Europe 1 with AFP 9:06 p.m., August 20, 2021

The President of the United States, Joe Biden, declared on Friday that he could not guarantee "the final outcome" of the evacuation operation currently underway in Kabul after the takeover of the Taliban.

He acknowledged that the latter poses risks to the American armed forces and is carried out under difficult conditions.

Joe Biden said on Friday that he could not guarantee the "final outcome" of the evacuation operation in Kabul, one of the "most difficult in history" at the end of a twenty-long war. years in Afghanistan. "This evacuation mission is dangerous. It involves risks for our armed forces and is carried out under difficult conditions", declared the American president during a speech at the White House.

"I cannot promise what the final outcome will be," he admitted, surrounded by his vice president Kamala Harris, his foreign minister Antony Blinken, Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin, and his senior security adviser Jake Sullivan.

"But as commander-in-chief, I can assure you that I will mobilize all possible means," he promised.

Only the United States is "capable" of carrying out such an operation, among the "most difficult in history", "on the other side of the world with such precision," said the American president. 

Thousands of people evacuated 

He also said the United States had evacuated 13,000 people from Afghanistan since August 14, and 18,000 since July, with thousands more evacuated on private flights "operated by the US government." The president assured that his country was committed to evacuating all Afghans who helped the United States in their operations in Afghanistan during the war.

Joe Biden has come under fire for the chaotic evacuation scenes in Kabul and the accounts of Afghan departing candidates prevented from reaching the airport by Taliban controls. We "are in constant contact with the Taliban, and we are working to ensure that civilians have safe access to the airport," said the US president. He also assured that this chaotic withdrawal did not affect the credibility of the United States on the international scene. Our allies in the world "do not question our credibility", assured the American president. "I spoke to our NATO allies," he added. "In fact it is the opposite".