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Evacuation Efforts Continue in Afghanistan. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired August 19, 2021 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[14:00:00]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Hello, everyone. Thanks for joining us on NEWSROOM. I'm Alisyn Camerota.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: I'm Victor Blackwell. Good to be with you.

At any moment, the State Department will give an update on the evacuation process in Afghanistan. We, of course, will bring that to you live.

But, today, we have learned the U.S. is using overwatch flights to protect those stationed at the Kabul Airport. Now, those are armed planes that fly over the area and are ready should the Taliban attack.

The Kabul Airport -- remember this detail in all the conversations we're having. The Kabul Airport is the only way out. But the State Department has reiterated it cannot ensure safe passage for Americans trying to get there. And the Pentagon says that U.S. troops will not go out to retrieve them.

CAMEROTA: So here's a look at the gauntlet where thousands of Americans and Afghans are risking confrontation with the Taliban and the Taliban's gunfire just to get close to that airport.

According to Reuters, 12 people have been killed in that area since the Taliban took control of the capital. This video was taken outside of the Kabul Airport. And it shows a woman pushing her way through, ultimately being pulled over the wall to safety by American soldiers.

BLACKWELL: In the past 24 hours, the U.S. has evacuated more than 2,000 people from Afghanistan. Tens of thousands are still waiting for their chance.

Nick Paton Walsh is CNN's international security editor.

Nick, you are in Doha in Qatar. Earlier this week, you were at the airport in Kabul. Having been there, what's your take on the ability to ramp up this mass evacuation that has to happen?

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR: Ramping up is not the problem, Victor. The problem is getting people inside the airport. There's planes, there's capacity. But there are not people in the security of the airport to get on those planes, as far as I saw on Tuesday afternoon. And even just a matter of hours ago, John Kirby, the Pentagon spokesperson, reported the last 24 hours have only seen 2,000 people leave, and they want to get to 5,000 to 9,000.

And, frankly, they have to get the number of people out they want. The biggest problem, the biggest unknown question in all of this was answered by Kirby a matter of hours ago. And they don't know how many American citizens are left in Afghanistan to evacuate. They are the priority, and the priority at this point an unknown quantity.

Now, the real issue, of course, about ramping this up -- and he referred to this himself -- is that the gates have to shut when they get flooded by Afghans trying to get on, be there American Afghans, Afghans themselves who think they have part of the SIV program to get into the United States, or whether they are the Europeans trying to get on as well.

They flood. They crush. I was caught in the crush myself trying to get on. It's incredibly difficult for the Marines to respond in any other way other than shutting down. You let one person over, everybody tries to climb over simultaneously.

And we have seen lots of videos today suggesting that, in fact, those crashes are worse. A rumor travels very fast. If somebody is successful getting on through a hole or a gate that's loosely attended for a while, people rush there. And so it is quite startling, Victor, the chaos outside and how little about that is often known inside that airport for planning.

CAMEROTA: Nick Paton Walsh, that is so helpful to understand exactly how complicated and challenging it is there. Thank you very much for your reporting.

So the Pentagon says there are 5, 200 U.S. troops now in Afghanistan. They say that 7,000 people have already been evacuated from Kabul, but that's over the past five days. And that is a fraction of the number waiting to get out.

BLACKWELL: CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr joins us.

Barbara, the number we got from the Pentagon was 2,000 people evacuated on Wednesday. As Nick said, the concern there is not the airlift capability. It's having people to fly out. What more are we learning about what the Pentagon is saying why the numbers are where they are?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Victor, as Nick just so aptly explained, the problem is getting people past the Taliban checkpoints, getting them past the gates at the airport, which are manned from the inside by U.S. troops, and onto flights

The Pentagon has been working towards trying to get a capacity, if you will, of 5,000 to 7,000 to 9,000 seats per day. But they don't have the bodies to put in those seats because of the situation outside the airport. There is a top U.S. military commander at the airport who has been talking directly to the Taliban for many days now, trying to get them to ease back on their violent control of the crowds.

But it is a crowd control issue. And trying to get people through, trying to get the Taliban to look at the paperwork and agree to let people through still seems to be the absolute number one challenge -- Victor, Alisyn.

BLACKWELL: Barbara Starr for us there at the Pentagon, thank you very much.

President Biden says that he always knew something chaos was inevitable, despite previously vowing an orderly exit from Afghanistan.

[14:05:05]

Now, there is this new interview. And he says that he insisted there is nothing he would change about the American withdrawal. Watch a portion of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ABC NEWS: Was the intelligence wrong, or did you downplay it?

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There was no consensus.

The intelligence community did not say back in June or July that, in fact, this was going to collapse like it did.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you don't think this could've been handled, this exit could've been handled better in any way? No mistakes?

BIDEN: No.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: CNN's Jeff Zeleny is in Washington for us.

What did he go on to say there, Jeff? Does he think there have been no mistakes made?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Alisyn, of course, President Biden, he's been defiant, he's been defensive all along, largely trying to keep the focus on the overall strategy of withdrawing American troops.

But what is left in that is, of course, is the chaos that we are seeing unfold to get to that strategy. So, saying no mistakes were made, he gives a bit of room there, saying that we will look back at this and see.

What the White House now is trying to do is focus on the forward- moving steps here, trying to speed the evacuation. But as we have seen from the challenges that Nick and Barbara were both laying out there, those challenges are dire. And it's nothing that can be really helped at this moment from here in the White House.

So the president is not giving -- spending much time being reflective on this about what he said in the months before, but, at this point, it is really President Biden's own words vs. the reality of what we're seeing here now. He said just a month ago, on July 8, that this would be a safe and secure exit. He said in April, when he announced this policy, that it would be an orderly exit.

And that, of course, we are not seeing anything like that. So there are discussions behind the scenes, were there pieces of intelligence that were missed? Obviously, there were. But, at least for now, the president is not trying to give any public voice to that. They are trying to, again, be defensive, be defiant.

We will see how long that lasts, though, because, starting next week, there will be congressional committees looking into all of this. And even Democrats, Democratic allies of this White House also have many questions and, actually, quite frankly, much criticism.

BLACKWELL: Yes, Jeff, one exchange and one claim by the president that certainly is going to get some scrutiny by those members of Congress is this exchange during this interview in which the president says that he did not get any advice from his military advisers to keep a small force in Afghanistan to avoid crisis. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANOPOULOS: But your top military advisers warned against withdrawing on this timeline. They wanted you to keep about 2, 500 troops.

BIDEN: No, they didn't. It was split. That wasn't true. That wasn't true.

STEPHANOPOULOS: They didn't tell you that they wanted troops to stay?

BIDEN: No. Not at -- not in terms of whether we were going to get out in a time frame all troops. They didn't argue against that.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So no one told -- your military advisers did not tell you, no, we should just keep 2, 500 troops, it's been a stable situation for the last several years, we can do that, we can continue to do that?

BIDEN: No. No one said that to me that I can recall.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: So, can that be reconciled with the reporting, Jeff?

ZELENY: No, because the reality is, at the time when this withdrawal was first announced here at the White House in April, there was much reporting by CNN and elsewhere that there were military commanders who were very worried about something like this ultimately happening. But even the president there himself, he said initially that there was some split advice. There were, of course, people on both sides of this. The overarching argument and issue here is, President Biden came into office looking to end America's longest war. He campaigned on that. He ran on that. And that is something that is supported by a broad swathe of the American public.

Of course, it's a continuation of what President Trump was trying to do here. So that much was not in dispute. The question is, in pursuit of that goal, were there questions that were missed? Were there red lights or potentially warning signs that to slow down this process?

And that seems to not have happened yet. So, again, all of these questions will be asked. We will see if they're answered beginning next week when those congressional hearings begin, because the secretary of state, the defense secretary, other top military commanders and others will be called to Capitol Hill to answer some of these questions.

But, for now, at least, the urgent situation the ground there, the math is simply not adding up to evacuate all those Americans, never mind the Afghan nationals. So that is what this White House at the moment is focused on. That's why the president has been meeting with his advisers here and others trying to get a handle on that.

CAMEROTA: All right. We will also hopefully get some answers from the State Department just moments away, because we are awaiting their briefing.

So, Jeff, stay with us, if you would.

Also still with us is CNN's Barbara Starr and Nick Paton Walsh. As you can see there, we're awaiting the briefing. We will bring it to you as soon as possible.

But we also have with us CNN counterterrorism analyst Phil Mudd. And Phil helped build the Afghan government that just fell.

So, Phil, obviously, this has been a sobering few days for you to watch.

[14:10:02]

What do you want to hear the State Department explain today?

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: I want to hear the explanation not today, but in the future, of not why Kabul fell so quickly.

I think, when you look at that -- when the Taliban first rose in about 1995, we were surprised. I was one of the intelligence analysts on that problem. We were surprised about how quickly they moved through. We were surprised again now 26 years later.

I think the question going down the road is, at the State Department, at the Pentagon and at the CIA, and ultimately at the White House, if we knew that this was going to fall, whether it's days, weeks, months, I don't care, if we knew it was going to fall, why weren't we bringing people out earlier? Why did we wait until the last minute?

It didn't have to take us to be surprised this week. We knew this was going to happen. I think people should have been out earlier.

BLACKWELL: Phil, to the point, you're just joining the conversation. I'm going to stick with you for a moment.

Was there a possibility of an extension of this stay of U.S. forces there? The president says that his hands essentially were tied by the agreement made by the previous president. Could there have been more time for U.S. troops to stretch this out a bit?

MUDD: Sure. I mean, I would have disagreed as an analyst with that decision. But the president can overturn the decision of a previous president.

The problem is if you're looking at the numbers on the ground, the amount of territory the Taliban was gaining was escalating. That territory was across Afghanistan. They were moving into areas where they would control entry points. That means a lot of money. You bring an oil truck into Afghanistan, you're going to pay off the Taliban.

So you're moving into those districts, you're gaining equipment as you capture people, as you capture outposts. You're gaining support. You're gaining money. What are 2, 500 people supposed to do? You tell me. I'm going to tell you, not that much. Not that much.

CAMEROTA: Barbara, have you gotten any response from military leaders at the Pentagon to President Biden's interview this morning with George Stephanopoulos in terms of basically him saying that he didn't think there was much that could have gone differently, the intelligence wasn't what ended up happening, and that, basically, they have done the best they can, not -- no major mistakes made?

STARR: Well, officially, the U.S. military always agrees with the commander in chief. That's how it goes. That's the official word.

I think it's really important to remember General Milley's words yesterday at the Pentagon press conference, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, chief military adviser to the president of the United States, and General Milley said he never saw any intelligence that would indicate the collapse of the Afghan government or the Afghan military in just 11 days' time start to finish.

So the question is -- and I think it goes very much back to what Phil is so directly saying--

BLACKWELL: All right, Barbara, we need to interrupt you.

We understand that the news conference at the State Department is beginning. This is Ned Price, the spokesperson.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS) NED PRICE, STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN: We have airlifted 7,000 total

evacuees.

I can also confirm their 6,000 people at the airport right now who've been fully processed by our consular team and will soon board planes.

Overnight, we significantly expanded how many American citizens, locally employed staff, SIV applicants and other vulnerable Afghans who are eligible for departure. And we offered them to consider transit to the airport.

We're aware of congestion around the airport. We are working closely with the Department of Defense to facilitate safe and orderly access for consular processing on the airport compound.

U.S. military and other country flights continued throughout the last 24 hours, and American citizens and legal permanent residents will be given the first opportunity to board, with other priority groups filling in seats from there.

We're continuing to rapidly deploy additional consular officers to ensure we can -- to ensure we can welcome Americans and others, and we will continue to do so over the coming days.

The department is sending consular staffing teams to Qatar and Kuwait to assist with the transit effort, and we're preparing teams to surge to other processing locations as well.

Additional consular officers have also now landed in Kabul. And we will nearly double the number of consular officers on the ground by tomorrow, by Friday.

I can also announce that Ambassador John Bass arrived in Kabul this morning to lead logistics coordination and consular efforts within the personnel who remain at the airport. As you heard Secretary Sherman say yesterday, our diplomatic and military personnel are working in lockstep towards the same goal.

And that is to get as many people who want to leave Afghanistan and who are vulnerable to Taliban reprisals because they helped the United States and our allies and partners or who are otherwise at risk because of who they are or what they do or what they believe out of the country as quickly as possible.

Our diplomats around the world are tirelessly engaging with their counterparts to ensure transit and passage for Americans, vulnerable Afghans and others. This is absolutely an all-hands-on-deck effort to ensure the safety of our personnel and citizens, rally our allies and partners, and organize the evacuation of thousands and thousands of individuals.

[14:15:03]

Additionally, Secretary Blinken spoke today with the G7 foreign ministers of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, United Kingdom, and the high representative of the European Union to discuss the situation in Afghanistan.

All leaders underscored the imperative of safe passage for those who wish to leave Afghanistan and the need for an inclusive political resolution that protects the fundamental human rights of all Afghans.

The leaders agreed that the international community's relationship with the Taliban will depend on their actions and not their words. Secretary Blinken and the G7 foreign ministers also exchanged views on counterterrorism, on humanitarian efforts, refugee migration, and they agreed to remain in close contact on all fronts going forward.

Secretary Blinken thanked his foreign counterparts for their steadfast commitment to supporting the Afghan people.

With that, I am happy to turn to your questions.

QUESTION: Ned, can I ask you an -- this is an extremely logistical question, and I hope it will be a very short answer.

So -- but does Operation Allies Refuge now include all of the categories of people who can go out? That means SIVs, P-1, P-2, and this other at risk category. Or does it still just apply -- does that term, Allies Refuge, just only applied SIVs?

PRICE: So, Operation Allies Refuge is--

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: -- briefed on different things all over town.

PRICE: Understood. Understood.

It is a military operation, Operation Allies Refuge. It was a term coined by the Pentagon. So I need to refer you there to speak precisely to what that operation now entails.

But what I will say more broadly, of course, is that Operation Allies Refuge, in the first instance, was an effort, an airlift operation, unprecedented airlift operation that no other administration, either in the--

(CROSSTALK)

PRICE: No, no, but I will get there -- but that no other administration either in the Afghan context or--

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: -- patting yourself on the back all you want.

I just want to know, does it include all of these categories now? Or is it just the SIVs?

PRICE: Matt, it was, in the first instance, an airlift operation for SIVs.

QUESTION: Now what is it?

PRICE: Now, of course, what we're doing is offering an airlift operation, we're in the midst of an airlift operation for American citizens, for locally employed staff members, for SIVs, for vulnerable Afghans.

QUESTION: So, the entire evacuation effort is Operation Allies Refuge?

PRICE: My point was that you will need to talk to DOD to understand exactly what OAR encompasses. But, obviously, we have a vast airlift operation ongoing now that encompasses all of those categories.

QUESTION: No is trying to say that you don't.

Clear -- secondly -- and I realize that the -- and I want to make sure that this is understood -- getting people out -- I understand that getting people out safely is the most important thing. But are there any COVID protocols for these flights?

PRICE: So, our first priority is to get as many people out as we can.

What we are doing, depending on where these individuals go -- and, as you know, there are several transit countries -- we -- there sometimes will be testing in those third countries. But our first priority right now is to bring as many people to safety as we can.

QUESTION: So there isn't a protocol at the airport? If they -- if they are lucky enough to get through and get on, there isn't any -- that there's no testing that happens beforehand?

Because if you look at the pictures of packed transport plans whenever -- one or two people who are infected could -- that could be a disaster, right, especially when they arrive someplace.

So, anyway, you're saying there aren't?

PRICE: When it comes to the transit countries, it is -- we are abiding by the regulations of those transit countries.

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: So there isn't any testing that happens before you get on a plane?

PRICE: In Kabul, at the airport, we don't at present have the capacity to test everyone on them.

QUESTION: Last thing. And I will be really brief, because it was kind of answered last night.

But that there were a bunch of reports last evening about this contingency and crisis response bureau proposal that had been made by the previous administration. And I just want to know if you guys still think that getting rid of it was the right thing to do? Was it -- was it a necessary -- was it a necessary element of the bureaucracy? PRICE: Well, I just want to correct something you said. We didn't get

rid of any bureau.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE).

PRICE: The bureau was never created.

The bureau was proposed by the previous administration in its final days. It was -- importantly, when it was conceived, it was not proposed to introduce any new capabilities whatsoever.

[14:20:08]

And that may have been the cause for concern on a bipartisan basis on Capitol Hill. As you know, there were holds on this idea on a bipartisan basis. Republicans and Democrats opposed this.

And, in fact, the memo that explains what this proposal was to do actually was explicit on saying that it would not bring any new capabilities on board.

Sol, when this administration came in, we studied the issue. And we determined, just as lawmakers on a bipartisan basis had determined, that a new bureau, a whole new structure was not the right way to go, that we could make improvements in other areas.

And that's what we have continued to do.

Kylie.

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: OK, just numbers here.

How many Afghans, SIVs, P-1, P-1, however they're being considered, have been evacuated since August 14? I know we have the 7,000 number in total for people. But how many Afghans are in that group?

PRICE: Well, the 7,000 figure, at this point, I'm not in a position to break that down much further.

As you know, it consists of American citizens. It consists of our locally employed staff who are Afghans. It consists of third-country nationals, as we have worked very closely with our partners on the ground to help bring some of their nationals to safety, and vulnerable Afghans.

So, right now, I'm not in a position to break that down further.

QUESTION: Will you break down that thousand?

PRICE: Break down 6,000?

QUESTION: Do you not have the information (OFF-MIKE). The 6,000 that are waiting to board, what about them? How many of them are SIVs?

PRICE: So, obviously, they're at the airport right now. So this is really data in real time that I just don't have access to.

What I can say, what I can say is that, overnight, we notified all Americans who had expressed an interest in being relocated to consider traveling to the airport. We notified our locally employed staff, Afghans who worked at our embassy in Kabul.

And we also notified a segment of the SIV population. So, of the 6,000 that are at the airport now, that is the general makeup.

ATWOOD: So, are you planning to give us a breakdown. Are you working on that? Or is that not--

(CROSSTALK)

PRICE: I expect we will have greater fidelity on all of these numbers as this continues, yes.

ATWOOD: Understood.

So, second question, there are reports of problems with these Afghans who you have told to come to the airport not being able to get into the airport because gates are closed .Is there anything that the State Department is doing to help them get into the airport at this time?

PRICE: So, what I can say -- and I'm seeing the same reports on Twitter that you are -- and every report of someone unable, for whatever reason, to reach the airport is something we take very seriously.

Our imperative is to relocate as many people as quickly as we can. And we have seen the reports of congestion. My understanding is that things are moving quite efficiently at this hour at the airport -- at the airport now.

But every report we see of someone unable to reach the airport is of concern. We are doing everything we can mechanically, logistically. But then, of course, there's also the diplomatic element to this as well. We are making very clear, we are making very clear, together with our international partners -- more than 100 countries have come together -- the G7 mentioned this today as well -- that safe passage should be guaranteed for all of those who wish to transit to the airport.

That is something we have focused on. We have focused on it in the Doha channel. We are focusing on it. And by we, I mean both State and the Department of Defense, which now has a channel with Taliban on the ground in Afghanistan.

And we have had what I would characterize as productive conversations about the need, the imperative of ensuring safe passage.

Now, of course, we're seeing some of the same reports. When it comes to American citizens, we have a relatively large cadre of consular officers on the ground in Kabul right now. They are in regular and constant contact with American citizens. I can tell you that they have received, as of a couple hours ago, a

small handful of reports from American citizens who weren't able to reach the airport for whatever reason.

What we do know is that 6,000 people are now at the airport; 6,000 people have been able to make it, have made it through the processing. And as of a couple hours ago, we had received only a small handful of reports otherwise from American citizens.

[14:25:02]

Sumara (ph).

QUESTION: So, then just to follow up on that, and you say you're doing everything you can, but also, yesterday, Defense Secretary Austin--

CAMEROTA: You have been listening to Ned Price there, the spokesperson for the State Department, talk about where we are, and the status of all of the people, the tens of thousands of people who are still trying to make it to that airport and get out of Afghanistan.

Let's bring back Nick Paton Walsh and Phil Mudd. We also want to bring in former CNN and NBC Kabul bureau Atia Abawi.

Great to have you here.

Phil, I just want to start with you, because it worries me, but I don't know if it was you, that Ned Price and no one can really give specific numbers. If they don't know the specific demographics of who they're flying out of there, exactly how many Americans, exactly how many Special Immigrant Visa Afghans, how do they know how many are left behind? How do they know when the mission is complete?

MUDD: Boy, you're a little more polite than I would be.

That was unacceptable. I'm not interested in hearing a U.S. government spokesperson talk about how unprecedented this is with other U.S. presidents and how other presidents didn't have to deal with this. I'm interested in understanding why we did only 2,000 people in 24 hours, how we increase that pace over the next 24 hours, what the total number it is -- is that we want to get out and how long that's going to take.

That was pathetic. Explaining how well you're doing, when they're American citizens who can't get to the airport, that guy needs some training fast. That was horrible.

CAMEROTA: I mean, obviously, it's more than just a messaging problem, Phil. It's not just that guy's messaging. It's that I don't know how they're figuring it out.

What are the logistics? I mean, you have been on the ground. You know how this works? How can they find people who are hiding and can't make it to the airport right now? MUDD: Well, there's -- I think you have raised one of the critical

questions.

Look, I think there's somebody -- and I presume it's at the Pentagon -- who has a breakdown about, for example, which Afghan citizens there, whether we have U.S. Embassy employees there, how many American citizens there are in Afghanistan, and Kabul in particular, how many have gone out on these flights.

I wouldn't be worrying about testing people in the airport now. Get them out and test them in Doha or someplace else. But I think the key question, aside from the throughput at the airport, is, when you look at the Department of Defense, the Department of State, the CIA and elsewhere, do we have an understanding of not only exactly who they want to get out, but how we're going to identify those people when they get to the airport?

If you have stragglers at the end who can't get there, I understand that. But at the front end, I'd be worried about the logistics of, how do you figure out who's John Doe and who's not John Doe, the person who worked for the CIA or the Pentagon? That is tough.

BLACKWELL: Nick, to you.

You're in Doha now. Have you obviously been in Afghanistan countless times over the last 20 years. Can you just relay the reality of the journey from, if there are Americans in Kandahar, if there are Americans in Herat, getting to Kabul, and then dealing with the melee around the airport?

WALSH: Yes, I have to -- obviously, as a reporter, I can't be as emotional as your previous speaker.

But it is amazing to hear the way in which this chaos, an utterly dysfunctional situation, is being relayed, as though it's something under control and orderly. I'm stunned at the lack of basic numbers the State Department have. I'm stunned at how he appears to be reading about instance of congestion or failure to get into the base on Twitter, and then takes each one seriously.

He also appears to suggest that there are a small number of Americans who haven't managed to get on. Well, certainly, I was there on Tuesday, and a woman bearing an American passport behind me, she was tearful. She was utterly unable to get any attention from the U.S. Marines, facing a crowd of hundreds pressing against the gate.

She gave up, frankly, because of fear of exhaustion in the heat and the crowd crushing her.

Just getting onto the base is the problem. When you're on the base, as of Tuesday, when I saw it, the planes were not particularly full. And so unless the State Department is able to kind of accept the fact that they have a major problem in streamlining individuals through their process to get them on the base, they're still going to be giving these press conferences that seem a little bit divorced from anything approaching reality. And I still struggle always to understand with the U.S. government

when it comes to Afghanistan, again and again and again, they seem to be really allergic to accepting things and not going well. When it was during the war and the surge and everything, there was a persistent desire to say, things are on track, we're handing it over to the next rotation of troops, and it's going to get better.

Even now, in this closing moment, they simply cannot say, we're not doing very well here because it's a mess. And that, I think, unless they can grasp the reality, and that they have a results problem here, not a messaging problem, as, allegedly, David Petraeus once said in Iraq, we're going to be having these press conferences again and again daily, as the situation around the base just gets more surreal and ghastly.

CAMEROTA: Atia, you lived and worked as a journalist in Afghanistan.