ABC's Terry Moran on Monday blasted US President Joe Biden following his public statement on the situation in Afghanistan as having "miss[ed] the moment."
“Joe Biden wanted to be the president, as did Donald Trump, as did others, to withdraw the troops. The question is this disaster that we are watching in front of our eyes in Kabul, in Afghanistan, and its impact on American power and prestige around the world, and he didn't answer the question as to how his administration bungled this," Moran said.
He went on to say that Biden "shifted blame" in his remarks and refused to "demonstrate the kind of leadership to live up to that saying, 'the buck stops here.'"
“[Biden] blamed former President Trump. He rarely mentions Donald Trump by name but he did say that Donald Trump’s agreement kind of boxed him in,” said Moran. “He blamed the Afghan government, he blamed Afghan troops, he blamed the Afghan people…he did not in any way accept responsibility for the catastrophe that’s unfolding in Kabul.”
In his remarks, Biden said he stood “squarely behind” the decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, and asserted that the US gave the Afghan military “every chance” against Taliban but “we couldn't give them the will to fight.”
He acknowledged that the US made many missteps in Afghanistan over the past two decades.
"I will not pass this responsibility onto a fifth president," he declared, adding, "The buck stops with me.”
"This is not in our national security interest. This is not what the American people want," said Biden of continued US military involvement in Afghanistan.