Bloodshed in Kabul
13 U.S. troops among scores of dead in attacks; Biden targets perpetrators
KABUL, Afghanistan — Two suicide bombers and gunmen attacked crowds of Afghans flocking to this capital city’s airport Thursday, transforming a scene of desperation into one of horror in the waning days of an airlift for those fleeing the Taliban takeover. The attacks killed at least 72 people, including 11 Marines, a Navy medic and a 13th U.S. service member, Afghan and U.S. officials said.
An additional 15 U.S. service members and more than 140 Afghans were wounded, officials said.
The American general overseeing the evacuation vowed that the U.S. would “go after” the perpetrators and warned that more such attacks are expected. President Joe Biden later echoed those sentiments in an address to the nation in which he spoke directly to those responsible for the attack.
“We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay,” said an emotional Biden, who vowed to complete the evacuation of U.S. citizens and others from Afghanistan despite the attack.
Speaking from the White House, Biden said there was no evidence the attackers colluded with the Taliban, who now control the country.
“We have some reason to believe we know who they are,” he said of the attackers. “Not certain.”
Gen. Frank Mckenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said flights out of Kabul were continuing. He said the airport had heavy security and that alternate routes were being used to get evacuees in.
The State Department estimates that as many as 1,000 Americans in Afghanistan and an untold number of Afghans still may want help getting out.
Shortly after Mckenzie spoke, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the killings on its Amaq news channel.
One of the bombers struck people standing knee-deep in a wastewater canal under the sweltering sun, throwing bodies into the fetid water. Those who moments earlier had hoped to get on flights out could be seen carrying the wounded to ambulances in a daze, their own
clothes darkened with blood.
The ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan is far more radical than the Taliban, which condemned the attack.
Western officials had warned of a major attack, urging people to leave the airport, but that advice went largely unheeded by Afghans desperate to escape the country in the last few days of an American-led evacuation before the U.S. officially ends its 20-year presence Tuesday.
Emergency, an Italian charity that operates hospitals in Afghanistan, said it had received at least 60 patients wounded in the attack, along with 10 who were dead when they arrived.
“Surgeons will be working into the night,” said Marco Puntin, the charity’s manager in Afghanistan. The wounded overflowed the triage zone, and more beds were being added, he said.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said one explosion was near an airport entrance and another was a short distance away by a hotel. Mckenzie said a security failure at the airport allowed a suicide bomber to get so close to the gate.
He said the Taliban have been screening people outside the gates, though there was no indication the militants deliberately allowed Thursday’s attacks. Kirby said the U.S. has asked Taliban commanders to tighten security around the airport’s perimeter.
Adam Khan was waiting nearby when he saw the first explosion outside what’s known as the Abbey gate. He said several people appeared to have been killed or wounded, including some who were maimed.
The second blast was at or near Baron Hotel, where many people, including Afghans, Britons and Americans, were told to gather in recent days before heading to the airport for evacuation. Additional explosions could be heard later, but Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said some blasts were carried out by U.S. forces to destroy their equipment.
A former British Royal Marine who runs an animal shelter in Afghanistan says he and his staff were caught up in the aftermath of the blast near the airport.
“All of a sudden, we heard gunshots and our vehicle was targeted. Had our driver not turned around, he would have been shot in the head by a man with an AK-47,” Paul “Pen” Farthing told Britain’s Press Association news agency.
Farthing is trying to get staff of his Nowzad charity out of Afghanistan, along with the group’s rescued animals.
He’s among thousands trying to flee. Over the past week, the airport has been the scene of some of the most searing images of the chaotic end of America’s longest war and the Taliban’s takeover, as flight after flight took off carrying
“We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay.” President Joe Biden
those who fear a return to the militants’ brutal rule. When the Taliban were last in power, they confined women largely to their homes and imposed draconian restrictions.
In Washington, Biden spent much of the morning in the secure White House Situation Room, where he was briefed on the explosions and conferred with his national security team and commanders on the ground in Kabul.
Overnight, warnings emerged from Western capitals about a threat from ISIS, which has seen its ranks boosted by the Taliban’s freeing of prisoners during their advance through Afghanistan.
Shortly before the attack, the acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul, Ross Wilson, said the security threat at the Kabul airport overnight was “clearly regarded as credible, as imminent, as compelling.” But in an interview with ABC News, he wouldn’t give details.
Late Wednesday, the U.S. Embassy warned citizens at three airport gates to leave immediately because of an unspecified security threat. Australia, Britain and New Zealand also advised their citizens Thursday not to go to the airport.
Mujahid denied that any attack was imminent at the airport, where the Taliban’s fighters have deployed and occasionally have used heavy-handed tactics to control the crowds. After the attack, he appeared to shirk blame, noting the airport is controlled by U.S. troops.
Amid the warnings and the pending U.S. withdrawal, Canada ended its evacuations, and several European nations halted or prepared to stop their own operations. The Taliban have insisted foreign troops must be out by America’s self-imposed deadline — and the evacuations must end then, too.
Nadia Sadat, a 27-year-old Afghan, carried her 2-year-old daughter with her outside the airport. She and her husband, who had worked with coalition forces, missed a call from a number they believed was the State Department and were trying to get into the airport, without any luck. Her husband had pressed ahead in the crowd to try to get them inside.
“We have to find a way to evacuate because our lives are in danger,” Sadat said. “My husband received several threatening messages from unknown sources. We have no chance except escaping.”
Aman Karimi, 50, escorted his daughter and her family to the airport, fearful the Taliban would target her because of her husband’s work with NATO.
“The Taliban have already begun seeking those who have worked with NATO,” he said. “They are looking for them house by house at night.”