77 percent of Americans back leaving Afghanistan: Poll

A large majority of Americans say they support US President Joe Biden's decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, after implementing a policy of death and destruction for twenty years there, according to a new poll.

The Washington Post-ABC News poll, released on Friday, shows that 77 percent of Americans support the decision to pull out all US forces from Afghanistan.

Eighty-eight percent of Democrats and 74 percent of Republicans and 76 percent of independents said they support the troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, which was invaded by the United States under the presidency of George W. Bush in October 2001 following the 9/11 terrorist attacks despite the fact that no Afghan national was involved in the attacks. Out of 19 people the US arrested over the attacks, 15 were Saudi nationals. But the US did not invade the kingdom.  

However, 52 percent of Americans say they support the exit of Afghanistan but disapprove of how Biden handled it while just 26 percent said they support both the decision and how the president handled it.

About 60 percent said they disapprove of Biden's overall management of the withdrawal, while only 30 percent said they approve. Some 56 percent of Democrats surveyed said they support Biden's handling of the exit, while only 7 percent of Republicans said the same. Only 26 percent of independents said they support Biden's oversight of the situation.   

Fifty-three percent of Americans said Biden bears either a “great deal” or a “good amount” of the blame for the attack on last week’s Kabul airport where over a dozen US troops and scores of Afghans died. But 43 percent say he doesn’t bear much or any blame.

However, the response across party lines varied heavily. About 70 percent of Democrats say Biden bears little to no responsibility for the attack, while nearly 90 percent of Republicans say he does. Fifty-two percent of independents say Biden is to blame.

Terrorists struck the Kabul airport on August 26, killing at least 180 people, mostly Afghan civilians and 13 US service members. Daesh-K claimed the responsibility for the attack.

Following the bombing, the US military carried out several drone attacks across Afghanistan without getting permission from the Taliban, who denounced the strikes as a violation of the country’s sovereignty.

Although the US claimed that these drone attacks were aimed at destroying Daesh-K targets, the local sources reported nine civilian deaths in the vicinity of the Kabul International Airport as a result of the strikes.

Biden has repeatedly defended his withdrawal from Afghanistan and said the 20-year war was no longer serving the interest of the US, and that Washington should focus more on China and Russia.

“We no longer had a clear purpose in an open-ended mission in Afghanistan,” Biden said. “After 20 years of war in Afghanistan, I refused to send another generation of America’s sons and daughters to fight a war that should have ended long ago.”

The Taliban are poised to run Afghanistan again 20 years after they were removed from power by American forces following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

The US invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 and removed the Taliban from power. American forces occupied the country for about two decades on the pretext of fighting against the Taliban. But as the US forces left Afghanistan, the Taliban stormed into Kabul, weakened by continued foreign occupation.

MG