and he sort of -- one of the only things that he continued trump policy on and he said he was hamstrung by it even though there were rules in place to given him and out. he could have said you haven't upheld the conditions of that agreement and we won't allow this to happen. one thing that strikes me is what we didn't know. when you read the account of the collapse of kabul. it is astonishing. it really looks like there were a number of tea leaves that should have told us a long time ago that we would never build a government that could stand without a u.s. presence. as soon as it signals that we were leaving, they lost al credibility and the taliban gained credibility. they overran the country. i think about ben hall's reporting in november of 2020. standing in villages saying hey, the taliban took this one, too. so it wasn't as if we didn't know this situation was disintegrating, but there needs to be accountability of intelligence, leadership, in terms of the president and what we understood about what was going on when that government fell and everybody said that they were completely shocked, neil. >> neil: martha, two minutes away from the briefing. jen psaki might echo a lot of things the president just said. but one thing that stuck out when the president took responsibility for this, he didn't waste a second pointing the finger at the prior administration. one thing that was interesting to me, paraphrasing here, he was locked into this agreement and then donald trump, the president, had with the taliban but he had no problems if memory serves me right ripping up everything else president trump had done. so it bends credulity that was locked into that when everything else he tore up via executive order or more. >> martha: he made that point several times. that's clearly the argument, that president trump put him in a corner and he had no choice. as we know, there's plenty of things that he's been very happy to throw out the window from the prior administration and he had no problems doing that. that is on president biden. this was his extraction. this was his exit from afghanistan. there are still americans that were left behind. he blames them in essence. he said we've been reaching out to you since march. if you didn't get your act together, it's not our fault. for some people there might be truth to that but doesn't line up with the texts and the accounts and terrifying accounts neil of people that made it in to the airport in some cases and got pushed out of the airport or people that got to the gate and they wouldn't let them through with their families like mohammed and his family who rescued senator biden and john kerry from a mountain top in afghanistan. so it's not the case that these people are twiddling their themes at home. we have a bureaucratic nightmare mess that these people face. which goes to how febrile the function of the government can be when it comes to this. so this is squarely on his shoulders. it was his decision to keep that policy and that agreement that was laid out by president trump and secretary of state pompeo. this is on president biden. we'll see if this war ended yesterday at 3:29 or not. >> neil: yeah, that's the fear. by the way, this brothering could start any second here. the administration is of the opinion that we can maintain robust counter terrorism capabilities in the region. secretary of state anthony blinken said that. but that's a tough hall when we're out of afghanistan altogether. >> yeah. there was an impressive attack that took out two suicide bombers. that was well-done. we hope that they can do it over the horizon. but we don't have intel on the ground anymore. that's going to be difficult. >> neil: got it. thanks, martha. here's jen psaki at the white house. >> damage assessments continue. he's made clear that the state, tribal and local officials that have request for anything have our full support and we are in close contact. today the fema administrator and the american red cross director meets with the governor and survey the damage from hurricane ida. the administrator will travel to mississippi tomorrow to meet with state officials. as ida continues to move to the northeast, we expect heavy rain to continue. life threatening flash flooding that remains a threat in west virginia, pennsylvania, d.c. and elsewhere. in the gulf coast search and rescue efforts are understood way, 12er ban and search teams are operational in louisiana to support state and local efforts. the coast guard has done overhead flights to search for anyone in need hoff assistance. urban search and rescue teams have assisted hunts of survivors and their work continues. we'res will in regular contact, which is a huge priority for people in the region, with private electricity companies to ensure that they have the resources that they need as they work to restore power in louisiana and mississippi where 1.1 million customers remain without electricity. we've seen people in mississippi get electricity back. there's more than 25,000 linemen in the region racing to restore power. fema has staged nearly 250 generators to support impacted areas. we're going to get more generators to the area to get more power to the emergency services that need it the most. we also want to make sure that individuals in the impacted areas of louisiana know they can apply for federal assistance. we would encourage anyone in need assistance to go to disasterassistance.gov. 48 shoulders are open throughout the coast. fema has staged more than 4.4 million meals, 3.2 million liters of water and 24,000 tarps in the region and ambulance crews have been transported to louisiana and mississippi. the department of transportation issued a regional emergency declaration nor states including alabama, arkansas, louisiana, tennessee and texas providing flexibility for transporting fuel and essential items like food, water and power restoration equipment to support emergency relief efforts. today we have two additional actions to announce to increase the availability of gasoline and ease price pressures. first, department will extend amend and emergency declaration a limited truck driving hours. now gasoline and fuel to be delivered. this waiver should help reduce the risk of shortages or price increases stemming from the hurt. the dot's top priority is safety and this waiver is accompanied by additional safety requirements to allow the department to monitor driver working hours. the epa has approved the emergency fuel weighers for louisiana and mississippi immediately which will expand the supply of gasoline and the availability at this critical time. we're continuing to assess and will provide you updates. kick it off, josh. >> thanks, jen. two subjects. first on afghanistan. the president said any additional evacuation will go through diplomatic generals and the united states has leverage over the taliban. what kind of leverage does the united states have? >> absolutely. first i would say -- i'd point you to the remarks that the secretary of state provided last night. let me give you highlights. we have leverage including access to the global marketplace. in order to gain access to the global marketplace, we'll be watching closely as will the global community. the u.n. security council passed a resolution that made clear to what the expectation is in terms of safe travel and evacuation or departure of people that want to leave afghanistan. nearly half the countries in the world have signed on to a statement making clear that is the expectation. that's the diplomatic side. the other components that our secretary of state will be focused on include establishing a presence in doha, which is already underway, which is a place-with we'll operate from diplomatically. the other pieces of engagement with the taliban, which will continue. the other piece of this is operational. which is opening the airport and regional airports and also ensuring that there is over land travel that is possible, which means leading across borders. the president touched on this in his statement. the airport front, the more specific piece with the qatarrys and the turks that are more important here, getting the civilian side of the airport operational again so we can use that not just for flights for people to depart but also for humanitarian assistance and others to distribute. so a number of channels, this is a priority the secretary of state will be leading and continue to provide updates and we're hoping to make progress in the coming days. >> secondly on the economy, you were asked about the expiration of the extension of the unemployment benefits. we know the black unemployment is above 8%. it's above 7% in new york, nevada, illinois, california. with the expirations, how do ensure people in those places still get the support that they need? >> you're right. it's vitally important to look at the different circumstances in different states. look at the national landscape on these benefits. in about half of all states, 20 governors have made the decision to eliminate pandemic unemployment benefits. that's a choice they made. the remaining 26 states, the levels remain widely from 3% to 7%. half of the remaining states have unemployment rates less than 5%. differing needs in different states. governors are making difference decisions. what we announced two weeks ago and a lot of news going on is our effort to put new tools in place to help states that choose to further extend pandemic unemployment benefits because of those needs. because there's states like those you mentioned or they have higher rates of unemployment among african americans. the se