Biden Touts Withdrawal From Afghanistan In Final Speech To United Nations

President Joe Biden defended his decision to withdraw from Afghanistan in his final speech to the United Nations as president.

Biden addressed the United Nations for his final time as president on Tuesday as his administration has seen multiple international crises erupt. The president touted his record on international relations, specifically pointing to his decision to pull U.S. forces out of Afghanistan.

“When I came to office as president, Afghanistan had replaced Vietnam as America’s longest war,” Biden said, according to National Review. “I was determined to end it, and I did. It was a hard decision but the right decision.”

“It was a hard decision but the right decision,” he continued.

U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan effectively turned the country over to the Taliban, who swept behind withdrawing U.S. forces to take the country over almost immediately. The withdrawal also saw the deaths of 13 U.S. service members who were killed in a terror attack on the Hamid Karzai International Airport.

“It was a decision accompanied by tragedy,” Biden said. “13 brave Americans lost their lives along with hundreds of Afghans in a suicide bomb. I think about those lost lives every day.”

Biden faced backlash in 2021 when he was photographed looking at his watch during the Dignified Transfer ceremony for the soldiers killed in the attack on Kabul’s airport. Biden appeared to check the time while the bodies of the 13 soldiers killed were returned to the United States.

Along with the 13 soldiers killed, dozens of Afghans were killed in the attack carried out by an ISIS-K terrorist. The attacker had been released from the Parwan prison at Bagram air base days before the attack after U.S. troops evacuated the base. Taliban militants took it over in the absence of American troops.

The U.S. left billions of dollars-worth of equipment behind in Afghanistan. Some of that equipment, almost entirely left to the Taliban, has begun to appear in other conflicts.

The president in his UN speech called for a ceasefire in Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza and in the growing conflict against Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“Full-scale war is not in anyone’s interest,” Biden said, according to Politico. “Diplomatic solution is still possible. It’s the only path.”

On the war between Russia and Ukraine, Biden reasserted his support for Ukraine.

“The good news is that Putin’s war has failed in its core aim. But we can not let up,” Biden said. “The world has another choice to make: Will we sustain or support? Or walk away and let a nation be destroyed. We can not grow weary. We can not look away.”