A general and an admiral turned down last-minute chances to keep Taliban out of Kabul

A top U.S. general and a key U.S. rear admiral both turned down last-minute chances which potentially could have kept the Taliban out of Kabul during the August 2021 fiasco of evacuation from Afghanistan. General Frank McKenzie rejected a proposal from the Taliban to keep the enemy forces out of Kabul, while Rear Admiral Peter Vasely shot down an overture from allied Afghan commanders that may have saved the nation's capital from the utter chaos that ensued.

McKenzie, the now-former commander of CENTCOM, held a mid-August 2021 meeting with Taliban leader Mullah Baradar in Doha, Qatar which would end with the Taliban taking control of Kabul and the U.S. relying upon the goodwill of Taliban fighters to provide security at the Kabul airport during the evacuation. 

During that meeting, Baradar said the Taliban was willing to withdraw its forces from in and around Kabul and would let the U.S. send in as many troops as it wanted to secure the Afghan capital and conduct the U.S. evacuation free from Taliban interference, but McKenzie admits that he turned the offer down on the spot.

McKenzie is currently listed as the Executive Director for the Global and National Security Institute at the University of Southern Florida. The general did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent to him through his email at the school.

Vasely did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent to him through his LinkedIn page.

Afghan military told to give up the fight

Afghan General Haibatullah Alizai and Afghan General Sami Sadat have both also said that they had proposed imposing martial law in mid-August 2021 following Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s flight from Kabul, and that Alizai and Sadat had sought U.S. assistance for this, but that U.S. Rear Admiral Peter Vasely, then the commander of U.S. Forces Afghanistan-Forward in Kabul, and now retired, had rejected the plan on the spot and told them to give up the fight and just head to the Kabul airport.

It is not known what would have happened if McKenzie and Vasely had made different decisions, but what is known is the harrowing and deadly scenes in Kabul that followed.

Despite its significance to the fate of Afghanistan and to the safety and success of the U.S. evacuation, the House Foreign Affairs Committee (HFAC)’s final report made no mention at all of McKenzie’s critical meeting with the Taliban in Doha. 

The HFAC report also only a single line obliquely referencing the unsuccessful bid by Alizai and Sadat for last-minute U.S. support to stave off the Taliban, with the report saying, “Even as the Taliban reached the gates of Kabul, the highest-ranking remaining Afghan commander, General Alizai, asked for U.S. support in a last stand to defend Kabul.” 

The report does not say to which U.S. military officer the Afghans made this request, does not mention what the U.S. response was, and provides no further details.

As for criticism of the HFAC report, "Chairman McCaul stands by his comprehensive report, the culmination of 18 transcribed interviews, seven public hearings, and 20,000 pages of documents obtained under subpoena from the State Department,” Emily Cassil, a spokesperson for former HFAC Chairman Michael McCaul, told Just the News.

“We were leaving”: McKenzie turned down Taliban offer at critical moment

McKenzie revealed in his memoir, The Melting Point, that Zalmay Khalilzad, the special representative for Afghan reconciliation, had begun pushing the general to come to Doha in early August 2021. McKenzie wrote that, on August 5, 2021, Khalilzad called him and “delivered his bombshell: [Biden national security adviser] Jake Sullivan wanted me to go to Doha to join in negotiations with him and the Taliban. I was noncommittal.”

The general wrote that “I did not relish being a potted plant for Zal while he continued to negotiate, with his leverage melting away every day, driven by events on the ground.” But McKenzie said that “I wasn’t sure where the idea had actually come from. I knew Zal and his methods well enough to believe that perhaps he — not Jake — had suggested this. It was then a small step to call me and to infer that the national security advisor wanted me to go. I did not commit to doing anything during our call, since neither Zal nor Jake had the authority to tell me to go.” 

McKenzie said he called then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley immediately after his call with Khalilzad, and that Milley was “completely unaware” of this “initiative” by Khalilzad.

Sullivan later reportedly called then-Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin and told him that “I think you need to send someone with bars on his arm to Doha to talk to the Taliban so that they understand not to mess with an evacuation,” according to Franklin Foer’s book, The Last Politician. According to the book, Austin reportedly said he would send McKenzie.

McKenzie wrote in his memoir that, on August 12, 2021, Milley reportedly told him that Austin wanted him to go to Doha. McKenzie said that “the plan was for me to meet with the Taliban political committee on Sunday, August 15 [of that year.] I would deliver a message about staying away from Kabul while we evacuated our embassy, citizens, and other groups of people. While not yet public, we were clearly moving toward a NEO. On Friday, August 13, our first forces — Marine combat units — arrived in Kabul.”

Too little, too late

By the time McKenzie arrived in Doha, the Taliban had encircled Kabul and began to enter the city.

McKenzie wrote that Austin’s directive “was to prepare a map that established a boundary around Kabul on easily identifiable geographic features, at a range of between twenty-five and thirty kilometers from HKIA. It would be a rough circle but would trace against terrain features that could be understood and visualized. My instructions were to tell the Taliban to stay outside this line, which was variously called a no-penetration line or a line of control, until we completed our withdrawal, which would be August 31. In return, we would stop striking them across Afghanistan. We would, however, strike inside the line of control if they interfered with our withdrawal.”

The New York Times reported that McKenzie attended the meeting between U.S. officials and Taliban officials in Doha on August 15, 2021. McKenzie reportedly gave a presentation warning the Taliban that any entry into that zone would be interpreted as a hostile act. But the Taliban were already inside that ring. 

Taliban leader Mullah Baradar allegedly asked McKenzie if the U.S. wanted to take over security for all of Kabul, but McKenzie turned that offer down. Baradar then asked McKenzie what the U.S. thought about the idea of the Taliban taking over Kabul, and, after consulting with Khalilzad, McKenzie reportedly told Baradar that he had “no opinion” on that so long as the Taliban didn’t interfere with the U.S. evacuation.

The U.S. was thus forced into relying upon the Taliban for security throughout the evacuation through Kabul airport, and Khalilzad served as an interlocutor between the U.S. military commanders on the ground at HKIA and the Taliban leaders still in Doha.

The general wrote in his memoir that, by August 15, 2021, “it was obvious that the Taliban were now in downtown Kabul and therefore well inside the line of control we were proposing, so our entering plan was already overtaken by events. [Rear Admiral] Pete [Vasely] told me that he thought Kabul would fall within 12 to 24 hours. I agreed — all the more reason for me to see the Taliban leadership in the afternoon and to push hard to get more forces on the ground at the airfield as quickly as possible.”

A book by Alexander Ward — titled The Internationalists — said that, once he arrived in Doha, McKenzie “devised a new proposal” for the Taliban “without directly clueing the White House in.” The proposal was for the Taliban to allow the U.S. to conduct its evacuation without interference, and then the Taliban could control all of Kabul.

McKenzie wrote in his memoir that he met with the Taliban at the Ritz-Carlton in Doha on the afternoon of August 15, 2021. The general said that accompanying him from the U.S. State Department were Khalilzad, Khalilzad’s deputy Tom West, and State Department official Salman Ahmed.

The general wrote that Baradar “sat directly across from me” while to Baradar’s side were Mohammad Fazl, Abdul Salam Hanafi, and Suhail Shaheen. All three were seasoned Taliban fighters and organizers.

McKenzie's pointless promise to Taliban

Baradar was co-founder of the Taliban in the 1990s along with Mullah Omar. Fazl, a close al-Qaeda ally and friend of Mullah Omar, was one of the “Taliban Five” freed from Guantanamo Bay by President Barack Obama in exchange for Army deserter Bowe Bergdahl. Hanafi was a key member of the Taliban government in the 1990s. Shaheen is an English-speaking spokesman for the Talibs.

“I began by telling them that our military withdrawal was continuing, and the forces that we were bringing into Kabul were focused on facilitating the safe withdrawal of Americans, other allies, and our Afghan partners,” McKenzie wrote. “I explicitly told them that they should do nothing to jeopardize this effort, including attacks against us, our allies, or our partners. If they did attack, I told them they would be met by a swift and forceful response.”

In his own words, during this meeting with the Taliban, McKenzie promised that the U.S. would not carry out any strikes against the Taliban — and, indeed, would not carry out any air strikes anywhere in Afghanistan — so long as the Taliban agreed not to interfere with the U.S. evacuation.

McKenzie wrote that he “referred to the large map that we had placed in the center of the table. It was a blowup of the line of control map that we had worked so hard on for the past two days. I explained to them that we would consider this a neutral zone until our withdrawal was complete. I told them that if we could come to an agreement on this map, we would undertake to launch no airstrikes anywhere else in Afghanistan. If there was any interference with our withdrawal operations inside the circle, then we would respond with force.”

The general wrote that “there was, in fact, no chance of the line of control construct being accepted by the Taliban. As they knew only too well, events on the ground had overtaken it — they had forces in the center of Kabul as we spoke.”

McKenzie then explained that the Taliban asked him if the U.S. would consider securing Kabul, and wrote at length about why he didn’t pursue this option.

McKenzie: "Our mission was a safe withdrawal"

McKenzie wrote that “Baradar asked me: if they gave us assurances of safe passage, would we consider employing additional forces to provide security for Kabul? This wasn’t a serious question, and in my opinion then, and now, there was no practical way to undertake what he so casually suggested. While I believed his question to have been off the cuff, my response wasn’t. It was something we had carefully considered and planned for. I knew the facts inside and out. The introduction of significantly more U.S. combat forces would have been inconsistent with Taliban objectives of getting us out of the country quickly.” 

“I told him that our mission was singularly focused on a safe withdrawal, and we would not commit forces for any other purpose. My guidance from the secretary for this meeting was very clear; we were leaving, and our forces would all be dedicated to protecting our withdrawal. I also knew from extensive analysis that it would have required a reinforced division, with a significant package of corps-level enablers, to hold Kabul,” McKenzie added.

Hanafi reportedly told McKenzie, “We will not allow any hostile act. We will ensure ISIS and others do not strike.” McKenzie wrote that “I told them again that if we were not attacked by the Taliban, then we would not undertake any strikes against them.” Baradar then reportedly replied, “If you give this assurance to me, I give it to you.”

Fazl reportedly told McKenzie, “We will provide security. We will try to stop others.” Hanafi reportedly finished the meeting by promising, “This is our policy. We will support your withdrawal. We will never jeopardize this. This is clear if we all agree. We will assign a liaison.” The general wrote that Rear Admiral Vasely would be tasked by McKenzie with coordinating with the Taliban’s men in Kabul.

McKenzie initially described this meeting with Baradar during a Pentagon press conference at the end of August 2021. He did not mention the Taliban’s offer to allow the U.S. to secure Kabul during the NEO, nor did he mention his decision to turn that offer down on the spot.

“On August the 15th, in a meeting with Taliban senior leadership in Doha, I delivered a message on behalf of the President that our mission in Kabul was now the evacuation of Americans and our partners, that we would not tolerate interference and that we would forcefully defend our forces and the evacuees if necessary,” McKenzie said at the end of August 2021. “The Taliban's response in that meeting was in line with what they've said publicly: While they stated their intent to enter and occupy Kabul, they also offered to work with us on a deconfliction mechanism to prevent miscalculation while our forces operated in close quarters. Finally, they promised not to interfere with our withdrawal.”

McKenzie described the Baradar meeting again in August 2022, and for the first time publicly acknowledged the Taliban’s offer and his decision to turn it down.

U.S. promises Taliban: "If you don’t interfere with the evacuation, we won’t strike." 

McKenzie told Politico that “On Thursday or Friday, I got the direction to go to Doha to talk to the Taliban. What we wanted was about a 30-kilometer exclusion zone: ‘You guys stay out of there while we do the evacuation. And if you stay out of there, we will not strike you anywhere in Afghanistan.’ I got on the airplane on Sunday morning. While I was on the airplane over, I was getting reports that the Taliban is in downtown Kabul, they’ve actually overrun the city. By the time I met with them, they had significant forces inside the city,” the general told Politico.

McKenzie continued:  “So I said, ‘Look, we can still have a solution here. We’re going to conduct an evacuation. If you don’t interfere with the evacuation, we won’t strike.’ Mullah Baradar said, off-the-cuff, ‘Why don’t you come in and secure the city?’ But that was just not feasible. It would have taken me putting in another division to do that. And I believe that was a flippant remark. And now we know in the fullness of time that Mullah Baradar wasn’t actually speaking for the hardline Taliban. I don’t know if he could have delivered, even if he was serious about it. I felt in my best judgment that it wasn’t a genuine offer. And it was not a practical military operation. That’s why they pay me, that’s why I’m there.”

One U.S. military officer involved in planning for the NEO whose name was redacted in reports spoke to military investigators about McKenzie’s meeting with Baradar, saying the meeting was held as “the Taliban is moving on Kabul” and so “McKenzie was trying to de-conflict and tell the Taliban to stay out of the city.” The officer said the Taliban told McKenzie that “they were already in Kabul, and that they wouldn't pull 30 kilometers out of the city as General McKenzie wanted.”

Taliban given a "green light" to take Kabul

Baradar had, according to The Last Politician, reportedly told McKenzie during the meeting: “We have two options to deal with it: you take responsibility for securing Kabul, or you have to allow us to do it.” But McKenzie had reportedly replied, “I’m telling you that my order is to run an evacuation. Whatever happens to the security in Kabul, don’t mess with the evacuation, or there will be hell to pay.”

According to that book, Baradar reportedly asked his Taliban compatriots, “Do you understand what McKenzie is saying? Is he saying that he won’t attack us if we go in?” Baradar’s adviser reportedly told him that that was indeed what McKenzie was saying. When asked if McKenzie had given the Taliban a green light to take over Kabul, Khalilzad told HFAC in 2023 that “I think that's clear.”

Khalilzad told the HFAC in 2023 that McKenzie “did not consider it seriously. McKenzie didn't say let's take a break and consider it, he just said no this is not my mandate, that's not what I'm about."

McKenzie wrote in his memoir that, after the meeting, he joined a videoconference with the entire NSC, including Biden and Harris, with the president joining from Camp David. The general wrote, “I debriefed him and the rest of the participants on my meeting with Baradar and his companions. There was no interest in the Taliban’s idea about us assuming security for all of Kabul, and Zal and his team did not raise the point.”

This discussion with Biden occurred only after McKenzie had already turned the Taliban’s offer down.

Dissenting views kept silent

Former senior defense officials who spoke to HFAC in 2022 said that assuming responsibility for Kabul would have allowed the U.S. military to avoid relying on the Taliban to secure the outer perimeter of the airport. A senior CENTCOM official told HFAC in 2022 that the U.S. military did not do any major planning in response to this Taliban offer because they believed the White House had provided strict guidance in its orders about the evacuation and felt that they would be prohibited from considering such an offer.

These comments from defense officials did not make it into HFAC’s 2024 report.

When asked about McKenzie’s rejection of the Taliban offer, then-White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on August 31, 2021 that “our objective has never been — and the President has been very clear about this — having a military presence to control Kabul.  So, that’s never been our objective.”

A senior military officer told The Atlantic that “the Taliban were willing to let us do all that was necessary to control the terrain to get out” and lamented that “when you consciously choose that the terrain you control is the fence line of the airport, you give up a lot of your prerogatives, and you permit yourself to be quite vulnerable to infiltration by suicide bombers.”

On top of all this, a different and prior report by HFAC from back in 2022 had in fact detailed this key meeting between McKenzie and Baradar.

As that previous report in 2022 pointed out, if McKenzie and the Biden Administration had accepted the Taliban’s offer, U.S. forces potentially could have set up processing centers outside the airport perimeter, which would have allowed for more robust processing procedures and easier transport to the airfield, avoiding the bottlenecks and teeming crowds at the gates which frequently caused processing operations to be temporarily shut down. 

The earlier report also noted that greater control of the city potentially would also have provided the U.S. with greater leverage over the Taliban regarding negotiations on a litany of subjects, potentially including women’s rights, forming an inclusive government, harassment of former Afghan allies, most importantly, extending the evacuation period beyond August 31, 2021, as soldiers and citizens  would not have been as vulnerable as they had when they were penned in at the airport compound.

Despite all of these facts, none of them — including McKenzie’s interviews, the general’s own memoir, comments from other meeting participants, tidbits from other books, assessments from outside experts, and HFAC’s own prior report — made it into HFAC’s final report last September.

Coordinating public relations for McKenzie

Then-HFAC Chairman Michael McCaul held a phone call with Milley and McKenzie just ahead of HFAC’s March 2024 public hearing with the two generals last year.

“I’m trying to protect you a little bit,” McCaul told McKenzie on that call, alluding to the indignation of the Abbey Gate Gold Star families at the military’s lack of candor.

McCaul previewed to the generals the questions he said he planned on asking them — telling them he was doing so “so there are no surprises.” McCaul specifically said he would be asking McKenzie about his decision to turn down the Taliban’s offer in Doha. McCaul immediately began supplying McKenzie with excuses or explanations the general could use during the hearing, telling him, “I know you had a lot of constraints on troop forces. … My understanding is the restraints you had from the orders that you were given to follow that you just didn’t have the troop presence to even fulfill that even if it was a serious offer.”

McCaul did not ask McKenzie about his Doha meeting with the Taliban during HFAC’s March 2024 hearing with the generals.

The HFAC report last year made no mention of McKenzie’s meeting in Doha, even in the report’s section on the “Daily Timeline of the NEO.” The entry for “August 15” simply states that the “Taliban enters Kabul, Ambassador Ross Wilson first requests a NEO” — without any mention of McKenzie’s meeting in Doha with the Taliban which set the stage for the entire evacuation.

Pleas for help ignored and labeled “not worth it”

A number of Afghan military leaders, including Commander of Special Operations Command of the Afghan National Army Haibatullah Alizai, made a last-ditch effort to convince the U.S. to help them secure the Afghan capital and fight the Taliban following Ghani’s flight from Kabul, but Rear Admiral Vasely allegedly shut the effort down on August 15, 2021 — the same day as McKenzie’s meeting in Doha. Afghan General Sadat provided his own details on this moment in his memoir, The Last Commander.

Alizai told HFAC in June 2024 that, on August 10, 2021, Ashraf Ghani, then-President of Afghanistan, issued an order that Alizai would now be chief of the Afghan army and that Sami Sadat would now be head of Afghan special forces. The two men were in Kabul by August 15, 2021.

Alizai told HFAC that he attended a meeting at U.S. Resolute Support headquarters in Kabul early on August 15, 2021, where Alizai said he briefed U.S. military and intelligence leaders on a plan to use Afghan commandos and Afghan police special units to secure Kabul and the surrounding areas.

Soon after Ghani fled Kabul, Alizai said he proposed declaring martial law to Afghan Defense Minister Bismillah Khan Mohammadi, according to the interview Alizai gave to TWZ. Alizai said he told Mohammadi: “Let's announce martial law. We'll keep Kabul. And we will expand in the future.” But Alizai said Mohammadi didn’t grant the request.

“There’s no president. There’s no vice president. No one is left,” Alizai said he told Afghan military leaders. “Let’s take the initiative. Let’s announce the martial law and let’s talk to the American colleagues to get some support that we need, like maybe air patrol, because our air force was also collapsing.”

Alizai said he took the plan to Vasely, asking “Are you going to support us with martial law? I'm going to declare it. … Look, Admiral, even if you don't support me, I'm going to do this.” Alizai said he explained to Vasely that his plan included using some of the U.S. forces who had already arrived in Kabul and who were yet on their way to assist in his effort to secure Kabul and keep the Taliban out.

The Afghan general told HFAC that Vasely repeatedly told him, “No, Alizai, you are crazy. You can’t do these things. There's no one left.” The Afghan general told the House Foreign Affairs Committee that Vasely told him, “Who are you going to fight for? There’s no president. There’s no vice president. No one is left. Everyone is escaping. Who are you fighting for?”

Last-ditch efforts rejected, told by U.S. military to simply flee

Vasely reportedly told the Afghan generals to abandon their martial law plan to secure the city and to head to Kabul airport instead, according to Alizai’s interview with TWZ. Sami Sadat recounted a similar story in his own memoir. The Afghan general wrote in his book that Vasely had announced during a meeting the morning of August 15 that at least three thousand U.S. troops were heading toward Kabul.

Sadat then wrote in his book that, on the afternoon of August 15, 2021, Afghan National Directorate of Security chief Asadullah Khalid informed him that Ghani had fled the country. Sadat wrote that his response was to tell Khalid that “I will secure the presidential palace and announce martial law.”

The Afghan general wrote in his book that, when he and Alizai met with Vasely, Sadat told the American admiral that “I want American patrols out on the streets. That’s the only way to restore confidence among my troops that their partners are here.” Vasely reportedly responded, “I can’t do that, Sami. You don’t have a government anymore. Who are you fighting for?” Sadat wrote that “I was fighting for principles, for a republic. If the president had abandoned it, we would not give it up. Vasely did not share my view.”

Vasely reportedly continued, “My orders are to evacuate this base and go to the airport. The extra troops are here only to enable our orderly departure. It’s over. And there’s a seat on the helicopter for you. I’ve been told to take you with me.”

Sadat wrote that he told Vasely, “Fuck that. … The whole city will be slaughtered if you leave. That’s thousands of Afghans, members of parliament, women leaders, civil society activists, journalists. We can’t leave a capital city with no one in charge.” Vasely reportedly replied, “Sami, don’t be stupid. The Pentagon told me to take you to HKIA. There’s no security on the road now.”

Sadat wrote that he told Alizai, “Let’s head out, brother. The Americans aren’t going to help us.” Alizai reportedly replied, “I want to go fight.” Sadat wrote that, on their way out the door, Vasely was still yelling: “Let me put you on a helicopter to the airport. Those are my orders.”

Vasely seemed to confirm at least some aspects of this story during an interview with military investigators, saying that two Afghan officials (whose names were redacted) showed up at the U.S. command center “asking for tasking.” Vasely said that “both wanted to stay and fight, but my guidance was to get whatever forces you can to HKIA, because it was not worth it at that point as your president and everyone else had fled.” Vasely added: “I told them they could potentially incorporate their forces into security at HKIA (early evening 15th). They departed, and went to HKIA.”

Alizai told the HFAC that help from the U.S. in declaring martial law and securing Kabul would have brought “historical change to the Afghan future and Afghan society and everything in Afghanistan.” The Afghan general said that “it would be a totally different Afghanistan” but “unfortunately we didn’t have that opportunity.”

These last-ditch efforts by Afghan leaders who still wanted to take the fight to the Taliban were dismissed by U.S. military leadership. The Afghan republic was done. The Taliban was in charge and was now an American security partner in the evacuation.

None of this — Alizai’s claims to the media and his own interview with HFAC, Sadat’s claims in his book, and Vasely’s comments to military investigators — made it into HFAC’s final report back in September.

It remains to be seen whether more about these fateful decisions in Doha and Kabul will be revealed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s new inquiry into the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.

• Reporter's disclosure

A quick word about this author (a disclosure I shared in my prior pieces on Milley). I co-authored a book — KABUL — on the withdrawal and evacuation from Afghanistan and, prior to joining Just the News, I worked as the senior investigator on the House Foreign Affairs Committee (HFAC), specifically tasked with reviewing the bungled Afghan withdrawal.

I quit the committee in protest last August over disagreements with then-GOP Chairman Michael McCaul over how his investigation was run and over what was edited out of the drafts I wrote before HFAC’s final report was published last September.

In full disclosure, I have also been serving as an independent factfinder in Defense Secretary Hegseth's ongoing review of the Pentagon’s failings during the Afghan withdrawal, but I am participating in that exercise solely as a journalist. I'm not paid by any government agency and my participation is solely to help provide Just the News readers and the American public a better understanding of what led to such a disaster.