State Department Slow-Walked Afghanistan Evacuation Order: Milley

‘It is my assessment that that decision came too late,’ the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told the House Armed Services Committee on March 19.

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Mike McCaul (R-Texas) (L) and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley arrive at a hearing in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington on March 19, 2024. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

The State Department slow-walked the order to evacuate Afghanistan, potentially resulting in the chaos seen during the United States’s 2021 withdrawal, according to the nation’s former top general.

Retired Gen. Mark Milley, who served as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the withdrawal, said that the State Department did not issue the plan to evacuate Afghanistan until mid-August, a whole month after he warned the country could collapse into civil war.