Much has been made of the artificial deadline President Joe Biden foolishly set for evacuating Afghanistan. Frankly, the deadline is irrelevant because long before the deadline arrived, the president had already folded and, as a result, the killing of Americans had already started. On Saturday, Aug. 28, 13 flag-draped coffins arrived at Dover Air Force Base. No one from the White House met the aircraft.

These 13 won’t be the last. Americans will be left behind and will be killed.

For several weeks, brave, exhausted Americans — all volunteers — have been working without rest to get hundreds of pre-manifested men, women and children into Hamid Karzai International Airport for evacuation from Afghanistan. Volunteers have been doing what an incompetent political and military establishment could and should have been doing. All of the chaos and deaths could have been prevented had there been leadership.

Allowing the enemy to dictate conditions on the ground is tantamount to surrender. Because they control the ground and the gates to the airport, the Taliban is charging $1,500 for anyone hoping to pass through one of their checkpoints.

At a time when the U.S. needed a strong president, we got a weak and inept politician. At a time when the U.S. needed courageous leadership, we got a bumbling coward. At a time when we needed a truth-teller in the White House, we got a habitual liar. As a result, American military families are grieving, and the blood of their loved ones is on Biden’s hands.

The president tries to defend his callow handling of the Afghanistan bug out by blaming former President Donald Trump for negotiating with the Taliban, but he conveniently ignores an important point. Trump negotiated from a position of strength with a gun held to the Taliban’s head; a gun they knew he would use. The Taliban feared Trump. Biden, on the other hand, has negotiated with the Taliban from a position of weakness, on his knees, with their gun held to his head. Not only does the Taliban not fear Biden — they laugh at him. He couldn’t frighten a puppy.

All along, the U.S. has had the ability to decapitate the Taliban’s leadership and crush its troops, but ability means little if the president lacks the will to use it. The few recent airstrikes by the U.S. are commendable, but they are a drop in the bucket compared to what is needed.

Once our troops are gone, God help any Americans or loyal Afghans left there. Biden, ever the calculating politician, knows this, but he is counting on two things to save him. First, he knows once America’s troops are out of Afghanistan, the cameras and reporters will be gone, too. He is counting on the Taliban being able to do its demonic work without the world viewing it on the news every night.

Second, he is counting on Americans having short memories. He is coldly calculating that by Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024, Americans will have forgotten about Afghanistan and moved on to other pressing issues.

What happens now? Intelligence officers from Pakistan and the People’s Republic of China are in Kabul now. Valuable American gear, arms and equipment are being moved across the Pakistan border for export to China. As the U.S. moves out, the Taliban, ISIS, al-Qaida, Haqqani and China are moving in, all with bad intentions toward America.

In several previous columns, we laid out out a six-point plan the president could have used to prevent the catastrophe in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, our recommendations are not the kind that appeal to a president who has already capitulated.

COPYRIGHT 2021 OLIVER L. NORTH AND DAVID L. GOETSCH