International Press Interview.. US Secretary of Defense: The United States is safer than it was in 2001

  • Lloyd Austin, US Secretary of Defense.

  • The US withdrawal from Afghanistan was chaotic and ill-considered.

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US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the United States is safer now than it was before 9/11.

Austin spoke in an interview with "Voice of America" ​​on the twentieth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, which killed about 3,000 people, and said that America's defensive and offensive capabilities have developed greatly.

He explained that the United States will continue to "pay attention" to threats as they develop in Afghanistan, but this effort will not prevent the United States from focusing on its main threat, China.

Here are excerpts from the conversation:

• Today is a very special day.

It is the day we stop and remember those who died 20 years ago.

Is the United States safer today than it was on 9/11?

•• Okay.

If you look at the capabilities that have evolved since 2001, in terms of our ability to collect, analyze and track various threats around the world, our capabilities have been enhanced.

The offensive efficiency has improved.

Most importantly, as a government, we work much better with any agency in terms of our ability to share information, our ability to coordinate and not conflict.

Therefore, I would like to assure that we are safer.

• When you talk about that information, let me go back to the withdrawal.

In April, intelligence was showing that the Taliban would likely take Kabul in December, but by July that timeline had shrunk to late-September.

So why was it so surprising when you took power in mid-August?

•• Intelligence estimates offer a range of possibilities, and they have changed over time.

And we'll go back and look at all of these things in the future, as we evaluate what happened, and evaluate things in a joint, better way.

But, until we are done with this process, I will not rush to provide any kind of evaluation.

• Do you think you should have paused the withdrawal, when you started getting intelligence, in July, that collapse was imminent?

•• Okay.

Again, I don't want to go into any assumptions or any kind of assessments.

And I think we have to do a very thoughtful and detailed assessment, not just in the military, but across the interagency.

• When I talked to some of our troops from the 10th Division (in Afghanistan), they wished they could get to Hong Kong International Airport.

They wish they could get to the airport soon and have a few more people.

Do you think the eviction should have started some time ago?

•• I think our young people who were part of that process did a tremendous job.

124,000 people had to be evacuated, including about 6,000 Americans.

The State Department is still evacuating Americans as we speak.

So, you know, I think our guys have done a great job.

And as I said, it was a historical stage because of the size of the airlift, and the process was heroic, for sure.

• But did you wish you had started the process before that?

•• As you know, we will come back and evaluate what we did.

But we made our decisions based on the intelligence and activities that were going on at the time, you know.

• You were among the supervisors of the withdrawal from Iraq, so that the US forces would return there after three years.

Why do you oversee the withdrawal from Afghanistan and the circumstances are similar?

•• We have not completely left Iraq.

As you know, we have kept personnel in Iraq to train the Iraqis.

But when you compare the two experiences, they are completely different.

The Americans in Iraq face different opponents;

So, I don't think it's fair to compare.

Intelligence estimates provided a range of possibilities, and they have changed over time.

And we'll come back and look at all of these things in the future.

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