President Donald Trump on Monday sharply criticized the US military’s 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan, claiming that valuable military equipment was left behind for the Taliban and calling the decision emblematic of what he described as “gross incompetence” by American military leadership at the time.
Speaking at a White House Faith Office Luncheon, Trump recounted a conversation he said he had with Gen. Mark A. Milley, the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, during his previous term in office.
“I said to Milley, I said, so you mean to tell me… you want to leave a jet fighter behind?” Trump said. “Planes cost $150 million apiece. Let’s leave it, sir. It’s just great. And they did. They left.”
He said Milley told him it was “cheaper” to abandon the aircraft than to retrieve it — an explanation Mr. Trump mocked.
“Give me a tank of gas and I’ll fly it to Pakistan, or fly it back home. Why is it cheaper? That’s when I realized the guy was grossly incompetent,” Mr. Trump said.
Although the final phase of the Afghanistan withdrawal was carried out under President Biden in August 2021, the original framework was negotiated by the Trump administration in early 2020. Trump has frequently distanced himself from how the exit was implemented, saying his administration would have left “with dignity and strength.”
He also criticized the public display of American military vehicles by Taliban fighters, which he said continue to be used in symbolic parades.
“Every year they have a parade wheeling down our equipment on some very unattractive street — that’s, you know, their Fifth Avenue,” he said. “It’s getting older and older, but I hate to see it.”
Though US officials have acknowledged some equipment was left behind during the chaotic final days of evacuation from Hamid Karzai International Airport, the Pentagon has said most of it was disabled or rendered inoperable.
Trump added that he had intended to remove all equipment during his first term, claiming the current administration made a strategic and financial blunder by not doing the same.
“We have a real great machine,” he said. “I rebuilt the military in my first term, and we left some of it to Afghanistan — the Taliban.”
While President Trump has not announced a new formal policy toward the Taliban since returning to office in January 2025, his administration has taken steps to further scale back US engagement in Afghanistan. Earlier this year, the State Department eliminated the post of Special Representative for Afghanistan, consolidating Afghan affairs into a smaller unit under the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs.
