ISTANBUL — Thousands of desperate Afghans trying to escape Taliban capture stormed Kabul’s main international airport on Monday, crowding boarding gates, crowding runways, boarding jets and even that US military planes were trying to drop.
At least half a dozen Afghans were killed in the chaos, some fell from the sky as they lost their grip, and at least two American soldiers tried to control the growing crowd.
The images evoke America’s frantic departure from Vietnam, showing the breathtaking collapse of Afghanistan in the wake of American abandonment.
As American troops sought to manage the escape, air traffic control was seized, prioritizing military flights to evacuate and evacuate Western civilians. Apache Helicopter Low Over Rushing to clear the runway, Taliban fighters made a swift and devastating skirmish for power, posing for an iconic photo behind the ornate presidential desk at the presidential palace hours after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country.
In a video broadcast on Al Jazeera, the chief of the Afghan presidential guard shook hands with a Taliban commander. “I welcome him and I congratulate him,” the official said.
Taliban fighters spread through the streets of the capital on Monday, driving motorbikes and police vehicles and Humvees confiscated from government security forces. Armed fighters captured Parliament, some visited the homes of government officials, seized property and vehicles, while others demonstrated to direct traffic.
Taliban officials promised security to civilians and urged them to stay, but the crowd at Hamid Karzai International Airport exposed the depth of panic and despair of Afghans who feared retaliatory killings and a return to a harsh Taliban regime .
“Our position is bitter,” said one Afghan man, whose name was not published to protect it from retaliation from the Taliban. Speaking amidst hundreds of people talking and children crying, he said: “There is no water or food. Now we have moved to a different location, but we are not sure when we will be kicked off the flight. “
President Biden, speaking at the White House on Monday afternoon, acknowledged the withdrawal was “filthy” but dismissed the Vietnam analogy, defended his decision to withdraw from Afghanistan and called on the country’s military and political leaders to stand up for themselves. blamed for failing. Two decades of American support.
“Afghanistan’s political leaders gave up and fled the country,” he said. “If anything, last week’s developments confirm that ending US military involvement in Afghanistan now was the right decision.”
He said he had urged the political leaders of Afghanistan to engage in genuine diplomacy. “This advice was categorically rejected,” he said.
But the ugly scene at the airport, which fast broadcast around the world, began to speak louder than words.
In an extraordinary scene filmed by Afghan media, hundreds of people ran alongside a US military C-17 cargo plane and some tried to climb into wheel wells or cling to the sides of the plane as it was gaining momentum, which the US It was an attractive symbol of the army. Even if the Afghans stood against all hope.
A US military official confirmed that some Afghans were killed, either crushed to death on takeoff or by planes.
American soldiers fatally shot at least two armed men who approached the Americans inside the airport’s security perimeter and brandished their weapons, according to a US military official.
An Afghan man, who was waiting to be evacuated with his family, said several people were killed when US troops opened fire to stop the growing crowd. He said he saw two bodies covered with sheets on the ground, but understood that at least three people, including a woman, died in one incident, around 10 a.m., and more died in another shooting.
The scale of the chaos made it clear how unprepared the international presence in Afghanistan was for the Taliban to win. Turkey, which offered to retain troops to secure the airport after the US withdrawal, indicated it was abandoning its plans on Monday evening, Reuters reported.
“It’s unsustainable,” said Asli Aydintasbas, a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, “we don’t know what Taliban 2.0 might be like.”
Thousands of people camped overnight in the departure lounges of civilian terminals, waiting for outgoing flights. Many of them were employees of international organizations and media companies who were targeted by the Taliban and feared for their safety under a Taliban-run state.
White House aides said several thousand US troops were in the process of securing the airport. But some Afghans said their priority was to evacuate Americans and other Westerners, not Afghans.
An employee of an international organization had a fixed seat on a Turkish Airlines flight, but according to an aide, the flight was hit by US troops favoring US citizens.
And when American troops took over air traffic control, commercial air traffic was largely halted for military flights to be carried out.
Mr Biden has vowed to rescue the thousands of Afghans who helped Americans during the two-decade conflict, but the fate of many living in Kabul and other parts of Afghanistan was uncertain. US government said that in the coming days It will evacuate thousands of US citizens, embassy staff and their families, and “particularly vulnerable Afghan citizens”.
The State Department said the United States evacuated 1,600 people from Afghanistan over the weekend, bringing the total to 3,600 people evacuated since mid-July. The Pentagon said on Monday evening that nearly 700 Afghans working with the United States had been evacuated along with their families in the past 48 hours. The Pentagon is hoping to evacuate 5,000 people daily by the end of this week.
Other countries were also scrambling to evacuate their citizens. British officials said they were confident they could remove the approximately 3,000 Britons living in Afghanistan, but said they were less confident about being able to provide a safe escape to Afghans who assisted the British and whose lives were lost. Might be in danger now.
There was no security on the civilian side of the airport for much of Sunday and Monday, when government police and airport security forces abandoned their posts, with Taliban forces beginning to capture the city on Saturday night.
As security deteriorated, many of those who had been promised flights abandoned the effort and went back home to a city where the Taliban was consolidating their control.
An Afghan man who took the flight on Monday said he visited the airport and after seeing the madness decided not to even try to bring his family there.
In Kabul, residents began tearing down advertisements showing women without head scarves, fearing upsetting the Taliban, whose ideology excludes women from public life. Some police officers were taken into custody by Taliban fighters, while others in civilian clothing were seen trying to escape.
A freelance journalist said he had taken some documents, although he could blame him for a neighboring Pashtun, a similar ethnic group to the Taliban, and asked him to hide.
Journalist Ammar asked not to publish his last name for fear of reprisal, “I was having anxiety attacks thinking that the Taliban would attack my house and I would be beaten up for wearing shorts or I would be arrested.” “So I changed into traditional Afghan clothing, which I know the Taliban approves of to protect themselves.”
The Pentagon said the military reopened the airport for flights on Monday afternoon, and resumed flights of US military aircraft carrying thousands of Marine and Army reinforcements. Pentagon officials said about 3,500 US marines and soldiers were expected to arrive at the airport by Monday evening, and 2,500 more on the way.
The Taliban began to exercise more control around the airport early in the evening. Residents living nearby said shops and homes in the neighborhood had been looted, but they were feeling a little safer since the Taliban arrived.
In the evening they heard gunshots coming from the airport as Taliban fighters entered the airport’s outer compound and opened fire to disperse the crowd.
The Afghan man interviewed earlier in the day said that after waiting for more than 36 hours, he was being processed for departure around 8 a.m., when the Taliban arrived and began beating people to break up the crowd.
“They beat us with their rifle butts and I got slightly injured,” he said. He said that his wife and son also beat him up. “It was a very dangerous situation but we managed to escape. Thank god we managed to get out of the airport. I’m going back home.”
In a harbinger of a stricter rule feared by many Afghans, the Taliban allowed people out of the airport, but an employee of a European organization who was trying to enter the airport was told that no one was allowed to enter the airport. They will also not be allowed to leave the country without permission. From “New Government”.
In video posted on facebook A Taliban commander driving a government police pickup truck outside the airport was asked about the hundreds of people who wanted to leave the country. “They shouldn’t go,” she replied. “We will be here and we will bring peace and security now because we have left behind a corrupt regime.”
Helen Cooper, Eric Schmidt and Lara Jakes contributed reporting from Washington, and Farnaz Fassi contributed from New York.