ELEVENTH HOUR

Leaked White House Note: U.S. Only Made Kabul Evacuation Plans Day Before City Fell

The notes from a Situation Room meeting held less than 24 hours before the Taliban moved in show officials only beginning to reach out to local collaborators.

One day before Kabul was seized by the Taliban, the Biden administration was only beginning to plan the evacuation of thousands of Afghan nationals who had helped the United States over the previous two decades of war, a leaked note appears to show. Axios published notes from a White House Situation Room meeting of top Biden administration officials held on the afternoon of Aug. 14, less than 24 hours before the fall of Kabul. The notes state that officials only decided during that Situation Room meeting that they needed to tell Afghan collaborators “to begin to register their interest in relocation to the United States and begin to prepare immediately for departure.” National Security Council spokesperson Emily Horne denied that the note shows a last-minute scramble to evacuate Kabul, saying in a statement that “cherry-picked notes from one meeting do not reflect the months of work that were already underway.”