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Resistance to the taliban. we did not adequately plan for the possibility of a real kol ps. we need to explore processes to understand why we were unrealistic and how to correct that going forward. the most important part of the question is why military we trained for 20 years at a cost of 800 plus billion collapsed so quickly? i can think of three reasons after i put them on the table i would like each of you beginning with general mckenzie to address the question. we can do it when we come back after lunch. the collapse may show our training was insufficient and it did not prepare the afghan...

An american citizen left behind in afghanistan, the military is going to stay until we get them out. general milley, was that statement -- did that statement turn out to be true or untrue by the president? >> i think that was the intent but we gave him a recommendation on the 25th of august to terminate the mission. >> bill: the at the same time was untrue. let me ask another question. the president around the same time said al qaeda was gone from afghanistan. told the american people that. was that true or not true? was al qaeda gone from afghanistan in mid august? true or not true? >> al qae...

The firtion of the eight forts that processed afghanistan and i visited afghans, troops and ngos. the competent and compassionate service on the american side and the deep gratitude among afghans made a deep impression on me. we should do all we can to make the transition to a safe life in america as productive as possible. my chief criticism and question why did the afghan security forces and government collapse so quickly and why do d the u.s. so overestimated their capacity. the second question is important, to any who have said we couldn't see this coming members of this committee know tha...

Military leaders and demoralized the piece agreement. did it deepen a culture of corruption that long predated our involvement. the best fighting force may give in. the lightning collapse may show we wanted things for afghans that afghan leadership did not want for themselves. we celebrated gains in public health and women's education and assumed that afghans would fight to preserve those gains rather than allow the taliban to take over. in other words, we thought we knew what afghans wanted and what they feared and what they would fight for. it was our belief, those well intentioned, was it n...

Lapsing. this gets to the overestimation, i think the overly optimistic assessment. even as late as july you are still encouraging the afghan special forces, you are expecting the ghani government to remain, but that was not the case. in december of 2019 the "washington post" reported the u.s. military commanders privately expressed a lack of confidence that the afghan army and police could ever fend off or defeat the taliban on their own. so general milley, you noted there are some specific military lessons to be learned. this is not the first time that i think we have relied upon overly opti...