Trump on Afghanistan: “We Should Have Hit That Country Years Ago… And Let It Rot”

Last updated on July 18th, 2023 at 01:38 pm

Former President Donald Trump offered no solutions for what should have gone down in Afghanistan or how he would have handled the withdrawal, but he nonetheless offered his idea of what his administration would have done had they been in charge of it.

During an appearance on Fox Business, Trump suggested that his administration would have done what prior administrations should have done, namely “hit that country years ago.”

“It’s something that’s rather incredible,” he said. “They”––referring to the people who he claims control President Joe Biden and make his decisions––”do horrible things, vicious things.”

To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.

“They cheat, steal, lie. But they can’t do a simple withdrawal from a country that we should never have gone into in the first place… We should have hit that country years ago, hit it them really hard, and then let it rot,” he added.

Trump claimed that Biden handed Afghanistan to the Taliban “on a silver platter.

“He ought to apologize and stop trying to, excuse the language, bullshit everybody into thinking that what he did was good. We should have withdrawn but we should have withdrawn in a totally different way, with great dignity. It would have been a tremendous win for us,” he said, without elaborating further.

The former president also dabbled in racism, claiming Afghan evacuees who have arrived in the United States include “many terrorists” and “criminal rapists.” In fact, these individuals include many who assisted the United States during the course of the war.

Trump’s comments came after the Pentagon announced that all U.S. troops have departed Afghanistan. The U.S. has met the August 31 deadline the Biden administration agreed to with the Taliban.

Earlier this morning, national security adviser Jake Sullivan stressed that President Biden and his administration remain committed to getting Americans who’ve remained in Afghanistan out via diplomatic means.

An estimated 100 Americans remain in the country following the end of the withdrawal.

Alan Herrera

Alan is a writer, editor, and news junkie based in New York.