Milley says he saw no intelligence showing a collapse of the Afghan government and military in 11 days

At a press briefing Wednesday, Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley said, “There was nothing, that I or anyone else saw, that indicated a collapse of this army and this government in 11 days.”

Video Transcript

MARK MILLEY: Let me make one comment on the intelligence because I'm seeing all over the news that there were warnings of a rapid collapse. I have previously said from this podium and in sworn testimony before Congress that the intelligence clearly indicated multiple scenarios were possible. One of those was an outright Taliban takeover following a rapid collapse of the Afghan Security Forces and the government. Another was a civil war, and a third was a negotiated settlement. However, the time frame of a rapid collapse, that was widely estimated and ranged from weeks to months and even years following our departure. There was nothing that I or anyone else saw that indicated a collapse of this army and this government in 11 days.

Central Command submitted a variety of plans that were briefed and approved by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Secretary of Defense, and the president. These plans were coordinated, synchronized, and rehearsed to deal with these variants scenarios. One of those contingencies is what we are executing right now.

As I said before, there's plenty of time to do AARs and key lessons learned and to delve into these questions with great detail, but right now is not that time. Right now, we have to focus on this mission because we have soldiers at risk. And we also have American citizens and Afghans who supported us for 20 years also at risk. This is personal, and we're going to get them out. And we in uniform have a deep commitment to this mission.